I'm interested in these religious organizations and their "ministers" or whatever they call themselves. It's not surprising the influence these church leaders have over their followings. A few days ago, a major cult figure was arrested and jailed June 24 for campaign election law violations in South Korea. Lee Man-hee is the "Chairman" of the Sincheonji (new heaven and earth) Church. I've got my open source analyst hat on this am, so please don't think I'm a "conspiracy theorist." This could all just be a pattern of coincidences caused by random incompetence, happenstance, ignorance, and greed, right?

First and foremost, is that Sincheonji resembles in several ways the Unification Church, aka the Moonies. Lee Man-hee claims a divine nature, messenger from god or something like that.

South Korean Sincheonji "missionaries" in Wuhan, China, were directly implicated in bringing covid from that city to South Korea, before the travel ban was implemented in South Korea, January 26, 2020. The cult leader, Lee and other top church members were charged with failing to comply with department of health directives, failure to cooperate with efforts to track infected persons. At the time I heard anonymous sources who claimed to be members say infected church members were ordered to hide their identities, not get treated, not cooperate with quarantines, etc. Lee was charged with violating health laws and consequently spreading the virus but was acquitted of that specific charge. He was however found guilty of embezzlement and obstruction of government affairs. He was sentenced to three years with a 4 years probation suspension along with a sizable fine. However, he did publicly apologize for the virus' spread following public anger. He appeared to play the dementia card very well. I don't know, I can't remember, etc.

I won't spend much time on this suspicious circumstance, which was never fully investigated. It took place during the Yoon administration. Police began behaving suspiciously at the scene of an attempted assassination of Lee Jae-myung almost immediately, destroying evidence. The day before, a Sincheonji member, "Mr. A" had been recorded on camera with the person who committed the assassination attempt on Lee Jae-myung, on January 2, 2024, at another venue Lee was expected to visit. The video showed Mr. A made a throat cutting gesture to Mr. Kim, the assailant during their conversation. Lee was hospitalized for a stab wound to the neck with a hunting style knife after Kim's attack in Busan. Lee was democratic party leader at the time, and is now the current president of South Korea. Mr. Kim told the police he wanted to keep Lee from becoming president. Mr. A when questioned by police absurdly claimed that he and Mr. Kim just met and conversed because they were Lee Jae-myung supporters.

Third, the latest charge against Lee Man-hee (no relation) alleges unlawful interference in the PPP party nomination process for president of South Korea in 2022, among other things, by the Sincheonchi organization and Lee Man-hee.

Just in: Lee Man-hee, the 95-year-old founder and chairman of South Korean sect Shincheonji Church of Jesus, has been detained over allegations he ordered more than 50,000 followers to join the opposition People Power Party to influence elections. https://t.co/aSKmTGjYWd

— Raphael Rashid (@koryodynasty) June 24, 2026

Here's the gist of it in a Yonhap news report, I used the google translator for the excerpt below:

국힘가입 압력' 95세 이만희 신천지총회장 구속…"증거인멸염려"

The arrest of the "pinnacle" of the Shincheonji-related allegations comes 169 days after the launch of the joint investigation headquarters of the prosecution and police on January 6 to investigate corruption allegations involving collusion between religion and politics.

Chairman Lee is accused of forcing his followers to join the People Power Party for the purpose of influencing the party's presidential and general election primaries from 2021 to 2024. Article 42 of the Political Parties Act prohibits coercing members to join or leave a political party.

The joint investigation headquarters believes that Shincheonji encouraged its followers to join the People Power Party under names such as the "Pilates Project" in each branch, and that at least 56,472 followers had joined the party as members.

I find the use of the expression "Pilates Project" interesting. I understand that Pilates was previously called "Contrology" by it's founder. The implication was use the mind to control the body. This is an analog for how a cult runs. In fascism, the volk or primary ethnic group associated with the concept of "nation," are viewed as a biological organism struggling for survival among hostile others. The authoritarian leader of the "movement" directs the followers following a parental model. Similarly, a cult leader and the cult cadre attract followers, particularly young or less educated followers by replacing parental authority. If the leader is divine with a direct connection to their god figure, who could have more authority?

Lee and Pastor Jeon Gwang-hun of the Sarang Jaeil Church, an entirely distinct religious organization, are a one-two punch in South Korean far right politics. Jeon took over where Lee left off.

