Half of Japan's LDP lawmakers had ties with Unification Church

https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/Unification-Church-and-politics/Half-of-Japan-s-LDP-lawmakers-had-ties-with-Unification-Church

by rntn • 4 years ago

251 250 4 years ago

asia.nikkei.com

realce• 4 years ago

This feels a lot like that "witches coven" from SK a few years ago. Are cults really that influential in Asia?

thematrixturtle2• 4 years ago

Yes, they are. The LDP (Japan's ruling party) is quite openly in coalition with Komeito, the political wing of Soka Gakkai, a prominent Buddhist-ish cult.

PaulHoule4• 4 years ago

Japan had a cult crisis circa 1990. This was the most famous example

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aum_Shinrikyo

however as the bubble economy popped there was a moral panic over financially exploitative cults and closely related multilevel marketing scams.

zumu• 4 years ago

I lived in a Soka Gakkai heavy neighborhood in Tokyo. They tried to recruit me a few times. I've been to their services and social events. It's big thing. They even have offices world-wide, with a few in Cali.

Generally while it's pretty culty, it doesn't do any of that cut-ties with non-culters and its beliefs are derived from Nichiren Buddhism which is pretty standard in Japan. As a result it peacefully exists out in the open for the most part. Not defending it, but it walks a fine line between religion and culty cooporation more so than the normal "cult".

Larrikin• 4 years ago

Generalizing Asian countries is usually as useful as generalizing Canada, the US, and Mexico as just North American countries. There are some extremely high level things you can point out, but it's often useless to try and come to conclusions about the group as a whole.

earthboundkid2• 4 years ago

Generalizing North America is a totally worthwhile thing to do. Why would it not be? They all have legacies of colonialism, racism, Western education, etc. Obviously, Mexico is more like the rest of Central America than the US and Canada, but so what? Japan is more like the Koreas than it is like Cambodia.

Der_Einzige• 4 years ago

Take mexico out and add the other anglos and you've got yourself a good an acceptable generalization!

eunos2• 4 years ago

East Asian society somehow went almost uncontrollable with cults. Yellow turban, Taiping, Aum Shinrikyo and now this.

SpaceManNabs• 4 years ago

qanon is getting a good run with. same cult-political nexus too.

purim2• 4 years ago

Think you are tad exaggerating things for sensationalism here, there is nowhere near the level of cult behaviour you describe. Aum Shinrikyo was a small group. There are other religious groups but they aren't extremists. I would argue that there are far more Christian sect groups in the States who are armed.

yongjik4• 4 years ago

Umm, the yellow turban rebellion happened in 184 AD. It's like saying West Europe can't control cultists and citing Celtic druids.

thematrixturtle2• 4 years ago

I'm continually amazed that Abe's assassin appears to have successfully turned the media spotlight exactly where he wanted it to be, and so successfully turned public sentiment against Abe that a vast majority of the population now opposes a state funeral for him.

oxff• 4 years ago

Someone over at Twitter called it the most successful robloxing in a while for this exact reason.

deepdriver• 4 years ago

Is "Robloxing" the new "but in Minecraft?"

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/in-minecraft

ajay-d• 4 years ago

It really astounding how much of a success it was. Related article and discussions:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32571989

PaulHoule4• 4 years ago

Japan is a strange place. Polls show very low trust in the government, but the LDP has been in power since WWII almost continuously. A low faction of Japanese people claim to "believe in God" but Japanese participate in religious rituals at a high rate.

Abe was controversial because he wanted to amend Japan's pacifist contribution which is a huge can of worms. Because Japan is so culturally homogeneous I think they'd have a very easy time picking an outgroup to blame for problems.

blowski2• 4 years ago

A low faction of Japanese people claim to "believe in God" but Japanese participate in religious rituals at a high rate.

Most people in the UK celebrate Christmas, including atheists.

beebmam• 4 years ago

Because Japan is so culturally homogeneous I think they'd have a very easy time picking an outgroup to blame for problems.

The US is the opposite, and its diversity doesn't stop them from doing it. Often, fully justified too, like in the case of the Soviet Union or Communist China. So I'm not very persuaded by this reasoning.

kadoban2• 4 years ago

A low faction of Japanese people claim to "believe in God" but Japanese participate in religious rituals at a high rate.

Wouldn't both a Buddhist and a believer in Shintoism tend to answer no to "belief in God"?

Also my impression is that the Japanese are generally just into rituals, they don't seem to need much excuse.

