Unification Church, Japan, Legal, Abuse, Sarah Lawrence, Larry Ray, Documentary,Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
"Sun Myung Moon, the late founder of the Unification Church, said in a sermon in 2005 that hundreds of households of the religious group's members helped elect former Japanese Foreign Minister Hirofumi Nakasone, the Mainichi Shimbun has learned.
"More than 300 households of Unification Church members participated in the election" to get Nakasone elected, Moon said during the address. The comments were confirmed following the Mainichi Shimbun's translation of Moon's Korean-language sermon records.
Nakasone, 77, a House of Councillors member of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), is the eldest son of the late Yasuhiro Nakasone, who served as prime minister of Japan between 1982 and 1987. Hirofumi was first elected to the upper house in 1986, when his father was still in office as prime minister, and is currently in his seventh term, chairing the upper chamber's Commission on the Constitution.
In the 615 volumes of sermon records, Yasuhiro Nakasone was mentioned most frequently among past Japanese prime ministers, as earlier reported by the Mainichi Shimbun. The latest discovery points to the possibility that the Unification Church, now formally known as the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, had connections with the Nakasone family over two generations."
The Daily Beast: 'Stolen Youth,' Hulu's Sarah Lawrence Sex Cult Doc, Stands Apart From the Worst of True Crime
"The case of the Sarah Lawrence College cult is peak true-crime fodder, to the point where it's gotten two separate docuseries in the past five months. The version of the story as told by Peacock's salacious September release Sex, Lies, and the College Cult was especially tantalizing. A bunch of college co-eds fall under a dad's spell, leading them to move into a one-bedroom apartment with him, have sex with each other, and endure emotional and physical abuse for years.
That doc, however, was a tacky reduction of this specific story. Larry Ray, who was recently sentenced to 60 years in prison for sex trafficking, conspiracy, and 13 other charges, preyed upon a specific set of people: twentysomethings dealing with mental health issues; men and women of color butting up against societal pressures of being underprivileged; kids still figuring out their sexuality. Each of the college kids who Ray blackmailed, abused, and brainwashed was particularly susceptible to his manipulation.
Hulu's new series Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult of Sarah Lawrence is the first version of this lurid yet intoxicating crime story that recognizes this. And that's most apparent in how Stolen Youth gives the most heartbreaking victims of Ray a human story—allowing them to speak up, on camera, free of their tormentor's presence and influence.
In the initial reporting on the Larry Ray/Sarah Lawrence case, Felicia Rosario emerged as the most heart-wrenching example of Ray's psychological damage. In 2010, 27-year-old med school grad Rosario met Ray through her college-age brother Santos; Santos was dating Ray's daughter Talia when he entered the toxic clique. Ray and Felicia quickly struck up a powerful, emotionally wrought relationship, leading to Felicia ditching her residency program in L.A. to move in with Ray, her brother, and the other kids; Felicia and Santos' sister Yalitza had also joined by this point.
Felicia's story stood out among the others for both how much and how long she endured Ray's abuse. Perhaps it was that she seemingly sacrificed the most by giving up on her dreams to become a psychiatrist that made her such a compelling figure—or perhaps it was the irony that a budding psychiatrist could so swiftly fall for a master manipulator like Ray. Either way, footage of Felicia is the most disturbing to watch of all the tape that Ray recorded over the near-decade he held his captives as psychological prisoners. (Why people like Ray or other recently nabbed cult leader Keith Raniere document their abuses so thoroughly, I'll never understand.)"
Deseret News: Perspective: What happens when the religiously illiterate are asked about Latter-day Saints
"Several months ago, on the Joe Rogan podcast, comedian Whitney Cummings mentioned a documentary she had seen about child abuse perpetrated by Warren Jeffs, leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
In the course of the conversation, she asked why "we're not all storming Salt Lake City to get these girls out" and wondered whether she was "going to get a dart in the neck (because) there is so much fear around the Mormon Church."
It was clear she was completely oblivious to the fact that Jeffs' offshoot, polygamous, fundamentalist sect was completely different from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. (Which also doesn't use the term "Mormon" anymore.)
Despite this, at no point in the conversation was there any kind of pushback, correction or questioning from the host or on-site producer, who seemed equally oblivious (which isn't surprising since Rogan also once believed that Jews hold Jesus as a prophet).
The thing is, it's not just Rogan. A nationally representative survey showed that only one-third of respondents knew that Latter-day Saints can't have more than one wife, while only about half know that members believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God — despite "Jesus Christ" being part of the church's name.
And about a quarter believed that Latter-day Saints can't have blood transfusions. They can — that's a teaching of Jehovah's Witnesses.
The lack of knowledge is not just about Latter-day Saints either. Pew found that only about half of Americans could correctly identify Jesus as giving the Sermon on the Mount — even when given four options.
With religious literacy in the United States so abysmal, it's hard to know what to make of another recent poll that showed that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has one of the lowest favorability ratings of any faith — lower than Wicca and not far ahead of satanism."
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