Escaping Shincheonji, Korea’s Covid Cult with Chris Vishoot: A survivor of the Korean doomsday cult on lies, waking up and helping others break free.

Shincheonji recruits through what looks like an ordinary Bible study, and most people who walk through the door have no idea that it is a destructive cult. Chris Vishoot found out only after three and a half years as a devoted member. In 2018, a woman he met on a dating app invited him to what she called an innocent class on scripture. Within a year he was driving an hour each way to an unmarked building in Seattle, sleeping three to four hours a night, and reporting on Bible study students he had once sat beside as a recruit himself. Chris grew up in a Christian household that expected the world to end at any moment. He graduated from the University of Washington with two engineering degrees, and by his mid-twenties he found himself asking a familiar question: is this all there is to life? Two friends had died young, and Chris, an agnostic at the time, was searching for something bigger. That search is exactly what recruiters for the group are trained to find and use. Chris is now one of the more credible Christian ex-Shincheonji voices in the country. He runs Bible Vaccine Center, helps moderate the r/shincheonji subreddit for former members, and works with pastors whose congregations have been infiltrated by recruiters posing as ordinary Christians. In this internationally criticized group, we talked about how he got in, how he got out, and why he now helps other people leave the same group.

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