Jesus Christians.com

Things are very rushed for us at the moment, but I thought that I should let our readers know that the community held another whipping trial yesterday with a slightly different approach being taken. It was staged more as a political demonstration against Jiang Zemin and Luo Gan, two leaders of the Communist Party in China, who have led a campaign of terror against innocent, peace-loving Falun Gong practitioners over the past ten years, torturing and killing at least 3,000 verified deaths (and almost certainly many more that have not been verified), including powerful evidence collected by independent researchers to show that they actually sell the organs of their victims to overseas tourists coming to China for organ transplants. (E.g. they guarantee the tourists that if a kidney or liver fails to function during the transplant itself, they will find and give a replacement organ within two weeks! They then go and check their Falun Gong prisoners for blood types and chop them up for sale to the tourists.)

Zemin and Gan were both invited to attend and/or send someone to represent themselves, but they did not turn up. Jayme and Alf each took 25 lashes of the whip in their place, in the presence of a small crowd of Falun Gong practitioners, and before the lens of a TV station which is sympathetic to their cause. We ourselves also filmed the trial and the carrying out of the punishment. There was spirited discussion afterwards of the efficacy of such an action as a way of bringing home to complacent viewers just how real the torture and execution of innocent people is. People who could not control their tears as they watched Jayme and Alf taking the punishment were enraged at what is happening in China today.

The trial will feature in our documentary, "Beyond Justice", which discusses the whole concept of substitutionary punishment as a way of supporting justice without seeking revenge. In a political demonstration of this nature, it brings home to people in a shocking way that there are innocent people suffering while we go about our lives without a thought in the world for them. In conjunction with a trial like this, we are strongly reminded of exactly what these men have carried out in the privacy of prisons and hospitals in China.

This morning our two volunteers are up and around with almost no signs of pain. The same cannot be said for the many thousands who have suffered and are still suffering in China today.

WOWWWWWWW!!!!

i can't believe you guys did this.You are very serious about this mater I can tell.wow is about all I can say.and that I am honored to no guys who stand up and are willing to lay down for what they beleive.i have read a little about that Falun Gong group but i didnt no they got killed for there organs and thats horrible.

I never heard the names of the two guys you mentoned but i'm going to read up on this.I pray that God convicts there hearts and that once they see what Alf and Jayme suffered on there behaff that they be ashamed and vow to change there ways and stop hurting and killing the falun gongs guys.I would like to see this documentry when it comes, i wonder if it will be shown in the usa or might it be made avalable online?it will be a powerful witness to you guys being sincere and acting not just talking. wow.proud of you guys all.

I pray that God convicts there hearts and that once they see what Alf and Jayme suffered on there behaff that they be ashamed and vow to change there ways and stop hurting and killing the falun gongs guys.

Thanks for your support, Peter. It was quite an emotional affair and I think it was really powerful for everyone who attended.

It was very sad hearing some of the personal testimonies from Chinese immigrants who practiced Falun Gong in China and were persecuted. One guy said that he was taken to an intensive labor camp and after a lot of physical and psychological violence he gave in to renouncing his faith.

But then he heard another guy at the camp scream out "Falun Gong is good!". That guy was surely tortured quite severely for that but the first guy was convicted by this other guy's faith and so he also shouted out "Falun Gong is good!"

I was reading some pamphlets about some of the other testimonies and I had to stop reading cause it was making me sick. It's really sad to know that even now that same treatment is still happening.

Sorry that we do not have an English translation of what was said, but here is the New Tang Dynasty TV report on the trial;

www.ntdtv.com/xtr/b5/2010/07/30/a416302.html#video

I watched the video. Seated there is a line up of what looks like maybe a family.is that a family members of Falun Gong people or do you know.I am just curious.from what i read falun gong people are peaceful types.would you say passifficts? would the Jesus Christians describe themselves as passifficts? is that an aceptable term?you are against fighting in the wars am i right?I am agiant wars i would imagine most people would say they are not for wars.i mean who wants to see fighting knowing people on all sides will be killed.not just solders who signed up to fight but innocent civilans who cant help where they live.

Now as for the whipping that looks very very painful and bad.who does the whipping? is it a guard or authority or what?I cannot imagine whipping someone is a job anyone would enjoy unless they are a sickie.same with exectuting someone. i often wonder if those peoople who do those jobs are either without feelings or else have so many such angry mean feelings they use that as an outlet.or maybe they are people who think they are extacting justice.

Anyway i understand what Alf and Jayme were doing and why now.I respect that.If you get more video of anything (not the whipping parti'll admit i didnt like seeing that myself but if the men from the Jesus Christians were gutsy enough to take the whippings in place of those who should be taking it- i need to man up and not look away as i presume people are whipped all the time in some countrys and we need to know what they go through being tortutered like that--it just felt bad seeing it was "my friend" being whipped-Alf or Jayme) i would like to hear more public reactions and if any falun gong people speak about this. or any officials.

I am glad the Jesus Christian men were up and around the next day.i am sure God laid his hand upon your bodies to help you heal.I hope God laid deep heavy conviction upon the hearts of the men you took the whipping for.praying for changes in there hearts so they dont torture and abuse the falun gong guys anymore.

The Chinese people seated in a row were witnesses for Falun Gong. The old woman, for example, was beaten and kicked by a group of guards to the point where her back was broken in two places. She is 80 years old, and the attack happened when she was in her 70s.

