Legal Cases, New Religious Movements, and Minority Faiths

James T. Richardson, François Bellanger, James T. Richardson, François Bellanger

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317106388
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Teología y religión
• Subtopic: Fundamentalismo y cultos religiosos

New religious movements (NRMs) and other minority faiths have regularly been the focus of legal cases around the world in recent decades. This is the first book to focus on important aspects of the relationship of smaller faiths to the societies in which they function by using specific legal cases to examine social control efforts. The legal cases involve group leaders, a groups' practices or alleged abuses against members and children in the group, legal actions brought by former members or third parties, attacks against such groups by outsiders including even governments, and libel and slander actions brought by religious groups as they seek to defend themselves. These cases are sometimes milestones in the relation between state authorities and religious groups. Exploring cases in different parts of the world, and assessing the events causing such cases and their consequences, this book offers a practical insight for understanding the relations of NRMs and other minority religions and the law from the perspective of legal cases. Chapters focus on legal, political, and social implications. Including contributions from scholars, legal practitioners, actual or former members, and authorities involved in such cases from various jurisdictions, this book presents an objective approach to understanding why so many legal actions have involved NRMs and other minority faiths in recent years in western societies, and the consequences of those actions for the society and the religious group as well.

PART I
Controversial Religious Groups and the Legal System

Chapter 1
Courts, Crusaders and the Media: The Family International

Claire Borowik

Introduction

The emergence of new religions throughout the second half of the twentieth century predicating alternative lifestyles and values, challenging the status quo and operating outside the mainstream has been met over time with a range of reactions from curiosity and tolerance to consternation and disapprobation. Throughout the second half of the 1970s and the 1980s, a social milieu of intolerance developed; the convergence of pressures brought to bear by countermovements, former member crusaders, and stigmatizing media culminated in some extreme attempts at social control through incidents of government intervention. These interventions were conducted on the grounds that the belief system and practices of the minority religion posed a danger to members and their children, as well as to the larger society. Consequentially, such interventions have placed the legal system in the precarious position of judging the beliefs and practices of new religions while weighing in the balance constitutional guarantees of freedom of religion.

During the early 1990s, dozens of communal residences of the Family International (originally known as the Children of God) on three continents were subjected to internationally publicized military-style raids, resulting in lengthy court proceedings. Hundreds of children were taken into state custody and subjected to rigorous physical, psychological and educational evaluations. Notwithstanding the initial prejudice and presumption of guilt that fuelled these state interventions, in the final accounting the higher courts on all three continents upheld the rights of individuals to their religious beliefs and affirmed that the children were not at risk due to the unconventional beliefs and lifestyle of the movement. At the heart of these cases has been the well-being of children, an incontrovertible concern and responsibility of any society. In their zealousness, however, authorities often overstepped the bounds of their authority, resulting in the rights of members being infringed upon and the very children they sought to ‘rescue’ being placed at risk. The trauma children have suffered from brutalizing raids, parental ruptures, the stigmatization of the media, and invasive psychological and medical procedures has rarely received serious reflection in the aftermath of such incidents.

The favourable outcomes of the Family International’s legal proceedings in the face of vexatious opposition have resulted in significant judicial precedents and provide hope for the future of religious tolerance in the legal forum. The rulings of courts in several countries in Family cases indicate that the legal protections and constitutional guarantees in democratic countries, if punctiliously observed, can serve to protect the rights of marginalized religious minorities. These protections and guarantees can provide the necessary balance between religious freedom and concerns for the well-being of children in the legal realm and uphold the religious rights of individuals insofar as these do not impinge on societal imperatives. The debate, however, has moved into cyberspace, with the public serving as jury, as popular media, crusaders and activists compete to claim ownership of public opinion and construct narratives that will ultimately define new religions. Doubtless, this new dimension of the religious debate portends to have a significant impact on the ability of new religions to successfully develop beyond their radical roots and controversial beginnings to take a place in the religious marketplace.

