“For these three to five days，Dayidian is a joyful place for all，men，women，old and young...Humans and gods share their joy.”¹

For many hundreds of years，community festivals for the gods in rural north China have had their own forms of organization and institutionalization in temples and villages，with their own forms of leaders，deities and beliefs.Despite much local variation one can find similar temples，images，offerings and temple festivals everywhere，all supported by practical concerns for divine aid to deal with the problems of everyday life.These local traditions are a structure in the history of Chinese religions；they have a clear sense of their own integrity and rules，handed down by their ancestors.There are Daoist，Buddhist and government influences on these traditions，but they must be adapted to the needs of local communities.It is the villagers who build temples and organize festivals；Daoists and Buddhists and other specialists may be invited to participate if they are available，but only to provide what the people need and want.In the past，and even now in many places，all members of the community have been expected to participate and contribute，regardless of their class or economic status；local leaders and merchants have a special obligation to do so，to support the honor of the community and its gods.

Local Religion in North China in the Twentieth Century：The Structure and Organization of Community Rituals and BeliefsPreparations for a community ritual in Shanxi province introduce us to the organization required：

Several months before the sai festival proper begins the Chief Community Head （sheshou） invites all the other Community Heads and the accountants（zhangfangren）to gather at the temple，where after a meal they begin to decide on assigning tasks for preparations，so the sai activities are set.Next，the Community Heads cooperate with the Chief in beginning to raise funds，purchase or make［what is needed］，write and deliver invitations，and arrange everything，because everything must be prepared and ready before the festival begins.Many assistants are involved in these activities.About ten days before the ritual begins，with the temple all properly arranged，increasing numbers of workers arrive.When all is as it should be，then all the Community Heads and Incense Elders go to the temple to burn incense for the chief deity and report to him，asking his permission for the villagers to conduct a three-day sai to congratulate him on his birthday and offer thanks for his kindness.They also ask the god to forgive them for any sins or mistakes they might commit during the festival.With this the sai rituals begin.²

In addition to this kind of organization，the local religion on which such community rituals are based shares a common set of theoretical assumptions，its own ‘theology’，which is based on the belief that the living and the dead，gods，humans and ghosts are all connected by bonds of mutual influence and response.These bonds of mutual obligation are based on a moral universe in which righteousness，respect and destructive behavior eventually bring their own rewards.Promise，efficacious response and gratitude，disrespect，cheating and punishment；all of these are manifested in specific material ways and provide the basic assumptions underlying ritual.The human counterpart and stimulus for the efficacious response of the gods is sincerity，qiancheng，in prayers and offerings，sincerity based in faith that the gods really exist and can indeed respond.All of this is reinforced by the beliefs that the gods were once humans，that humans can still become gods，that deities and the dead can appear in dreams and can speak or write through spirit-mediums，and that the dead live in an underworld from which they can be called up or to which their living relatives can go in séances to see how they are.Through fengshui and intercession with the gods the natural world is also part of this system of influence and response.Siting of graves and buildings that recognizes and respects the flow of power in the landscape brings blessings；proper worship of the gods can bring rain or stop floods.It is this network of relationships that provides the underlying logic and coherence of local cults.

Local gods manifest flows of power that are believed to be beyond those of ordinary humans；they are present in their images，tablets or paintings，but are not fully encompassed by them，because at festivals they are invited to attend，and are ritually sent off at the end.They are invited to descend and sent back up，so they seem to have an undefined realm in the sky，beyond their earthly incarnations.They must also be ritually implanted in new images，which are powerless before their ‘eyes are opened’（kaiguang）.They need respectful offerings of incense and food to elicit a positive response；the absence of such attention