These fears are not unfounded. While similar in some ways, Christianity and Confucianism are distinct traditions, with theological assumptions that, if unchallenged, could set the US and China on a collision course.

Christianity, like Judaism, believes in the existence of only one true God. But, unlike the latter, the former transcended Judaic ethnocentrism to embrace Christian universalism. The Abrahamic god in Christianity is no longer just for the Jews, but for all peoples.

Still, Christianity remains monotheistic, exacting absolute allegiance to the one God. For Christians, to be saved one must embrace the biblical faith. Put differently, humanity’s fate lies with Christianity, the sole gateway to heaven.

Imprints of these Christian motifs are unmistakable in Pax Americana. Stepping out of isolation, the US played a central role in stabilising the post-second-world-war order. Hailed as the American century, the 20th century has had its lows, surely. But it was also marked with historic accomplishments.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is one. This and other US-led initiatives set the framework of a new international order, whereupon people everywhere could aspire to a dignified existence free of tyranny.

As US president John F. Kennedy eloquently acclaimed, “...not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women, not merely peace for our time but peace in all time”.

And Americans embraced this mission as a “manifest destiny” to guide humankind like a “shining city upon a hill”.

Reminiscent of Christian exclusivism, the Americans believed in a singular path to realising this free world: the liberal democratic process, exalted as the historic culmination of human political progress.

In Confucianism, the ancient Chinese sages also envisioned a “tianxia”, where all peoples could coexist harmoniously under heaven.

But, unlike Christian monotheism, the Chinese are polytheistic, pledging allegiance to Confucianism, Daoism and Buddhism all at once. These multiple allegiances underscore the Chinese pluralistic approach to achieving the Dao in this and the afterlife.

Certainly, not every tradition is equal. Confucians do assert dominance. But there is no equivalent Christian doctrine of “God’s elect”. Moral pre-eminence is not predestined but merit-based. If proven worthy, anyone can take the lead under heaven.

While matching the US in aspirations, China differs on how to actualise these ends.

Repudiating the West’s “one way only” democratic liberalism, Beijing championed the Confucian “many ways” multilateralism, defending nations’ prerogative to chart diverse ideological progress. The China model, Beijing assured, is unique and will not be replicated elsewhere.

Earnest in intent, China’s campaign to forge an alternative, pluralistic world order is nonetheless facing a hard sell.

Last year, US Vice-President Mike Pence delivered a stinging speech, labelling China authoritarian, Orwellian and expansionist.

It was widely interpreted as the declaration of a new cold war, and a wake-up call to contain a menacing power antipathic to the liberal, democratic values of the West and civilised societies.

Civilisations ought to hold each other accountable. But the West’s rebuke of China is tinged with disquieting self-righteousness.

Americans would, of course, readily concede to failings of their own. Yet a quasi-religious conviction persists: the US remains the divinely anointed “first among equals”.

One such dark blot is the merciless violence Catholics and Protestants inflicted on each other during the Reformation.

Reeled by the barbarism committed in God’s name, Europe turned to enlightened philosophy to curb myopic theology.

In America, the founding fathers secured the new world from religious persecution. But the “land of the free” is not entirely liberated from religious zealotry.

A “messiah complex” continues to plague America, with the tendency to demonise foes and treat challenges to its pre-eminence as a battle between good and evil.

The US sense of exceptionalism as the only force of good is anachronistic. To diminish others as innately different (read “evil”), when the world is in a tectonic-geopolitical flux, is dangerous.

China shares America’s core values: to advance the universal good. They disagree on the means, one must concede. But disputes over liberal democracy are more differences of degree than kind.

US leadership was pivotal and will stay so in the 21st century. But America must shed that “manifest destiny” of an exclusive superpower, and embrace the likes of China as worthy partners in humanity’s quest for an inclusive “community of common destiny”.

In so doing, Pax Americana and Pax Sinica are more likely to reach a peaceful power equilibrium, thus averting the dreaded collision postulated by the Thucydides Trap.

Peter T. C. Chang is a senior lecturer at the Institute of China Studies, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia