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This article examines the construction of Macao’s unique cultural identity, characterized by its position at the intersection of Portuguese and Chinese civilizations. Drawing on theoretical frameworks of collective identity and heritage, the author argues that Macao’s "Janus-like" identity is defined by a dualistic nature—balancing a Lusitanian aesthetic with Chinese cultural structures. The study explores Macao’s historical evolution since the mid-sixteenth century, highlighting its role as a "religious receptacle" and a strategic bridgehead for the expansion of Christianity in East Asia. Central to this analysis is the city’s transformation into the "Rome of the Far East," with a particular emphasis on the Jesuit-led Cult of Mary and its architectural manifestation in the Façade of the Church of the Mother of God (St. Paul’s). The author contends that Macao’s identity is shaped by the permeability and fluidity of its cultural matrices, where sacred spaces like churches and temples coexist with the profane elements of casinos and brothels. By analyzing the city's seascape, landscape, and monuments, the article concludes that Macao’s cultural significance lies in its ability to reconcile contrasting images into a complex, dialogic social fabric. This hybridity fosters a sense of community and shared destiny that distinguishes Macao as a unique site of historical and cultural convergence.

This paper investigates religious syncretism in Macao through a focused study of Lian Feng Miao (The Lotus Peak Temple). Arguing that Macao's Sino-Portuguese milieu fostered a polytheistic religious life in which Buddhism and Daoism intertwine rather than compete, the author shows that Lian Feng Miao transgresses doctrinal boundaries by enshrining a broad gamut of deities regardless of sectarian affiliation. Situating the temple within Ming-period toleration of disparate beliefs and the hegemonic project of san jiao he yi, the article asks whether such a site can be classified as Buddhist or Daoist, and what its spiritual dimension reveals about each tradition. Methodologically, the study combines historical-anthropological analysis of temple practice, liturgical imagery, and the euhemeristic representation of mythological figures who are gradually constituted as immortals; it also considers Daoist and Buddhist textual strategies that legitimate their authority by weaving classical myths into ritual life. The findings show that Daoism absorbs and reinterpretates ancient Chinese beliefs, using myths and popular imagery to consolidate its autochthonous status, while Buddhism provides a compatible cosmology for reverence of a vast pantheon. The Lian Feng Miao case thus demonstrates a dynamic, inclusive religious culture in Macao, where syncretism and toleration sustain a plural sacred landscape beyond rigid sectarian boundaries.

This article examines the spiritual and intellectual journey of Wu Li (1632–1718), a preeminent painter of the "Six Masters of the Early Qing" and a central figure in the Orthodox School of Chinese landscape painting. Born during the transition from the Ming to the Qing dynasty, Wu Li initially utilized traditional literati arts to navigate a period of intense political censorship and cultural oppression. However, the author argues that his life was defined by an evolving quest for spiritual transcendence, metaphorically described as the search for a “Western lantern” to illuminate his inner self. The study traces Wu Li’s religious trajectory from his early engagement with Buddhist and Daoist circles to his pivotal decision at age fifty to travel to Macao to study Christianity. By analyzing Wu Li’s literary output—specifically the poems and verses composed during his tenure at the Jesuit seminary and his subsequent years as a rural priest—the paper explores how he reconciled his syncretic background in the Three Teachings with his conversion to Catholicism. The research further situates Wu Li’s experience within the historical context of Macao as a 17th-century center for religious and cultural exchange. Ultimately, the article evaluates how Wu Li’s adoption of the "Western Tao" served as a means of achieving religious fulfillment and personal enlightenment amidst the social and political upheavals of early Qing China.

This article investigates why the Chinese goddess Nu Wa—often associated with cosmogony and the repair of the sky—is venerated in Macao in a peripheral space, through an apparently “subsidiary” cult within the local pantheon. The author articulates an etiological and exegetical approach: she reconstructs the formation and transformations of the Nu Wa myth from classical sources (from texts of the Warring States period to compilations and works of the Han and Ming dynasties) and relates these literary narratives to their religious appropriation in the Macanese context. Methodologically, the study combines textual analysis, religious history, and an examination of the temple’s functioning, while also drawing on contributions from disciplines such as history, literature, religion, folklore, and anthropology. As a case study, the small Temple of Nu Wa (renovated after fires and today marked by the reconfiguration of urban space) is described, showing how the divine hierarchy in Macao incorporates the goddess into a broader network of Daoist and devotional practices, rather than placing her at the center of the more prestigious maritime “service.” Among the main findings, the liminal character of the cult stands out: the matriarchal nature of Nu Wa persists as an archetypal and ontological image, but is locally reorganized—including her coexistence with Lu Zu—in order to integrate into the territory’s syncretic spirituality.

