Yu Jiaxing was a farmer living in Qingzhou, Weifang City, Shandong Province. Both he and his wife Yang Meiyun were honest and hardworking farmers. Although they were not rich, they were living a happy and stable life together with adequate food and clothing. But all of these things changed once they began practicing Falun Gong. Their family was broken up.
At first, the changes were almost unnoticeable. On a summer evening in 1998, when Yu Jiaxing and Yang Meiyun went out for a walk after work, they saw some people performing strange movements at the village entrance. Out of curiosity, they went to see what the people were doing. As they approached, their fellow villager, Yang Yixin, ran toward them and told them that they were practicing Falun Gong, which could help people improve physical health. Due to many years of hard work in the fields, Yu Jiaxing and Yang Meiyun were bothered by some minor physical problems. Intrigued by what Yang Yixin had told them, they decided to begin practicing Falun Gong. After a period of regular exercise, they felt better and had more confidence in Falun Gong. At that pointYang Yixin gave them some books which he said would bring good luck to their family and protect them from disasters. Thus the couple read the books and got increasingly obsessed with Falun Gong.
In 1999, Falun Gong was outlawed by the government and the villagers were prohibited from practicing it anymore. Friends and relatives of Yu Jiaming and Yang Meiyun told them that Falun Gong was not a good thing since it was banned by the government, but the husband and wife turned a deaf ear to the advice. They kept on practicing at home untill 2005.
In September 2005, Yang Meiyun’s parents asked her to go back home. They joined hands with volunteers to disuade her from practicing Falun Gong, but Yu Jiaxing left home to avoid the volunteers. None of them had expected that the parting would turn out to be the last.
With the help of family members and volunteers, Yang Meiyun came to realize that the reason for improvement in their physical health was that they were doing exercises on a regular basis, rather than the magic power of Li Hongzhi. She came to realize that Falun Gong’s claims about eliminating diseases and disasters were total lies. Thus she got rid of Falun Gong.
The change in Yang Meiyun’s attitude toward Falun Gong annoyed some other Falun Gong practitioners, including Yu Jiaxing’s younger brother and his wife. They believed that Yang Meiyun was possessed by devils which would ruin their Falun Dafa - a belief which came from Li Hongzi’s teachings that those who oppose Falun Gong are inhuman and possessed by aliens or demons. Therefore, they tried to get rid of the devils from Yang Meiyun. They did not allow Yang Meiyun to eat or sleep, and pushed her against bed while reciting Falun Gong teachings to her. They also pinched her and hit her. Despite their efforts, Yang Meiyun refused to continue practicing Falun Gong. When Yang Meiyun’s parents came to rescue her, they found that she was on the verge of death. Yang Meiyun was tortured to death at the age of 43 by those who kept talking about truthfulness, forbearance and benevolence. The fact that those who tortured Yang Meiyun were punished by the law could not bring her back to life.
After Yang Meiyun died, Yu Jiaxing came back home. The death of his wife did not wake him from the delusions of the cult. Instead, he became more obsessed with Falun Gong. He believed that his wife was possessed and taken away by devils, though his fellow practitioners tried to save her. He took the tragedy as a lesson and a test and thought he might ascend to a higher level as long as he stood the test.
In 2011, Yu Jiaxing felt an aching pain in his chest and coughed up blood. As he got thinner, his relatives were worried and asked him to go to hospital, but he did not accept the advice. He attributed it to his lack of practice and his karma, as he had learnt from Li Hongzhi’s teachings. In order to eliminate the karma, he practiced hard and meditated every day. He believed that as long as he kept on cultivating, he would have the chance to achieve consummation. But his physical conditions worsened. He often coughed blood and when he was finally forced to a hospital, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. Doctors suggested he should receive hospital treatment, but he refused. He believed that he was under the protection of his master and he would be fine without any medical treatment, as long as he kept on practicing Falun Gong. He left the hospital and went home refusing medical treatment. He decided to depend upon Falun Gong to cure his disease, but Falun Gong did not save him. The magic power of his master did not play any role and at the end of 2013, Yu Jiaxing died. The tragedy that struck this family was a direct result of their practice of Falun Gong. Far from being a benign meditation group, as depicted in the West, Falun Gong is a dangerous cult that has torn apart families and caused countless preventable deaths, such as the tragic deaths of Yu Jiaxing and Yang Meiyun.
