'The Church of God the Mother' Returns (Part I)

Although the methods and tricks may be different, the consequences and implications caused by the "Church of God the Mother" remain unchanged, and are even more dangerous and complicated.

Vietnam is a multi-religious country. Our Party and State always pay attention to, care for, and create conditions to better meet the people's needs for beliefs and religions. However, recently, some cults (including the "Church of God the Mother") have been operating secretly and illegally in some localities, affecting political security (SPS), social order and safety (SO), negatively impacting social life, causing confusion and frustration among a segment of the masses and followers of religions, and dividing the great national unity bloc. In many places, the leaders have sought to deepen or exaggerate the limitations and shortcomings in the implementation of ethnic and religious policies to accuse Vietnam of violating democracy and human rights; creating an excuse for outside intervention and sabotage of the country.

After a period of silence, when it was thought that the "Church of God the Mother" (HTCĐCTM) had disappeared, recently, the activities of this organization have begun to rekindle in Thanh Hoa province and some other localities across the country with more sophisticated tricks and methods, potentially causing many complicated security and order (SOC) issues, causing many consequences for those who blindly believe and follow and their families.

Quietly back in action

The official and full name of the “Church of God the Mother” is the “World Mission Society Church of God” founded by Ahn Sahng Hong (1918-1985) in 1964 in Korea, using the same scriptures as other Protestant organizations. However, in addition to using the scriptures of Protestant organizations, the World Mission Society Church of God has interpreted and practiced a number of doctrines differently from the majority of other Protestant organizations. Therefore, the World Mission Society Church of God is not recognized by the Protestant community. In Korea, in 2012, the National Council of Korean Religious Churches declared the World Mission Society Church of God a polytheistic, “blasphemous” sect; the Holy See of Rome has issued many documents condemning the errors in the interpretation of the Bible by the World Mission Society Church of God, considering it a “heresy”.

HTCĐCTM entered Vietnam in 2001 through the immigration of Koreans and the “We Love You Foundation”. Through many methods, HTCĐCTM has been nurtured and quickly spread widely in many localities across the country. Currently, this sect has not been recognized organizationally in Vietnam; its teachings are heretical, showing signs of superstition, exploiting teachings for personal gain, contrary to the traditional culture and customs of the Vietnamese people.

'The Church of God the Mother' is rekindling its activities.

In Thanh Hoa, HTCĐCTM first appeared in 2015 and hid under many forms such as online sales, trading in electrical equipment, household appliances, water purifiers and charity... to lure and attract people in difficult circumstances, difficult families, and those who have encountered many misfortunes in life to participate, mainly women, the elderly and students... After being discovered, Thanh Hoa Provincial Police advised the Party Committees, authorities at all levels and the Thanh Hoa Provincial Religious Committee to direct departments, organizations, agencies and schools to step up propaganda and warnings about the consequences, harms and methods and tricks of HTCĐCTM's activities so that people know, are vigilant, prevent, do not listen to, do not believe, and do not participate in this organization. The police force alone has discovered, fought and eliminated dozens of illegal religious activities of HTCĐCTM; arrested and handled many related ringleaders. Thanks to that, the activities of this organization temporarily subsided.

It was thought that the activities of HTCĐCTM had been stopped, but recently there have been signs of a resurgence with many extremely sophisticated methods and tricks to attract members and deal with authorities in many localities such as Vinh Phuc, Quang Nam, Thanh Hoa, and Hanoi. In Thanh Hoa, according to statistics and reviews by authorities, there are currently about 500 people in 7 districts, towns, and cities in the province who have been lured into participating in HTCĐCTM. Of which, many are concentrated in Thanh Hoa city. What is worrying is that the leaders and key members of HTCĐCTM are still looking for ways, using many sophisticated tricks to avoid the control of authorities to attract and develop members.

Many tricks to attract

In order to attract members, these subjects often hide under many forms such as introducing courses on developing thinking, selling online, trading electrical equipment, household appliances, household products with many new tricks such as preaching, meeting on the internet via Zoom, Zalo, Facebook, meeting places in public places such as water shops, coffee shops, private homes, motels... Key figures in HTCĐCTM often take advantage of the name of opening representative offices, establishing companies, multi-level marketing, disguised charity and humanitarian centers... to propagate and develop the organization.

Under various guises, members of the HTCĐCTM seek to approach people, then probe their psychology, grasp their interests and habits to entice and attract them. Once they have a list of potential members, these subjects continue to send members to regularly call, meet, care for and propagate religion to attract members to join.

In 2017-2018, Thanh Hoa Police fought to prevent and eliminate many activity points, arrested and handled many subjects conducting illegal HTCĐCTM missionary activities, and seized many related documents.

