When prosecutors this week jailed Han Hak-ja — the 83-year-old leader of the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, more commonly known as the Unification Church — the move drew swift condemnation from followers abroad and their political allies, including figures in Washington. They saw it as a step too far and a breach of Korea’s constitutional guarantee of religious freedom.
But inside Korea, the case fits a familiar pattern — one less about justice and more about political score-settling.
From the authoritarian era through the democratic governments to the present, each new administration has made a habit of targeting its predecessors. Exposing corruption serves a dual purpose of undermining political rivals while projecting an image of moral superiority.
This time, the spotlight is on the main opposition People Power Party (PPP), with the biggest targets being former President Yoon Suk Yeol, ousted after his short-lived declaration of martial law, and his wife, who faces abuse of power allegations.
What makes the current crackdown unusual, besides the necessary prosecution of imposing martial law, is its religious dimension.
In most previous anti-corruption drives, the secondary nonpolitical targets were corporate — powerful chaebol leaders from the Samsung chairman down, who often served time only to be pardoned early for the sake of the “national economy.” This time, the net is catching religious figures.
The roots of this shift go back to 2017, when former President Park Geun-hye was impeached. Deserted by her own party and by normally pro-government media, her supporters migrated for news and opinion to YouTube. A significant portion of conservative activism, previously done through the system because the right was, in a sense, always the establishment, took to the streets.
Into that space stepped an unlikely group: evangelical Protestants, many of them middle-aged or older. They were a minority, because involvement in politics is not typically directed by churches themselves, but they were a noisy one. Their discontent was and still is expressed in the form of massive worship services that routinely clog downtown Seoul traffic.
At the center of this protest movement is Pastor Jeon Kwang-hoon of the Sarang Jeil Church in Seoul.
A few weeks after President Lee Jae Myung took office, police raided Jeon’s church and related properties, searching for evidence that he had orchestrated a chaotic protest inside the Seoul Western District courthouse. His daughter is also under investigation.
Proper religious persecution, such as that in evidence in China, picks off controversial and unpopular sects, knowing the main body of co-religionists will not disapprove when the state descends on the theologically incorrect. But the Korean prosecutors are not engaged in religious persecution per se. This is politics and they are the pit bulls of those in power.
That is why authorities have also gone after mainstream religious leaders at the same time. This summer, for example, prosecutors raided the offices of Pastor Lee Young-hoon of Yoido Full Gospel Church — Korea’s largest single congregation, with nearly half a million members — and the home of Billy Kim Jang-hwan, an influential Baptist pastor in his 90s. Both are suspected of illegally lobbying on behalf of a military officer involved in a soldier’s death.
Why are they seen as the enemy? The answer may lie in a point made this week by religion expert Massimo Introvigne, writing in Bitter Winter, a publication that focuses on religious liberty and human rights. He notes that several religious groups with huge membership aligned themselves with the previous conservative government because of its anti-Communist and anti-LGBTQ+ positions.
“Ironically, some of Yoon’s religious supporters were anti-cult crusaders,” he wrote this week. “Now they may share jail cells with the ‘heretics’ they once condemned.”
Those “heretics” include groups like Shincheonji, which is another Christian-based new religion like the Unification Church. Both have been accused of enrolling thousands of members into the PPP.
This argument is not to say that the religious figures now under investigation are innocent. Some may well have broken the law, if not the ones they’re accused of, then something else that crops up. And while Korean prosecutors have wide discretion in defining crimes like bribery or coercion, large organizations often contain enough ambiguity to justify some kind of charge.
And, as Koreans all know, with an estimated acquittal rate of just 3 percent, being arrested means you’re guilty.
Of course, there comes a point where the law becomes technical. Politics doesn’t always need a verdict. Last week, for example, when news broke that prosecutors had found a database of 110,000 Unification Church members allegedly enrolled in the PPP, the ruling party quickly called for the opposition party to be disbanded.
Had it waited for verification, it might have learned that, while media reports there are 200,000 to 300,000 Unification members in Korea — probably based on the church’s own claims — the real figure is 10 percent of that. The list is dodgy. Of course, if it turns out it includes fake names or people unknowingly registered, the church could face separate charges.
That brings us to a final question. If Han and the other pastors end up convicted, will their treatment mirror that of tycoons in the past who were given a heavy sentence and quickly released? Or will they be left to languish in prison, awaiting liberation from the next conservative administration, a cautionary tale at the intersection of faith and politics?
Michael Breen (mike.breen@insightcomms.com) is the author of "The New Koreans.” The views expressed here are his own.
Religion, politics, payback: Why the jailing of Han Hak-ja feels familiar – The Korea Times