082349872349872• 4 years ago

...but the LDP has been in power since WWII almost continuously.

My impression is that gerrymandering initially associated with the Reverse Course[0] has much to do with those electoral results.

(But maybe not? A cursory search turns up an article[1] complaining that voters in a rural district had —only— twice the voting power of urban voters, which certainly sounds inferior to the extent of US practise)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_Course

[1] https://www.eastasiaforum.org/2022/04/29/fixing-japans-gerry...

bamboozled• 4 years ago

No real opposition.

Just factions within the LDP.

coliveira4• 4 years ago

Belief in gods and participation in rituals are different things. Japanese people are very traditional, they like to maintain the rituals of their predecessors. However, this doesn't imply that they believe in traditional gods. This may be strange for people that grew up on Christianity, but it is natural once you stop believing in supernatural beings.

thanhhaimai• 4 years ago

A low faction of Japanese people claim to "believe in God" but Japanese participate in religious rituals at a high rate

This is similar to what we have in Vietnam.

A very large portion of the country, last estimated about 80%, consider themselves atheists. They don't believe God exists, and they are superstitious only in a joking way.

However, most of us also go to the temple for "religious activities". It's not because people truly believe in God, but because many traditional activities like Tet holidays (Lunar New Year), funerals, or anniversaries have usually associated with them. Also, people don't mind going to the temples even when they don't believe in God because the temples are much more relax (chill/zen). When I was young, I visit the temple myself just to chill and enjoy the scenery despite having no association with Buddhism.

bell-cot• 4 years ago

..."believe in God"...

In context (modern Japanese, capital-G "God"), I suspect that phrase would generally be interpreted to mean "believe in the monotheistic God of Christianity and other Western/Middle Eastern Abrahamic religions".

supercheetah• 4 years ago

Is it that unusual? LDP is a conservative party that holds a majority with the voting public, and the opposition to conservatives everywhere is often much more fractured.

wahnfrieden3• 4 years ago

less strange, more that you are projecting when you say a country with behaviors that appear like unfamiliar paradoxes to yourself is itself a strange place, instead of it being yourself that is the stranger

boxed4• 4 years ago

very low trust in the government, but the LDP has been in power since WWII almost continuously

US Congress has an almost 80% (!!!) disapproval rating. https://www.statista.com/statistics/207579/public-approval-r... yet people are basically lifers in there. The Japanese system was largely modeled after the US, so seems logical...

fomine34• 4 years ago

One of the reason is election system is bad. People in 1990s wanted to have two big party like US so they introduced single-seat constituency system but it's failed. One big party (LDP) and other smaller parties is current situation. One big party don't want to change current system for obvious reason.

Kukumber2• 4 years ago

I don't know why do you push this foreign view on their country (i kind of know, i'm just trying to be playful, hopefully you got the reference), maybe you have a specific agenda, i won't comment on it

However i'll remind you that for the majority of Japanese, Abe is a 'traitor' (their word) [1]

[1] https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/abe-ignores-cont...

yorwba2• 4 years ago

Seems like you linked the wrong article.

tjpnz• 4 years ago

I've lived here for close to a decade and was stunned by the reaction from the press. Even the NHK (which is a well known LDP mouthpiece) started covering the Unification Church angle early on. People like to bash the state of journalism here but I think this shows it to be worthy of more credit.

lostlogin2• 4 years ago

Covering it after 60-70 years?

At least they got there I suppose.

Sin2x• 4 years ago

This speed implies they knew about the state of affairs a long time ago but couldn't speak then, so that's not much of a credit to the country.

skhr0680• 4 years ago

I'd question if public sentiment was ever pro-Abe; he regularly antagonized and taxed the middle class while doing little or nothing to help them, even during the COVID pandemic. His connection to the Moonies is just the icing on the cake. Everyone has a relative or knows someone who lost all their money to a cult.

maybelsyrup4• 4 years ago

Don't forget his strong family ties to psychotic Japanese fascism and racism [1,2], and his personal affinity for heinous war crimes and human experimentation in Imperial Japan [3].

Imagine your next door neighbor going out in public wearing a Dr. Mengele t-shirt and you start to get Abe's vibe. Complete ghoul.

I know the Japanese aren't exactly excited to take responsibility for their role in WW2, but good for them all the same for seeing through this guy's bullshit. Every now and then these lone nuts get it right, I guess?

