Dear Friends, I remember the first client who told me she had left a cult that day and asked if I could help her. I went to the hospital library and found NO books, a few journal articles by Maurice and Jane Temerlin in Oklahoma, and a large network of nonprofessional but very wise, experienced people all over the country who were willing to share by phone what they had learned. That was our version of networking in the early days. In this issue of ICSA Today, we get some glimpses of the evolution of cultic studies over the past half century. Lorna Goldberg, in “A Few Things I’ve Learned and People I’ve Learned From,” takes us back to the early 1970s, when she was a young wife whose brother had begun to exhibit bizarre and frightening changes in his behaviors and speech. Her search for an explanation led her to encounter some of the pioneers in our field, people on whose shoulders we stand today. Ron Burks and his wife Vicki had joined a church they thought would enrich their spiritual and family life, only to find themselves in a harmful cult. There was no Internet at that time, so they turned to a small cadre of professionals who had begun writing about dramatic behavioral changes in prisoners of war during the Korean conflict, people who freely shared what they had learned from their own studies. In 1982, when I entered the field, Margaret Singer answered her own phone late one evening when I called her in desperation over a family member in trouble. She was able to pull from her files one interview with the leader of the cult with which my family member was involved. Ron Burks’s “Thought Reform and the Psychology of Breaking Away From Totalism” honors another pioneer, Paul Martin, founder of one of the first treatment centers devoted to recovery from cultic trauma. Ron Burks and Paul Martin both derived their ideas from Robert Lifton’s foundational Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism (1961, 1989), but adapted Lifton’s ideas to the arena of coercive movements. Burks does an elegant job of translating his two brilliant predecessors’ words into easily grasped concepts. When these principles are understood, they provide a map that clarifies the way back to the real world for any person who has been lured into a cultic situation. The publication of Massimo Introvigne’s “Religious Freedom and New Religious Movements” reflects ICSA’s ongoing commitment to dialogue and balance. Although most people in the ICSA community are concerned about abuses associated with belief systems, Introvigne reminds us of the democratic and human-rights contexts that protect even unpopular belief systems. Completing the arc of the past half century, ICSA has pioneered in the recognition and understanding of the unique challenges facing the growing population of young adults born into the movements their parents joined. Angela “Vennie” Koscis tells her moving story of self-discovery and liberation from coerced beliefs, and shows us, through her poetry and art, the role creativity has played in her healing journey. Information about cults and cult recovery is much more available today for people seeking help and those who want to help them. But there remains vast ignorance about the topic; many people search for too long still in this century, looking to clergy who are often clueless, or therapists who have never seen a former member or read a scholarly article on the subject, and who know only what they’ve seen in sensationalized news articles or on TV. My hope is that when you finish reading this issue of ICSA Today you will share its contents with friends and thus help with dissemination of this needed material! Sincerely, Lois Svoboda, MD

About ICSA Today

ICSA Today is published three times a year.

ICSA Today (IT) serves ICSA members by providing information that enhances understanding of all aspects of the cult phenomenon, including how groups function, how they affect members, techniques of influence, dealing with harmful effects, educational and legal implications, and other subjects.

Regular ICSA members receive the print edition of ICSA Today and have access to its Web edition. Students and other special members gain access to the online edition only. Nonmember print subscriptions are available. Submissions to the magazine should be sent to the Editor-in-Chief, Michael Langone, PhD: [email protected] We prefer Microsoft Word or a program compatible with Word. Articles should be no more than 2,500 words. Please include a jpeg photo (less than 150 KB) and biographical sketch (less than 150 words) with your submission. Appropriate submissions are reviewed by the relevant section editor and, when appropriate, editorial review advisors.

ICSA Today issues may include • practical articles for former members, families, helping professionals, researchers, and others • opinion essays • theoretical articles • reports on research • summaries of news reports on groups • information on books, articles, links • information on ICSA members • biographical profiles on selected members • personal accounts • art work • poetry • short stories and other literary articles • special reports from correspondents around the world

International Cultic Studies Association P.O. Box 2265 • Bonita Springs, FL 34133 Phone: 239.514.3081; Email: [email protected] Website: icsahome.com

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A Few Things I’ve Learned and Some People I’ve Learned From

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Arts: Poetry Angela “Vennie” Kocsis

Lorna Goldberg

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Thought Reform and the Psychology of Breaking Away From Totalism

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Arts: Mixed Media Angela “Vennie” Kocsis

Ron Burks

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Religious Liberty and New Religious Movements: The Italian Experience and the Observatory on Religious Liberty Massimo Introvigne

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Profile On... Diana Pletts

Ghosts by Angela “Vennie” Kocsis

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Book Review

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From Survivor To Thriver Angela “Vennie” Kocsis

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Correspondents’ Reports

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News Desk

ICSA Today, Volume 5, No. 3, 2014 Editor-in-Chief Michael D. Langone, PhD Associate Editor Ann Stamler, MA, MPhil Arts Editor Diana Pletts, MA Book Review Editor Livia Bardin, MSW Family Editor Lois Svoboda, MD, LMFT Member Profiles Editor Mary O’Connell Mental Health Editor Gillie Jenkinson, MA Research Coeditors Linda Dubrow-Marshall, PhD Rod Dubrow-Marshall, PhD Point of View - Q&A William Goldberg, MSW, LCSW Correspondents Austria/Germany Friedrich Griess Eastern Europe Piotr T. Nowakowski, PhD French-Speaking Countries Guillaume Garih, BA, LLL, JD Italy Dr. Cristina Caparesi Dr. Raffaella Di Marzio Nordic Countries Noomi Andemark Joni Valkila, PhD Hilde Langvann Håkan Järvå, MSc Psych Spain and Latin America Luis Santamaria, SThL Erika Toren, MSEd News Desk Editorial Board Writing Consultants Sharon Hamm Robert E. Schecter, PhD Bios of ICSA Today editors can be found at icsahome.com/elibrary/peopleprofiles International Cultic Studies Association P.O. Box 2265 • Bonita Springs, FL 34133

Note to our readers regarding website addresses (URLs): For all http website addresses, such as http://www.icsahome.com, ICSA Today uses only the shortened address form without the http (icsahome.com). In all instances when the basic address is other than http, such as https or ftp, we give the full address. Please keep this in mind when exploring sites mentioned in ICSA Today. The views expressed in ICSA Today are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of ICSA Today’s editors or editorial boards or of ICSA’s directors, advisors, or staff. Groups analyzed or mentioned in ICSA Today are not necessarily cults, nor are they necessarily harmful.

Web: icsahome.com Email: [email protected] Phone: 239.514.3081 Fax: 305.393.8193 ISSN: 2154-820X Printed in the USA Artists and poets retain copyright of their works and grant ICSA permission to reproduce them. Unless otherwise indicated, all other material copyright International Cultic Studies Association.

By Lorna Goldberg

Based on a paper first presented at the ICSA annual conference in Trieste, Italy, July 4–6, 2013.

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first discovered the world of cults when my younger brother became involved in a cultic group in the early 1970s. My husband Bill and I were young social workers at that time. At first, we weren’t particularly alarmed when we discovered that my brother joined what appeared to be a communal group in California. We were naïve and idealistic— and we believed that he was levelheaded enough to leave the group if he felt there was anything wrong with his experience. We knew that he had met a young woman on the UC Berkeley campus while he was traveling between terms. However, when he eventually returned home for a visit, we were shocked by the drastic changes in his appearance, values, and interests. No one seemed able to explain how a young man of 19 who previously wore long hair, flannel shirts, jeans, and work boots had transformed into a person with a crew cut and an ill-fitting second-hand suit. Even more alarming to us than his outer appearance was the dramatic transformation of his personality. Although he still spoke English, his words and phrases were unnatural and confusing. This brother was a stranger. Instead of discussing his previously held passions—civil rights, ending the Vietnamese War, love of rock music—he was actively supporting a prowar President Nixon and proselytizing about his newfound religion. Bill and I found it impossible to make a personal connection with the young man we loved and with whom I had shared a childhood. My alarm and despair at the striking changes in my brother’s appearance and personality began a continuing education that has become the most important aspect of my professional life.

What I Learned From My Brother’s Entrance Into a Cult What have I learned from my brother’s entrance into a cult? I’ve learned that, at a time in their lives in which they are open to new ideas, in transition, or feeling more vulnerable than at other times, innocent people can fall prey to controlling and manipulative groups. My friend and colleague Shelly Rosen has labeled involvement in a cult as similar to involvement in a natural disaster.

Viewing their cultic participation in this way helps former members to better accept the notion that their becoming involved is not indicative of some pathology on their part. During my brother’s 5 and one-half years in the cult, Bill and I had the gratifying and humbling experience of giving birth to a child, and I became aware of how loving parents can only try their best to give their children a positive childhood. In contrast to our freedom to parent as best we could, I began to learn that the children of firstgeneration recruits, similar to children who experience natural disasters, could be the most vulnerable cult members of all. Early on in my career, when I was working with an 8-year-old child whose father had rescued her from an abusive, cult-run boarding school, I began to see how cult leaders who need to make all a group’s childrearing decisions often prevent potentially loving parents in the cult from giving their children the love and protection they require. While I was in social-work school, I read about how Anna Freud researched the impact of the Blitz on the children of London in 1940. The children who remained in London and received reassurance and support from their mothers fared better than those who were sent away to the countryside to be safe. Children in cults, who often are separated from their parents, are more at risk than noncult children for being neglected and/or abused. As a result of such treatment, too many of these children incorporate the attitude that they are unworthy of care and love, which has a devastating consequence on their lives. However, those who have the courage to leave often show the determination and resilience to eventually understand that what happened to them was not because of their own inadequacies.

What I Learned From Becoming a Psychoanalyst About the time that my brother was rescued from the cult, I began my postgraduate education to become a psychoanalyst. I already had begun therapy to deal

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with my sense of loss. From my therapist, I learned to benignly investigate behavior and always treat clients with respect. I also learned that if the therapist helps clients to verbalize previously unacknowledged or disavowed fantasies or thoughts, individuals are better able to gain access to and rectify potentially undermining unconscious beliefs. We all carry around these beliefs or assumptions about the true meaning of events and about the people who enter our lives. Sometimes we’re wrong. We often base our beliefs on the way that we experienced interactions with others in the past.

with former cult members, I began to understand that I also might become a stand-in for a more recent powerful figure from the past, the cult leader. Former cult members might play out an aspect of their relationship with the cult leader with their spouses, with bosses at work, or with me in sessions. It is important for me as therapist to explore these interactions and help the clients see them as a repetition of the past—sometimes the cult past. I also encourage clients to talk about their feelings of how they experience me without my “collapsing” or “retaliating,” to use Winnicott’s words.2 I would add, “without my inflating” to Winnicott’s list. This is a way for clients to begin to explore the transference by seeing the difference between my response and their transference expectation.

I first discovered the world of cults when my younger brother became involved in a cultic g roup.

Therapy centers on helping clients become better aware of the limiting effect of their assumptions and opens up the possibility to them of other ways to interpret events or view interactions. To gain access to their beliefs, I not only listen to clients’ words and the stories they are telling, but also comment on their nonverbal cues such as a body movement or other actions they take. For instance, I might notice and remark on how a client’s body stiffens after I’ve said something, or I might explore what it means when a client “forgets” a session. I’ll also wonder about the timing of the onset of physical symptoms clients might be experiencing for which no medical cause is found. To engage clients’ critical thinking, it also is useful for me to question them about the terms they use in sessions because cults usually have redefined the meaning of everyday words. By discovering their cultic definitions, I gain insight into their worldviews as former cult members. Reading Freud, I learned how individuals transfer onto the therapist feelings they originally experienced with people important in their early childhood. I particularly learned about how, through transference, leaders of groups could have the power to change the superego (conscience) of group members.1 Cult leaders have a great deal of influence, in part because the recruits begin to experience them as parental figures. By focusing with all my clients on transference reactions, I learn about their early life experiences. Transference tells the story more clearly than the remembered story each tells. In working

Both my own therapist and all the experts I initially met in the cult-related world served as positive figures for me. They were encouraging models, and we need those models in adulthood as well as when we are young. In adulthood, they can help repair punitive and restrictive experiences of childhood and reinforce good ones. They also can help us move in positive new directions. In my psychoanalytic training, I also learned to better understand my clients through my own countertransference reactions—that is, the feelings that were stirred up inside me during therapy sessions. As part of this process, I began to discover my own characteristic tendencies as a therapist. For example, as a new therapist, I had a tendency to want to rescue not only my brother, but also my clients. In my own therapy, I was able to understand the genesis and meaning of this tendency and, hence, resolve the repetitive, often undermining behavior. Although I am relieved that my brother was rescued from a cult, in time I learned that, for clients to grow, they needed to rescue themselves. Being rescued is undermining to clients and short-circuits their ability to think things through for themselves in their own time; they gain a sense of accomplishment from providing their own answers. Rescuing also reinforces the belief that someone else can give them “the answer,” or that someone even might have the answer to give.

I learned to benig nly investigate behavior and always treat clients with respect.

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Top Row: Robert J. Lifton, Margaret T. Singer, Louis Jolyon West Bottom Row: Michael Langone, John (Jack) Clark , Janja Lalich Robert J. Lifton photo credit: Wolfgang Richter/The National Center for Jewish Film

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Sometimes, I may be induced to feel what any therapist might feel. For example, if clients are reporting in a detached manner on a hurtful life event, I might begin to feel the sadness or anger that they have defended themselves against. Cautiously, when the time seems right, I might suggest that, even though my clients need to protect themselves from the pain of this experience, a part of them might want me to experience it. In this way, I can help clients understand how they might defend against their painful emotions by projecting those feelings into others. In recent years, more information has become available about trauma and dissociation, and this has been helpful to my work. Members of cultic groups often have learned to dissociate—that is, disconnect. It is the therapist’s role to serve as a bridge to those dissociated feelings, sometimes in response to a client’s manner of talking and sometimes in response to somatic behavior, such as the display of a distant look. Sometimes, the dissociative response is an aftereffect of the hypnotic techniques the cult used. However, especially for those who have dealt with cultic or childhood abuse, I believe that we can understand the dissociative response as a way of protecting themselves in the face of trauma. It is helpful for the therapist to identify and delineate each of these types of dissociative responses. The therapist can play a crucial role in recognizing the client’s disorientation, confirming the significance of an experience that the client has dissociated or devalued.

compulsion.3 That is, if we can’t acknowledge powerful experiences in our lives, we tend to repeat them with new participants, and thus we might be undermining our present relationships. The psychoanalytic therapist is working to bring all these aspects into the room with the patient, where she can think about, understand, and work through them.

What I Learned From Former Cult Members When we began a support group for former cult members, Bill and I learned about the loneliness and sense of loss and alienation many individuals experience after they leave the intense cult-group experience. We learned how relieving and comforting it was to finally find an accepting community who shared aspects of their unique experience and understood how this had changed them. However, while there were commonalities, the group also became a place where diverse opinions were welcome and people were free to come and go. Sitting with former cult members each month gave us tremendous insight into the numerous ways in which they need to make adjustments to postcult life. We also learned how to be most helpful to former members by listening to the wisdom former members offer to one another.

I learned that, for clients to g row, they needed to rescue themselves.

Some former cult members often wonder whether their personal experience deserves so much attention, whether it happened as they remember it. This questioning can serve as a defensive function, keeping the pain of their experience at bay, continuing to foster the dissociation. The questioning also might be an aftereffect of cultic pressure to deny their true feelings. Without validation, these individuals frequently experience confusion and doubt about the significance of the experience. One example of the value of validation is when it allows a former cult member to acknowledge that for her to receive “wisdom” or “the knowledge seed” through the cult leader’s ejaculation of sperm actually was sexual abuse. Without acknowledgment, the client runs the risk of playing out undermining or painful experiences again and again. Freud defined this pattern as the repetition

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In the early years, I discovered that mental-health professionals frequently failed to show empathy for cult members. Although today there is more awareness of cult dynamics and an appreciation of trauma’s powerful impact on personality at any stage of life, these concepts were not as available 40 years ago. Both the public at large and most mental-health professionals tended to blame the victim, viewing former cultists as emotionally disturbed. This view was based upon cult members’ strange behaviors or strange notions, their dissociative reactions, or the wide array of emotional difficulties that they struggled with when they came into clinicians’ offices after they had left the cult.

