A lone woman stands barefoot on a plastic sheet in meditation outside a Chinese government office in Hong Kong. Spiritual songs and sermons are being heard on the speaker next to him.
She is protesting alone against the Chinese government’s ill-treatment of the followers of the cult called ‘Falun Gong’.
Earlier, she did not protest alone at this place, but many followers of the Falun Gong sect also took part in the protest with her. But China imposed a national security law in Hong Kong in 2020 that made it easier to prosecute protesters, and since then Falun Gong followers have not dared to protest again. However, this woman is not afraid of this law.
The situation of Falun Gong followers has become so bad that nowadays they don’t openly identify themselves as followers of the sect and you have to go outside of Hong Kong to find them.
Falun Gong practitioners meditate in a flat on the top of a residential building on the outskirts of Taipei, the capital of Taiwan.
They are reciting the teachings of Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Gong, in unison. The picture of the founder of this sect is displayed on the wall in the room and his words and sentences are echoed in this room.
In this independent country away from the influence of China, the followers of this sect are living without any fear or danger.
It has been more than two decades since Falun Gong was banned by the Chinese government. China called it an ‘evil cult’.
The Falun Gong says its members face persecution and forced labor in China. They also allege that they are killed to harvest their organs.
The Chinese government has denied the allegations, but an independent international tribunal has found the allegations ‘credible’.
An interim decision of the tribunal issued in 2018 stated that ‘the members of the tribunal are without doubt unanimous in their belief that the organs of peaceful prisoners who have expressed their views have long been forcibly removed and There are a large number of victims of this process.’
The Falun Gong is said to be the most organized opposition group to the Chinese government. But what is this sect?
“It’s a spiritual movement or belief,” says Li Ao, a local leader of Falun Gong in Taiwan. It consists of both knowledge and action.
“To us, he is a god,” says Mr. Wang, a local businessman, expressing his views on the sect’s founder, Wang Flingong. That’s how it looks to me. To us they are like Jesus or God. In our opinion, their level of knowledge is very high.
Wang and his wife, Chen, have been involved with the cult for more than a decade.
“Falun Gong is a miracle,” says Chen. Chen was diagnosed with hepatitis B two decades ago.
She says that after attending a Falun Gong concert, something happened to her that even medical experts could not understand. She claims that small itchy red spots appeared on her body and when they disappeared, her illness also disappeared.
She says, “I felt that Master Lee (Babi of the sect) cleansed my body.” I am very thankful to him for healing me. Many other patients, including cancer sufferers, recover.
However, there is no medical evidence to support Falun Gong’s disease claims.
Those who practice do not get sick. Mr. Lee tells us that we do not get sick because of the disease, but it is the practice of mikharva. You do not need to take medicine. There is no need for it.
The Chinese government says that these kinds of teachings (such as refusing to take medicine in case of illness) make Falun Gong too dangerous.
The Falun Gong movement says they are being defamed by state-level propaganda. But on the other hand, there is increasing criticism of the teachings of the sect’s founder, Li Hongzhi, about health and medicine.
Sam (pseudonym), a former member of the sect who did not want to be identified, told the BBC, “They (the founders) have made their image so that they can cure people’s diseases.” They use disease as a test of life and death. If people are saved from illness, their faith is strengthened that He (the Founder) healed them. And when other people die, it also strengthens their belief that they should strengthen their faith or else the same may happen to them.
He said, “I know several people who died due to lack of treatment.” I can say that if it were not for these teachings of Falun Gong, many of these people would still be alive today.
Falun Gong was founded in Northeast China in 1992. There was a time when this movement was considered beneficial to public health and was supported by the Chinese authorities.
Initially due to the ‘shigong’ present in this movement, it spread throughout the country. Shigong is a traditional Chinese method of posture and movement, breathing and meditation.
In the late 1990s, the Falun Gong claimed to have more followers than members of the Chinese Communist Party. In 1999, the founder of Falun Gong estimated that he had 100 million followers worldwide.
According to the American non-governmental organization Freedom House, even today it is believed that there are two to four million followers of this movement, while the teachings of this sect are practiced secretly in China.
Thousands of people in China have taken part in protests against state interference in the group’s affairs and alleged persecution of sect members, prompting a severe state crackdown on them.
The Chinese authorities claimed that the movement was anathema to society. Critics say the authorities were threatened by the growing popularity and influence of Falun Gong and became determined to eradicate the spiritual group.
Falun Gong claims to have followers in 70 countries and its teachings have been translated into 40 languages, but its members are troubled in the country where the movement was founded.
“We believe that the Communist Party is evil,” Weng says. For this, they suppress Falun Gong.
The Falun Gong denies accusations by Chinese authorities that the movement is dangerous because it prevents its members from taking medicine.
“Our views on illness may be different from others, but we don’t have any teachings that say you shouldn’t go to the hospital,” says local leader Li Ao.
“Illness is the result of a negative action and it happens when you do something bad to someone, or something is done that is morally wrong,” he said. So there is no benefit in taking medicine.
Sam says it is a matter between two unreliable organizations. He says that the Chinese authorities rightly criticized Falun Gong at first, but later went into things they cannot believe.
“Folun Gong presents itself as a group of non-health-conscious people who just want to do what they want and develop spiritually,” he says. But Falun Gong is not such an organization. It is an organization that is very strict.
The founder of the movement, Li Hongzhi, is believed to be currently residing in the United States. Sam criticizes him too, and he’s not alone. Experts say that most of Li Hongzhi’s teachings are taken from science fiction.
The higher teachings of Falun Gong actually speak of an extraterrestrial life on earth. They claim that their members are on a journey back to ‘space’.
But the journey is not great or good for followers.
“Earth is not a destination where everyone must live forever,” says Li Ao.