Confucian Zhongyong, Religious Commitment, Church Identification, and Church Commitment: A Moderated Mediation Model

Although Confucian zhongyong (the doctrine of the mean) has an important influence on Chinese Christians’ religious affections, due to the sensitivity of matters related to religion in China, there is a serious lack of empirical knowledge on this topic. To fill this gap, we have developed and tested a moderated mediation model based on Allport and Ross’s religious motivation theory and Meyer et al.’s organizational commitment theory, linking Confucian zhongyong to Christians’ religious affections (i.e., religious commitment and church commitment). Overall, using data from 387 Protestants in China, we found support for our moderated mediation model. In particular, our findings indicate that church identification partially mediates the relationship between religious commitment and church commitment. Furthermore, Confucian zhongyong appears to moderate the relationship between religious commitment and church commitment as well as between church identification and church commitment. The article concludes with a discussion of the findings, recommendations for future work, and practical implications.