It would be many years before we began to understand that former cultists could be suffering from a wide variety of aftereffects, sometimes including symptoms related to post-traumatic stress disorder. Additionally, we had no understanding that, as part of the mind-control process, they were induced to believe their cult leader’s bizarre ideas, and that they would continue to carry most of those ideas with them when they left. As Steve Hassan has pointed out, former cult members likely were dealing with numerous fears after the phobia induction from the cult.4 That is, they believed both the cult leader’s message that they would

suffer from negative consequences if they left the protection of the cult, and the cultic view that the outside world was a dangerous place. I realized that my psychoanalytic training was not enough for me to fully understand the cult world. Although I was learning many tools to help clients grow, I knew that, to work with former cult members and their families, I had to educate myself at cultrelated conferences. There, I had the opportunity to listen to remarkable pioneers such as John Clark, Robert Lifton, Margaret Singer, and Louis Jolyon West.

to learn about the processes that had changed my brother. Singer, along with West and Lifton, had investigated and testified about techniques the North Koreans used against American soldiers in wartime. These clinicians discovered that, whereas prisoners of war were frightened by physical coercion, the cultic groups emerging in the United States in the late 1960s were using thought-reform programs that were more “sophisticated, subtle, and insidious” (Singer, personal communication) to create a psychological bond that could be more powerful than the program the POWs had experienced.

I learned about the loneliness and sense of loss and alienation many individuals experience after they leave the intense cult-g roup experience.

What I Learned From Remarkable Pioneers I learned from Dr. John (Jack) Clark that a clinician in the office who carefully listens to families without making strong presumptions is able to consider new possibilities for the meaning of their behaviors. Clark didn’t align with the many mental-health professionals who dismissed alarmed families like mine, telling them they were having trouble letting their children separate. Instead, he listened carefully to the families’ descriptions of behavioral changes in their loved ones and was open to investigating different possibilities for how these changes had occurred. Instead of relying on preconceived theories, Jack Clark was open and willing to learn from his patients. To let my clients teach me the theory was the most valuable lesson that I could learn as a new clinician. Hippocrates observed, “It’s more important to know what sort of person has a disease than what disease a person has.” I’ve learned that, although former cult members might have gone through similar processes, each experience is unique. Based on their own personalities, members of the same cult can have quite different experiences, and can become controlled by different beliefs and dismissive of other beliefs. It’s important for therapists not to categorize too quickly.

From Margaret Singer I learned that “Therapy cannot begin until education ends” (personal communication). This means that therapy with former cult members and their families is a psychoeducational process. The most therapeutic part can be cult education, which can clarify what often has been a confusing, mystifying, and overwhelming experience. Furthermore, Margaret helped me understand how it is possible and important to deliver complex ideas in plainspoken language. Sometimes I’ll look at a sentence filled with psychoanalytic jargon and think, “How would Margaret say this?” From Robert Lifton I learned about a variety of mind-control techniques that groups use, and I learned about the power of influence (1961). I also learned about the psychoanalyst’s need to look at the individual in the context of the larger society. Along with Singer and West, Lifton studied American prisoners of war. On his own, Lifton studied everything from Nazi doctors, to the effect of the Hiroshima bomb on survivors, to members of the Aum Shinryko cult. Appreciating Lifton’s message led me to read Erich Fromm, particularly Man for Himself, Fromm’s study of the totalitarian conscience. This book helped me understand how those who are born, raised, or brought into totalitarian societies develop a harsh conscience; I began to feel that helping former cult members develop a more humane and compassionate conscience needed to be central to my work. I began to consider that the therapist’s conscience could serve as a new and more loving model for former members. I learned from my psychoanalytic training that understanding the meaning

I realized that my psychoanalytic training was not enoug h for me to ful ly understand the cult world.

When I first met Jack Clark and Margaret Singer, they treated me with compassion and respect; they helped me

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behind the clients’ actions is more important than to quickly judge those actions. However, while I attempt to understand how we can see mind-control techniques as influencing cult members’ antisocial or callous acts, I also find myself morally repelled by the cult leaders’ actions, and containing my reactions is often difficult. For the most part, my moral outrage seems helpful to those clients who have difficulty objectifying the cult leader’s harm and tend to blame themselves for the harmful behavior, as they had learned to do in the cult. However, at times, blaming themselves for the abusive behavior of others is extension of their early childhood thinking. At times, I have been horrified at the terrible circumstances my clients have endured. Even so, I continue to encourage them to explore their experiences. I’ve often relied on my own therapy to work out my feelings of horror, because my clients need me to be open to hearing their story.

former cult members, through “bounded choice,” participate in their own indocrtination and resocialization (2004). That is, cult leaders demand proof of loyalty, and cult recruits believe that by renouncing previously held views (which now have become devalued) they are attaining the path to purity. Shaw has been helpful in describing the cult leader of this relational system as a traumatizing narcissist (2014).

From al l of the pioneers in the cultic field, I have learned about compassion, courage, and basic decency.

Dr. Louis Jolyon (“Jolly”) West, along with Clark, Singer, and Lifton, viewed this field as central to the study of human rights. In fact, West previously had worked to promote civil rights in the United States and South Africa. From West, I learned about hypnosis and how sleep deprivation leads to personality change. He explained how prolonged, chronic loss of sleep, combined with an experience of increased dependency on one’s “captors,” ultimately leads to personality changes. Later, Jolly West and Paul Martin wrote about how we can use the concept of identification with the aggressor to understand the transformation of personalities that occurs in cults (1998). I’ve seen how cult members are influenced to take on both the leader’s attitudes and view of the world. Also, through identification with the aggressor, they often will take on the leader’s contemptuous view of all recruits. As a result of this attitude, they often begin to harbor feelings of shame and self-loathing. However, as a psychoanalyst, I generally need to explore what character traits the cult leader influenced and what areas remain untouched.

From all of the pioneers in the cultic field, I have learned about compassion, courage, and basic decency. Clark, Singer, Lifton, and West all were attacked by the cults, and they continued to persevere in the face of sometimes--vicious treatment. Furthermore, when I first met all of them, I was the heartbroken and confused sister of a cult member, and each one of them reached out to help me. Jack and Margaret were there from the beginning. Jolly was in the audience the first time Bill and I presented information about our support group. At the end of my presentation, Jolly gave me a smile and an encouraging “thumbs up.” I can only tell you that gesture meant the world to a young person who was dealing with tremendous anxiety about public speaking and was filled with doubts as she presented her work professionally for the first time. My brother was able to spend time with Margaret Singer and Robert Lifton after his cult departure, and I believe those interactions helped in his recovery. Since I’ve been involved with ICSA, I’ve learned from Dr. Michael Langone. He has been a model of organization, tirelessness, good judgment, and patience. Through Michael, I’ve come to recognize the importance of research. Research substantiates our clinical work. Additionally, Michael has always been there, encouraging Bill and me to write about our clinical work. This support has pushed us to better appraise and sharpen our skills and search for the links between our clinical experience, research, and previous theory in the field. Michael tends to remain in the background, encouraging others to move forward and get the credit when he often has suggested a topic, done the groundwork, and worked on the final editing of a project. Furthermore, Michael has the flexibility to simultaneously look at the larger picture and take care of every small detail.

My time in this field over these 40 years has changed me in fundamental ways.

More recently, my understanding of cult influence has been enhanced by Janja Lalich’s consideration of this progression as a two-person process. Lalich has demonstrated that

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How My Time in This Field Has Changed Me My time in this field over these 40 years has changed me in fundamental ways. In the beginning of this work, I often had nightmares after a session with a client who had endured particularly grim circumstances. Sometimes, I feel that I’ve seen too much of the evil side of human nature. However, I’ve benefitted from and appreciated the help and support of my husband; my therapist; my colleagues, particularly those who work side by side with me at the recovery workshops; and friends I’ve met at ICSA conferences. I can say that I’ve also seen the best of human nature, not only in the compassion these clinicians have demonstrated, but also in the resilient behavior of former cult members who have rigorously worked to improve their lives. I’m relieved that my brother has been in my life over these past 38 years to share the ups and downs of family life. He has been free to become a well-rounded person. He now is married with two sons and a good job. He continues to be troubled by the conflicts in the world, he engages in service to others, and he still has a passion for music. (Not too long ago, we shared a magical New Jersey experience at a Bruce Springsteen concert.) We rarely talk about his cult life. However, last year, he telephoned me after seeing The Master to let me know that the hypnotic techniques shown in that film reminded him of his cult experience. We spent time discussing the parallels and the chilling aftereffect of this film. Later in that phone call, we returned to our typical subjects—children, politics, and upcoming events. Although the cult experience will always be with us, my brother and I have learned that it’s important to create balance in our lives. There’s always a need for pleasurable times with loved family members and friends. I feel fortunate that my brother now is able to be a central part of that pleasure. n

Notes [1] S. Freud (1921), p. 126. [2] D. W. Winnicott (1971), p. 91–92. [3] S. Freud (1914), p. 53. [4] Steven Hassan (1988), p. 64–65.

Bibliography Freud, S. (1914). Remembering, repeating, and workingthrough (further recommendations on the technique of psycho-analysis II). In James Strachey (Ed.), Complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud (SE 12, pp. 145–156). Freud, S. (1921). Group psychology and the analysis of the ego. In James Strachey (Ed.), Complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud (SE 18, pp. 65–144). Fromm, Erich (1947). Man for himself. New York, NY: Henry Holt. Hassan, Steven. (1988). Combatting cult mind control. Rochester, VT: Park Street Press. Lalich, Janja. (2004). Bounded choice. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Lifton, R. (1961). Thought reform and the psychology of totalism. New York, NY: Norton Library. Shaw, D. (2014). Traumatic narcissism. New York, NY: Routledge. West, L. J., & Martin, P. (1998). Pseudo-identity and the treatment of personality change in victims of captivity and cults. In S. J. Lynn and J. Rhue (Eds.), Dissociation (pp. 268– 288). New York, NY: Guilford Press. Winnicott, D. W. (1971). Playing and reality. London, England: Tavistock Press.

About the Author Lorna Goldberg, LCSW, PsyA, Board member (2003 to present) and past president (2008 to 2012) of ICSA, is a psychoanalyst in private practice and Dean of Faculty at the Institute of Psychoanalytic Studies. In 1976, she and her husband, William Goldberg, began facilitating a support group for former cult members that continues to meet monthly in their home in Englewood, New Jersey. Lorna and Bill received the Hall of Fame Award from the authentic Cult Awareness Network in 1989 and the Leo J. Ryan Award from the Leo J. Ryan Foundation in 1999. In 2009, Lorna received the Margaret T. Singer Award from ICSA. Along with Rosanne Henry, she co-chaired ICSA’s Mental Health Committee from 2003 to 2008. Lorna continues to publish numerous articles about her therapeutic work with former cult members in professional journals. She has authored a book chapter on guidelines for therapists and co-authored with Bill a chapter on psychotherapy with targeted parents. n

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2012 Paul R. Martin Lecture:

Thought Reform and the Psychology of Breaking Away from Totalism By Ron Burks

Above: Paul R. Martin

Based on a paper first presented at the ICSA annual conference in Montreal, Canada, July 5–7, 2012.

I make no apology for the blatant plagiarism in the title of this lecture. I am going to attempt to combine two areas near to the heart of Paul Martin’s life and work. The first is, of course, recovery from the psychological effects of thought reform. One of Paul’s most significant contributions to this field was to turn Robert Lifton’s academic discourse into an accessible tool to help former cult members.

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The second is an area in which I’m not aware Paul made any public presentations: the moral and philosophical necessity of freedom. That cults deprive members of basic freedom was of great significance to Paul for two reasons: First, he could personally identify because it happened to him; and second, freedom was pivotal to his view of a moral universe.

Indoctrination and the Loss of Freedom Cults take away freedom and then attack those who work to help their victims get it back. A quote from Abraham Lincoln seems appropriate: The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act, as the destroyer of liberty. Plainly the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of the word liberty; and precisely the same difference prevails today among human creatures. (Roe, 1907, p. 220) ICSA sees the harms cults perpetrate as human-rights violations. Cults and their proponents see activities of those of us in this field as sometimes violating their right to religious freedom: “the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of the word liberty.” Paul Martin would have disagreed with some of his politics but would have agreed with Noam Chomsky when Chomsky said, “For those who stubbornly seek freedom, there can be no more urgent task than to come to understand the mechanisms and practices of indoctrination” (Otero, 2005, p. 212). The purpose of indoctrination in cults is, in essence, to convince inductees that what they are gaining is far more important than what they are losing. All cultic indoctrination is an attempt to make inductees comfortable exchanging the freedom to think for themselves for the group’s “ultimate truth.”

of captivity, one of which they are not usually fully aware at the beginning of treatment. As former members of cults hear these processes described, they are able to identify in their experiences specifically what happened to them and how they came to feel and think the way they do. What is more, they now have names for what happened and the assurance that, if the processes have names, they must have been experienced by many other people. Former members are able to normalize a phenomenon with which few other people can identify. Thought reform is the process of making an intelligent, thinking person into a virtual slave without the person knowing what has happened. The context of all thought reform is a differential in power or worth between the indoctrinator and the inductee. There are many ways this differential is established in cults; but power differential, either conscious or unconscious, is the foundation of thought reform. Thought reform in the model Robert Lifton proposed involves eight processes (italicized in the following paragraphs) that, together, have the effect of controlling three aspects of human experience that are central to the notion of freedom: thinking, feeling, and conscience. Controlling Thinking. Once a power differential has been established, two of Lifton’s criteria, Sacred Science and Loading the Language, work together to undermine inductees’ ability to think critically, or outside the box created by the group.

Ironically, it was an American reporter, not Lifton, who first used the term brainwashing in the media.

Thought Reform

The teaching and views of the group and its leader have a sense of sacredness not to be challenged by mere mortals. The means by which logic may, and may not, be applied to certain group beliefs are controlled by the leader. The sacred science enables the group to inactivate in inductees the ability to distinguish association from causation. If the group prescribes a certain ritual that is supposed to affect some other events or persons, there are three scenarios, and all serve the needs of the leader. If the expected outcome occurs, the sacred science of the group is proved. Association is causation. If the outcome doesn’t occur, it was because the followers did the ritual incorrectly, or with improper inner attitude, again proving sacred science is true by associating the “incorrect” practice as the cause of the improper outcome. If the leader is performing the ritual and a negative outcome occurs, it is due to a “hole in the pipe” somewhere, proving that the followers were not in a frame of mind to prevent such a travesty, and once again proving sacred science is true: The followers caused the negative outcome because of their shortcomings.

My view of Lifton’s work is based on Paul’s, as you might suspect. Paul never shied away from modifying or adding to Lifton’s work as he observed in the clients he treated the methods and psychological effects of the eight processes Lifton described. Neither have I. My view has been colored and textured by more than four hundred stories, including my own, about being drawn into a cultic group—all resulting in captivity and varying only by degree, not kind. Today, I use some of these insights in my work with substance abusers who suffer from an eerily similar kind

The group system or its leader also directs questions and thoughts into a prefabricated box by controlling or Loading the Language used in the group. Unfamiliar terms and familiar terms used in esoteric ways are often employed more for emotional effect than for logical content. Terms that are not familiar to the inductees are used to enhance the appearance of authority and uniqueness of the group. It is hard even to frame an individualized question when the only terms one has are jargon provided by the group.

Robert Lifton, Margaret Singer, and others were asked by the military intelligence community to interview former prisoners of war after the Korean conflict. Lifton detected similarities between the prisoners’ stories of interrogation and the stories of those who escaped to Hong Kong after having served sentences in the forced-labor camps where their “counterrevolutionary thoughts” were “reformed.” In both sets of stories, Lifton identified processes that seemed unique to Asian interrogation. Ironically, it was an American reporter, not Lifton, who first used the term brainwashing in the media. The reporter simply looked up the Chinese words reform and thoughts in his Chinese-English dictionary, took the first English meanings he saw, wash and brain, and a Hollywood phenomenon was born. Lifton never used the term, and the two words were never used together in public discourse in China after the Cultural Revolution.

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Controlling Feelings. Emotional reactions are interpreted in the light of the group’s teaching, so that everything one feels deeply is connected to the system. All emotional highs and lows are related to one’s standing within the system and serve to provide an often mystical experience that proves the claims of the group are valid. This process is what Lifton calls Mystical Manipulation. When one does something that the group considers “right,” there is great appreciation, shown here as pumping up the inductee. When the group or its leader is unhappy with the follower, he may “pop the bubble,” bringing the follower down to size. Gradually, nearly all one’s emotional life as an inductee is based on one’s relationship to the group. Connection to the group just feels right.

group’s philosophy makes them unable to hear or respond to any reasoning against that philosophy.

