The timeless and ever-present teaching of universal spirituality is based primarily on the personal first-hand experience of the divine and the principle that an individual can actually reunite with and become part of divinity themselves. It involves the awakening of individuals to the greater reality of existence and to their own inner potential as human beings. It is therefore seen as unorthodox and a threat to the power structures and institutes of control that have existed in societies for thousands of years. For this, spiritual practitioners have been persecuted throughout history and still are today.

The historical persecution of spiritual practitioners, although now seen as abhorrent, is based on the same intolerance as its modern equivalent. Although dressed differently in modern times, the opposition spiritual practitioners face today is no more valid than the opposition they have faced throughout history, and uses the same forms of persecution, psychological warfare, and propaganda, that has been used for centuries, but now through vastly more complex bureaucratic and technological means. Learn about how spiritual practitioners were persecuted throughout history

This page outlines the situation The Gnostic Movement and its spiritual teacher Belzebuub, amongst many other persecuted groups, are confronted with today in practicing any form of spirituality not accepted by the “mainstream” and those who secretly control it.

Modern Persecution

Dictionary Definitions:

Witch-hunt: an intensive effort to discover and expose disloyalty, subversion, dishonesty, or the like, usually based on slight, doubtful, or irrelevant evidence.

Persecute: to pursue with harassing or oppressive treatment, esp. because of religion, race, or beliefs; harass persistently.

Cult: formal religious veneration; a system of religious beliefs and ritual; a religion regarded as unorthodox or spurious; a great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement: a usually small group of people characterized by such devotion.

Today, the teachings of universal spirituality are practiced particularly in the Western world. Unlike countries where an unorthodox spiritual practice can be punishable by death, modern Western countries by comparison have tended to be more respectful of the rights of religious freedom. However, in the West, this freedom is again under growing threat as institutions, shady organizations, and the media, have come increasingly under control by people with secret and hidden vested interests. Andre Tarassi, the founder of CICNS (an organization responding to the persecution of religious minorities en masse in France today), has gone so far as to state that there is currently a war being waged on spiritual movements.

“Cult” is a word that pervades the mainstream media, being drummed into the minds of millions of people and set on the agendas of governments and institutions by people behind the scenes, effectively demonizing anything but trashy commercial spirituality or long established and powerful religions. The use of the word “cult” in the West today—like the use of the words “witch”, “heretic” and “blasphemer” in the past—has initiated a modern witch hunt, effectively making it so hard for small religious groups to operate that they disappear or go underground as they have throughout history. False witness, harassment, bullying, deceit, and “deprogramming” are now carried out in large part with the aid of the internet and media, with no positive counter offered, nor any assistance for groups in need. These are the methods of old adapted to modern culture and technology.

It is undeniable that criminal and harmful groups exist, but academics in the field argue that the connotation between these and the word “cult” has been very deliberately used to persecute countless numbers of harmless groups. The media has played a large part in this, as sensationalistic and imbalanced media coverage of small religious groups has created a near total fear and distrust of them amongst the general public. The public arena is then used to effectively put small religions “on trial” with the false witnesses of ex-members again playing a key role as they have throughout history, such as in the trials of the witch hunts. Mediums such as the media and internet can give uncritical coverage to the accounts of ex-members about their time in the religion, all without scrutiny of their real motives, and even when the allegations made are false and unsubstantiated.

The small religious group is then condemned in the public eye, and the ripple-effect of such condemnation can be even more far-reaching and serious. This process is part of a systematic persecution affecting many small religions in numerous countries, echoing the trials of the Inquisition and the witch hunts that were used to persecute small religions and their practitioners over many centuries.

Now that the concept of “cult” is firmly lodged in the Western mindset, and the methods of persecution actively operating in society, for most spiritual groups, facing persecution at the hands of the “cult” label is just a matter of time – all it takes is for someone who doesn’t like or agree with you, to turn around and cry “cult!” where they used to cry “witch” or “heretic”, and the process of persecution begins.

