Sydney, Australia - Awareness post of “non denominational” bible study
Hey guys, i'm a long time lurker on reddit, but i've decided to make a post after quite some time in regards to a particular bible study in Sydney as they are literally Harassing me after i had left their group. This is kind of an awareness post but also a bit of a rant since i'm actually annoyed, frustrated and honestly just a bit angry now. I'll start with the beginning of my journey and post a tl;dr at the end. I'll try and post the most relevant information about the group at the bottom as well.
Sometime at the start of 2018, i was somewhat coerced into joining a bible study. Initially someone had approached me in townhall and had me attend one of their events in which case i profoundly refused many times but eventually decided to since they had gone out of their way to invite me and i thought it would be a one time thing. At that point i was very clueless as they hadn't mentioned anything about God, or Jesus or Bible study. I had met up with 2 people (which is a tactic they use, because power in numbers i suppose, unless they're a "veteran" in the group), and we spoke for somewhat of an hour, which they then invited me to their "bible study". I said i would give it a go one time and that would probably be it as i was not interested in having a life of faith outside my own church.
I then had attended this bible study which i later found out was a kind of PRELIMINARY SCREENING, for the actual "class", but here's where it gets weird. Because i knew people going to that class, they had postponed me attending with this particular group of people since i knew 2 of them in that group, and had "placed" me with a Korean Bible study teacher/missionary for some time (this was actually towards the end of 2017) until the next "official" class as they did not want me to "lead" or be "lead" astray just in case we had found out the origins of this group(which i will specify evntually).
So at this point i was genuinely interested, i thought it was a bit weird at first but said, hey whatever, i hadn't really tried anything like this type of "bible study" beforehand, where they essentially say "everything we teach is from the bible" and they strictly explain things from the bible, using verses in the bible. Once again, another weird thing, when confront with "who taught you these things" or "where do you originate from" to the said Korean teachers, they will generally say something like "we will tell you eventually as it's part of the course" etc. i took this without any doubt and kept on going. The Korean missionary lady had then told me about this "8 month course" thing, where they teach you the bible, and out of curiosity i decided to attend.
In the class they taught about things like, the fruit of knowledge of good and evil and tree of life, or john the baptist, the meaning of parables, and other things such as the meaning of, seed, fire, fasting, 4 types of fields, bowl, the meaning of manna, and other parabolic meanings of the sort. Also as part of the class they showed movies such as passion of the christ, or an indian indie movie called "black" and "PK", as comparisons to your life of faith. They always stress that if your pastor says that if they're not sure or seem to have a lack of understanding of these type of questions in regards to the meanings of those parables mentioned above, then they're not a "true pastor of god" and essentially say that you should leave that church. At this point in time i was obviously having doubts because of specifics reasons such as, we didn't know where these teachings come from or, how do we know that these teachings are just some random bits of interpretation (that obviously anyone could thing of) that they were conveying to us, all we knew was that "if it's in the bible, it's from god".
8 months later of essentially rinse and repeat, and eventually they taught us "revelation", where they had revealed to us the "promised pastor" who at the time, was quite a big shock. Turns out this korean bible study is SCJ or also known as Shincheonji, And the promised pastor is Man Hee Lee, Who also leads HWPL, IPYG, and IWPG.
For months i had been doubting this group, and i kept saying to myself "it's fine, i'm sure it's not as bad as it seems". I guess i was in kind of a denial that, yeah, this was a freaking cult. They pretty much preach that they are heaven on earth, and that as long as you are with them, and go through this whole "graduation" ceremony, then you are registered in the "book of life" and will obtain eternal life etc.
Come 2019, obviously quite shaken, i had left the group at the start of the year, due to obvious reasons, and now they are showing up at my workplace (i wasn't going to mention this as they would confront me, but i don't care anymore, I've really had enough and i want to get them off my case), messaging me, honestly, annoying the heck out of me with constantly wanting to harass me at my workplace and "meet up with me". I don't see these people as friends, i would have considered it, but the fact they are showing up at my workplace, harassing me with questions and dive into my private life like they didn't just lie to me for 8 months to a year, really ruffles my jimmies. I've spoken with other people who had left the group far earlier than me, and they all feel the same way, however in my case it's different as they are actively going out of their way to "see" me and contact me.
At this point i have no intention of returning to any church at all, or participating in any church or religious activities. This has honestly traumatised me, furthermore with their harassment. How can i go along with my daily life without worrying about these people showing up to my workplace and trying to contact me?
Relevant information about the group
As far as i'm aware, they have "centres" in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne. Their main centre is at Central, kippax street, and i hear they're going to be opening one at parramatta.
The normally go around and do, what they call "fishing", which is to approach people and ask them if they are either interested in an Event or Bible Study, And they do this around the city, Parramatta, Blacktown (sometimes but i hear it will be more frequent), chatswood, and that's all i can recall.
Most of the group obviously consists of Koreans.
I believe they normally frequent universities such as USYD, UTS, University of Notre dame, and i've been hearing they have been actively going to churches and trying to coerce people into coming to their bible study.
The "event's" they host normally are "talent shows" of some kind of a "board game/ casual/Chill out" kind of gathering, which i believe they would host on weekends, normally Saturdays around 4pm? depending since they have "class" in the morning.
The normally run "classes" on 2 different times, 3 days a week, Monday, Wednesday, Friday, or Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday(morning), every other day i believe would be 6pm - 10pm roughly speaking.
They have "service" on Wednesdays and Sundays, as they believe it's in the bible to have service on the 3rd and 7th day of the week.
If they successfully "fish" someone, they will lodge their details, so name and phone number into one of their little excel sheets and try to contact you for a "meeting" or "coffee gathering" to try and obtain details about yourself, such as your schedule, availability, occupation, whether or not you're active in your church, etc.
They are a part of IPYG, IWPG, and HWPL, and if you ever see any of these groups having an event, the majority of the people will most likely consist of people from shincheonji.
I've heard they've been ongoing in Sydney for maybe around, 10 years or so?
The questions they would ask when "fishing" would be random things about "do you know this from the bible" or, "i'm practising my English so i can go overseas to be a missionary, can we meet up", "can i ask you a quick question? over x amount of years, christianity in australia has been on a decline". These are the type of questions they will ask, and then they will then try and make small talk to see if you are, Local in australia (PR,Citizen etc), your background, and if you're christian.
I'm not too sure if i've missed any relevant information so, if you comment a question i'll try and answer if i remember. I've was doing the study for roughly over a year before leaving so i would believe I was more or less involved (unwillingly at many points).
Pretty much, be aware of who approaches you if you're in Sydney, Melbourne, or Brisbane, if they're christian and randomly try probe questions from you.
tl;dr; joined a cult, and left, now they are harassing me by showing up to my workplace when i told them i want nothing to do with them, here's some general information to be wary of.
EDIT: If this posts gets immensely downvoted (although this is just an awareness post mainly), it may be because of the people from SCJ, as part of their "service" or religious activities as well, is to "heal the internet" but promoting their group as one that is good, so what they have done in the past, is gone on google, and reported search results with specific words such as "cult scj" or something of the sort. They've also removed posts off of facebook, and have downvoted other posts on Reddit so that it does not show up, when newcomers from the group, may "google search" SCJ or Sydney christian bible study.
EDIT #2: 07/11/2019 One of my mates apparently has had his friends poached and some of his older ex-church friends who are within SCJ, have now gone to SA under the guise of either study or work. Not sure if it means that it's legit or it means they're now expanding in SA but who knows. Apparently one of them has told his parents he'd be living in SA for uni and then told his friends that he'd be living there for work now.
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