Ex-Shincheonji exposes ‘dangerous’ group

In September 2019, Monash student Caleb* was on his way to a class when he was approached by two students who asked him if he wanted to do a survey.

The vivacious 18-year-old happily agreed and began answering questions about whether he was Christian and what he knew about the bible.

Caleb handed over his mobile phone number assuming it was part of the survey.

But in the weeks that followed, the university student received constant phone calls from the pair.

“At first, I declined, because I had a lot of things to do in terms of my classes and assignments,” Caleb told news.com.au.

“But one day I was in a good mood because I had received a good mark for my assignment so I answered them.”

Caleb was experiencing some issues with his friends at the time and was feeling quite lonely, so when the pair invited him to a bible study he saw it as an experience to meet new people.

What he failed to realise was that he had just been evangelised by the Shincheonji church.

What is the Shincheonji Church?

Korean religious leader Lee Man Hee founded Shincheonji Church of Jesus (SCJ) in South Korea in 1984, which has since amassed a following of over 200,000 people globally today.

Adherents are awaiting Judgement Day where only 144,000 believers will be “elevated” to the high priests to be immortalised.

For Caleb, his two-year journey with SCJ began when he started attending “Bible Basics” classes twice a week for nine months.

“I was quite intrigued, because religion is like a very interesting book for believers and I wanted to know more about it,” he said.

At the same time he was juggling a Bachelor of Science degree, however this became difficult when the church started to take up more of his time.

“After that nine month process you have to enter into the church … they don’t make your schedule difficult in the beginning but overtime it becomes more (intense),” he said.

Shortly after entering the church, Caleb became a recruiter for the SCJ where he would go to multiple venues to try to “evangelise” people.

“Usually, (recruiters) start off with something that seems quite innocent, or positive like ‘we’re doing a survey’, or they will say that they‘re new to Melbourne and they’re looking for recommendations, or they’re just trying to make new friends,” he explained.

“They‘ll always check two things – your religion and your visa status … and they will do this by asking innocent questions like ‘what’s your ethnicity’ or ‘whereabouts are you from’.”

Caleb also added each SCJ member had evangelising quotas to meet, with a spreadsheet used to track this.

As the university student became more involved in the church he was assigned a leadership position where he would be responsible for a group of up to five SCJ members.

While this role involved educating followers about the faith, it also required leaders to “manage the emotional state of members”.

“Team leaders need to meet with their members to see if there are any issues relating to their life of faith,” Caleb said.

During these meetings the leaders would find out what the members’ career aspirations are, whether they want a relationship or if they are questioning their faith.

“If a person seems to have those thoughts you need to report it to the group leader … then the group leader will have a service to target those issues and to create a mindset to prevent those aspirations from happening,” he said.

“There was no such thing as privacy.”

Some group leaders would even write down everyone’s secrets in a spreadsheet so they could target their flaws and make them see how the church could help them.

Leaving the church

Over time Caleb was once again promoted to a group leader status, where he overlooked the activity of the team leaders.

But he soon grew unhappy in his role as it took up most of his days, leaving him with no time to see family or study.

Caleb started to develop feelings against the church in the early months of last year, but leaving behind something that he dedicated 18 months of his life to was far from easy.

“I started wanting to leave around eight months ago. The problem was … the only reasonable way to leave was if there was an issue with the doctrine,” he said.

At first, Caleb admitted he couldn’t find anything wrong with the faith and because he wasn’t allowed to search for information about the religion it was difficult for him to see beyond his teachings.

But in a shock twist, a teacher Caleb had adored suddenly left the church which “triggered” him to do the same.

“I was curious, what would make an instructor want to leave? So I did a lot of research and I found a lot of issues in the doctrine,” he said.

However a lack of self-confidence stopped him from speaking up.

“I brought up the issues with leaders but then they did a lot of gaslighting. They were like, ‘oh, you‘re just confused’, or ‘you don’t understand’ and that made me really angry.”

Caleb’s frustration eventually fuelled his confidence to take his concerns to one of the highest leaders of the church.

“They were like, ‘since you already have these kinds of questions, and you really are doubting the doctrine, you can just leave’,” Caleb recalled.

But it didn’t come without SCJ members – some of which were Caleb’s friends – from shutting him off.

“Everyone that I‘ve known for the past two years blocked me on everything. So I was in the first few weeks (of leaving) quite distressed,” he said.

“I felt very sad because I put in so much effort for the church when I could have been focusing on my career … my friends were all about to graduate, but I still had two years left.

“I wasted so much time on something that wasn‘t even real – something I believed to be real, but it wasn’t real.”

Have a similar story? Get in touch – rebecca.borg@news.com.au

Shincheonji Church in Melbourne

Caleb’s confession about the church comes as dozens of Melburnians report being approached by Shincheonji members while at train stations, shopping centres and even universities in recent months.

Anjile, a 20-year-old university student from the state’s west, was approached multiple times by different girls “in groups of two” while at Watergardens shopping centre in September last year.

“My initial thoughts were quite neutral. They approached me in an unthreatening way, and were young girls in their late teens to early 20s, and asked questions that at first didn’t evoke any suspicions,” she told news.com.au.

“It seemed like a very normal interaction that could be had at any time, and I was happy to talk to them, however, when I was approached a second and a third time I started to get a little irritated and suspicious because the interaction was becoming quite repetitive with an obvious intent.”

Anjile said they’d ask her questions regarding good places to visit in the shopping centre and commented on the necklace she was wearing.

“They proceeded to ask if I was religious to which I said no, and I explained that (the necklace) was a gift from a family member when I actually practised Islam,” she said.

“They also gave me compliments and were quite inquisitive of me but the conversation ended quite quickly after I told them I was Muslim.”

More recently, members of Facebook group Melbourne Gal Pals have also come forward with concerns they’d been approached by a “cult”.

“In the past month, I’ve had two of those cult people come up to me at Highpoint (shopping centre) and it is so uncomfortable!!” a member posted.

“I was walking through Highpoint on my phone and (a lady) stopped me asking for help … She then proceeded to ask me questions that started to totally creep me out … and tried to get my number.

“I obviously made up an excuse to not give it to her, I told her that I’m moving overseas soon so she could stop trying … I’m not 100 per cent sure if it is actually a cult thing, but it needs to stop!”

The post received many comments from other members who shared similar experiences, with one woman saying she was approached at Southern Cross Station.

“I am Christian, so I did end up going to a few of their ‘bible studies’ (but I) dropped it because I could see so many red flags with what they were preaching,” she said.

“They blamed exhaustion on the devil and pretty much tried to separate you from family … they’re extremely manipulative and often target young females under the guise of friendship.”

Is Shincheonji dangerous?

After reflecting on the last two years he spent with the Shincheonji church, Caleb agrees he fell victim to the group.

But ultimately the university student hopes by sharing his story, people will come to understand Shincheonji is just “an illusion” that can be “quite dangerous”.

“I don‘t want people to waste their effort or waste their time on something that’s never going to benefit them,” Caleb said.

“It affects people‘s mental health … people inside confessed to me like they felt quite suicidal … and it is very dangerous.”

*Name Changed for privacy reasons