Historical Background

Born in the heat of the counterculture movement of the 1960s, the Children of God emerged as a large millenarian, world-rejecting communal movement at the moment in time where the Holiness Movement met the Psychedelic Movement (Bainbridge 1997: 219). While it came into being as an integral part of the Jesus People, the Children of God developed radical innovative beliefs that separated it from the movement early on (Richardson and Davis 1983). Subsequently, the Children of God would be considered the most controversial of the communal groups to emerge from the Jesus People movement (Miller 1999: 96). Despite never exceeding 10,000 adults in its 45-year history, its members zealously established communes and carried out evangelistic activities in over 90 countries (Davis and Richardson 1976).

The roots of the Family International can be traced to the Pentecostal revival of post-World War II. Both its founder David Berg (1919–94) and his wife and successor, Karen Zerby, were raised in evangelical Pentecostal churches. David Berg became disenchanted with organized religion and established churches, which he dubbed ‘churchianity’, and in his writings he often excoriated their accommodation to the world. He contended that the churches had been overtaken by the secularization of modern society to the point that modern denominational Christianity had little in common with the radical message and impassioned commitment of the early church that he sought to resurrect.

Berg embraced the anti-establishment message that resonated amongst the counterculture youth that were his target audience, which he referred to as the ‘lost generation’ (Berg 1973). His teachings berated the ‘System’ for its corruption and declared that its destruction was imminent. Revolutionary language was adopted, with Jesus being cast as the true revolutionary of all time and the Bible the handbook to spiritual revolution (Cowan and Bromley 2008: 123). With its sackcloth vigils and message of ‘Woe to America’, from its earliest days the Children of God was no stranger to controversy. The movement’s communal lifestyle, its radical message with anti-establishment themes and its unconventional doctrines and practices sparked opposition and negative media profiling from its earliest days. The Children of God is also credited with giving rise to the first ‘cult watch’ group, FREECOG (Free our Children from the Children of God), which would serve as the prototype for future anti-cult organizations (Shupe and Bromley 1994: 5).

Beginning in the mid-1970s, Berg’s writings challenged conventional sexual mores and taboos with the postulation of the ‘Law of Love’ doctrine and the subsequent development of liberal antinomian sexual practices. According to this doctrine, individuals were freed from the strictures of the Mosaic Law, inclusive of biblical prohibitions of adultery and sexual immorality, through faith in Christ. As such, heterosexual relations between consenting adults, regardless of marital status, were deemed lawful in God’s eyes to the extent that others affected by these actions were not hurt or offended (Richardson and Davis 1983). The development of the Law of Love doctrine led to a period of extensive theological exploration of sexual themes and experimentation, including the introduction of the controversial practice of ‘flirty fishing’. Flirty fishing, discontinued in 1988, was a form of evangelistic outreach that encouraged members to frequent clubs and recreational places to meet and proselytize members of the opposite sex, with allowance for members to engage in sexual intimacy as a tangible manifestation of God’s love.

During this period (1978–85), David Berg’s most polemical statements and speculations were published, challenging traditional moral boundaries for sexual relations, including those relating to minors, which ultimately led to incidences of adult/minor sexual interaction. In 1986, during the first Family international teen gathering, grave complaints were made by several teenage women of sexual misconduct by adult men. Subsequently, an early draft of a child protection policy was published, followed in 1989 by an excommunication policy for those found guilty of child abuse. An official policy statement was published in 1992 with strong denunciations of child abuse and exploitation, renouncing previously published literature at variance with this position. This policy was ratified in 1995 in the Family International’s Charter of Rights and Responsibilities, which would serve as the organization’s constitution.¹

From 1989 to 1994, the leadership worked to systematically expunge and remove from circulation any writings that could be construed to approve of aberrant practices, particularly relating to the sexuality of minors (Melton 1997: 55). In 1994, in compliance with a court stipulation in a custody hearing in England, acknowledgement was made by Karen Zerby of David Berg’s responsibility in predicating a sexually liberal doctrine while failing to institute necessary protections for minors.² In 2006, a series of internal documents entitled Family History, Doctrine, and Practices Regarding Sexuality candidly examined the Family International’s sexual history and made definitive statements regarding past errors in the interpretation of the Law of Love doctrine, culminating with a public apology to second generation members and former members.

