Pop-Buddhism is a reference to the fusion of sacred and secular practices in the so-called "play and pray" festivals organised around shrine-temple complexes, particularly in the 10th century. What started as a simple shrine-temple area evolved into complicated economic and social organizations with growing populations.

By the early 13th century, in many areas of China and Japan, temple-shrine complexes had become the largest landowners rivaling the aristocratic and warrior houses in their power. And not just that. Large “towns before the gates” started to sprawl around these spiritual centers expanding the economic resources, social influence and cultural significance of religious institutions.

By the early 15th century, markets were held periodically in or near the "towns" fostering the growth of merchants’ associations and the circulation of spiritual-cultural goods and produce. Talismans sold at shrines and temples allowed people to carry a connection to the other world. Guidebooks presented lists of shrines and temples, categorized by the problems each spiritual site specialized in. In fact, the temple-shrine complexes and their surrounding districts were developing into cities.

Pilgrimages became ever more popular among all levels of society. Visitors typically combined a visit to the shrine with lunch at one of the area’s fine restaurants or a teahouse, a stroll by the nearby river, or cherry blossom viewing in spring. This led to the organisation of urban shrine festivals where ordinary people also participated with music, dancing, and many popular entertainments. Processions of portable shrines and recitations of the Heart Sutra became central to these rites. At some point, there was such intense competition to present the most elegant and astounding displays at festivals that laws limiting financial outlays on these events were repeatedly promulgated.

The appearance of this attitude reflects a distinctively urban shift in religious consciousness. Secular and sacred coexisted in a unique blend which has not been seen in history before or after that. Pop-Buddhism pays tribute to this bygone era when people knew better than at any other time in history that we live in two simultaneous realities - the physical and the metaphysical. That we are in the world, but not really of it.