Moral Reasoning: Redefining Right and Wrong. The victim’s moral compass is gradually reset to indicate that most things the victim does or says that oppose the system are bad, intrinsically evil, and generally unpopular with those who matter. Things that are done or said that support the system are by definition good, meaningful, and moral. There are no gray areas. All of life is divided into black and white categories. In addition, the goals of the group are presented as having cosmic or ultimate significance. Therefore, since so much is at stake, there is what Lifton calls the Demand for Purity. Absolute perfection is expected, and any deviation is unacceptable and must be confessed, usually in a prescribed way. This is Lifton’s Cult (or proper way) of Confession. Any inability to find something to confess is ignorance of the truth and should, itself, be confessed as failure to meet the standard. Under these conditions, balanced, thoughtful views are not to be tolerated because those who hold them do not understand the eternal significance of what the group is doing.

Followers live in an alternate reality, complete with its own rules, incentives, taboos, responsibilities, punishments, and rewards. This reality may be hard, but it is always on the edge of the ultimate, “the spiritual Marines,” the “remnant,” the agape force, the forever family. Heady stuff, until they discover that the emperor has no clothes, there is a man behind the curtain, and there is no great and powerful Oz, because it was all a lie.

The victims of thought reform gradually realize that any resistance to prescribed beliefs will result in banishment from the group and in some form of cosmic or eternal consequences far beyond that. Fortunately for the victims, dedication to the group’s teaching and loyalty to its leadership confirm their right to exist. The group’s ability to determine the victims’ right to exist is what Lifton calls Dispensing of Existence. Connection with the group now has the urgency of a survival need. Thought-reform victims perceive that the price to be paid for being wrong is so high that they will not make a choice without consulting another member of the group.

Freedom after a cult can be a lonely, confusing, and discouraging experience.

Creating a State of Distraction. Thinking, feeling, and moral reasoning tend to remain distracted in an absence of outside data. It is believed that outside ideas and opinions are held by persons without special knowledge or revelation and, as such, represent a threat to the sanctity and peace of members. All members should protect themselves from this threat by being cut off in some way from direct, unmediated contact with the outside world. In Lifton’s terms, the milieu or surroundings of the inductee are controlled. Milieu Control may be physical, as in living in a remote compound, or functional, as in frequently moving so that inductees interact only with other members. Milieu control removes the “reality check,” the input that disinterested third parties may provide. Outsiders are referred to by mildly derogatory terms such as “the unenlightened,” “the worldly,” or “enemies of God.” Thinking, feeling, and moral reasoning are three basic aspects of our humanity that in large part enable us to know who we are and how we are related to others. These facets enable us to find meaning in our lives. In a thought-reform system, the group is defining who we are. Redefining the Self. The teaching or philosophy of the group or the opinions of the leader gradually subvert the thinking and observations of the victims, who now regard the group’s philosophy as higher than their own perceptions of reality. This is Lifton’s Doctrine Over Person. Members’ allegiance to the 12 14 ICSA TODAY

Getting Out Is Not Enough Intervention, whether external or internal, usually involves a breakdown of the milieu control, which allows outside ideas and perceptions to provide a reality check to inductees. In retrospect for some former members, their joining a cultic group seems like a bad life decision that didn’t affect their lives in major ways. But for others, their joining a cult destroyed a family, or prevented the former members from forming a family or stopped them from following the dream of a career that would have given life meaning. For these victims, the feeling of failure is excruciating. Fear of starting over is palpable. Restarting life after a cult is terrifying for those who believe they brought all this meaningless suffering on themselves. The depression and guilt can be debilitating. Paul’s gift to those he treated and to those of us he mentored was to show how cultic leaders use inductees’ best qualities against them, to convince them to give up all for a cause that is based on a lie. When thought-reform victims recognize what was done to them and how it was done, they can see that, regardless of the original intentions of the leader, it was usually done selfishly, for the leader’s personal aggrandizement. At that point, their recovery begins with a healthy anger, followed by a realistic measure of humility. The former members begin a journey into taking accurate responsibility for what they may have done to others, and into holding leaders accountable for what was done to them.

The Downside of Freedom Aldus Huxley said “a man’s worst difficulties begin when he is able to do as he likes” (Lippmann, 2009, p. 6). Freedom for former members often starts well enough. There are questions and the wrong answers from leadership, doubts about doubts, deciding to decide to leave. Some have to make terrible choices: “I know I’m

going to hell for leaving, but I couldn’t stay either.” For secondgeneration members (SGAs), if family is still in the group, the isolation and lack of support are excruciating. Even with the affirmation of family and friends, the sweet rebellion, the joy of not complying, the first trip to the mall without witnessing eventually give way to the Rip Van Winkle effect: “So what is this Twitter thing again?” Reality sets in: You’re 43 and all you have done since you were recruited at age 18 was clean carpets. You never finished your freshman year because “God called you.” The last time you applied for a job there was an application packet and a receptionist. Now there’s just a kiosk and a keyboard, or, more often, just a website. Freedom after a cult can be a lonely, confusing, and discouraging experience. Thinking they’re free, former members without treatment can find themselves in less restrictive but still controlling situations or relationships. “Hey, having to give 20% of your income is way better than the group we were in where we had to turn in our paychecks and get an allowance for underwear and toothpaste.” Indeed, some former members who realize that their leader was a fraud and the group abusive, and who have been out of the group for years, may still demonstrate some attachment to the mindset of the group by wishing for the “good old days before things got bad.” Former members frequently avoid exercising their freedom because of the challenges freedom brings after a cult experience: anxiety, boredom, loss of a sense of purpose and meaning. Worse yet, for many, life loses its context. A useful anecdote from one of my military friends tells the tale: A young airman was leaving the Air Force. His crusty staff sergeant warned the young airman, “Listen to me; you need to reenlist.” “No, Sarge; I’m sick and tired of the military telling me what to do all the time.” His face now pale, the sergeant warned again, “You don’t understand; you need to reenlist”; and with a slight tremor in his voice, “there’s nobody in charge out there.” Freedom can be daunting, which is why subjection to the will and whims of another can be tempting. But by living an unexamined life based on a single perspective, followers become slaves to that perspective. They get used to not being wrong. They give up something others are willing to die to achieve—freedom. They are deceived into trading their autonomy for what they are told is a noble cause that makes them part of a special elite, and for the security that comes with perspective that permits no uncertainty.

Choices Someone once asked Margaret Singer, “How will I know who I am, now that the cult is not there to tell me?” She admitted that was a philosophical question and she was a psychologist. But then, in a burst of insight, she added, “By the choices you make.” She echoes Simon Weill, who said, “Liberty, taking the word in its concrete sense, consists in the ability to choose” (Weil, 2005, p. 11). Learning to make choices is the antidote to thought reform, the foundation for finding purpose and meaning, and a new

life context. The problem is that with choice often comes uncertainty. If we are sure about which way is the right way, we don’t need choice. Freedom implies living with uncertainty, the uncertainty of facing choices, small and large, every day of our lives. Former members have a greatly diminished capacity to choose, due to the nature of thought reform. For the most part, former members have been conditioned to look at choosing, exercising their own judgment, as willfulness, a spiritually fatal vice. And they have not been able to exercise their mental abilities, which languish from disuse. Choosing is hard and sometimes risky work. Every time we make a choice, we could have made a different choice and borne the consequences. Freedom of choice means we have the opportunity to screw up.

Emancipation: A Welcome Discomfort After the cult, good choices are the ones I make because to me, they are reasonable, they make sense in the short and long run, and they are desirable, to me. Freedom of choice takes research. It takes self-knowledge. Research and self-knowledge are messy. Facts only go so far, then I have to know what I like. The yearning for certainty is one reason people are attracted to cultic belief systems. But as so many philosophers have said, by accepting someone else’s certainty, we give up what makes us human beings, our freedom of thought, our freedom to become who we, and only we, are. n

References Lifton, R. J. (1961). Thought reform and the psychology of totalism. New York, NY: W. W. Norton. Lippmann, Walter. (2009). A preface to morals (7th edition). Piscataway, NJ: Transaction Publishers. Otero, C. P. (Ed.). (2003). Chomsky on democracy and education. New York, NY: RoutledgeFalmer. Roe, Merwin. (Ed.). (1907). Speeches and letters of Abraham Lincoln. London, England: J. M. Dent and Sons. Weil, Simone. (2005). The need for roots: Prelude to a declaration of duties towards mankind. London, England: Taylor & Francis.

About the Author Ron Burks, PhD, holds an MDiv and an MA in counseling from Asbury Theological Seminary and a PhD in Counselor Education from Ohio University. He worked for many years at Wellspring Retreat and Resource Center in Albany, Ohio. He and his wife Vicki wrote Damaged Disciples: Casualties of Authoritarian Churches and the Shepherding Movement, published by Zondervan. He and Vicki now live near Tallahassee, Florida where both are licensed mentalhealth counselors. n

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ICSA TODAY

Religious Liberty and New Religious Movements:

The Italian Experience and the Observatory on Religious Liberty By Massimo Introvigne

Based on a paper first presented at the ICSA annual conference in Trieste, Italy, July 4–6, 2013.

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F

rom January 5 to December 31, 2011, I served as Personal Representative of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s (OSCE’s) Chairman-in-Office on combating racism, xenophobia, and discrimination and intolerance against Christians and members of other religions—which made, at least, for a long business card. I was the third such representative after the office was established, and the first scholar—my two predecessors were politicians. My successors have been an Irish retired judge, in 2012, and the Ukrainian Ambassador to the Holy See, in 2013. Headquartered in Vienna, OSCE has 57 participating states, including the United States, Canada, all the states of Europe, and those resulting from the collapse of the Soviet Union, many of which are in fact located in Asia. A number of nonparticipating states have signed partnership agreements and maintain embassies to the OSCE in Vienna. Representatives’ positions are honorary, which, translated from diplomatic jargon, does not mean that the representatives only pretend to work, but instead that they do not receive any monetary compensation. I regard as the main achievement during my mandate an OSCE high-level meeting held in Rome on September 12, 2011, on the theme of hate crimes against Christians. Calling the Rome event a high-level meeting is not a selflaudatory way of emphasizing its importance. In fact, high-level meeting is an OSCE technical term to indicate meetings the organization regards as especially important. At the concluding OSCE Ministerial Council Meeting for that year, held in Vilnius on December 6 and 7, 2011, the Vatican Secretary for the Holy See’s Relation with the States, Archbishop Dominique Mamberti, mentioned “the outstanding work” done in 2011 on behalf of religious liberty, praising especially “last September’s Meeting in Rome […,] a successful and hopeful event.” At that meeting, I was instrumental in introducing a threestage model of dangers that threaten religious liberty. First comes intolerance, a cultural phenomenon; second, discrimination, a legal process; and third, hate crimes. The social actors involved in the three steps are obviously different. But there is a slippery slope from the first step to the second, and from the second to the third. After the end of my term as representative of the OSCE, the Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs, taking advantage of my experience at the OSCE, approached me about the possibility of setting up an Observatory on Religious Liberty in Italy. The general idea was that the Observatory should adopt the three-stage model of the Rome conference and assist Italian diplomacy throughout the world in making the defense of religious liberty part and parcel of Italian foreign policy. As a secondary aim, the Observatory’s aim was to spread awareness in the Italian media of international religious-liberty problems Because the Observatory was being promoted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, its aim was primarily international rather than domestic. However, one idea was to present the Italian system of cooperation

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between the state and several churches and religious organizations as a possible model for countries in which democracy and religious liberty were newly introduced. The Observatory was formally established as a joint venture between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the City of Rome in 2012, with the undersigned as chairperson, and four other members, two of them diplomats and two of them coming from nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) active on behalf of victims of religious persecution. We decided to start the activities of our Observatory with the quite provocative idea of an event about threats to religious liberty, not in Pakistan or Nigeria—in fact, we addressed Nigeria in our second public event—but in the United States. We invited the Catholic Archbishop William Lori of Baltimore, who presented the documents of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, of which he was the main architect, about threats to religious liberty in their country. He described these threats according to the Rome OSCE model, starting from a general attitude of religious

We decided to start the activities of our observatory with the quite provocative idea of an event about threats to religious liberty ... in the United States. intolerance in some media and escalating to legal and administrative discrimination, and to occasional incidents of violence. Discrimination in the area of conscientious objections by Christians with respect to laws affecting what they regard as a non-negotiable view of life and family, and of free speech, was of particular concern. The discussion extended to Canada, where in April 2012 the Roman Catholic Bishops had published a Letter on Freedom of Conscience and Religion denouncing similar forms of discrimination, and to Europe. The Canadian Bishops gave as examples of discrimination that in their country some colleges of physicians require that members who refuse to perform abortions refer patients to another physician willing to do so; elsewhere pharmacists are being threatened by being forced to have to fill prescriptions for contraceptives or the

“morning after” pill; and marriage commissioners in British Columbia, Manitoba, Newfoundland and Saskatchewan must now perform same-sex marriages or resign. In addition, Canadian courts of law used laws against homophobia in order to punish preachers—Catholic, Protestant and Islamic—who were denouncing homosexual practices as sins, a position everybody should be free to disagree with but whose public expression should be protected by free speech. I had the similar experience at the OSCE when I was confronted with British cases of Protestant street preachers facing criminal prosecution for their graphic descriptions of how homosexuals will burn in hell. As a Roman Catholic, I have no special sympathy for the style of these preachers, the more so since some of them informed their audiences that Catholics will also burn in hell. At the same time, who will burn in hell has always been a favorite topic of religious controversy whose discussion should be protected by religious freedom and not decided by secular courts. By directing the attention to North America and Western Europe in the Observatory’s first public event, we wanted to call attention to the fact that threats to religious liberty do not exist only in Asia and Africa, but also surface daily in what is commonly called the West. Of course, it would be absurd to equate the bloody persecution of Christians and other religious minorities in some areas of Africa and Asia with the administrative discrimination in the West. However, there are risks associated with what the well-known American Jewish jurist of South African origin, Joseph Weiler, called the West’s “Christophobia.” Christians are the most persecuted and discriminated religious minority in the world. According to statistics released yearly by the US-based International Bulletin of Missionary Research, 75% of those killed in the world because of their religious faith are Christians. Of course, other communities are threatened as well, both in Europe and on other continents. Laws limiting free speech in cases of socalled homophobia affect Muslims as well as Christians. In July 2012, the Observatory issued a press release denouncing attempts by German courts to forbid circumcision of minors, with decisions affecting both Muslims and Jews. The German Parliament later prevented this judicial campaign to go further through a law, but—as the German Die Zeit editorialized on July 20, 2012—it was not about the foreskin, nor about any special exotic provisions in Islam and Judaism—it’s about something that goes much further, and that must concern the entire society: it’s about religion as a whole […]. What a society that tends to be tonedeaf towards religion tends to forget—or the point that it often simply misses—is the depth of the injury that comes from meddling in religious freedoms.

The Observatory also cooperated with the National Permanent Conference on Religion, Culture, and Integration instituted by the Ministry of International Cooperation and Integration, of which I am also a member, to investigate incidents of Islamophobia and the role of prejudice in the denial of permits to build new mosques in Italy. Although this is a complicated problem, and Muslim communities may perceive as discrimination what is the simple enforcement of general provisions of the admittedly intricate Italian law on zoning regulations or building permits, there is little doubt that certain political forces do try to manipulate these laws and exploit fears of fundamentalist Islam for electoral reasons, thus feeding Islamophobic prejudice. This conference focuses on new religious movements (NRMs), and I am personally a scholar specialized in this field. Reflecting on my experience first at OSCE in 2011, and then at the Observatory in 2012 and 2013, what surprises me, however, is that very few incidents submitted to these institutions refer to NRMs. In 2011, the three OSCE representatives for combating intolerance visited France. Among the official meetings there, I organized one in the offices of Mission interministérielle de vigilance et de lutte contre les dérives sectaires—i.e., “Interministerial Mission for Monitoring and Combatting Cultic Deviances,” or MIVILUDES; but the only complaint OSCE had received referred to problems encountered by a branch of the Plymouth Brethren about their home-schooling system, a problem we were able to address with MIVILUDES in a very cooperative and sympathetic way. So far, the Observatory has not received complaints about violations of the religious liberty of the NRMs. We are of course aware of criticism against some police and other activities in Italy, but the Observatory’s mission is about international rather than Italian issues. Other governmental institutions are monitoring religious liberty within the Italian territory. Internationally, most of the truly serious and bloody incidents affect Christians, Muslims, and Jews. Very few cases of murder of believers and destruction of places of worship concern the NRMs, except perhaps in China with the cases involving Falun Gong, although there are of course several instances of administrative discrimination. The Observatory addressed these problems indirectly, by presenting certain positive features of the Italian model— although we are aware, of course, that Italy has also its shares of problems. We celebrated with a special event the fact that in 2012 Intese between the Italian government and respectively the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (i.e., the Mormon Church), the Italian Hindu Union, and the Italian Buddhist Union entered into force. Italy has a system of concordats called Intese that regulate the State’s relations with a number of religious bodies. Intese provide inter alia for spiritual assistance in the military forces, hospitals, public schools, and jails, and legal recognition of marriages performed by a priest or minister. An important feature is the possible entrance of the religious bodies with an Intesa, which so elect (they can, in fact, refuse this benefit, as the

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Mormons did) into the 0.8% system. This is a peculiar Italian system wherein each taxpayer should devote 0.8% of his taxes either to a religious body or to the national publiccharity system by selecting the preferred institution’s box on the tax form. Unlike in Germany, taxpayers who fail to mark a choice do not keep the money; instead, it is divided between the different bodies according to their national percentage scores unless they have explicitly declared that they want to keep only the 0.8% of those who select their name. For example, if one does not select any option and the Catholic Church option is chosen by 90% of those who do mark an option, and the Baptist Church is chosen by 2%, then 90% of the 0.8% of taxes paid by the nonchooser will go to the Catholic Church, 2% of the 0.8% will go to the Baptist Church, and so on. Most churches advertise through TV and other campaigns to capture the 0.8%. Only a minority selects the state charities, which are often plagued by scandals.

of what groups the community of scholars may recognize as inherently religious over the course of time. I am aware that every mention of Scientology may open a floodgate of controversies. But it is also true that in this field the landmark case in Italy is the Supreme Court (i.e., the Corte di Cassazione, in fact the Supreme Court in Italy in matters of law, while the Constitutional Court is the Supreme Court in interpreting the Constitution) decision of October 8, 1997, which annulled for the second time a Milan appeal decision that regarded Scientology as not religious. This 1997 decision led to a third Milan decision, which on October 7, 2000, finally declared Scientology a religion. What is important here, in my opinion, is not whether the judges had their facts about Scientology right. Some may doubt that this was the case, and the debate does not belong to the subject matter of this presentation. Rather, what is relevant is the judges’ general comments about the advantages of broader definitions of religion.