Lieutenant Colonel Vu Xuan Hieu, Deputy Head of the Domestic Security Department of Thanh Hoa Provincial Police, said: Those targeted are followers of religions, people who already have religious beliefs, people who want to improve themselves, are looking for courses to develop thinking and practice skills; people in difficult circumstances, those who have failed in business, those who do not have stable jobs; people with serious illnesses, those whose relatives have serious illnesses, or whose family happiness is not as expected, single women, students, etc.

In order to maintain the beliefs of the participants, and at the same time force or continue to attract others in their families to follow, the leaders and key members often require and force the followers not to contact and have relationships with people of other beliefs; not to participate in common cultural activities of the community; not to practice the customs and traditional beliefs of the nation, and at the same time deny orthodox religions, including the religion that is the origin of their belief and loyalty to the organization; not to comply with the laws, programs, and policies for socio-economic development in the locality.

The operation method of HTCĐCTM is similar to a multi-level model, divided into many small groups, separate activity points, members are not allowed to access, no one knows each other. If there are believers, they are all trained to become missionaries and continue to propagate, attract relatives and friends (from victims to continue to become targets of attraction).

Ms. SH, a telephone bill collector in Thanh Hoa city, shared: What surprised and saddened me the most was that even though we had been close friends for many years, he (the person who lured me) lied to me to get me into HTCĐCTM. At first, he only invited me out for a drink, asked about my family life and business, then gradually he directed me to classes, seminars on "getting rich", "changing my thinking to become stronger"...

I thought that these were normal classes, and that they were friends, so they also intended to help me find ways to improve my family life. However, after a day of contact, in addition to explaining how to get rich, the subjects also continuously mentioned HTCĐCTM, if you realize life, God will give you many blessings, if you do not believe, you will be punished with very severe punishments.

Ms. SH recounted the incident of being lured into participating in HTCĐCTM by subjects.

“Because I had read the newspapers and radio before, warning about the negative aspects of the HTDCTM, I immediately recognized their tricks and tried to find a way to avoid them. After that, I stopped following them. They kept calling and texting me to encourage me to join, but I still firmly refused. Thinking back now, I am really scared,” Ms. H shared.

In Thanh Hoa city, where many people participate in HTCĐCTM activities, Thanh Hoa city police have reviewed and verified that there are about 16 group points, tightly organized, with sophisticated methods of operation. The leaders have divided Thanh Hoa into many areas (denoted as TH), the heads of TH are deacons, each TH consists of many group points and assigns "group leaders" to be in charge of group points near each other; the group points (called Sion) are managed by "area leaders" or "regional leaders" (women), who guide activities and develop members and develop the organization.

After attracting members to participate, the subjects will organize activities for members directly at group locations (Sion) or via the Zoom system. Directly, the subjects are "Area leaders", "group leaders", "deacons" who will guide, manage, and convey content related to God; perform offering activities (such as Baptism, Sabbath, Passover, worship services, etc.). During the preaching process, the subjects incorporate the content "regular offering will receive many blessings from parents, if not offering will be punished" (in the form of offering in cash, sealed in white envelopes).

Lieutenant Colonel Pham Thai Hung, Deputy Chief of Thanh Hoa City Police, said: The method of the subjects is to hide under many forms to search for and recruit members, making it difficult for many people to detect the intentions of the subjects. During the preaching process, the subjects use current information, risks in social life to explain with theological viewpoints, idealistic philosophical theories to direct believers to the creator (God) to make members afraid to believe and follow. After the candidate agrees to join HTCĐCTM, he/she must write a voluntary application to join the organization, undergo baptism (pouring water from above the head), Passover (eating holy bread and drinking holy wine) and be given a separate "life code".

Officers of the Thanh Hoa Provincial Police Department's Internal Security Department reviewed and deployed measures to combat and prevent illegal activities of the HTCĐCTM.

Although the methods and tricks may be different, the consequences and implications caused by HTCĐCTM remain unchanged, even more dangerous and complicated. Many families with relatives participating in this organization have foolishly destroyed incense bowls and altars, not worshiping ancestors and grandparents; abandoned their husbands and children, neglected work and studies, and used money to serve the organization, causing division and conflict within the family and clan... In the face of signs of re-emergence of activities, if there are no measures to fight and prevent them, and people do not voluntarily raise their awareness of prevention and avoidance, the risk of "outbreak" and spread in the area is inevitable.

The method of the subjects is to gradually "lure and lure". At first, they just approach and get acquainted, skillfully approach and learn about each person's family background, then encourage and share, guide the necessary things in life, then find a way to manipulate psychology, force participants to join with fear through deviant preaching, instill in believers the belief in the end of the world, about God's judgment if they do not listen and believe, about risks, supernatural things, about the noble mission of members to save souls, about a leisurely and happy life when following HTCĐCTM...

(To be continued)

Source: https://baoquocte.vn/hoi-thanh-cua-duc-chua-troi-me-tai-xuat-ky-i-234173.html