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shintaro_Abe

[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobusuke_Kishi

[3] https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.as...

yorwba2• 4 years ago

The Abe cabinet had approval ratings above 60% in 2013, but the trend from then on was mostly downwards, with disapproval at times exceeding approval. https://www.nhk.or.jp/senkyo/shijiritsu/ Approval is red, disapproval blue; Abe is 安倍

wahnfrieden3• 4 years ago

An adjacent mental leap is to recognize how much power workers and the poor can have over corporate and politician behaviors (doesn't have to be violent assassination like this, that's besides the point - what was effective came from the resulting widespread awareness of the subject matter brought to attention). Hopefully LDP isn't able to whitewash it through mild reform.

MomoXenosaga2• 4 years ago

Abe was always controversial for Japanese. Most people only know his foreign policy but he was socially ultra conservative- even by Japan standards.

fomine34• 4 years ago

He was very conservative even in the party, but what he did as a prime minister is not much conservative (than expected) and some work are liberal-ish. He was very good at show himself conservative, so he was supported by conservatives.

HereIGoAgain3• 4 years ago

A just over 50% approval rating, in a vote largely based along political party lines, does not a vast majority of opposition make.

What I find most interesting is that among younger generations, the approval goes past 65%. Though that might have something to do with younger people not having the luxury of ignoring potential future threats, with respect to defense, energy and such.

throwaway4good2• 4 years ago

Both LDP and the Moonies were setup by the CIA to combat the commies.

erdos4d• 4 years ago

Sauce please.

modernpink• 4 years ago

LDP links to the CIA are barely a secret. Asking for a source there is only to advertise one's ignorance. Not sure about the Moonies part however.

Laaas2• 4 years ago

https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL1209/S00029/reverend-moon-...

There is a lot if you look around wrt. how the Unification Church was supported to disrupt communism.

throwaway4good2• 4 years ago

It is so established that you can find it on Wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Democratic_Party_(Japa...

"From the 1950s through the 1970s, the United States Central Intelligence Agency spent millions of dollars attempting to influence elections in Japan to favor the LDP against more leftist parties such as the Socialists and the Communists,[24][25] although this was not revealed until the mid-1990s when it was exposed by The New York Times.[26]"

Wikipedia only mentions that Moon was promoted by Radio Free Asia, here is an article that tells a bit more:

https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL1209/S00029/reverend-moon-...

Reverend Moon: Cult leader, CIA asset and Bush family friend

"In 1997, Congressman Donald Fraser launched an investigation into Moon's cult. The 444-page Congressional report alleged Moonie involvement with bribery, bank fraud, illegal kickbacks, and arms sales. The report revealed that Moon's 20,000-member Unification Church was a creation of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA). The Moonies were working with KCIA Director Kim Chong Phil as a political instrument to influence U.S. foreign policy. The U.S. CIA was the agency primarily responsible for founding the KCIA after WW II. The Moon organization has denied any link with the U.S. intelligence agencies or the Korean government."

I've heard the Moonies described as a "classic tale" on how US intelligence operations risk feeding back into US politics.

cdavid• 4 years ago

I don't know about the unification church side of things, but it is well documented that the USA supported heavily the LDP inthe 50ies, including sinister politicians like Kishi, to advance their interest and fight communism.

Kishi happened to be Abe's grand father.

lucozade• 4 years ago

https://twitter.com/mooniespeppa

twright• 4 years ago

A good analogy is that it was a bit like Operation Gladio[1] but for Japan. A short article from the LA Times (1994): https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1994-10-09-mn-48400-... A longer article from NYT (1994): https://www.nytimes.com/1994/10/09/world/cia-spent-millions-...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Gladio

adultSwim4• 4 years ago

You will find more direct evidence and reporting on the KCIA's ties. At the time South Korea was a dictatorship propped up by the US. Not a big leap to go from the KCIA to the CIA.

Wikipedia is a potential starting point. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unification_Church

Here's a Washington Post article linked by Wikipedia, House Subcommittee's Report Links Rev. Moon to the KCIA (1977) https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1977/08/05/h...

New York Times covered it too. https://www.nytimes.com/1978/03/16/archives/unification-chur...

Please post any specific materials you find useful. Apologies for not having good links/books at the ready.

Journalist Tim Shorrock posted (https://twitter.com/TimothyS/status/1558478761615626241), "Speaking of the Unification Church ... has anyone else noticed how US media coverage of Abe's assassination stopped the instant that the Japanese media began uncovering the unsavory ties between LDP, Abe, and the Moonies? Nothing about this event in the US press. Zilch."