Before 2012, churches with Intese included Waldensians (the oldest Italian Protestant community) and Methodists (1984), Seventh-day Adventists (1986), Assemblies of God (1986), the Jewish Communities (1987), Baptists (1993), and Lutherans (1993). In 2012, Apostolic Pentecostals and Greek Orthodox were also included. The Catholic Church has a Concordat, something more than the Intese, with a constitutional status that protects it from interferences by the Italian judiciary, and it gets a large majority of the 0.8% tax money. Jehovah’s Witnesses are next in line for a final approval of their Intesa, although in their case opposition also exists. The fact that

The Supreme Court regarded the theistic definition of religion used by the Milan courts against Scientology, which defines religion as the organization of a relationship between human beings and a personal God, as “unacceptable” and “a mistake” because it was “based only on the paradigm of Biblical religions.” As such, the Supreme Court noted, the definition would exclude inter alia Buddhism, which “certainly does not affirm the existence of a Supreme Being and, as a consequence, does not propose a direct relation of the human being with Him.” Yet, few in Italy would doubt that Buddhism is a religion.

These risks are the price to pay for the benefit of living in a free society, which recognizes religious liberty as the cornerstone of most other liberties. the system of the Intese in 2012 was extended to include Mormons, Hindus, and Buddhists was presented by the Observatory as quite significant, and as an example of how traditions that are not indigenous to a certain country may be accommodated and even regarded as valuable partners by the governments. In my view, another positive feature of the Italian system is the fact that the Constitution, by not defining the notion of religion, allows for a broader and evolving recognition

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It is true, the Supreme Court observed, that “the selfdefinition of a group as religious is not enough in order to recognize it as a genuine religion.” But although self-definition may not be crucial, neither is the prevailing opinion among the general population or in the media. The appeal to the “common opinion” in order to decide whether or not a group is a religion, a criterion used in the past by the Supreme Court itself, should be, according to the 1997 decision, qualified. The relevant common opinion, according to the Supreme Court, is “the opinion of the scholars” rather than the “public opinion.” Media, in particular, were regarded as not particularly relevant. The public opinion, the Court said, is normally hostile to religious minorities; additionally, it is quite difficult to ascertain, while the opinion prevailing in the community of scholars is at least easier to know. And most scholars, according to the Supreme Court, seem to prefer a definition of religion broad enough to include Scientology. This definition recognizes as a religion any group organized in order to spread and ritually celebrate answers to the fundamental questions about the nature of human life and death, answers that are not purely scientific but involve nondemonstrable beliefs about some sort of supernatural agency. Interestingly, the Supreme Court addressed the objection that texts by L. Ron Hubbard (1911–1986), the founder of Scientology, and by some early Italian leaders seem to imply that Scientology’s basic aim is to make money. Such

texts’ interest in money appears indeed, according to the Supreme Court, as “excessive,” but a similar excessive interest in money is often found in Catholic and other movements that nobody would regard as nonreligious. The Supreme Court observed that, even if one should take at face value the “crude” comment included in a technical bulletin of Scientology that “the only reason why LRH [L. Ron Hubbard] established the Church was in order to sell and deliver Dianetics and Scientology,” this would not necessarily mean,

A movement may be both religious and guilty of sustained criminal activities. Religions do not always “do good.” accordingly, that Scientology is not a religion. What is, in fact, the ultimate aim of “selling Dianetics and Scientology”? There is no evidence, the Supreme Court suggested, that such “sales” are organized only to assure the personal welfare of the leaders. If they are intended as a proselytizing tool, then making money is only an intermediate aim. The ultimate aim is “proselytization,” and this aim “could hardly be more typical of a religion,” even if “according to the strategy of the founder [Hubbard], new converts are sought and organized through the ‘sale and delivery’ of Dianetics and Scientology.” Another interesting objection the Supreme Court discussed is that Scientology is not a religion since there was evidence in the Milan case itself that a number of Scientologists were guilty of “fraudulent sales techniques,” or that they abused particularly weak customers when “selling” Dianetics or Scientology. These illegal activities, the Supreme Court commented, should be punished; but the presence of “deviant activities” is not the criterion for establishing whether or not a group is religious. A group may both engage in a certain number of illegal activities, which are not protected by provisions on religious liberty and should be prohibited and sanctioned, and maintain a basic religious identity. Summing up, the Supreme Court decision of 1997 established five fundamental principles about defining religion under Italian law. First: There is no fixed definition of religion, since the very notion of religion is subject to historical evolution and change. Second: Religion may exist without a belief in a personal God. Third: Neither the self-definition by the movement concerned, nor the public opinion influenced by the media should have significant relevance. Fourth: A movement may exhibit a truly excessive

interest in extorting money from its followers and still maintain a fundamentally religious nature. Fifth: Leaders of a movement may be guilty of sustained criminal offenses, for which they should be prosecuted without being allowed to claim religious liberty as a defense; but these criminal offenses do not take away the religious nature of the group when this has been recognized according to general criteria. We should not be afraid, the Supreme Court implied, that recognition of certain movements as religious will be a license for them to commit common crimes. Contrary to a perception circulated in the media, a movement may be both religious and guilty of sustained criminal activities. Religions do not always “do good.” Both in my capacity as an institutional advocate of religious liberty and as a social scientist, I believe that these principles may be useful internationally. Ultimately, of course, these debates have no final or true solution. In 1996, sociologist Larry Greil famously stated that religion [is] not (...) a characteristic which inheres in certain phenomena, but (...) a cultural resource over which competing interest groups may vie. From this perspective, religion is not an entity but a claim made by certain groups and—in some cases— contested by others to the right of privileges associated in a given society with the religious label. Definitions of religion are not essentialist truths, but tools for pursuing certain social aims. The Italian Supreme Court stated that religious liberty is best served by broad definitions of religion. Those definitions may involve risks, too. These risks are the price to pay for the benefit of living in a free society, which recognizes religious liberty as the cornerstone of most other liberties. n

About the Author Massimo Introvigne, JD, is a professor of Sociology of religion at the Pontifical Salesian University, Turin; a partner in one of Italy’s largest law firms; and a member of the Religions division of the Italian Association of Sociology. He is the author of more than thirty books and one hundred articles in international journals on the sociology and history of religious movements, and has been the chief editor of the award-winning Encyclopedia of Religions in Italy (2001; third edition: 2013). He is the head of CESNUR (Center for Studies on New Religions). In 2012 he was appointed Chairperson, Observatory of Religious Liberty established by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Rome, Italy. n VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

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Profile On...

Edited by Mary O’Connell

Diana Pletts Freud would have loved her. When he spoke of leaving things in “the capable hands of the artists,” he might have been thinking about Diana Pletts, MA, creator and director of the Phoenix Project, an art exhibition that showcases the work of ex-cult members. With the iconoclasm and prescience of a true artist, Diana says, ...this is kind of counterintuitive and not quite PC [politically correct] in terms of cult recovery, but in some weird way I feel we as ex-members have been given a gift, afterward, of actually being able to see better than we could before, and, perhaps, better than others can. We are sensitive to things in the world to which others are not, necessarily. I think that from Wellspring I somehow got the notion that I had to accept that evil that had occurred, to come to terms with it, and that out of it can come a great good. We are like canaries in the coal mine—our sensitivities make us aware of realities of which others are not aware. This is a hard-won benefit. With this generous and nurturing attitude, Diana encourages, receives, and organizes the work of her fellow ex-members, creating exhibits that are displayed at ICSA conferences. She also assists Michael Langone and Ann Stamler in finding work to be published in ICSA Today magazine. Diana grew up in suburban New York City in a “middle-class, Ukrainian, Catholic family with much time spent with beloved cousins, reading, and out in nature.” She entered State University of New York (SUNY), Purchase, in Westchester County, New York as a film student, earning a spot in the highly regarded, highly competitive program. “Although it had been difficult to get into the film department, I left it quickly once I got into my group, at age 20.” The group was known as the Path, and it was located in upstate New York: Its focus was the last days, and the need to be preparing for those coming days in various ways. I went from 22 ICSA TODAY 20

being a film student to a reluctant student of electrical technology in a community college... The group broke up about five years after I joined, after I had married in the group and had my eldest child. Although I was out of the group, the group was not out of me—not for over another twenty years, when I went for exit counseling at Wellspring in Ohio. Wellspring made a profound impact on Diana: The Phoenix Project really was a result of my time in Wellspring.... Dr. Martin encouraged me to reacquaint myself with my artistic precult self.... When I was completing my undergraduate degree I began to produce cult-related art and writing and music, and I recalled Dr. Martin’s idea of some sort of place for exmembers to produce their art freely. While I couldn’t do that, I did think it was possible for us to have a place to at least exhibit our work; so I began to pursue finding that place. 2014 marks the sixth Phoenix Project since its beginning in 2006 at the ICSA annual conference in Denver, Colorado. About her work, Diana says, I have found it a wonderful pleasure and delight to work on the Phoenix Project, bringing together people’s works, getting to read and view and hear them, and trying to come up with a way to showcase them. I find it very exciting to be able to interact with the creators and find a way to get their works out there. Opening the boxes and files is like Christmas! Diana has been married for more than thirty-five years to her husband, Denny; together, they have three sons, one daughter, and one grandchild. Besides ICSA, she also works with another nonprofit and has shared her experience at various venues, on the radio, and at Chautauqua Institution. She currently lives on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Diana can be reached at [email protected] n

Book Review Manson: The Life and Times of Charles Manson By Jeff Guinn Great Britain: Simon & Schuster, 2013. ISBN-13: 9781451645163; ISBN-10: 1451645163 (hardcover). $18.47. 512 pages. Amazon Standard Identification Number (ASIN): B00A2813WE (Kindle edition), $12.74. 30272 KB. Review by RaeAnne Wiseman It turns out our mothers were right: Sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll can lead to trouble. For the Manson family, trouble took the guise of free love, LSD, and the Beatles—which may not have been all that toxic without that one poisonous ingredient: the dangerously charming Charlie M. Manson. The Manson Family made it into the popular press during the summer of 1969 as the perpetrators of ritualistic witchcraft and brutal slayings. Over the course of two sweltering Los Angeles nights, 12 victims were tortured and killed. In Manson…, journalist, veteran, and best-selling author Jeff Guinn offers the inquiring reader an engaging exposé on the sociocultural and psychospiritual factors that led to the brutal murders. Guinn’s primary source material comes from numerous interviews with former members and associates of the Manson Family. Guinn has artistically woven these extensive interviews together to create an organic and informative perspective. By recording the thoughts and feelings of the actual characters involved, he provides the reader an eerie familiarity with the events as the story unfolds. Guinn incorporates into this profile public records pertaining to the frightful murders that shocked the nation. However, unlike the popular true-crime manuscript on the same subject, Helter Skelter, Guinn spends a relatively short time discussing the heinous details of the Manson Family’s civil transgressions. The target audience for this biography is not the macabre-seeking masses looking for gruesome descriptions of ritual slaughter. Rather, Guinn’s objectivity appeals to professionals and laypeople of social science who wonder what alignment of circumstances contributed to the bitter saga of Charlie Manson. Guinn opens the book with a gripping tale of Manson’s unexplainable magnetism. The biography proceeds with key influences on Manson’s upbringing. He pays particular attention to the juxtaposition of a benevolent Christian grandmother and a felonious mother, whose ideology fused to create a righteous savagery that was foundational to Manson’s psychology. The author’s engagement with origins and early life provides valuable insight into the formation of Manson’s radical, drug-infused philosophy.

Guinn later suggests that Manson’s prolonged residence in the criminal-justice system provided designs for his nefarious cult. For example, during one of his many incarcerations, Charlie enrolled in a workshop on the practical application of Dale Carnegie’s book, How to Win Friends and Influence People. In the penal system, Manson also gleaned from Scientology manipulative techniques that would ultimately assist him in the recruitment of naïve and insecure supporters.

It turns out our mothers were right... Guinn also pays meticulous attention to the methods that Charlie employed to keep his followers obedient. Along with their physical and emotional dependence on him, Manson played on the chemical desires of his group. The hallucinogenic drug LSD was routinely used to excite the family’s mythos of an impending race war they called Helter Skelter. Manson kept his followers busy preparing for this mayhem through strenuous physical labor, including ceaselessly probing the Death Valley desert for an escape hatch: the phantasmagorical “bottomless pit.” Manson told his followers that within this natural orifice, the family would be sheltered during the impending conflict. In this subterranean utopia they planned to wait out the bedlam until their time came to emerge as heralded sovereigns of the postapocalyptic earth. It didn’t quite work out that way. n

About the Reviewer RaeAnne Wiseman is a graduate student at Hood College in Frederick, Maryland. Here she researches the ways individuals create existential satisfaction through the process of life review. Professionally Ms. Wiseman works as Activities Director at a local nursing home. In 2011 she founded Existentialists Anonymous, a support group to examine mortality and meaning in the absence of an objective religious truth. n VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

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Emerging the Empath This self-portrait is a representation of the artist’s self-awareness and understanding of the suffering of others. She has a heart on her pineal gland, a reminder of the depthof her compassion and empathy.

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ICSA TODAY

By Angela “Vennie” Kocsis

The Move of God, which is also known as The Move, was founded by a former Baptist preacher in the 1960s in Florida. During his ministry, Sam Fife was a charismatic leader. It was a time of unrest in the country, with seething racial tensions and an increasingly unpopular Vietnam War. Sam seemed able to offer a sense of security, a place to belong, for people across the United States and Canada, and eventually in other countries around the world.

an empire. By 1974, the movement was boasting up to 40,000 followers from all walks of life.

My time at Ware was filled with... humiliation.

The basis of Sam Fife’s doctrine was that God had set some individuals inside the church system, first as apostles, then as prophets, and after that in a three-fold ministry. This configuration made up what Sam called the five-fold ministry that he taught would one day govern the world under God’s direction (Sam Fife’s sermon, God’s School of Divine Government, is available in its entirety at ima.cc/godsschool.php).

When Sam Fife died in a plane crash in 1979, Move Elders, primarily led by C. E. Buddy Cobb, took over his ministry. Today, The Move of God exists in the form of nonprofit organizations and churches scattered across the world. They still have a strong following and still teach the same doctrines passed on by Sam Fife (see ima.cc/messages. php).

In the late ’60s and early ’70s, Sam began to gather his followers into the wilderness to prepare for this transition and end of the world. In a matter of just a few years, Fife’s followers had moved onto farms in Alaska, Canada, and South America. Sporting a large array of military equipment from Quonset huts to military cots, beds, and ham radios, Fife’s followers utilized his methods to build

Although The Move still has supporters, several hundred people have participated in a Yahoo group in which they have written thousands of messages detailing their experiences (https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/ sam_fife/info). Supporters relay positive experiences; many child survivors, along with some adults who left on their own, describe a more sinister scene.

