c. 1998 Religion News Service

(Rabbi Rudin is the National Interreligious Affairs Director of the American Jewish Committee.)

UNDATED _ Twenty years have passed since the November 18, 1978 People’s Temple catastrophe in Jonestown, Guyana, when 913 members of the religious cult were murdered. The victims, including 278 children under the age of 16, were either poisoned with cyanide or shot by the Rev. Jim Jones’ security guards.

The Gallup Poll later described the Jonestown massacre as the most widely reported news event since the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.

Predictably, the universal reaction to Jonestown was shock and revulsion. But critics, and I proudly list myself among them, warned that Jonestown, despite the horror of mass murder, was only the beginning of a deadly phenomenon.

These dire warnings were blithely dismissed by apologists who falsely accused us of fomenting public hysteria and undermining the Constitutional guarantees of religious freedom. And some optimists naively believed the terrible shock of Jonestown would bring the cult phenomenon to an end.

Unfortunately, this did not happen and during the past two decades many groups like the Branch Davidians, the Solar Temple, and Heaven’s Gate have proliferated and become even more destructive. Tragically, we have witnessed a growing number of charismatic leaders order the mass suicides of their devoted followers.

Some current news stories about the ominous activities of three religious groups indicate that the world may soon be witnessing more suicides, deaths, and bereaved families.

Aum Shinrikyo, the dangerous sect that placed the deadly nerve gas, sarin, in the Tokyo subway system in 1995 that killed a dozen people and injured several thousand, is making a strong comeback in both membership and influence. This startling fact is true even though Shoko Asahara, the group’s half-blind 43-year-old leader, is in jail facing 17 counts of murder, kidnapping, gun running, as well as the lethal subway attack.

And as is typical of many cults, Aum Shinrikyo’s new members are frequently highly educated engineers, graduates of Japan’s leading universities: the country’s best and brightest. Aum Shinrikyo runs a network of businesses in Japan that grossed over $30 million last year, and its growing membership has spread to the former Soviet Union.

Asahara’s chilling plans call for mass destruction and death throughout the world. His followers, well-trained in chemical and germ warfare, will, of course, survive the catastrophe and turn control of the earth over to their beloved leader, Asahara, whom they worship as divine.

In early October seven South Korean followers of the Everlasting Life Church, a destructive religious sect, were found dead in a small town 85 miles east of Seoul. Woo Jong-min, the group’s leader, joined his six disciples in self immolation. Woo’s family reported he left his home with his devotees several months ago seeking”martyrdom.” Six years ago, another Korean cult leader was jailed for taking more than $1 million from his followers. The”donations”were given in expectation of a guaranteed trip to heaven.

And finally, 38 members of Concerned Christians, a Denver-based religious cult that includes several young children, mysteriously left their Colorado homes in early October.

The Denver media report the cult members sold all their possessions including cars, businesses, and furniture prior to their departure and gave their money to Monte Kim Miller, the leader of Concerned Christians. Many cult critics fear Miller wants to move his group to Israel to prepare for the”end of days.” Miller believes he is God and has predicted the total destruction of Denver. He has boasted he will die in the streets of Jerusalem in December 1999 just before the millennium begins, but will rise from the dead after three days and return in glory and power.

Bill Hornsberger, a Denver Baptist minister, knows Miller and fears he”is liable to do something bizarre just to ensure his place in history. And there’s nobody in his group who could question him … He has that much control. You question him, you question God.” Usually, columnists love the feeling of being proven right, of being able to say to their skeptical readers,”You see! I told you so!” In these cases, however, I draw no satisfaction for being correct about the escalating dangers of destructive cults. Instead, I only have a sense of dread expectation.

DEA END RNS