Sounds like the recent Japanese press might be a good place to look.

dontlaugh• 4 years ago

This is a good summary with many references https://soundcloud.com/trueanonpod/mooned-in-nara

hollywood_court5• 4 years ago

I don’t know about the LDP part but I do know that my father was told to “drop it” when he discovered that the flower children’s passports were being withheld and sent to Korea. He was told that by a police chief though and not the CIA.

adultSwim4• 4 years ago

Not sure why this fact is downvoted

trynumber9• 4 years ago

The CIA supported political parties that opposed communism all over the world. Even socialist parties in Europe. The CIA didn't setup the LDP anymore than it setup the Portuguese Socialist Party. https://www.nytimes.com/1976/01/07/archives/cia-funding-in-e...

concinds• 4 years ago

The CIA didn't setup the LDP anymore than it setup the Portuguese Socialist Party

Yeah, it setup and ran both equally.

The most crucial interaction between the CIA and the Liberal Democratic Party was the exchange of information for money. It was used to support the party and to recruit informers within it. The Americans established paid relationships with promising young men who became, a generation later, members of parliament, ministers, and elder statesmen. Together they promoted the LDP and subverted Japan's Socialist Party and labor unions. […]
The Japanese came to describe the political system created with the CIA's support as kozo oshoku—"structural corruption." The CIA's payoffs went on into the 1970s. The structural corruption of the political life of Japan continued long thereafter.
"We ran Japan during the occupation, and we ran it a different way in these years after the occupation," said the CIA's Horace Feldman, who served as station chief in Tokyo. "General MacArthur had his ways. We had ours."

From the book Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA (https://www.amazon.com/Legacy-Ashes-History-Tim-Weiner/dp/03...).

lern_too_spel2• 4 years ago

The LDP was helped by the CIA. The Moonies were not. They were helped by the KCIA and then by the GOP, who they trade favors with in the US. The only link to the CIA is George H. W. Bush. https://www.nytimes.com/1978/03/16/archives/unification-chur...

hollywood_court5• 4 years ago

My adoptive father was an LEO who spent most of his 40+ year long career between the Bay Area and Alabama. He had plenty of stories to tell about the Moonies. He spent 10 years as basically the right hand man and enforcer for the police chief in a very well know southern city. He would literally run folks out of town on the request of the chief and/or the mayor. Sometimes he'd use violence and other times he'd use intel.

Mostly harmless stuff like running out the Dixie Mafia when they setup up porn shops or illegal gambling dens. He spent 3 years under cover in the KKK and helped ruin their credibility in the Central Alabama area.

And then some questionable stuff like breaking into a Nation of Islam church and spending multiple days camped out in their attic until he was able to take photos of the leader of that church engaging in extra marital affairs with the wives of church members. He used those photos to cause quite a bit of mayhem and violence amongst the church members until the church was no more.

But his most interesting story is when he claims to have discovered (I have never been able to verify this like I have the other stories) that the Moonies from Europe had their passports withheld and then those passports were sent to Korea in order to get their operatives into the country.

I have no idea if that was true, but every single time we saw someone selling a flower somewhere he would share that story.

alex_sf2• 4 years ago

And then some questionable stuff like breaking into a Nation of Islam church ...

I'm not sure why that should be more controversial than ruining the KKK. Change a couple words and the doctrines aren't much different.

hollywood_court5• 4 years ago

He was welcomed into the KKK as a member. He didn’t do anything illegal. They gladly posed for photos for him. They used his land for gatherings.

Breaking into the church and spending days there was illegal.

pessimizer13• 4 years ago

Change a couple words and the doctrines aren't much different.

Saying this is just a declaration that you know nothing about either the KKK or The Nation of Islam. The KKK are aging race-terrorists, and the NoI are almost Scientologists. The KKK murders people, the NoI thinks that white people were created by evil alien scientists.

yborg• 4 years ago

How would having a European passport be useful to insert Koreans into the US? A Korean named 'Hans Schmidt' would presumably arouse some suspicion with INS, especially if he didn't look anything like the photo.

hollywood_court5• 4 years ago

I was led to believe that the passports themselves could be altered.

Again I was never able to verify this like the other stories. I saw the pictures from the klan rallies and the Nation of Islam church. I’ve heard numerous people tell me how folks used to scatter whenever my father was walking toward them on the street or sidewalk.