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My Story I was only 3 years old, but my siblings, 7 and 9 at the time, and my father have clear memories of how my mother was drawn into The Move of God in the early 1970s, and how that led my parents’ marriage to dissolve. While my father was locked down at the military base near San Diego, California working, one of The Move of God’s religious recruiters was diligently flattering my mother, who was busy trying to raise three children while her husband was absent. The more my father had to be gone, the more The Move of God recruiters were able to get their clutches into my mother, even convincing her that my father was actually not working, but most likely spending time with other women. They filled my mother’s head with so much confusion and question in regard to her own marriage that soon she was giving my father the ultimatum of either joining The Move of God or getting a divorce. My father refused to join The Move, trying to get my mother to somehow see reason. My mother put my father through a brutal divorce, taking what she could until she had depleted his financial ability to continue fighting her in court for custody or even visitation of my siblings and me. The Move of God funded all of my mother’s court costs, including flying in my uncle all the way from the South to be a character witness on behalf of my mother. My father never stood a chance to gain custody of us. It felt that, in the blink of an eye, my mother, funded by The Move, had

...outside The Move of God... we moved through life wearing a mask of functionality... packed our lives into a U-Haul headed to Ware, Massachusetts. We children would not have a relationship with our father until we all became adults. My mother convinced us throughout our young lives that he did not want us and was an evil man. The compound at Ware was classified as a deliverance farm. Sam Fife taught that all negative behaviors, including pedophilia, were a product of possession by demons. Sam’s doctrine included the belief that medical conditions, such as seizures, were the body being possessed by demons. We were specifically sent to this farm because my mother was overweight, my older brother was considered to have behavioral problems, and I was loud. My sister tended to be more on the quiet side, both trying to protect me and to stay out of anyone’s attention. My loudness was the result of my being completely deaf in my right ear, something that would never be brought up while I was living in this cult. Instead, I would be punished often for being too loud. The act of sending us to a deliverance farm, according to Sam Fife’s doctrines, would allow our family to get the necessary treatment to rid my mother of the demons of gluttony that were making her fat. It would also help rid us children of our demons, whatever the ministry decided they were. 26 24 ICSA TODAY

I spent my years from 1973 to 1977 at Ware, until I turned 7. Upon arrival at Ware, our family was split up and put into classification units. I was put with other children my age. Everything from our former life was sorted through, from the back of the U-Haul truck. Anything that could be used for the commune was put into a community clothing bank, and the rest of our belongings, including all of our baby photos and mementos of childhood, were burned in a bonfire. The ministry taught that this process served to rid us of our life before the cult, erasing all memories we might have of it. The process would allow our minds to be emptied of the demonology of the secular world outside and refilled with Sam Fife’s doctrines of purification for God. My time at Ware was filled with torture and humiliation. I was subjected to demon-casting-out rituals while tied to chairs and beaten, and to severe discipline, which included but was not limited to hypothermia baths, sleep deprivation, beatings with belts and paddles, public humiliation, and withholding of food. I also experienced sexual abuse through grooming, petting, fondling, and eventually penetration. In 1977, our family was brought together, and we were flown up to a compound in Alaska. In Alaska the sexual abuse continued, as The Move of God still created a safe haven for pedophiles, its leaders believing they could deliver the demon of pedophilia out of a person. I, along with other children, still experienced child labor, withholding of food as discipline, and severe mental and physical abuse. Although elders and their children seemed somewhat protected from the treatment I endured, I have learned from survivors that some elder’s children were not impervious to abuse within their family unit. Armed men monitored the compound 24 hours a day, and we were held to strict rules. For example, females were allowed to wear only skirts, and members needed elders’ permission to work certain jobs or marry. We were put through execution training because The Move taught that the Communists would eventually take over the United States and kill the Christians. My mother, sister, and I were excommunicated from the cult when I was 14. My sister was a teenager who was seduced by a man in his early 40s. She was made to stand in front of the entire congregation and say that she was the one who seduced him. The elders made the decision that our family must be required to leave the cult, citing as their reason that my sister was an “untreatable harlot” and a threat to the sanctity of the other teenagers there. We moved to Martin, Tennessee, where my grandmother lived. The compound we left still exists today, miles off of the highway, near Delta Junction, Alaska. Some call it Dry Creek, the Land, or Living Word Ministries.

Surviving Life in society outside The Move of God was severe culture shock for me. My mother kept on living as though none of what we experienced had ever happened. Instead, we moved through life wearing a mask of functionality over severe dysfunction such as alcoholism, drug use, and intrafamily hatred and lashing out. Not only was I unfamiliar with the

culture of my peers, but I also faced severe poverty because The Move sent us away with nothing but the clothes on our back and very few belongings. I was a chameleon, watching and learning as I moved through my high-school years. Struggling to fit in socially, I joined a band in an attempt to feel part of a group and ended up turning to drug use and partying, trying to numb a pain that I didn’t yet have the skill to identify. I simply knew it existed inside of me like a dark hole.

Poetry, art, writing, and music have been my savior. When I turned 20, I became pregnant. Becoming a mother changed my focus considerably, and I began to study fine arts at the local university. But then I entered a relationship in college and migrated to the Pacific Northwest, where I gave birth to my second child. Still, I ended up wandering. My relationship failed, my family fell apart, and I found myself a single mother. I poured my attention into my children as much as possible, avoiding the inevitable collapse from the trauma I was carrying. My weight ballooned. I became physically ill. I shut down outwardly and became hardened. Through these years I could not critically think through any of my experiences. Still, I spent much of my time writing poetry and trying to figure out the excruciating emotional and physical pain I was carrying.

of authenticity because artistic endeavors were stifled. In adulthood, creativity became my rite of passage. I began to embrace my gifts and flourish artistically. Through my creativity I was able to take my pain and create a blueprint through which I could study the intricate details of my traumatic experiences. A major change came when I discovered the power of my gratitude. When I was able to remember the things in my life I could be thankful for, the pain didn’t hurt as badly. I wasn’t sure exactly how to utilize this tool in my life, so I created a sensory system by which I could explore gratitude using my five senses. I later used this system to create and publish an interactive journal, Becoming Gratitude. Most of my recovery from cult thinking I have accomplished on my own, knowing that there is much more for me to learn and understand about my experiences. The Internet allowed me to find more information about how my experiences had resulted in certain behaviors. I eventually found a counselor who helped me define my experiences, giving me a language by which I could communicate what was happening in my head, the way I viewed the world, and why. The journey from being a cult survivor to thriving and being joyful was long and required active work on my part. I filled my living space with kind sayings toward myself, written on sticky notes in multiple colors, and reminding me that my past experiences did not have to define who I am today. Now I let the pain out, feel, accept my own vulnerability, and tell my story without shame. I believe creative therapy can reunite us with our authentic uniqueness and purpose. As a second-generation cult survivor, I find deep joy in sharing creative outlets with others who have experienced trauma. n

Thriving After my mother passed away in 2007, I decided that I was going to write about my life in the form of a novel. I had been trying to understand myself for years. I felt that using a character outside of myself would allow me the perspective to tell my story. So I began to write Cult Child through the eyes of a little girl named Sila Caprin. I naively believed that I would fly through this story, tell it, and be done, and I set a deadline of a year to finish the novel. Instead, it would be 7 long years of traveling into me, and I could not have predicted what would emerge. I suffered from deep night terrors, dreams that I could not speak of for days, and I was unable even to turn on the light in a room. I lost my job. I started to understand that I was going to have to travel deeply back into the trauma in order to write the book. It was not going to be an easy ride. I avoided. I wept. I wrote an album of songs and lullabies for Sila as we travelled together into the dark recesses of the torture I had experienced. Poetry, art, writing, and music have been my savior. As a child I was disallowed a voice, an identity, or any forms

About the Artist Angela “Vennie” Kocsis is an author, poet, painter, and songwriter residing in the Pacific Northwest. She is the author of Dusted Shelves: memoir of a cult child, a collection of poetic expressions of her cult experiences and their aftermath. This book is available in paperback, ebook, and audio-book formats. She is also the author of Becoming Gratitude, an interactive daily journaling system designed to explore gratitude using the senses. Her debut novel, Cult Child, recounts her life growing up in Sam Fife’s Move of God. She is currently working on the sequel to Cult Child and also recording a music CD. Vennie continues to create art and support survivors of cult trauma. Her art and poetry were represented in the 2014 Phoenix Project art exhibit and literary reading at ICSA’s 2014 Annual Conference in Washington, DC. Her work can be explored in depth at venniekocsis.com n

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Arts: Poetry

I wish I could tell you wh at it was like to be a girl who dreamed of sparkling glitter and princess h ats but it wasn , t like th at

it was developing insomnia and early mornings meeting the sunrise with kerosene eyes pick the grubs throw , em in the can with my tiny h ands

I wish I could tell you th at I danced and twirled and giggled like most little girls color crayons and rag dolls but it wasn , t like th at at all

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ICSA TODAY

It was dirt lines and corn seeds on my h ands and knees picking weeds running from sh adows where demons lurked while my fingers ached and my thighs hurt

I wish I could tell you about flower berets and Hello Kitty shoes summertime dresses and shiny tutus h alos of flowers hide and seek but th at isn , t wh at it was like for me.

it was bruises and backh ands swift tongues and hell threats grizzly bears lurking behind trees miles from the Alkan helplessness, reversed time lean-tos and firearms

I wish I could tell you of being tucked in morning cartoons and roller skating kisses on the forehead and bedtime stories, play dates with fake makeup and rice-crispy treats but damn, it wasn , t like th at for me

It was hiding emotions till I could set them free on torn bits of paper chewing it like gum I ate poetry and damn I don , t know shit about Disney how many times I gotta tell you it wasn , t like th at for me.

It was straining to hear while being accused of ignoring it was odd girl out cuz I always h ad to shout it was stand on the sideline solitary playtime and damn how many times I gotta tell y a your life wasn , t like mine.

I was a mystic before I was three before the devil tried to put the demons in me I traveled the dimensions before I was four stood on cliffs with the Greys My whole life , s been a war.

It gets worse before it gets better when you fall to your knees to sip from the water sometimes I run my fingers across the scars then trace up my chest to the beat of my heart

I wish I could tell you how I survived how I sleep off the day so I can gu ard the night; I give it to prose write it on guitar strings paint it in pictures till my tears make me sing.

Suffering can form the most elegant seed it , s me it , s me it , s me ~ Angela ”Vennie” Kocsis VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

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Arts: Mixed Media

By Angela “Vennie” Kocsis

Poetree This piece represents the artist’s connection to the trees and nature, as well as the expelling of painful emotions and the receiving of positive, healing energy. Out of her suffering emerges a strong tree, with branches reaching outward, stretching their arms to the moon, wherein peacefulness feels familiar, as home. Mixed media on matte

Re-Enter This piece contains elements that express the artist’s emotional death and rebirth. The white unicorn represents innocence that was lost at the hands of her ritual abusers. She reenters and rebirths through strength and the washing off of their deeds, letting the ocean sweep away the pain. Acrylic on canvas

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Prodigy This piece is an artist self-portrait of needing to escape the aftermath, pain, and frustration of being labeled crazy when her need is to be able to process the pain. The quote on the digital piece is a line from the poem “Born Crazy,” from her collection of poetry Dusted Shelves: memoir of a cult child. Digital collage

Fro seed bloo who butt abu mini gre bec to th self. of h con feet. leavi sha ope con warr wha Acry

Birth of a Monarch From the darkness grew a seed whose life began in the blood-red hands of the abusers who froze her heart. The black butterflies represent the dark, abusive methods used by the ministers who ran the cult she grew up in. But the wicked seeds become gold and give birth to the strength of her warrior self. She faces the violet light of her infinite worth, and the conditioning falls away at her feet. She walks steadily forward, leaving love in her wake. She shamelessly carries her heart openly on her shoulder. Vennie connects deeply with the anime warrior, the advent children, and what they represent. Acrylic on canvas

Birt

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of a cult child. Digital collage

, Correspondents Reports Report From

France and FrenchSpeaking Countries Guillaume Garih Yves Bolduc was appointed Quebec’s Minister of Education on April 23, 2014. Bolduc affirmed his determination to settle the issue of clandestine schools swiftly, once and for all, and the government is asking citizens to report suspected clandestine schools. The present and published list is made up of six confessional institutions, with religion the only subject matter being taught at some of these schools. Five of the six schools are Jewish and one is Mennonite; four of the six appear to function without any pending litigation from the Province of Québec. According to the newspaper La Presse, Quebec government workers are reluctant to involve the courts since the workers’ failure before the Superior Court of Justice in 2011 on the matter of the Academy Yeshiva Toras Moshe of Montreal. In that case, the Honorable Judge Dugré refused to close the school because the institution had been tolerated for more than fifty years. Yves Bolduc is not the first Minister of Education to tackle the issue, and it is uncertain at this point whether he can hold to his promise to put a stop to clandestine schools. Alex Werzberger, a Hasidic leader, claims that negotiation and compliance with the government’s rules and programs is also a viable avenue to finding a solution. He is nevertheless adamant that certain points, such as not teaching the theory of evolution, are non-negotiable. Although the practice has been banned by law since 1996, about 60% of women in Burkina Faso have undergone genital mutilation. The West-African country is now part of a controversy stirred by the Raëlian movement, which claims to have invested $413,000 in “the pleasure hospital,” a place dedicated to clitoral reconstruction, only to have the hospital declared illegal shortly before its grand opening. Brukina Faso’s Ministry of Health claims that the decision is purely administrative, while the Raëlian movement sees it as a blatant display of religious persecution. Undeterred, a Raëlian spokesperson indicates that another pleasure hospital will soon open 30 32 ICSA ICSA TODAY TODAY 32

in East Africa. There is not enough data available regarding clitoral reconstruction to conclude that the surgery is beneficial, including claims that it can restore pleasure to victims of female circumcision.

Report From

Italy

Christina Caparesi News From the Italian Associations The SOS Abusi Psicologici project approved in October 2013 had to await the Friuli Venezia Giulia-region decree in late December before the organization could proceed with putting together all the professional duties included in the project. In the early months, the group organized the office and located it in a law firm (which included two rooms, one for administrative duties and one for consultation). Thus, a working group of professionals was launched. The group includes Teresa Dennetta, attorney; Cristina Caparesi, educator and family mediator; Salanitro Gabriella, psychotherapist; and Elisa Mattiussi, psychiatrist. A secretary also was appointed for administrative purposes and to provide for the coordination of volunteer members. At its inauguration, the working group shared the protocol intervention approved by SOS Abusi Psicologici with the social cooperative EXIT S.C.S. onlus, a nonprofit organization (for a summary of the methodology, see abusievessazioni.it/ wp-content/uploads/2012/05/il-centro_ aiuto_sos_abusi2.pdf ). An infopoint was activated in Pordenone, at the Antimobbing Office of the CISL (Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Lavoratori [Confederation of Italian Workers’ Trade Unions]) with the Province of Pordenone, and another was activated at a medical clinic in Trieste. The infopoints will offer informational meetings with people in the local areas and provide informational brochures about the services in Udine. The group subsequently began advertising for the help center, informing local authorities of its existence, and began structuring formal and informal collaboration with individual public bodies where necessary for the referral of cases both from the help center to single entities

and vice versa to create a network of support for people in need. In particular, for 2014, the following public buildings are involved: the social-welfare areas of local towns; the Mental Health Center of Udine; the Family Counseling Center with the Udine multidisciplinary team; the Regional Education Office; and the State Police of Udine and Trieste. The working group currently is organizing small presentations at some treatment sites regarding issues related both to planning and to explaining the operation of the center. The group also is developing a database for the management of cases that come to the center. The database will provide the option of individual indicators to represent the three phases of case management: reception, problem analysis, and orientation. By the end of the annual project, scheduled for October 30, 2014, a computer database will have been developed. New plans for 2015 were presented at the administrative office for the region in late January, with the hope of also keeping the help center going with the current standards. The timeframe for approval and subsequent implementation of upcoming projects is currently unknown. Among the activities being considered and planned are an annual convention honoring S.O.S. Abusi’s 10-year association. The convention will be titled Network Help Against Manipulation, with details to be finalized by November 7, 2014, and a seminar titled Intervention Guidelines Within Abusive and Harassing Group Environments to be held on November 8 and 9, 2014. The seminar will be structured using focus-group meetings, and its purpose will be to discuss the best practices developed by the participating associations. The seminar is directed at those who employ different professional associations who deal as first responders, provide legal advice, or offer psychological help and mediation of conflicts in the environment of alternative faiths. For this purpose, Italian and foreign associations have been invited. The new project also aims to expand the network of collaboration with public institutions. The presentation will be organized into two tracks, one in Italian and one in English. At present, some Italian and European associations have registered, and more registrations are expected.