Modern Persecutors

Those who play a part in modern persecution of small religious groups can take many different roles within society. They include anti-cult groups, established religions, journalists, lawmakers, and politicians, and particularly ex-members (called apostates), who can, based on their own ulterior motives, use the term “cult” to harass people for their beliefs, affecting the ability of people to practice their faith and in some cases even to live a normal life. Yet these seemingly separate players effectively all work together as part of one greater mechanism put in place to destroy spirituality and distract the public from the fact that it is even occurring.

Belzebuub and practitioners of his teachings were handed over to this mechanism through the use of false witnesses of ex-members from The Gnostic Movement (also called apostates), just like false witness was used to put witches on trial in the past (the Judas figure). This time, the trail was held on television, with the media playing the role of modern authorities in society, acting as judge and jury of what is deemed acceptable in society at large – with talk show host and “expert” panel members (Pilate and Caiaphas). Psychologists and theologists of Christian faith called in as panel “experts” represent the trusted institutions of society, similar to the government (the Romans). Whilst off camera, the orthodox church made requests that Belzebuub and The Gnostic Movement were harmed on the show (the Jewish priests who harmed Jesus). This story of persecution and its players have been enacted many times, throughout thousands of years, and will continue to do so as long as hatred, betrayal, deceit, and ill-will exist within humanity. These traits have always opposed spirituality and react against it wherever it is genuinely found.

Read about the background to this campaign and the response to its allegations
Find out how the Gnostics have been persecuted by this campaign

Methods of Persecuting the Spiritual Today

Methods of persecution can include anything that inflicts harassment, fear, and suffering upon another, and there have been a number of methods used to persecute spiritual practitioners today. To date the The Gnostic Movement has experienced the use of false allegations made toward it on the internet and towards its adherents, unsolicited contact made towards our members and some of their families, breaches of its own property, legal threats, our property has been vandalized, derogatory material about our organization being displayed publicly and on the internet, media coverage which unfairly promoted false allegations against us and labeled us a “heresy”, and the closure of one of our organizations, amongst a number of other things, including methods of deprogramming.

Deprogramming is one of the main methods of dealing with alleged “cults”. It refers to actions that attempt to force a person to abandon allegiance to a religious, political, economic, or social group, and would ultimately have the affect of stopping the adherence to a particular faith, and thus the existence of it altogether. Methods and practices may involve kidnapping and coercion. Similar actions, when done without force, are called “exit counseling.”

Sylvia Buford, an associate of Ted Patrick who is considered the “father” of deprogramming, described five stages of deprogramming:

1. Discredit the figure of authority: the cult leader
2. Present contradictions (ideology vs. reality): “How can he preach love when he exploits people?” is an example.
3. The breaking point: When a subject begins to listen to the deprogrammer; when reality begins to take precedence over ideology.
4. Self-expression: When the subject begins to open up and voice gripes against the cult.
5. Identification and transference: when the subject begins to identify with the deprogrammers, starts to think of him- or herself as an opponent of the cult rather than a member of it.

The current smear campaign against The Gnostic Movement and its spiritual teacher, which has been carried out by a small group of ex-members of our organization, appears to have tactics based on ideologies of deprogramming, as the campaign has systematically spread false allegations  aimed particularly at The Gnostic Movement’s spiritual teacher, in an effort to discredit him. These false allegations have been used to present contradictions between spirituality and the alleged behavior in an attempt to move people away from The Gnostic Movement and the teachings of its spiritual teacher.

Read a detailed outline of how spiritual practitioners of Belzebuub’s teachings have been persecuted today

Personal Accounts of Persecution

Read the stories of Gnostic practitioners who have been affected by religious persecution:
A Mother’s Religious Freedom Threatened and the Impact on Her Daughter
A Daughter’s Response to Her Mother’s Claim that She Has Been Brainwashed by a Cult

Further Reading

For some excellent reading on the modern persecution of spirituality see…

The articles:
Cult is the New Heresy
Jesus Would Be Called a Cult Leader

And these pages:
Wikipedia’s cult page
An introduction to cults provided by the Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance
An FAQ related to cults from the organization CICNS