The Volatile Mix Of A South Korean Church, Politics And The Coronavirus

At that time, Jeon was calling then President Moon Jae-in a "North Korean spy" while leading street demonstrations against Moon's administration. The script hasn't changed much since then, except now the focus has changed to calling the current Lee Jae-myung administration, one run by Chinese agents.

Both religious cult leaders were major supporters of Yoon Seok-yeol, the impeached and imprisoned former president. Other elements are the Unification Church, the Taeguki right wing militarist paramilitary, the student groups they sponsor, and the members of press-prosecution collusion clique (who's leader was former President Yoon). The latter group dominates the South Korean power structure on behalf of the vested chaebol, the family owners of corporate empires. Included in the clique are the beob-gae (the legal world) who are the judges, prosecutors, and lawyers who exist in a virtually closed society typically dominated by senior members. The top priority of the democratic opposition to this order, is to reform prosecution powers and if possible the judicial structure as well, to make it more accountable to the public and policy values of fairness, equity, justice and democracy, rather than its traditional self serving attributes as a caste of privilege in a nominally democratic republic. The media-prosecution collusion clique operate together to protect their own interests as well as those of the chaebol class, and prosecute their political opposition.

The Moonies and their leader Han Hak-ja, widow of Moon Sun myung, the nominal leader of the Unification Church, is also in confinement currently on bribery charges.

Leader of secretive South Korean church arrested in election influence investigation

Lee’s arrest came months after the arrest and indictment of Unification Church leader Hak Ja Han over allegations that she instructed church officials to bribe Yoon’s wife and a conservative lawmaker close to him in an effort to secure business favors. Han, widow of the church’s founder Sun Myung Moon, has denied the allegations.

An appeals court in April sentenced Yoon’s wife, Kim Keon Hee, to four years in prison after convicting her on various charges, including receiving luxury gifts from a Unification Church official.

There are all kinds of oddball political activity going on in South Korea recently. The purpose is obviously to bewilder, confuse and misdirect the South Korean public. The so called new right movement is trying to survive the takedown of the martial law conspirators now in prison. The current movement doesn't represent the normal trends since the dictatorship era was left behind. There are professors claiming the June 3 election ballot snafu represents the greatest crisis in democracy, blah, blah, blah. At the same time the Yoon "brief coup attempt" is trivialized and creepy arguments circulate claiming that the June 3 election ballot misfire "justifies" Yoon's earlier attempted coup. These specious arguments continue to be aimed at attacking the current administration's legitimacy.

There are relatively small demonstrations praising dictator Park Cheung-hee, promoting taking North Korea by force, restoring Yoon, driving out pro-Chinese communists in the government, etc. Most of these people carry US flags, as well as Taegeukis. Why do we need parties? Affecting a faux non-partisan posture, speakers ask can't there be only one unified party ? Many of them seem to reading off scripts. I saw one small group in front of a major university calling for South Korea-US-Japan unity, and unity between South Korea and Taiwan against the "CCP." A few speeches were in Japanese and Chinese respectively. Good luck with that message. All South Korean progressives, including the current administration and democratic leadership, are vilified as communists sympathetic to North Korea or China. The intent is obviously to destabilize and delegitimize the current South Korean government.

반대쪽으로 가면 만나는 사람들.
군가 "멸공의 횃불"을 좋아하는 윤석열 지지자들 https://t.co/N2kBh7uxBr pic.twitter.com/xAfVsbfHH4

— aqua (@aqua52043525) June 27, 2026

On one sign left, Picture of Yoon, martial law was right, unfair election.

On the formal US official side, General Brunson, the USFK/CFC commander in South Korea, is provoking the situation with respect to China-South Korea relations and the CFC OPCON issue which is regarded as an affront to South Korean autonomy. Brunson said that the wartime OPCON issue should not be determined by "political expediency." This accusation against the Lee administration is more like a confession coming from Brunson.

As far as commanders of the USFK go, Brunson has generated the most controversy and press coverage in Korea since Gen. John A. Wickham Jr., who served in the role from 1979 to 1983. https://t.co/zyzqDi3s8U

— The Hankyoreh (@TheHankyoreh) June 29, 2026

Brunson's logic doesn't hold water, even if taken at face value-

No, Seoul regaining OPCON won’t necessarily trigger a US troop withdrawal

I've been listening to a former Director of Kaesong Foundation, discuss how the "US is not allowing even the eyehole of a needle's space" for South Korean maneuver with respect to the North Korean issue. Kaesong joint industrial park and other cooperation with North Korea were shut down in 2017 after a North Korean nuclear test. When former president Moon Jae-in held summits with Kim Jong-un in 2018, he opened various North-South cooperation possibilities, including military, economic and exchange plans, aimed at relieving tensions on the peninsula. The US shut down these plans after the Hanoi Trump-Kim summit. "No daylight" was to be allowed between US and South Korean positions. Behind the scenes loomed threats of US sanctions against South Korea. After Yoon took power, anything left of those efforts such as the September 2018 military agreement with North Korea was summarily violated.