, Correspondents Reports

In May 2014, SOS Abusi Psicologici, together with the Association of Victims of Terrorism (AVITER), was a guest of SOS Antiplagio Novara at a news conference, where the theme of “comparison of sectarianism and terrorism” was discussed. The collaboration continues with EXIT S.C.S. onlus, partner of SOS Abusi Psicologici, in the context of addressing, with the working groups that are promoted by various European associations, extremism and radicalization as security threats at the local level. Of particular note have been meetings earlier this year with the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (Brussels, March 21, and London, May 8–9); the European Network of Deradicalisation (ENoD) (Berlin, October 31 and November 1, 2013); and the Radicalisation Awareness Network Deradicalisation (RAN-DERAD) (Berlin, May 25, and Brussels, June 16–17). EXIT S.C.S. onlus has been mentioned among the promising practices in the RAN document Preventing Radicalisation to Terrorism and Violent Extremism: Strengthening the EU’s Response (p. 35). The organization also was mentioned among the best practices with several other organizations that are engaged in countering left- and right-wing extremism, jihad, and the like—what we would call political cults. The Italian Society of Psychology of Religion (SIPR) and L’Istituto Superiore di Scienze Religiose [the Higher Institute of Religious Sciences] (ISSR) of the Ecclesia Mater organized a conference in Rome on March 26, 2014. The conference was entitled The Psychology of Religion: Backgrounds and Prospects for Intervention. The goal of the Pontifical Lateran University (associated with ISSR)

was to consider the psychology of religion, a discipline still little known in academic circles, by highlighting the epistemological and methodological perspectives, the current state of research, employment opportunities in professional contexts, and new fields of study. Legal Proceedings Danilo Speranza, founder of R. E. Maya, renamed Science for Love, was sentenced by the Tribunal of Tivoli to 10 years in prison for first-degree sexual abuse of minors. March 28, 2014, ended the judicial matter of Tersilia Tanghetti, charismatic figure of the Sergio Minelli group, with a decision by the Supreme Court not to prosecute her for enslavement. The woman, who was accused along with 15 others, was also acquitted of the charge of kidnapping and mistreatment of several guests at the organization’s accommodation facilities.

Report From

Ukraine Piotr T. Nowakowski Alexander Dvorkin, who chairs the Russian Association of Centres for the Study of Religions and Sects, was invited by the Archbishop Mitrofan of Lugansk and Alchevsk (Ukrainian Orthodox Church under the ecclesiastic jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate) to give lectures about cults on April 9–10, 2014, in Lugansk (Eastern Ukraine). However, Dvorkin was denied entry in Ukraine at the airport of Donetsk. The official reason given was that

he had been seen with Ekaterina Gubareva, the wife of Pavel Gubarev, the selfproclaimed governor of Donetsk (Ekaterina Gubareva has recently been declared as Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Donetsk People’s Republic, a pro-Russian separatist state in Eastern Ukraine). Dvorkin denied any link with Gubarev and accused then Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseni Yatseniuk of contacts with Scientology, which means that “he could be controlled by the CIA.”

Report From

Poland Piotr T. Nowakowski On May 15–16, 2014, the Department of Theories of Religion and Alternative Religious Movements at John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin organized a 2-day conference titled Alternative Visions of Spirit World: Old-Time and Present-Day Conceptualizations. The event was divided into several sessions: “Christian Vision of Life After Death and the Spirit World,” “Visions of Spirit World in Non-Christian Religions,” “Alternative Visions of Spirit World,” “Methods of Research Into Spirit World,” “Descriptions and Interpretations of Spirit World,” and “Spirit World in Culture.” More than twenty speakers from nine academic institutions presented their papers at the conference. The Department of Theories of Religion and Alternative Religious Movements examines phenomena generally referred to as cults, sects, or new religious movements. The head of the Department is Prof. Robert T. Ptaszek. n VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

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News Desk Pilgrimage to Welsh Mountain to Impart Spiritual Energy Dozens of members of The Aetherius Society, who believe Jesus and other historical figures including Buddha, Krishna, Confucius, and Laozi were aliens, will climb Carnedd Llewelyn in Wales this summer to transmit spiritual energy from a mountain they say is packed with Martian power. Society members think 19 global peaks were charged with alien energy after London cabbie George King was ordered by “cosmic intelligence” in 1954 to climb them. Group secretary Richard Lawrence said, “The purpose of going up is to send out spiritual energy for world peace and to pray for the betterment of humanity. … He explains that King climbed 18 of the 19 peaks specified, and that on each ascent “…was zapped by ETs.” Richard has “…been on 10 of the mountains around the world. I have always experienced a burst of energy on them. The climbs are quite demanding … at the top we raise our hands and join in prayer.” Richard said The Aetherius Society believes Jesus and Buddha were from Venus but Krishna was from Saturn—the “most advanced planet,” and that all the “great religions” are from one “cosmic source.” The Society believes that these “advanced beings [were] coming to help us and give certain teachings in some cases … to help humanity without interfering with us too much.” The Society believes a messiah will one day visit earth in a flying saucer. Richard said his religion might not be everyone’s thing: “It’s unusual, is it not?” (Contacts With the Gods From Space, by George King and Richard Lawrence, is published by The Aetherius Society.) (Wales Online, 5/25/14)

Catholics Say We Need More Exorcists The decline of religious belief in the West and the growth of secularism have “opened the window” to black magic, Satanism, and belief in the occult, the organizers of a 6-day conference in Rome on exorcism have said. The meeting aimed to train about two hundred Roman Catholic priests from more than thirty countries in how to cast out evil from people who believe themselves to be in thrall to the Devil. The conference, Exorcism and Prayers of Liberation, also attracted psychiatrists, sociologists, doctors, and criminologists in what the Church called a “multidisciplinary” approach to exorcisms. About 250 priests have been trained as exorcists in Italy, but many more are needed, conference organizers claimed. Giuseppe Ferrari, from GRIS, a Catholic research group that organized the conference, said there was an ever-growing need for priests to be trained to perform exorcisms because of the increasing number of lay people tempted to dabble in black magic, paganism, and the occult. “We live in a disenchanted society, a secularised world … where religion is being thrown out….” The abandonment of religion “inevitably leads people to ask questions about the existence of evil and its origins.” 34 32 ICSA TODAY

“Just in the dioceses of Rome, around a third of calls that are received are requests for the services of an exorcist,” said Fr. Cesar Truqui, a priest and exorcist from Switzerland and a member of the Legionaries of Christ, a conservative Catholic order. The Church tries to play down the more lurid associations often made with exorcism but at the same time insists that the Devil exists and must be fought daily. “Exploring the theme of demonic possession does not mean causing general paranoia, but creating awareness of the existence of the Devil and of the possibility of possession,” Fr. Truqui told Vatican Radio. Pope Francis has frequently alluded to the Devil in his homilies and addresses since being elected to succeed Benedict XVI last March. In a recent homily, he said the Devil was behind the persecution of early Christian martyrs, who were murdered for their faith. The “struggle between God and the Devil” was constant and ongoing, he said. (The Telegraph, 5/8/14)

The Family’s “Living God” Fades to Grey, Estate Remains Although she can walk and talk, according to former cult members, Anne Hamilton-Byrne, Australia’s most notorious cult leader, doesn’t talk much, and her once-plentiful assets and properties are being sold, transferred, or given away. At 84, Hamilton-Byrne is frail and isolated, cared for inside the dementiacare wing at Centennial Lodge nursing home at Wantirna South, a long way from the messianic figure who ruled The Family in Melbourne through three decades from the 1960s. Cult member Stevenson-Helmer, who is related to former governor-general and prominent Melburnian Sir Zelman Cowen, is poised to lead what is left of the cult, together with Geoff Dawes, the son of former senior cult member Leon Dawes and former cult “aunty” Helen Buchanan. Stevenson-Helmer saw Hamilton-Byrne recently and said she was “stable” and that “it is always wonderful to be with her.” He claims not to know anything about her assets. Dawes and a fellow cult member from Gembrook, Helen McCoy, a wildlife campaigner and principal of a school in Wheelers Hill for disabled children, control HamiltonByrne’s affairs. (The Age, 5/17/14)

Dispute Over Legal Fees Prolongs Polygamy Custody Case What is being called a landmark custody case isn’t over yet for Lorin Holm, a former member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS), who in March won legal custody of his nine minor children from his former wives Lynda Peine and Patricia Peine, active polygamists and current FLDS members. Under Utah code 30-3-3, paragraph 1, which states that in a child-custody case the court may order one party to pay the other party’s legal fees if there is a financial need, regardless of who wins the case, Holm now faces the potential of paying his ex-wives’ legal fees of more than $76,000.

Holmes’ attorney Hoole said the statute makes sense in many cases to ensure equality when an impoverished spouse and a wealthy spouse are engaged in a custody battle, but Holm’s wives had good legal counsel throughout the case and demonstrated no financial need before the ruling. Enforcement of the statute also would place a burden on the hundreds of other formerly polygamous fathers who have been similarly ejected from the FLDS community and severed from their families, many of whom also would like to gain custody of their children. Six former FLDS men who watched Holm’s court case with interest have filed declarations with the court on Holm’s behalf to show that his former wives and others still living within the FLDS community have the ability through the church to pay their own legal fees. The apostate church members are told by the FLDS to repent of their often-unspecified sins before they can return. “These are men who have given everything they own to the church and they got pushed away, thrown out,” Hoole said. “They’re sent away, … told to write letters of repentance and …just beat themselves up writing anything and everything they can possibly think of,” Hoole said. “In the meantime, their families are poisoned against them.” According to Hoole, the most commonly stated reason men currently are being sent away is for killing unborn children. He said he doesn’t know if that relates to FLDS members using birth control or something else. “These men have no idea what that means.” The conclusion of Holm’s 3-year-long custody case was the last ruling handed down by Judge James Shumate, who recently retired. The legal fee payment matter is being handled by Judge G. Michael Westfall and hasn’t been submitted for a decision yet. Ultimately, the fees issue for attorneys will come down to a ruling and possibly an appeal. In the meantime, although Holm has physical custody of his children now, Hoole said that getting them back mentally and emotionally will be a longer process. “They’re coming around slowly,” he said. (Dixie Press Online, 5/17/14)

Hare Krishna Gets Evangelical The International Society for Krishna Consciousness arrived in the United States in 1966; by 1980, many Americans considered the faith a cult. Today’s Hare Krishna temples, which currently support claims of 250,000 US devotees, have been sustained over the years by Indian immigrants; they host mostly Indian congregations and sing mostly Indian music. But devotee Howard Resnick, who helped lead Hare Krishna at its US peak, along with others who include devotee Emily Penny, intend to reverse that trend. Westerners such as Resnick and Penny want to bring founder Swami Pradhupada’s teachings to Americans again by removing the group’s increasingly Indian overtones so Westerners can connect directly with Krishna. As a white American from North Carolina, Penny originally struggled to find a place in the community dominated by Indian immigrants. She says, “The music is Indian. The dress is Indian. The food is Indian.” But “Krishna never told us to wear saris.” But Pradhupada wanted to separate Hare Krishna from traditional Indian Hinduism and even created a specific translation of the Bhagavad Gita, the Hindu holy book, for his followers. Sarvatma

Dasa, a 34-year devotee and Hare Krishna priest, supports the evolution, noting that “I have a lot of friends who are still caught up in the details of the ethnicity instead of the broad philosophy. There are universal principles that are easily understood, and then there are local customs that I couldn’t care less about.” Resnick and his organization, Krishna West, imagine a temple without saris. Prasadam could be Italian, Brazilian, or Chinese if correctly offered to Krishna. But what drives Krishna West is more a profound evangelical spirit than just a desire to adapt. Resnick says, “We’re seeking intelligent people who want to help change the world. If Krishna wants it to work, it’ll work.” Resnick and Penney believe Hare Krishna can bring peace to American lives. Devotees believe chanting Hare Krishna, much like prayer, brings divine energy into the chanters, which they can then use to better their community. “Pradhupada came because there was an emergency in our culture,” Penney said. “And it’s not better than it was 40 years ago, it’s worse.” (OnFaith, 6/16/14)

Jehovah’s Witnesses to Hand Over Top-Secret Manual Finland’s Jehovah’s Witnesses were to give their religious rule book to the Minister of Justice and the Minister of the Interior in mid-May so that it could be inspected to ensure that it’s in line with Finnish rule of law. Until now, only senior members of the Jehovah’s Witnesses Committee have had access to the congregation’s secret book of rules. The disciplinary activities of the Jehovah’s Witnesses Committee have been criticized for violating human rights. Anna-Maja Henriksson, Finland’s Minister of Justice, and Interior Minister Päivi Räsänen met with Witnesses leadership in Helsinki the day before the planned delivery of the book for inspection. According to Witnesses representatives, committee practices have changed recently and the committee no longer addresses or interferes in member matters that are considered to go against church guidelines. (YLE News, 5/16/14)

Human-Rights Commission to Study Handling of Lev Tahor Case The Quebec Human Rights Commission will study what went wrong in the case of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect Lev Tahor last November after approximately two hundred members fled the Laurentians town of Sainte-Agathe-des-Monts and relocated in the Ontario city of Chatham-Kent to avoid a hearing in Quebec’s youth court. Sect members had been due in court to respond to allegations of child abuse and neglect made by Quebec’s Department of Youth Protection. After several hearings, the Ontario courts have ruled it would not be in the best interests of the children to execute a youth-court order to return 14 children to the province and place them in foster care. Chatham-Kent’s Children’s Services has also refused to execute a still-outstanding warrant the Quebec court also issued in November to remove all 127 children from the community. The commission will examine whether police, youth-protection officials, the school board, the health sector, and the legal system VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

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in Quebec had the proper tools to deal with the situation, and if they used them properly. “We’re not going to make a judgment about the Lev Tahor intervention, but rather to examine whether we’re well-equipped” to deal with youth-protection cases as they relate to sects and different cultures, said Camil Picard, the commission’s vice-president who deals with youth-protection matters. “The commission has to assure that all young people in Quebec in all communities see their rights respected. We want to know that the actors have what they need to intervene in assuring children’s rights are protected.” He added that the study, to be completed by the end of the year, will rely on testimony from police officers, officials at the department of youth protection, and their counterparts in Ontario. The study also will look into other high-profile cases, such as the murder of four members of the Montreal-based Shafia family by their parents and brother in 2009. (The Gazette, 5/14/14)

A Split From NXIVM Kristin M. Keeffe, former legal liaison for NXIVM [neks-ē’-ŭm] founder Keith Raniere, has broken with Raniere’s life-coaching enterprise and fled with her young son from his inner circle, according to court papers filed as part of a federal lawsuit. Raniere has been identified in court cases involving NXIVM litigation as the founder of the “rational inquiry” curriculum and philosophical movement. He is referred to reverently by NXIVM students as Vanguard. He has been identified in court documents from adversaries in sharply critical terms. Email messages purportedly sent by Kristin M. Keeffe and quoted in court papers filed by New Jersey attorney Peter Skolnik include the statement that “I have completely left NXIVM and New York” and numerous other allegations. They also refer to Keeffe’s turning over to the authorities “evidence of massive criminal conduct” by Raniere as well as NXIVM President Nancy Salzman and Clare Bronfman, who oversees the group’s operations. In the petition, Skolnik inserted parts of recent electronic communications he said he has had with Keeffe since her disappearance from Saratoga County at some point in the past few months. Skolnik also is the lawyer for Rick Ross, leader of an organization called the Cult Education Institute. Ross has been sued by NXIVM, which denies that it is a cult, for publicizing portions of its training program. Ross has countersued Raniere, Salzman, and Keeffe for invasion of privacy. Skolnik filed a petition on April 26 in U.S. District Court in Newark, New Jersey to dismiss Keeffe from the countersuit. Skolnik’s filing includes a passage in which Keeffe purportedly calls the district attorneys’ offices in Saratoga and Albany counties “compromised” regarding NXIVM. Skolnik said his filing speaks for itself. In responding to Crockett’s appeal to seal his letter, he wrote that Ross “now views Ms. Keeffe and her child as victims of the very organization whose objectives she previously served.” The court filing indicates that Keeffe cannot communicate easily. She asked Skolnik, in the purported email, to thank Ross for applying “pressure” on her. Without it, she wrote, “me and my son would have been lost forever. … You need to know now the reality of what the trainings and Keith do ... He is so dangerous 36 34 ICSA TODAY

you would not believe it. ... He has gotten way more lethal in the last 4 years too.” In an interview, Ross said he believes the emails came from Keeffe. Ross has studied NXIVM, which has training outlets in New York, Mexico, and elsewhere. He said he is writing about the organization in a book he is planning to self-publish later this year. “Of all the people to think of Keith Raniere losing—that would turn against him, that would reject him, that would spurn him— probably near the end of my list was Kristin Keeffe,” said Ross. “...she must know a great deal. She was absolutely in the inner circle.” Lawyers representing NXIVM, Bronfman, Raniere, and Salzman had no comment or did not respond to email messages from the Times Union. (Albany Times Union, 5/10/14)

