Terms from Consumer Law Used to Rob Faith

Human rights expert reveals shocking story of how lawyers involved in faith-breaking managed to persuade gullible Japanese judges to allow the use of consumer law to rob Family Federation

Patricia Duval, French attorney specialised in international human rights law, sent on 22^nd September 2024, a 29-page report titled “Japan: A Witch Hunt to Eradicate the Unification Church” to several UN offices. Bitter Winter, the leading international magazine on religious freedom and human rights published 3 days later, on 25^th September, an executive summary of the report. The day after, the magazine started publishing a 5-part series where Duval gives a more detailed description of the content.

Part 2 of comment on first article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series 

See part 1, part 3.

See part 1 and part 2 of comments on second article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series

See part 1, part 2, part 3 of comments on third article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series 

See part 1, part 2 of comments on fourth article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series

See part 1, part 2, part 3 of comments on fifth article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series

After pointing out Japan’s non-compliance with UNHRC suggestions, Patricia Duval in her above-mentioned 29-page report exposes in great detail the amazing and shocking grand scheme leftwing lawyers put into action in order to wipe out the Family Federation, formerly called the Unification Church.

Duval describes how for more than 30 years, large-scale faith-breaking was carried out with Unification Church members as victims, with the implicit approval of the Japanese authorities. The sheer magnitude of the faith-breaking led to what Duval depicts as “an avalanche of tort cases” – alleged civil wrongs that may have caused harm. Such civil cases were initiated by individuals who had once been members, but had been abducted, forcibly detained and become victims of faith-breaking. They were then coerced by professional faith-breakers and the National Network of Lawyers Against Spiritual Sales to sue the Unification Church, now called the Family Federation.

The network of lawyers was formed in 1987 and has been aligned with the Socialist and the Communist Party. Its goal was to fight the Unification Church, which actively opposed Communism at the time. One of the leftwing network’s key objectives was to prevent the passage of the Anti-Espionage Law, which was supported by the International Federation for Victory over Communism (IFVOC), an organization with the same founder as the Unification Church – South Korean Sun Myung Moon.

At the Network’s inception, attorney Hiroshi Yamaguchi, a prominent member, remarked that “money made from spiritual sales is being used to fund the Unification Church and the IFVOC’s efforts to enact the Anti-Espionage Law.” The lawyers of the hostile network claimed that funds raised by the church through so-called “spiritual sales” were being used to fight Communism.

“Spiritual sales” is an expression coined by those very same lawyers based on consumer law and refers to sales conducted by some church members – often through private businesses – of items like seals, statues, vases, and miniature pagodas at prices far exceeding their actual value. Similar practices can be found in other traditional religions, such as the Catholic Church.

The network of leftwing lawyers also applied the term “spiritual sales” to donations given to help the work of the Unification Church, arguing that the church “sold” eternal salvation by exploiting anxiety followers may have had. The lawyers made such claims specifically about the Unification Church even though concepts like hell and salvation are common in the majority of religions.

The term “spiritual sales” was deliberately chosen by opponents of new religious movements in order to classify donations to minority religions as consumer law issues, thus allowing donors to claim refunds under the pretext of fraudulent sales.

This approach was also seen in other countries, such as Germany in 1997. Then, a law was proposed which aimed to regulate “commercial services of assistance in overcoming life’s difficulties”. It was labeled by activists against new religious movements as “Psycho Contract Law”. However, the bill was abandoned after Lutheran and Catholic Church representatives expressed concerns that it would also restrict spiritual counseling services provided by their churches.

In Japan, the leftwing network of lawyers successfully convinced courts that donations to the Unification Church were likely made under coercion, claiming the church created anxiety to deprive donors of their free will. By applying consumer law principles, the network of hostile lawyers dismissed the religious faith of Unification Church members who collect donations (raise funds), arguing that their beliefs were merely a guise for profit-making.

All former members who were abducted, forcibly detained and exposed to faith-breaking, were subsequently referred to lawyers from the network fighting the Unification Church, either by their faith-breakers or their families, to file lawsuits against the church for “wrongful solicitation of donations and proselytizing”, seeking damages.

Masumi Fukuda, a sociologist and investigative journalist, conducted an in-depth investigation of the entire process of faith-breaking and interviewed a considerable number of members of the former Unification Church who had had their faith broken by so-called deprogrammers. Based on her findings, she sent a letter to the authorities, urging them to withdraw their request for a court order to dissolve the church, now called the Family Federation.

Patricia Duval writes,

“She [Fukuda] gave a figure of over 4,300 believers in Japan who have been abducted by physical violence or deception, locked up for long periods of time in apartments or other places, and not released until they abandoned their faith.”

Masumi Fukuda came to the conclusion that the majority of individuals who brought legal proceedings against the church alleging harm suffered and seeking compensation, were former members who had been forced through this inhuman faith-breaking process. On top of that, they were required by the lawyers to prove their genuine intent to leave the church by filing lawsuits.

Fukuda detailed how faith-breaking was followed by civil lawsuits for damages. She explained:

“In the 17^th century persecution of Christians in Japan, to save their life it was not enough for them to tell the authorities they had abandoned Christianity. They were asked to trample a painting of Jesus underfoot to prove they were no longer Christians. Similarly, now it was not enough for deprogrammed believers to state they were no longer members of the Unification Church. They should prove they had really left the church by claiming they had been ‘victims of spiritual sales,’ and filing lawsuits demanding that the church return the money they had paid for the items they had purchased, such as marble vases, two-stories pagodas, seals, and other items.”

Fukuda also highlighted how the lawyers from the network combating the Unification Church were deeply involved in the faith-breaking process. She noted that all those who ultimately renounced their faith were consistently directed to this network to pursue legal action against the church.

She writes that the activist network of lawyers played a significant role

“in this abduction and confinement business because they were the attorneys in the subsequent lawsuits filed by former believers against the church. There were lawyers who became rich through these cases, as did deprogrammers and Christian pastors involved in the abductions, who received substantial amounts of money from the relatives of the believers they deprogrammed.”

In some cases, the network’s lawyers were involved from the outset, as they were often the ones who advised families to pursue faith-breaking as a solution. Fukuda explains,

“When the lawyers were consulted by the believers’ parents, they first introduced them to the deprogrammers. If and when deprogramming was successful, the lawyers took over from the deprogrammers as ‘handlers’ of the former believers, made them plaintiffs, and filed lawsuits.”

The network fighting the Unification Church – including attorney Masaki Kito and journalists Yoshifu Arita and Eito Suzuki – continues to defend faith-breaking, claiming it was carried out to “protect” former members of the church.

See part 1, part 3.

See part 1 and part 2 of comments on second article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series

See part 1, part 2, part 3 of comments on third article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series 

See part 1, part 2 of comments on fourth article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series

See part 1, part 2, part 3 of comments on fifth article of Bitter Winter’s 5-part series

Text: Knut Holdhus

Featured image above: Japanese lawyers discussing consumer law. Illustration: Microsoft Designer Image Creator, 30th September 2024

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