The article examines how the popular cult of Nezha 哪吒, the "prince"/child god often characterized as rebellious and eccentric, took root in Macau and how its forms of devotion reflect the circulation between religious traditions and concrete social needs. Drawing on legendary narratives and historical evidence associated with two temples dedicated to Nezha, the author argues that the development of the cult cannot be understood merely as a continuation of Chinese mythology, but rather as a practice of local reinterpretation. Methodologically, the analysis articulates competing versions of the apparition legend (including an episode described as witnessed by both local residents and a Portuguese woman) with records of the cult's founding and institutional reconfiguration, particularly following epidemic outbreaks. The findings highlight that, in 1898, the miraculous survival of the inhabitants of the Morro do Diabo/Carvalho area—associated with "Morro do Marmelo" 柿山—spurred pilgrimages, donations, and the expansion of the temple, converting myth into a mechanism of consolation and healing. The conclusion is that Nezha functions as a liminal deity, recognized by Daoist and Buddhist practices, and whose devotion in Macau materializes folkloric "humor" and community agency in contexts of crisis.

The article analyzes how Leung Ping-kwan (也斯), one of Hong Kong’s leading poets and cultural critics, constructs an image of Macao through his “new poetry” (xinshi 新詩). It is argued that the author’s poetic writing transforms the observation of landscapes, ruins, and everyday practices into cultural reading: the city emerges simultaneously as a historical-Portuguese space and as a setting for Luso-Oriental encounters, traversed by nostalgia, ambivalence, and stereotyped perceptions. Methodologically, the author undertakes a thematic and chronological reading of the poetic corpus associated with Macao, articulating textual images with concrete historical contexts—namely, the infrastructural modernization linked to the bridges (Macao–Taipa) and the persistence of religious and material memories (such as inscriptions, temples, and ruins). The main conclusions emphasize that Leung’s poems mobilize topographies (cobblestone streets, shadowy houses, provisional supports, murky sea) to dramatize decay and uncertainty in the face of the future; at the same time, the juxtaposition of Western monuments and Chinese devotional spaces reveals a cultural “ecology” of coexistence, but also signs of dissonance and erosion. Thus, Leung’s “Macao” offers a critical window onto transformations and the ways in which the city is imagined, remembered, and reinterpreted.

This article examines "An Audience with the Envoy" in *The Peony Pavilion* (1598), a scene frequently omitted from performances and studies of Tang Xianzu. The author argues that this passage functions as a "crossing point" between east–west and south–north dynamics, anchoring literary imagination in Tang's historical experience in southern China, when he visited Macau, then an entrepôt of the Portuguese Empire. Methodologically, the work proceeds through a close reading of the scene and its role in the dramatic architecture, combined with historical-cultural contextualization: the representation of Macau as a space of encounter is compared with the way the plot organizes exogamous relations between north and south and, simultaneously, between a European alterity and the oriental "Middle Kingdom." The main conclusions indicate that the text does not stage the West merely as peripheral exoticism; rather, it integrates a western enclave and a Chinese world into narrative unity, allowing cultural geography to operate as a device of meaning. Thus, the Macau scene reveals how Tang transforms colonial contact into aesthetic imagination, reconfiguring regional identities and cultural exchanges within the very logic of love and resurrection.

The article investigates why the Sanjie Huiguan (三街會館), “Guildhall of Three Streets”, in Macau, transformed from a corporate space of merchants into a sacralized place associated with the cult of Guan Di/Guan Yu. The central question—how a precinct linked to commercial transactions became a “temple” and a deity-guarantor of prosperity—structures a historical-cultural analysis that articulates the institutional transformation of the building, the “ascent” of Guan Yu to divine status, and the longevity of the cult in the polytheistic Chinese tradition. Methodologically, the study combines interpretive reading of cultural and discursive sources with ethnographic-historical contextualization of the role of guilds in the Macanese commercial ecosystem, examining especially the representation of Guan Yu in the historical novel Sanguo Yanyi (三國演義). The author argues that the literary dramatization of Guan Yu favored his expansion beyond the official biography, simultaneously legitimizing the intervention of imperial authorities in the production of a ritually glorified hero. It is concluded that the Sanjie Huiguan exemplifies the intersection between myth, popular culture, and socio-economic organization: the sacralization of the guild space operated as a symbolic mediation between heroic ethics, religious cosmology, and the wealth aspirations of merchants, contributing to the enduring centrality of Guan Di as a “god of fortune” in the Chinese imaginary in Macau.