Extremist Group Drops Worship-Hall Plans The conservative Christian group known as Exclusive Brethren or Plymouth Brethren Christian Church and described by former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd as an extremist cult has walked away from plans to build an 800-seat hall in the Perth Hills of Australia. Mundaring Gospel Trust, acting for the sect, has withdrawn its plans for a meeting hall in Parkerville. Whether the trust will look at an alternative site is not clear, with a spokesman saying the group was “considering its options….” The 13-month dispute began in April last year when the shire rejected the proposed hall, arguing it would breach the shire’s proposed planning scheme, was inconsistent with its existing scheme, and would “have a detrimental visual impact.” The trust appealed to the State Administrative Tribunal and wrote to Acting Planning Minister Bill Marmion. Mr. Marmion initially moved to relax the council’s restrictions on allowing places of worship in residential areas, but subsequently endorsed a scheme that was not compatible. Once it was determined the trust’s proposal would not be allowed under the shire’s scheme, the SAT provisionally dismissed the application and the trust withdrew its application. (The West Australian, 5/26/14)

Secrets, Lies, and Sex Abuse As Former Sect Leader Chooses Life on the Inside Chris Chandler was a leader of the secretive Bible sect known as Friends and Workers, or the Two by Twos, who have 2,000 members in the state of Victoria, Australia. When he recently drove to the Melbourne Magistrates Court from his property on French Island to turn himself in, Chandler had already admitted his guilt in eight charges in a Gippsland court, including unlawful indecent assaults, indecent assaults, and gross indecency on three young female victims. Chandler had balked at his sentence of a year’s jail with a nonparole period of 3 months; he told his lawyers that, while he was guilty, he wasn’t guilty to that extent. But then he decided he wanted to go to jail. The Friends and Workers/Two by Two sect is an offshoot of the Cooneyites, founded by Irish Protestant evangelist Edward Cooney. The sect adheres strongly to Bible sections of Matthew 10

to do with Jesus sending out disciples to cleanse “impure spirits.” The group does not have church buildings or headquarters, and it has no written policies or doctrines. Travelling missionaries live with sect families for extended periods. Television, radio, movies, dancing, and jewelry are banned. The sect holds five Victorian conventions a year at various locations throughout Victoria.

outside law enforcement planned to interview those residents. Barlow allegedly said that the FLDS church often directed activities at the marshal’s office, selected members who would attend the police academy, had access to municipal security cameras, and conducted meetings with Barlow to plan “how best to protect our church or church members.”

Ex-member “Ruby” said Chandler had sexually assaulted her at the beach in 1989 when she was 10. Her allegations led to one of the eight charges against him. She said the sect had a “culture of secrecy” and distrust of outsiders. Sexual abuse of young people and children was common. She said Victorian and Tasmanian leader of Friends and Workers, David Leitch, visited her before she went to police and told her there wasn’t much the police could do if she went to them. Ruby said Chandler had told her in a Facebook message that he was molested as a child, had a different memory of the beach incident, and was not a pedophile.

In March, a jury awarded non-FLDS residents Ronald and Jinjer Cooke $5.2 million at the trial of their discrimination lawsuit, finding that the two towns had denied them access to utilities for years. After the police department put Barlow—no longer an FLDS member himself—on paid leave, he secured immunity from state and federal prosecutors and admitted to falsely denying discrimination by deputies in the Cooke trial. According to Horne, Barlow said he had been afraid to testify truthfully at the Cooke trial because “it could have jeopardized his employment and his associations within the community,” where the “Marshal’s Office has operated for decades, and continues to operate, as the de facto law enforcement arm of the FLDS Church in support of the FLDS Church’s discriminatory policies.”

The sect was linked to the 1994 suicides of adolescents Narelle and Stephen Henderson. In her suicide note Narelle said they “…committed suicide because all our life we were made to go to meetings. They try to brainwash us … and have ruined our lives.” A Fairfax Media investigation last year established that sect leaders knew of allegations against Chandler but still promoted him in 1991 to the senior position of “worker,” or minister. Until 2004, he still was staying in private homes in locations throughout Victoria, and he later positioned himself as a counselor and sect contact for child sexual-abuse victims. A WINGS (online group of former sect members) submission to the Victorian parliamentary inquiry into the handling of child abuse by religious groups said the sect has been ‘‘haphazard’’ in dealing with sexual-abuse allegations. Leader David Leitch, who is known to be close to Chandler, would not comment. A formersect source claimed Leitch, who sacked a sect leader for reporting sexual abuse in 2013, has a file on alleged sexual offences by Chandler, which he has not given to police. (The Age, 7/28/14)

Arizona Attorney General Asks Judge to Shut Down Polygamous Towns’ Police Force Pointing to statements town marshal Helaman Barlow made in April admitting that law-enforcement officers discriminated against residents who do not belong to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS), Arizona Attorney General Thomas Horne has asked a federal judge to disband the police department of the twin cities of Colorado City, Arizona and Hildale, Utah. Barlow recounted numerous incidents in which deputies tried to thwart legal action against FLDS members and harm nonmembers. Barlow made the statements in April, contradicting his testimony from a civil-rights trial less than a month earlier, according to documents the Attorney General filed in federal court. Barlow described such actions as secretly recording meetings with Texas and federal investigators about Warren Jeffs; ignoring illegal marriages of young girls in Hilldale and Colorado City by FLDS men; not reporting the doctoring of “numerous” police reports that otherwise would have reflected poorly on the marshal’s office; and giving advance warning to local residents when

Barlow’s statements “[lead] to the inescapable conclusion that the disbandment of the Colorado City/Hildale Marshal’s Office is the only remedy that will stop the FLDS-controlled towns ... from using their willing participant Marshal’s Office as a tool to perpetuate their historical discriminatory pattern and practice of interfering with the ... rights of non-FLDS people.” (Salt Lake Tribune, 6/17/14)

Charges Laid Against Bountiful Leader Winston Blackmore After Judge Rules Charter Should Not Protect Polygamists Polygamous sect leader Winston Blackmore, who has exercised power and control for decades over some 500 souls from his Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS) stronghold in Bountiful, British Columbia (BC), recently fought the tax man and lost. A Tax Court of Canada judge agreed last year with an earlier ruling finding that Blackmore had underreported his private company’s income by $1.8 million over 6 years. The judge slapped him with $150,000 in penalties and dismissed claims that his community is a “religious communal congregation” and thus tax exempt. Mr. Blackmore is also being sued by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for alleged trademark violation. The church, which represents mainstream Mormons, wants nothing to do with Mr. Blackmore or Bountiful and its polygamous ways. But these are the least of his worries as he now faces criminal prosecution. BC’s Criminal Justice Branch (CJB) recently announced that, on recommendations from the RCMP and the advice of a special prosecutor appointed by the province’s Attorney General, Mr. Blackmore and another man, James Oler, have each been charged with one count of polygamy. Crown prosecutors now have access to a lengthy and detailed analysis of Bountiful, its polygamous practice, and the law. Written in 2011 by BC’s Chief Justice Robert Bauman, the document is described in Bauman’s own words as “the most comprehensive judicial record on the subject ever produced.” VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

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Bauman was asked to declare whether Canada’s longstanding but seldom-used antipolygamy law is consistent with the freedoms guaranteed by the Charter. He heard from dozens of expert witnesses and former sect members over 5 months, and then described in his report what really goes on at Bountiful. He dismissed claims that the divided community is free of abuse and harm. Instead, harm is what the Bountiful question is all about, Chief Justice Bauman concluded. “Harm to women, to children, to society and to the institution of monogamous marriage.” Specifically, he found that women in polygamous relationships “are at an elevated risk of physical and psychological harm. They face higher rates of domestic violence and abuse, including sexual abuse.” And children in polygamous families “face higher infant mortality. … They tend to suffer more emotional, behavioural and physical problems, and … lower educational achievement than children in monogamous families.” He wrote that early marriage for girls, frequently to older men, is common. Chief Justice Bauman listened, reflected, and then determined that any Charter breaches caused by Canada’s antipolygamy law are “demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society,” and that the prohibition on polygamy “is consistent with, … further, Canada’s international human rights obligations. … In my view, the salutary effects of the prohibition far outweigh the deleterious.” With this document in hand, BC’s CJB are proceeding with the criminal prosecution of Blackmore and Oler. The two men are scheduled to appear in a provincial courtroom in Creston, BC in October. When the trial begins, prosecutors might point to evidence that Mr. Blackmore gave at an unrelated civil trial in Salt Lake City earlier this year. There, he acknowledged to having wedded on different occasions three 15-year-old girls. “I never touched anyone before they were 16,” he testified. (National Post, 8/14/14)

Seized Children Returning to Manitoba Mennonite Community Twenty-three of the children taken from the Manitoba, Quebec Old Order Mennonite Community by welfare officials last year are now home, according to Jay Rodgers, CEO of the General Child and Family Services Authority in Manitoba, and he expects almost all will be back in the community by the end of summer. A number of adults were charged with multiple counts of assault, including assault with a weapon, between July 2011 and the end of January 2013. The charges stemmed from how the children were disciplined. The youngest of the alleged victims at the time was less than a year old, and the oldest was 17. The province’s child and family services authority removed all children but one while the matter was investigated. “It’s been a process of working with these families around parenting capacity, parenting techniques, learning about child development, learning about appropriate discipline approaches,” said Rodgers. Many of the charges have now been stayed, but a community member told CBC News that seven people still face charges. Nobody from the community, or its location, can be named to protect the identity of the children who were apprehended. 38 36 ICSA TODAY

“We desperately want to do things differently,” a man from the community told CBC. “We are very committed to trying to stay here, build here and put our community back together again,” the man said. (CBC News, 6/19/14)

“…an embassy to welcome the Elohim back to Earth!” The Raëlians recently have thrown open their doors to the cameras for the first time, after presenter Darren McMullen travelled to Croatia to meet the sect members living there. And as Glenn Carter, the man responsible for the UK’s Raëlian population reveals, there’s more to Raëlian life than alien ancestors. Like Scientology, Raëlianism is considered a “UFO religion” with similar theories on intelligent design and extraterrestrial life. Unlike the Scientologists, however, Raëlians are famous for espousing sexual freedom and scientific development, and they even claimed in 2002 to have produced the world’s first cloned human baby. According to Raëlian Glenn Carter, “The main goal of Raëlians at this stage is to create an embassy in order to facilitate and welcome the return [to Earth] of the Elohim,” who they believe record every human memory and DNA on an advanced supercomputer. In preparation for that day, the Raëlians are in the process of creating an extraterrestrial embassy, which they hope to build in Jerusalem, to welcome the Elohim back to Earth. (Daily Mail, 5/9/14)

Harvard Students Cancel Satanic Black Mass After Outcry Harvard University extension-school students planning a satanic black mass canceled the event after an outcry by administration, students, faculty, and community religious leaders. The Harvard Extension Cultural Studies Club had decided to move the event off campus after widespread objections but found no other location willing to host it. The university had decided not to block the event, even though President Drew Faust said she opposed it. “Vigorous and open discussion and debate are essential to the pursuit of knowledge, and we must uphold these values even in the face of controversy,” Faust said. “Freedom of expression, as Justice Holmes famously said long ago, protects not only free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate.” Harvard students, faculty, and alumni signatures were among those on about sixty thousand online petitions protesting the black mass. The Archdiocese of Boston and a group of Harvard chaplains also opposed the ritual. Francis Clooney, a Roman Catholic priest and Harvard Divinity School professor, said that while Harvard is committed to freedom of expression, it’s clear that there are limits to its latitude. “If this had been a reenactment of a Nazi rally or a lynching, the university would have stepped in quickly and stopped it,” he said. “I’d be concerned that the university is saying we just allow student groups to do what they want.” In an earlier statement, Robert Neugeboren, the extension school’s Dean of Students and Alumni Affairs, said the club was hosting the black mass as part of a series of events to explore

other cultures. The school’s administration had worked with students to ensure that no consecrated host, the sacramental wafer that has been blessed by a priest and is used in the Eucharist ceremony, would be used to reenact the black mass. (Bloomberg News, 5/12/14)

Lawsuits Target Scientology Rehab Center in Nevada Narconon’s Caliente, Nevada drug-and-alcohol rehab facility is considered the last hope for some families, with its promise of a 76% success rate to get addicts off drugs. But several federal lawsuits now target the unlicensed Narconon program, whose patients and families say the rehab center isn’t curing addictions but instead trying to recruit people into Scientology. Patients say they were exposed to mold, lice, and treatments that forced them to try to lift objects with their mind, while Narconon’s own unverified videos show a clean, safe rehab center. Current Nevada law considers private facilities exempt from inspection, and an effort the health department made to state lawmakers through Senate Bill 501 to close what they called a loophole in the law would have allowed state inspections inside Narconon. But the bill did not pass before the session ended. Las Vegas attorney Ryan Hamilton now is taking Narconon to federal court on behalf of multiple families nationwide in a series of federal lawsuits, with “the fraud claim being that we were promised drug and alcohol rehabilitation treatment, but instead … received Scientology.” So far, the families suing Narconon are from Massachusetts, Texas, Florida, and Virginia. Narconon recently changed its name by adding “Fresh Start” or simply calling itself Rainbow Canyon Retreat. Narconon’s advertisements mention nothing about Scientology, and families claim in the federal lawsuits that recruiters never mentioned the word Narconon, even though Scientology’s own guidebook devotes an entire chapter to its controlling role in Narconon. In legal filings, Narcanon claims the federal lawsuits should be dismissed, saying through its attorneys that the complaints against it were not “simple” and “direct” enough. Hamilton has filed two new federal lawsuits against Narconon Fresh Start. These lawsuits focus on facilities in Colorado. (KLAS-TV, 5/12/14)

Narconon Faces Federal Lawsuit In the latest update, a federal lawsuit against Narconon and the Church of Scientology seeks an immediate injunction to prevent unauthorized use of counseling certifications, trademarks, and logos along with compensatory, statutory, and punitive damages, plus attorneys’ fees. The lawsuit filed by the National Association of Forensic Counselors (NAFC) at the Eastern District Court of Oklahoma in Muskogee names Narconon International, the Church of Scientology International, and 80 other Narcononrelated defendants. NAFC is the only organization to offer an accredited Certified Chemical Dependency Counselor certification on a national level and has never delegated the authority to provide such certifications to any of the named defendants, according to the lawsuit.

