Geelong Revival Centre, Australia, Legal, Paranormal Phenomena, Mormonism
"A Sunday school teacher who was jailed for sexually abusing nine children was protected by the leader of his fundamentalist church, after parents reported the abuse to him instead of police, a Victorian parliamentary inquiry has heard.
Catherine and Ryan Carey, former members of the Geelong Revival Centre (GRC), gave evidence at the first hearing of the parliamentary inquiry into the practices of cults and organised fringe groups on Wednesday.
The inquiry was established in April, after allegations of coercive practices at the GRC, as detailed in LiSTNR's investigative podcast series Secrets We Keep: Pray Harder. The church has not publicly commented on the allegations contained in the podcast.
Led by the legislative assembly's legal and social issues committee, the inquiry is not examining specific religious groups or their beliefs but rather the methods they use to attract and retain members – and whether those practices amount to coercion that should be criminalised.
Ryan told the inquiry the man had a valid working with children check at the time of the offending and described the government's screening process as a "Band-Aid on an amputee".
"He was convicted last year of molesting nine kids in the Geelong community and the parents that found out reported it to the cult leader – and this was in the judgment – instead of going [to] police," he said."
Two-thirds of Americans are skeptical of paranormal beliefs; none of eight concepts are believed by a majority.
"Americans are broadly skeptical about each of eight paranormal phenomena tested in a recent Gallup poll. Nearly half of U.S. adults, 48%, believe in psychic or spiritual healing. Slightly fewer, 39%, express a belief in ghosts, while between 24% and 29% say they believe in six other supernatural phenomena, including telepathy, communication with the dead, clairvoyance, astrology, reincarnation and witches.
For each of these paranormal phenomena, respondents were asked whether or not they believe in it or are unsure. Roughly one in five Americans are unsure about each of them, while at least half say they don't believe in clairvoyance (50%), reincarnation (50%), astrology (55%) or witches (60%)."
" ... These findings are based on a Gallup poll conducted May 1-18, 2025.
Americans' levels of belief in five of the eight paranormal phenomena are statistically similar to Gallup's 2001 readings. Gallup has previously asked about various paranormal phenomena in 1990, 1991, 1994, 1996, 2001 and 2005 surveys. Comparisons to some of these past data are complicated by whether the paranormal questions were preceded by questions about religion, which appear to influence the way people think about communicating with the dead and ghosts or spirits.
The 1994, 2001 and 2025 surveys included religion questions. A comparison of the 2025 results with those from 2001 shows that Americans' beliefs in paranormal phenomena are largely unchanged. The exceptions are six-percentage-point declines in belief in psychic or spiritual healing and clairvoyance, and a seven-point drop in belief in telepathy."
"Shelise Ann Sola grew up in a devout Mormon family in Tremonton, Utah. At 19, after being berated by her local bishop for being sexually active with her boyfriend, she began to question her faith, she told RNS.
Then, when she was 27, after leaving the church and moving to Las Vegas, memories of suffering sexual abuse as a child at the hands of her father resurfaced.
"I would wake up screaming and hyperventilating until I figured out what it was," Sola said.
Sola confronted her father soon after the memories began. He eventually admitted to the abuse when she was 32 — two weeks before her wedding, she said.
"It took five years for him to admit to everything," Sola, now 34, said. "But those are experiences that I can hold compassion for and have a better understanding of how to talk to survivors because of them."
Today, Sola is the host of Cults to Consciousness, a YouTube channel with 326,000 subscribers she runs with her husband and co-producer, Jonathan Rosales. Since the channel's launch in 2022, Sola has interviewed hundreds of survivors who escaped what she often described as "high-control" religious and/or spiritual groups, or more plainly, cults. Guests recount harrowing journeys through systems of manipulation, abuse and control by fear and exclusion in long-form interviews."
No comments:
Post a Comment