I'm not sure if the Falun Gong are "pacifists", but they are "peaceful", the difference being that they may support war under certain circumstances, but they have no political agenda as such, as in overthrowing the government through force. However, they have been accused of being "political" because they oppose the regime in China and believe that capitalism is a better form of government. Our own differences with them on that point would be that they are really observing the fruits of Christian values over many centuries in the West, and capitalism itself is really a horrible distortion of those values. In fact, the communist party in China is becoming extremely materialistic and is gradually buying up the whole world while the U.S. goes deeper and deeper in debt. I think we will soon witness the collapse of the U.S. version of capitalism and be subjected to a far more evil Chinese version.

We JCs would consider ourselves to be pacifists, although I think we do try to understand and love those who participate in war too.

It was much harder to find a JC who would volunteer to do the whipping, because we understand that it is a much harder job for a Christian than it is to take the whipping. We spent some time experimenting with various people cracking the whip before arriving at Casey as the most suitable volunteer. It was important that the punishment not be faked. Casey knew that both Jayme and Alf were free to call the whipping off at any time, and Jayme did, in fact, ask for a short halt about midway through his ordeal. After a short break he instructed Casey to continue. We encouraged Casey to see his job as being done unto the Lord, and to see (as we all tried to see) the whipping as an expression of outrage at the crimes that were committed against Falun Gong. That was the whole point of the exercise, and so Casey's role was crucial. I understand that both Alf and Jayme hugged Casey after the whipping, and thanked him for his willingness to take on that most unpleasant task.

I think it is significant that, while in the Long Beach trial the emphasis was on forgiveness being OFFERED to the Johnsons (who refused to even acknowledge their need for it), it was fairly clear from the start that Jiang Zemin and Luo Gan were not going to come to this one. The Johnsons were a fairly isolated case of injustice within the American system, and the trial did at least result in the police finally pressing charges against Jared and John. However, the entire Chinese government is corrupt and so we could hardly expect that these former leaders of the government and the secret police were going to change as a result of what happened.

So in many ways the whipping was being taken in solidarity with their victims; and I think that is why so many people in the audience were moved to tears, and why they gave an outpouring of thanks to Alf and Joe immediately after the trial. I think we have shown that substitutionary punishment can be a powerful way of embarrassing a corrupt regime and stirring up public anger against such injustices as what has been happening in Communist China.

A side effect for the Falun Gong in Australia is that I think it has motivated them to be even more zealous in speaking up for their friends and relatives in China.

I agree with Redyukka..."wow"!

That was great guys. I'm glad it went well. Good on you Jayme and Alf. It was a great testimony of love and justice.

I think it is in the same league as Gandhi's Salt Yatra. People may argue that it is not the same as what Gandhi did because you are doing it to yourself, but I would have to say that I think that western governments have learned lessons from what happened in India, with Gandhi and the USA with Martin Luther King. They are smart enough to know that they will not get away with publicly persecuting people like they did in the old days.
You could go to China where they still do things that way but I doubt that you would ever be seen again and the story would never be told. So I think staging the protest the way you did was the most effective thing to do at this time.

I think that the only way a western government could get away with human rights abuses and torture, like China, would be to label the said group a cult (like China) and then they could get away with murder (like China). Which may be something that will happen in future.

Anyway, I just did a search on Google for Falun Gong protests in Australia and nothing is showing up.
Media blackout, perhaps? I guess the Australian media has been bullied into silence by the Chinese as well?

Casey Man I am sorry to have left you out when I was commenting.

Your roll was huge and would have been hard.perhaps like Dave said even harder than being whipped because those were your brothers you were hitting.it also would be going against your peaceful loving nature to hit anyone.so your roll was massive and i give you respect for carrying it out.

None of it looked fake at all and anyone could see it was 100% real,you would think the corrupt ones would feel shame to no that outsiders cared enough to want to correct a very greevious wrong which is the abusing of falung gong people.

you guys are right to care about the falun gongs because it could be any group targeted by corrupt people.i have read you guys have already suffered a lot of abuse.lots of ugly verbals things and words do hurt.insults hurt too.

Thankfully you guys are covered by God love and protected by the sheild of knowing you are doing what is right.but i dont take away from the meanness or abuse i can see you guys suffer even on the intenet,people can be so mean.almost easier on the intnet in fact as littlerose showed us.i dont think she would speak the way she wrote in real life.easy to hide behind a screen and fire nasty words.

Sometimes i read my own writing out loud before i ever send it to someone if i am feeling angry at them.reading it out loud helps me be sure i am happy with my words.

Anyway all due respect to Casey Alf and Jayme. I look forward to learning more from you all guys.what I saw was so powerful it would be good if you could get that video up on youtube to reach a wider audeince.

Thought I would just re-post this, in case anyone has missed it. It's much easier to find when the actual video appears on the post, but I don't know how to make this do that.

Sorry that we do not have an English translation of what was said, but here is the New Tang Dynasty TV report on the trial;

www.ntdtv.com/xtr/b5/2010/07/30/a416302.html#video

Hi Peter,

You've made some really good comments on this thread; thanks for that. I particularly liked this one

you guys are right to care about the falun gongs because it could be any group targeted by corrupt people

There is a famous quote that goes something like "I didn't speak up when the such-and such group was taken. I didn't speak up when the other such-and such group was taken. I didn't speak up when all the other such-and such groups were taken. When the time came for me to be taken, there was no one left to speak up for me."

I probably didn't get the words right, but I think the spirit is there. Anyway, I'm gonna be rate so I gotta go now!