The suit alleges that NAFC has suffered by the “repeated abuse and misuse of the NAFC logos, trademarks, and certifications,” and that more than “400 Narconon-associated websites contained the purported certifications of staff members that, in reality, have had certifications that have been suspended, revoked, or never existed.” The lawsuit also alleges that a Narconon facility advertised affiliation with an NAFC board that is no longer in existence. Among other allegations, the lawsuit charges that “as recently as March 2013 Narconon Arrowhead falsely advertised that the National Board of Addiction Examiners recognized Narconon Arrowhead for their facility location and for their world class staff… Specifically, Plaintiffs claim that the misuse was calculated to increase the credibility of the Narconon Treatment Centers and the affiliated counselors, and to expand the reach and profitability of the Church of Scientology International to Plaintiffs’ detriment.” The Oklahoma Arrowhead facility has been under investigation following the deaths of three Narconon clients, all found dead at the facility within a 9-month span. A fourth died while at a local hospital. The deaths spurred legislation that was signed into law in 2013. Since then, several wrongful-death lawsuits, along with a number of other lawsuits alleging that Narconon’s counselors traded drugs for sex and other allegations, have been filed in Pittsburg County (Oklahoma) District Court. The County Sheriff’s Office, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, and the District 18 District Attorneys continue to investigate the four deaths, according to Sheriff Joel Kerns. (McAlester News-Capital, 5/22/14)

Lawsuits Allege State Suppressed Narconon Report, Fired Investigators Two lawsuits against the state of Oklahoma’s Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services (ODMHSAS) claim the agency “buried” an inspector general’s report recommending that Narconon Arrowhead be shut down after three patients died there. The lawsuits state that the Department fired Kim Poff, its inspector general, and Michael DeLong, an investigator, last year after they objected to the agency withholding the Narconon report. A multiagency investigation of Narconon Arrowhead, the flagship branch of an international drug-rehabilitation organization, began after a patient died from a drug overdose at the facility in July 2012. Her death followed the deaths of two other patients in 2011 and 2012. Following these deaths, state lawmakers passed legislation to give the state more regulatory authority over the facility. Then Narconon Arrowhead sought certification as a residential substance-abuse treatment center but withdrew its application before Department of Mental Health site visits. The facility has now applied for certification as a substance-abuse halfway house, defined by state law as one that provides “low intensity substance abuse treatment in a supportive living environment to facilitate the individual’s reintegration into the community.” Poff sued the agency for wrongful termination, civil conspiracy, and other claims in Oklahoma County District Court on

VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

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August 4. DeLong filed a similar suit on July 30. Both lawsuits name the department’s CEO, COO, general counsel, and HR director, in addition to the state and board of directors for the Department of Mental Health, as defendants. An attorney representing Poff and DeLong said they “...were retaliated against for speaking out about wrongdoing.” Ms. Poff’s lawsuit states that she “…and her investigators determined that Narconon violated numerous state laws and recommended that the facility be shut down by ODMHSAS. … Despite this recommendation and the finalization of the reports, leadership at ODMHSAS … repeatedly” took the position “that the investigation was still pending...” and thus “…failed to protect the interest of Oklahomans at the facilities…” and also was key in their decision to terminate Poff and DeLong’s employment. The World reported that a multicounty grand jury is investigating the facility and has called state officials and at least one former Narconon Arrowhead executive, Eric Tenorio, to testify. The investigation reportedly revolves around insurance fraud. The Department of Mental Health did not respond to a request from the World for comment on the lawsuits’ allegations. (Tulsa World, 8/20/14)

Commissioners Approve Mediated Settlement Over Narconon Expansion Plans Hernando County, Florida commissioners on Tuesday accepted a mediated settlement awarding $1.97 million to Narconon, the operator of a Scientology-affiliated drug treatment center in Spring Hill. The settlement apparently ends the legal fight that erupted when the commission turned down the Suncoast Rehabilitation Center’s proposal to expand from 22 to 54 beds in 2009. However, several commissioners then indicated they had further questions and concerns about a story published almost simultaneously with the mediation settlement in the Tampa Bay Times. According to that story, Narconon had expanded anyway after being turned down by the county, renting three properties elsewhere in Spring Hill. None of the sites was licensed, as state law requires, until after the Times sought comment from operators about their licensing status. The Center director subsequently applied for one site license, which the DCF issued on a probationary basis. Narconon and Toucan Partners, owner of the Cessna Drive property, had sued the county in June 2011 for more than $6 million, alleging it intentionally discriminated against the facility, violating the federal Fair Housing Act. The jury found the county liable for discriminating against Narconon and awarded $74,490 in damages. Narconon appealed and won a new trial. The parties went to mediation several weeks ago and reached the settlement. The county’s insurance will pay all but a $5,000 deductible, which the county paid some time ago. The Florida Department of Children and Families, which has licensed the center at 8231 Cessna Drive since it opened in 2008, has not decided whether to conduct a formal investigation into Narconon’s leasing of off-site properties. (Tampa Bay Times, 8/26/14)

40 38 ICSA TODAY

Lawyer Clobbered on Verdict for Scientology Issues of state vs. federal jurisdiction continue to influence ongoing litigation between Florida attorney Kennan Dandar and the Church of Scientology. In May, a federal judge refused to enjoin the $1 million judgment against Florida attorney Kennan Dandar, who represented the estate of Lisa McPherson in a suit against the Church of Scientology in federal court in 2009, despite a 2004 settlement agreement in a related civil suit that barred Dandar from pursuing any other claims against Scientology. Dandar first sued Scientology’s Flag Service Organization in state court in 1997 for damages on behalf of McPherson, a member of the Church of Scientology, who died of a pulmonary embolism in 1995 while under the care of the Flag Service Organization in Clearwater, Florida. First ruled a negligent homicide, the cause of McPherson’s death was later changed from “undetermined” to an accident. Subsequently, criminal charges against Scientology were dropped. McPherson’s family pursued civil claims against the church. Attorney Dandar alleged that Scientology’s attorneys had used their political connections to influence the outcome of the proceedings in state court. In 2004, Dandar agreed to a settlement that dismissed the McPherson lawsuit and barred him from pursuing any other claims against Scientology. But Dandar filed another wrongful-death lawsuit against the organization in 2009, this time in federal court, and Scientology sought to enforce the settlement agreement against him. A Pinellas County judge ordered Dandar to withdraw from the new wrongful-death lawsuit, and a state appellate court affirmed his decision. Dandar failed to withdraw from the action, and the state court held him in civil contempt and ordered him to pay damages to Scientology. The federal court presiding over the new wrongfuldeath lawsuit enjoined the state-court proceedings, but the 11th Circuit (federal) Court reversed and vacated that injunction in July 2011. A few months later, Dandar withdrew from the wrongfuldeath action. Conflicting jurisdictional rulings between state and federal courts, new suits by Dandar against Scientology and its legal representatives, and appeals of related decisions against Dander had been ongoing up to the May 28 ruling by U.S. District Judge Virginia Hernandez Covington. In her ruling, Covington included various findings related to the complexities of the related state and federal rulings and unresolved issues. Covington ruled that federal courts could not interfere with statecourt proceedings where the state court had not yet entered a final judgment, and that Scientology’s state-court action was a civil proceeding involving “orders uniquely in furtherance of the state court’s ability to perform its judicial functions,” which warranted abstention under principles of federalism. The May 28 order states that interfering with a state court’s ability to impose sanctions and fees for a party’s failure to comply with courtordered mediation agreements is an exceptional circumstance that bars federal courts from interfering. She also ruled that, given Dandar’s attempt to enjoin the execution of the March 2014 final judgment, the state matter remains pending despite the entry of that judgment.

The court again stayed Dandar’s claim for damages under Section 1983 pending the resolution of the state-court action, noting that federal courts have a duty to assume jurisdiction where it properly exists. (Further details regarding the actions and counteractions between Dandar and Scientology and its legal representatives leading up to this recent judicial decision are available online at courthousenews.com/2014/06/04/68449.htm). (Courthouse News Service, 6/4/14)

Scientologists Accused of Brainwashing French Company’s Employees French prosecutors are investigating the Church of Scientology for alleged harassment of employees of a company whose boss had joined the organization. The 12 employees of Arcadia, based near Paris, claim that Scientologists became “omnipresent” in the business after their boss turned to the cult in 2000. In 2008 he restructured the company following the advice of alleged Scientologist trainers. The plaintiffs say they were forced to undergo a “training routine” by Scientologists that amounted to psychological harassment and an effort to brainwash them. The plaintiffs’ lawyer, Olivier Morice, also told the AFP news agency that “the Scientologist trainers infiltrated the company with the sole intention of financially pillaging it for their personal profit and that of Scientology.” He estimated that between one and two million euros had been embezzled. Sources confirmed that prosecutors in Versailles are investigating the charges. Scientology claims to be a religion but is classified as a cult in France, where an appeals court confirmed fines of 200,000 and 400,000 euros in 2013 on the organization’s bookshop and “Celebrity Centre” in Paris for organized fraud. (RFI, 7/24/14)

Judge Rules Scientology Leader Not Required to Give Deposition Church of Scientology leader David Miscavige has sidestepped giving a deposition in a high-profile harassment lawsuit filed in Texas by Monique Rathbun, wife of vocal church critic Marty Rathbun. A Texas appeals court this week overturned December’s ruling by Comal County, Texas District Judge Dib Waldrip, who had ordered Miscavige to submit to questioning. Church attorneys argued from the outset that Waldrip’s court had no jurisdiction over Miscavige because he lives in California and has no connection to church activities in Texas. Miscavige has guided the church since founder L. Ron Hubbard died in 1986 and has testified a handful of times. Monique Rathbun alleges in her 2013 suit that Miscavige directed a 3-year campaign of harassment, spying, and intimidation aimed at her and her husband that began soon after Marty Rathbun, who had worked closely with Miscavige before leaving the church in 2004, spoke critically of Miscavige to the Tampa Bay Times and national media in 2009. The suit also names as defendants the Church of Scientology International, three private investigators, and a Scientology parishioner.

Church officers and attorneys do not contest that the Rathbuns were targets, suggesting that those who watched and confronted the couple were investigating Marty Rathbun’s antichurch activities and delivery of Scientology services without church authorization. In its latest ruling, Texas’ 3rd District Appeals Court agreed that Miscavige is protected by Texas “apex deposition doctrine,” which shields high-ranking executives from being pulled into burdensome, harassing depositions. However, with additional questioning of church representatives and further review of church records, Rathbun’s team could demonstrate that a Miscavige deposition is necessary, the court said. Rathbun’s lead attorney, Ray Jeffrey, said striking the deposition was a blow. Likely next in the case, he said, is a decision on the church’s appeal of Waldrip’s order in March that denies Scientology’s motion to dismiss the suit altogether, which could come by year’s end. Church officers in Los Angeles did not respond to a request for comment. (Tampa Bay Times, 7/18/14)

China’s Crackdown on Sects Concerns Mainstream Churches A recent campaign by China’s government to crack down on fringe sects concerns many mainstream churches. With voices muted by censors, human-rights advocates and some mainstream religious leaders in China say the latest anticult campaign is misguided and frequently violates Chinese law. Teng Biao, a defense lawyer who has represented Falun Gong members in the past, said the most recent roundups were politically motivated by the government’s deeply rooted fear of organized religion, especially of groups it cannot control. “This is an effort to eradicate an entire group of believers, not just the ones who committed crimes,” he said. Likewise, New York Times contributing columnist Murong Xuecun suggests that the antireligion campaign “is not borne of concern for public security stemming from a horrific murder,” but is instead “a concerted effort to bring independent churches and their followers into line, … the government’s way of strengthening its control of society.” On May 28, a woman named Wu Shuoyan was beaten to death in a McDonald’s restaurant in Zhaoyuan in China’s Shandong Province while people stood idly by. The state broadcaster closedcircuit TV (CCTV) announced that Wu Shuoyan’s murderers were members of the Church of Almighty God, or Quannengshen, also known as Eastern Lightning, a Christian sect, and implied that the killers’ faith had to do with their act. Soon after the killing, the Xinhua news agency reported that authorities had rounded up about fifteen hundred cult members. Xinhua’s report said that among those arrested, 59 had already been handed prison terms of up to 4 years. The agency said those arrested included members of another Christian group known as Disciples Sect, and it appears many of those were arrested as early as 2012.

VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

41 39

Then, on June 1, Pastor Wang Yi of the Early Rain Reformed Church in Chengdu, China was arrested as he distributed leaflets against forced abortion and was held briefly. Three days later, Mr. Wang was detained again; arresting officers released him after 12 hours of interrogation. A few days later the government published its list of 20 active “cults.” Since then, Chinese TV channels and newspapers have issued warnings about the dangers of “evil cults,” which community organizations, authorities, and schools have been supporting. The anticult campaign extends to more-mainstream religious practices, including a barrage of attacks on China’s underground Christian churches. As a perceived “foreign” religion, Christianity and the growing numbers of Christians in China make the Chinese leadership particularly nervous. A September 2012 policy document on the Religious Affairs Bureau’s website stated that unlawful religious groups are “threatening China’s national security.” 2010 government figures put the number of Christians in China at 23 million. A Pew Research Center 2014 estimate is that Christians account for around 5.1 percent, or 67 million of the Chinese population, with 58 million Protestants and 9 million Catholics. “Legal” and “Illegal” Christians. China has two classes of Christian churches: The legal group consists of state-approved congregations. The illegal group includes “home churches” or “underground churches,” independent congregations that operate without state approval. But even legal churches are fair game for the government in this latest crackdown. Churches once treated as legal now face persecution, and at least ten of them have had crosses destroyed or have been completely demolished. After decades of antireligion propaganda, many Chinese people remain ignorant about religion and are easily manipulated into viewing foreign faiths as evil sects. A June 1 CCTV report outlined the “six characteristics of evil cults,” which a legal “expert” said included the cult of personality, immorality, and restrictions of individual and spiritual freedom. As many Chinese people took to the Internet with renewed antireligious fervor to thank the government for exposing the true nature of “evil cults,” columnist Murong Xuecun commented that “the name of the biggest cult is hidden in plain view: the Communist Party.” (The New York Times, 6/11/14; 6/17/14)

China Arrests “Nearly 1,000” Members of Illegal Cult In a recent update according to the state news agency Xinhua, Chinese authorities have arrested nearly a thousand members of the religious group, Church of Almighty God or Quannengshen, the latest in a series of official moves against a group that China has outlawed as an illegal cult. China has sentenced dozens of followers since the murder of a woman at a fast-food restaurant by suspected members of the group in June sparked a national outcry. Among those currently arrested were 100 “high-level organizers and backbone members,” Xinhua said, citing a statement from 42 40 ICSA TODAY

the Ministry of Public Security. The murder trial is set to open on Thursday, Xinhua said. (Reuters, 8/19/14)

Insufficient Evidence Ends Investigation of Devon Community In October 2013, officers started working with Devon County (England) Council to “thoroughly review” information received about the Twelve Tribes community, which runs the Common Loaf Bakery at Dunkeswell in East Devon. At the time, police confirmed they had received no allegations and there was no formal investigation. However, a team of council officers visited the commune on a number of occasions and spent a day with the families and the children alone. The investigation followed concerns raised to officials at the county council’s Children’s Services by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC). The children’s charity approached the council after a national newspaper reported the Twelve Tribes community’s belief in the right to use the cane as a form of punishment and following the removal of 40 children from two of its communities in Germany after an undercover reporter’s investigation. Tony McCollum, manager of Honiton Market where the group has a bread stall and leaflets about it are available, said in October that the investigation came as a surprise to him, adding that “You couldn’t ask for nicer people. They seem very family orientated—I find it hard to believe they would mistreat their children.” The information the Council officers gathered on their visits led the Council and police officers to conclude there was insufficient evidence to take matters any further at this time. A council spokesperson added, “The council takes all allegations of abuse extremely seriously. … If any further allegations are made to us, we will look into them.” (Exeter Express and Echo, 5/29/14)

Tony Alamo Church Empire Dismantled While Tony Alamo, whose Christian-ministry empire stretched from California to Arkansas, was living in the small town of Fouke, Arkansas, his crimes landed him behind bars. Alamo is now 79 years old and serving out his 175-year sentence in Tucson, Arizona for a long list of offenses that include battery, false imprisonment, and marrying his victims, including children as young as 8 years old. In 2008, the dismantling of Alamo’s million-dollar ministry began. FBI agents raided his home and seized seven girls, later believed to be Alamo’s child brides. A year later, he was sentenced to life in prison. The women were awarded more than $1 billion by an Arkansas judge. Alamo also owes $30 million to two men who were beaten, starved, and denied education while being raised in the ministry. Several of Alamo’s properties have already been sold to help satisfy the court judgment including his church building in Fouke. Prosecutors say some of Alamo’s property sold for as much as a

quarter of a million dollars. The individual who bought the Fouke church building donated it to the Sanctuary of Hope Church in Fouke. Judy Frazier, a longtime Fouke resident and member of the nondenominational church, says that when the Tony Alamo Christian Ministry signs are taken down in Fouke next month the whole community will be celebrating. “…I never dreamed that one day He would put that property into our hands.” In an ironic twist, one of the properties belonged to former Judge Jim Hudson, who presided over the child-custody hearings. After Hudson’s death in 2009, prosecutors say Alamo followers purchased the home. Now it’s being sold, and the money will go to Alamo’s victims. The city of Fouke has found some closure with these properties sold, but unfortunately Alamo, who is still in prison, has followers in other places. “Tony Alamo is still preaching his word from prison and his message is still getting out because his followers are able to obtain that material,” said Jeanne Philyaw, a member of the group Partnered Against Cult Activity (PACA). She actively spoke out against Alamo during his trial, calling him the worst kind of predator, using the name of God to abuse children. “As long as that kind of hatred can be put out, there will always need to be prayer and people watching,” said Philyaw. (KTBS News, 8/13/14) n

VOLUME 5 | ISSUE 3 | 2014

43 41

UPCOMING EVENTS International Cultic Studies Association Local Meetings Philadelphia · New York · Boston ••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

Surviving and Moving On After a High-Demand Group Experience: A Workshop for Second-Generation Former Members April 17–19, 2015

Chester, Connecticut ••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

ICSA Annual Conference June 25–27, 2015

Stockholm, Sweden ••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

After the Cult: Recovery Workshop for Former Group Members July 31–August 2, 2015

Colorado Springs, Colorado

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