Mission de l’Esprit-Saint, a cult in Anjou
I was skimming the news Thursday, as I do, and when I saw Québec veut le nom des enfants qui fréquentent la Mission de l’Esprit-Saint I thought we were in a far-flung corner of Quebec with some hillbilly messiah. Not so. The Mission de l’Esprit-Saint is mostly located in Anjou. It was founded in 1913 and has a Wikipedia page and Quebec is concerned about 70 kids being “educated” in its religious school. I see on a search that the group also practises their religion illegally in Joliette (this last piece has quotes from ex-members who grew up in it).
It’s always philosophically interesting to read about good reasons to dismantle cults, because once you get into the inculcation of irrational beliefs in children, any major religion can be damned with the same argument, except I suppose for the key aspect of taking people out of mainstream society.
Chris 10:33 on 2019-11-08 Permalink
Yes, it’s an interesting topic. What difference would being a “major religion” make? If this group had more membership, would what they’re doing be any less wrong? No. It’s likewise wrong when it’s a Hasidic school, or Wahhabi madrassa.
These children have a human right to a proper education. Their parents are denying it to them, which is basically a form of child abuse, so the state should help.
Kate 11:15 on 2019-11-08 Permalink
Chris, as I said, a major religion generally does not require that you leave mainstream society. A cult generally does.
qatzelok 13:47 on 2019-11-08 Permalink
At the same time, Kate, in multi-cultural societies where religious identity predominates like Lebanon, there is no mainstream society. Everyone gets polarized into their own isolated social-status cliques.
Kate 14:22 on 2019-11-08 Permalink
qatzelok, that’s as may be, but it’s not true of Anjou or even Joliette.
Chris 19:01 on 2019-11-08 Permalink
Kate, the difference between religion and cult is one of degree, not kind. But I agree the amount of self-separation from ‘mainstream society’ is one of the fuzzy dividing lines. (This of course puts Haredi Judaism more on the cult side.) Then again, once you get big, there’s less need to self-separate because the things you would need to self-separate for become more widespread everywhere in society. ex: there are enough Muslims here now that getting halal meat is pretty easy in many neighbourhoods, so Muslims have one less reason to concentrate into their own bubbles.
Michael Black 20:21 on 2019-11-08 Permalink
No, “cult” is not about belief, but used for groups that use other means.
So years ago when Josh Freed’s friend Benji joined a cult, they were worried about brainwashing.
That caused a group to form about cults, a long existing resource centre.
Other cults have the leader expecting sexual favors, and whatever.
The degree is way larger than you want in your vendetta against religion.
Michael
Chris 15:09 on 2019-11-09 Permalink
Michael, not sure I follow you. Are you saying ‘expecting sexual favours’ is a dividing line between religions and cults? What about all the Catholic clergy (leaders) sexually abusing kids? What about all the imams (leaders) selling pleasure marriages? Heck, if you’re worried about “the leader expecting sexual favors” what about prophet Mohamed marrying a child?!?
Anyway, kids have human rights. Parents can’t do whatever they want to their children. ex: They can’t beat them. It doesn’t matter the reasoning. If they want to beat the kid because of reason X or because some old holy book says so, it makes no difference. Likewise kids have a right to a proper education. If a parent denies it, whether for religious/cult reasons or otherwise, it’s wrong.