But all I have is his word in regards to the Moonies and passports.

maerF0x0• 4 years ago

ELI5: wouldn't a large proportion of USA's lawmaker's have ties with a Christian church?

Sorry for being uninformed, but why is this an issue?

ziftface• 4 years ago

It's a cult. I think it would be more akin to a large portion of American lawmakers being ties with Scientology.

YeahNO• 4 years ago

One person's established religion is just someone else's cult. They all engage in indoctrination and belief in magical thinking with absolutely no proof in the existence of its deity or deities.

badRNG• 4 years ago

What exactly separates a "cult" from any other church? It seems that the word is often lobbed against minority religions that either aren't mainstream (or somehow related to mainstream religions), are recent in origin, or are viewed as eccentric or peculiar.

There are truly damaging religious groups, but this doesn't seem to be what is referenced by the word cult. It seems to be used more often to describe religions that are unconnected (or less connected) to religions considered "normal" like Christianity, Islam, etc.

castrodd• 4 years ago

I agree with you. But all churches start as cults. Romans viewed Christians the same way most Americans view Scientologists. Actually, Romans killed Christians, so probably they viewed them a tad bit worse.

coliveira4• 4 years ago

Christianity was a cult during the Roman empire. The only difference is the reach of these religious entities.

bnralt• 4 years ago

It's worth pointing out that American lawmakers also have ties with the Unification Church. A couple of decades ago its founder, Sun Myung Moon, actually had a coronation in a U.S. Senate office building that was attended by numerous U.S. Senators and Congressmembers. He was declared humanity's messiah in the ceremony:

Mr. Davis says he held the wife's crown and was ''a bit surprised'' by Mr. Moon's Messiah remarks, which were delivered in Korean but accompanied by a written translation. In them, he said emperors, kings and presidents had ''declared to all heaven and earth that Reverend Sun Myung Moon is none other than humanity's Savior, Messiah, Returning Lord and True Parent.''
By Wednesday, after news of the event had been reported in the online magazine Salon and various newspapers, Capitol Hill was in full-blown backpedaling mode, as lawmakers who attended but missed the coronation -- or saw it and did not think much of it -- struggled to explain themselves.

The Washington Times, a conservative D.C. newspaper that has many prominent conservatives on its staff (Tony Blankly, Larry Kudlow, Tony Snow) was also founded by Sun Myung Moon and owned by the Unification Church[2].

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/24/us/a-crowning-at-the-capi... [2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/sun-myung-...

Rackedup2• 4 years ago

Christianity is kind of a cult too, just more popular.

pessimizer13• 4 years ago

But plenty of them have connections to weird cults, also, due to the US largely being (especially in governance) a Protestant country. Protestantism isn't a religion, it's thousands of religions, each having between 1 and 100 leaders with constituencies between the size of a family or the population of a state.

For example, H. Clinton's relationship with The Family http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Family_(Christian_political... or Amy Coney Barrett's People of Praise https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People_of_Praise.

American lawmakers are at least as if not more religiously bizarre than Japanese ones.

vorpalhex10• 4 years ago

Imagine if 50% of US lawmakers had deep intimate connections with the Mormons or Scientologists.

jakeinspace• 4 years ago

Well, in Utah I imagine that’s the case.

1270018080• 4 years ago

I really can't see majors differences between socially conservative evangelical Christians and those other groups, if we're talking the harm they can cause politically.

adultSwim4• 4 years ago

A better comparison might be if you discovered many US politicians having ties to Wahhabi mosques set up by Saudi intelligence.

Note: I do not in any way support anti-Islam sentiment. Just making up an example of a newer foreign religious community.

themaninthedark3• 4 years ago

I was just about to make this analogy but it would be more akin to the mosques having ties to Iran, a state with nuclear ambitions and leadership that is hostile to the US, as opposed to Saudi Arabia where they don't have nuclear ambitions(that I know of) and the leadership is at least friendly with our leaders even if significant parts of the population may not be.

Edit to add the same disclaimer the parent has: Note: I do not in any way support anti-Islam sentiment.

adultSwim4• 4 years ago

Moonies have had influence in both Korea and Japan. This is a big deal as Korea harbors strong anti-Japanese sentiment, due to Japan's brutal occupation of Korea. If I was Korean, I could imagine feeling that these are pro-Japanese collaborators.