We acknowledge that some of David’s writings misapplied the Law of Love to sexual contact between adults and minors, and as such were the direct cause of any misconduct that occurred at that time. This was rectified in 1986, when any sexual contact between adults and minors was banned. We regret that this policy was not in place during the earlier years of the Family to protect minors from hurt or harm. Sadly, because such rules were not in place, some of you experienced inappropriate sexual contact with adults, and we acknowledge that abusive actions occurred (Zerby and Kelly 2008).

As the public had gained a greater awareness of child safety and child protection concerns throughout the 1980s, the Family International had concomitantly undertaken measures to eradicate doctrine or practices that could place minors at risk and had begun retrenchment efforts to domesticate the sexual liberality of the late 1970s and early 1980s. By the early 1990s, the movement was approaching a relatively more conventional view on sexuality (Melton 1997: 11). In 2010, the application of the Law of Love doctrine to sexual relations between adults was ratified in principle at the Family International’s most far-reaching restructuring to date, known as the ‘Reboot’. However, the practice itself was significantly de-emphasized; in summarizing the current position, Zerby stated, ‘Applying the doctrine of the Law of Love to sex is no longer something that we will promote or encourage members to practice’ (Zerby 2010).

Notwithstanding the great pains taken in the late 1980s to address the errors of the past, these would have far-reaching consequences in the official investigations the Family International would face in the early 1990s. Family members would find themselves vulnerable to claims-making by counter-movements and detractors, in particular the claim that children in certain groups were being harmed ‘just by being in a group that adheres to certain beliefs and practices thought by some to be harmful to children’ (Richardson 1999: 175–6). Its communalistic lifestyle and home schooling of children, coupled with past sexually liberal doctrines and practices, and a relatively high degree of tension with the greater society would render the Family International susceptible to such collective claims. In the brief description of the cases that follows, it becomes evident that these concerns were elemental in instigating authorities to investigate and take action against Family communities. In the early 1990s, anti-cult organizations and detractors would collaborate to make grave claims of institutional child abuse, mobilizing authorities to take intrusive and draconian measures under the guise of concern for the well-being of Family children.

Brief Analysis of Governmental Interventions

From 1989 to 1993, predawn police raids were launched at dozens of Family International communal residences in Spain, Australia, France, and Argentina. Although there are significant differences in the development and resolution of each of these cases, more striking are the commonalities. Despite the variances in local culture, legal systems, geographical divides and constitutional expressions of freedom of worship, a similar pattern emerged in the investigations and subsequent legal proceedings.

The raids in Australia, France, and Argentina featured hundreds of heavily armed police officers forcibly entering communes in the dead of night (in some cases violently breaking down doors), accompanied by child protection agencies at the ready to take all the children into care. The media, previously alerted to the pending actions, were present to capture and broadcast images of the raids, which were accompanied by lurid sensationalistic headlines denouncing the group as a ‘sinister cult’ culpable of any number of pernicious acts. Self-proclaimed anti-cult ‘experts’ were consulted by examining magistrates and law enforcement and were interviewed by the media from the earliest stages. Their analyses of the movement, although lacking in empirical knowledge and parroting generalized popular rhetoric on ‘cultic’ groups came to be the primary source of information for law enforcement, as well as to inform the media’s reporting of the incidents and consequently public opinion.