A true believer-

I saw some another video short, where a South Korean Yoon Again demonstrator, whose face was concealed not very well, who didn't appear all that young, at least thirty or older, was almost crying. He complained that the Americans had told him, they would help save Yoon. He then said, we've been here for weeks, where are they? One South Korean commentator I follow, suggested this American was probably Douglas Frank, a US election fraud theorist from the Trump camp, who arrived in Korea with Morse Tan to monitor the election. "Stop the Steal!" The South Korean political pundit alleged on his talk show that Frank had said, "if you can get the number of demonstrators to 30,000, the Americans will intervene." The commentator also reported that the conservative opposition PPP leader met with Frank recently while on a trip to the US.

The cult in North Korea and it's Christian origins?

Interestingly enough, there is a book being praised this year in the all the "right places." called Korean Messiah, by Jonathan Cheng, which follows Kim Il Sung's life and rise to power in North Korea. The thesis is that his exposure to western missionary Christianity in his early family life, had great influence on the personality cult style communism he fostered in North Korea. Cheng has a peculiar focus on "North Koreans" as being particularly susceptible to the cult Kim fashioned, that continues to this day. I listened to an hour long video discussion on his new book, promoted by the Asia Society, but haven't read the book. It seems to have a particularly orientalist bent, looking down on the naive or stupid North Koreans. Attributing to western Christian influence and a "North Korean" character foible, the political culture in North Korea which continues to this day. My reactions are these:

Kim Il Sung was trained and lived in Soviet Russia, which initially played a great role in establishing Kim's communist rule. At the time, Stalinism was rife in Russia. I didn't hear Cheng mention either the Taiping rebellion in China, nor the later Tonghak rebellion in Korea, both in the 19th Century, which while reactions to some degree to earlier Christian missionaries, were heterogenous in nature, representing indigenous religious, social and cultural influences. I don't know how these mainstream historical trends could be avoided in a presentation of a historical thesis on Kim's cult of personality and the associated ritual and public behavior in North Korea to this day. The main social influences I see in the indigenous influences are widespread illiteracy and poverty, massive social inequity and dislocation, and a consequent deep desire for a common bond to reestablish a sense of community and stability.

This link below better expresses the appeal of the Tonghak movement at the time.

Salvation through Dissent: Tonghak Heterodoxy and Early Modern Korea

The Taiping rebellion in China earlier in the mid nineteenth Century presaged the later Tonghak rebellion in Korea which shared some of its dynamics. Clearly, the Taiping movement was of religious nature. I'll leave it to readers, if anyone made it this far, to visit on their own its characteristics as a revolution with syncretic roots. Perhaps I'm wrong about Cheng's thesis. Will I read the book to be sure? Probably not. I'll read the work of other historians first I think, before I read the work of the Wall Street Journal reporter.

Jonathan Cheng on North Korea’s Past and China’s Present

I saw this poem a few weeks ago, by a South Korean resistance leader who opposed the South Korean dictatorships of the past. He spent ten years in prison, as a result. The poem is Firefly by Kim Nam-ju:

On the empty field
darkness thickens.
To my ears, water flows.
The sound is clear,
and a firefly on a grass field
stays awake and
flickers on and off.

Firefly, don’t sleep.
If your light disappears in this night,
who can I befriend?
With whom can I spend these dark times?

The night deepens
and at last
the eastern sky brightens.

The firefly has disappeared
and only I remain, alone—
at the end of darkness
I greet the morning that brightens.

The dew dangling on the grass
looks beautiful in the morning sunlight.

Someday in heaven
I will live as a poet
who sings about you, firefly,
reincarnated as the dew.

Translated by Chae-Pyong Song and Anne Rashid

I wanted to share this old Chinese aphorism on the value of expressing gratitude- I found it in a beginner Chinese language text. I went to an online source to get the characters:

The proverb has roots in classical Chinese texts. A similar sentiment appears in the Book of Han (汉书), completed around 111 CE, which quotes a letter saying: “Receiving a drop of grace, one should repay with a spring” (得人滴水之恩，当涌泉相报).

Proverbs Hub