This is also partly why Abe was so controversial. Instead of apologizing for Japan's occupation of Korea, he repeatedly signaled a desire to return to those times.

warabe4• 4 years ago

1. they have caused a variety of social problems, including dozens of civil and criminal lawsuits

2. they have close ties to North Korea. When they met with North Korean leader Kim, it is estimated that as much as $4.5 billion was given to North Korea as donations. This means that the Unification Church is also part of the source of funds for North Korea's nuclear missiles.

3. The Unification Church's doctrine is very anti-Japanese and Korean nationalismistic. For example, according to their dogma, Japan, as an Eva country, must devote all of its wealth to Korea, and the language of all nations must be unified in Korean, etc. Please note that these anti-Japanese doctrine has actually caused damage like high donations.

After all, from the Japanese perspective, the Unification Church's problem is not just a religious issue, but also a security threat.

masterof03• 4 years ago

1. Roe v Wade?

2. There are many evangelical churches in the US that send money to dictatorships, for example, [1], [2] , I can collect you a longer list.

3. This point is clearly very specific to Japan, I can't find a bijection within a few minutes.

But, we aren't that different , really.

1. https://nnoc.org/pastors-for-peace-continue-support-to-cuba/

2. https://juicyecumenism.com/2019/11/13/churches-supporting-ve...

Edit: Spacing

chrischen• 4 years ago

Isn't it odd that a nationalist Japanese politician was associated with a nationalist Korean group?

flanbiscuit• 4 years ago

In the US we have many people who are 'christian' but they do not all go to the same church. What's happening in Japan is like saying that a majority of U.S. lawmakers went specifically to Joel Olsteen's church.

photochemsyn• 4 years ago

I think a decent historical model would be the relationship between Spain's fascist government under Generalísimo Francisco Franco and the Opus Dei sect founded by Josemaría Escrivá:

"Many newly published Spanish history textbooks agree that the Opus Dei had a strong influence in the Franco regime. Moreover, Opus Dei developed itself in its early days during the Franco regime. According to these books, Opus Dei was not only linked but also tightly interwoven with the power structures of the Francoist authoritarian government soon after the Spanish Civil War, although its stronger involvement in the government came only in the late 1950s. It had at least 8 ministers during Franco's rule. This was in keeping with the organization's aim of influencing the development of society indirectly..."

https://www.primidi.com/opus_dei_and_politics/francisco_fran...

MomoXenosaga2• 4 years ago

It's easier to make fun of other countries.

If memory serves Jesus said "let he who is without sin cast the first stone". Americans in particular should not even be allowed to look at stones.

mdtrooper• 4 years ago

In Spain, because fifty year ago we had a right-Catholic dictatorship (there is a article in spanish wikipedia about this: https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nacionalismo_cat%C3%B3lico ).

Now, we have a lot of lawyers who are in christian/catholic dangerous/psychopaths sects such as Opus Dei (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opus_Dei), Kikos (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neocatechumenal_Way), Yunque (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Yunque_(organization)) and other far right christian sects.

It is a serious situation for the Human Rights in Spain.

pfortuny• 4 years ago

Just in case, you should be careful with the use adjectives: they tend to deform your point of view.

Saying that this is a serious situation for the Human Rights in Spain is a bit, just a tiny bit, of an hyperbole.

Rackedup2• 4 years ago

Since I realized that there was a lie on every U.S. dollar bill, I figured that lying was accepted. I still don't do it but I try to be less trustful.

tikkun2• 4 years ago

Here's a GPT-3 written summary of this article:

The article discusses the findings of an internal survey conducted by the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan, which found that around half of the party's lawmakers had dealings with the Unification Church, a controversial religious group believed to be behind the fatal shooting of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. LDP Secretary General Toshimitsu Motegi told reporters that the party will take the results of the survey seriously and reflect on them, and that lawmakers who do not abide by the party's policy of severing ties with the Unification Church will not be allowed to participate in party activities. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters that it is difficult to scrutinize Abe's past relations with the Unification Church, but pledged to implement measures to strengthen internal surveillance on ties between his ruling party and the religious group.

dang• 4 years ago

Can you please not keep doing this? Predictable patterns are off topic in HN comments.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

tikkun2• 4 years ago

Thanks for letting me know, will stop.

compyman• 4 years ago

This really misstates an important point - the Unification Church is not "believed to be behind" the assassination, it was a man holding a grudge against the Church. Pretty much the opposite meaning. I don't think this comment is useful for discussion.

hbarka• 4 years ago

Isn’t this akin to our major politicians having ties to Billy Graham/Evangelicals?

Half of Japan's LDP lawmakers had ties with Unification Church

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