Adult members were arrested and incarcerated on non-specific charges, and considered guilty by association without having been individually charged with any misdeeds. Traumatized children, having been aggressively whisked away to detention centres by child protection agencies, in some cases were not permitted to contact their parents for several days after the raids. Regardless of the outcomes of medical and psychological evaluations, social welfare authorities were determined to place the children as wards of the state or to appoint custody to relatives outside the organization (Richardson 1999: 178). Due to the lack of evidence to substantiate the complaints filed by anti-cult organizations and ex-members from which the raids originated, officials scrambled post-intervention to produce corroboratory evidence to justify their actions. In each of the cases, after examining, interrogating and observing the ‘rescued’ children, no evidence was found to support their actions or claims that the children were victims of neglect or abuse.

What was the net result of all these separate investigations following the terrorizing of large numbers of children and adults, mass arrests, imprisonments, custody placements, invasive examinations, and breakup of households? Not a single case against Family adults was upheld in courts of law within the various countries involved. Not one of the more than 600 children examined by doctors and psychologists in these countries was found to have been abused. In every country, in every case, parents and children were released from custody for lack of evidence and eventually reunited. (Shepherd and Shepherd 2011: 238)

An analysis of the Family judicial proceedings suggests that the concerted claims-making of anti-cultists and ex-members, coupled with a stigmatizing media, ultimately created a clime of ‘moral panic’.³ The resultant pressure brought to bear on the authorities by these convergent claims galvanized the authorities to respond disproportionately and to exceed the limits of their authority.

Argentina

In October 1989 commando-style raids were staged on two Family communal residences in Buenos Aires by scores of heavily armed police under the direction of examining magistrate Alberto Piotti.⁴ Twelve adults were detained for two weeks, while their 18 children were placed in state custody. The media had been alerted and were present for the initial stages of the raids, and broadcast images of officials throwing the movement’s religious literature on what looked to be a pyre for burning on the front yard. A custody dispute was at the heart of the intervention; an estranged husband, the father of two children residing in the community, sought the assistance of Argentine journalist, Alfredo Silleta, an activist committed to alerting the public to the dangers of what he referred to as the ‘invasion of the cults’. Silleta would later go on to found the Argentine anti-cult association FAPES (Fundacion Argentina para el Estudio de las Sectas – Argentine Foundation for the Study of Sects) in 1990. Based on the joint allegations of the estranged husband and Silleta, local police and social services officials were commissioned to launch the raids.

These proceedings formed the basis for three separate court actions: drug charges, child neglect, and corruption of minors. Considering the group’s historical disapprobation of the use of drugs, the presiding magistrate summarily dismissed the drug charges (Moldes 1990). The Minors Court judge returned the custody of the children to their parents, convinced that the children were healthy and not at risk or in need of intervention. In her ruling, she stated that it was her ‘sincere conviction that the minors found themselves in an environment fit for their physical and moral development; therefore the extreme conditions required for the court to intervene were not present’ (Mercedes 1989). The third case, addressing charges of corruption of minors was also dismissed in May 1990 (Korvez 1990). Social workers and physicians had found no evidence of abuse in the course of their examinations. The children had been required to take state examinations to ascertain their educational development and all passed these tests with high marks, impressing the judicial authorities and teachers, who went on record stating their satisfaction. Court officials who visited the homes also issued positive reports about the living conditions and the care afforded the children (Richardson 1999: 178).

Notwithstanding the positive results of these investigations, the third case (corruption of minors) would be reopened three and a half years later by federal magistrate Roberto Marquevich. A minor from the previous case (16 years old at the time of the 1989 case) claimed to have testified falsely under duress and reversed her testimony, making claims of widespread abuse of minors (Prack 1996: 18). Three embittered apostates, who played a role in instigating similar official interventions in other countries joined forces with José Maria Baamonde, the head of the Argentine counter-cult organization SPES (Servicio para el Esclarecimiento en Sectas – Service for the Elucidation on Sects) to file similar claims. Once again, the local chapters of the Family International found themselves under investigation.

For several years, the Argentine public had been alerted by the media to the threat ‘the proliferation of the cults’ represented; the stage was set for the largest action against Family communities to occur. The political stakes were high, as the less...