“I was dragged into the Almighty God cult (the Church of Almighty God, or “CAG” for short) when I was 20 years old. For 15 years, I wandered and hid, always thinking about how to 'fulfill my duties' and satisfy Almighty God, just to gain Almighty God's protection. In the end, I lost my youth, lost myself, and lost my family. How could I have been so foolish!” Xiaoxi (a pseudonym) painfully recounted her experience of being trapped in the Almighty God cult to anti-cult volunteers, crying as she realized the true nature of the cult.
Misled into a cult in confusion
My name is Xiao Xi, I am 35 years old, and I grew up in a small county in Henan Province. My father was a worker, my mother was frail and stayed at home. I have an older brother and a younger brother. Although our family of five was not wealthy, we lived happily together.
In 2006, because I failed to get into my desired high school, I asked my father to let me re-take the courses a year, but he refused. Out of spite, I went south to Guangdong to work with some girls from my village. Due to my low education level, I faced constant obstacles in finding jobs and getting promotions. At the same time, I reached a marriageable age, and every time I went home for the Spring Festival, my family would constantly urge me to get married and arrange various blind dates. I don't want to live a life like my parents, where I can see the end at a glance, but what can I gain by continuing to wander outside? I fell into confusion, unable to find the direction for my future. At this time, a coworker in the factory came to preach the “gospel” to me, telling me that the reason I was confused was because I didn't know about the existence of God. Everything about a person is predestined by God, and as long as people follow God's words, they will be fine. At first, I was still cautious, afraid that they were trying to pull me into a pyramid scheme, but she kept talking to me about miracles and disasters, playing DVDs of the Indian Ocean tsunami, floods, houses collapsing, corpses floating everywhere, and telling me things like “those who do not pursue belief in God will die in such disasters, falling into a lake of sulfur and fire where they can neither live nor die.”
As the saying goes, “A lie repeated a hundred times becomes the truth.” Coupled with my uncertainty about the future at that time, and after hearing and seeing these words repeatedly, I slowly began to believe them. In October 2007, I officially joined the Almighty God cult, not realizing that this would mark the beginning of a fifteen-year nightmare.
(Image sourced from the internet)
Forced into isolation amidst grief
After joining the Almighty God organization, I spent all my free time outside of work attending gatherings, singing “God songs” with the sisters, and eating “God's words.” My days became extraordinarily busy. Although I felt tired, I thought it was all worth it because I could receive the protection of Almighty God. But the reality was contrary to my expectations; what awaited me was the shocking news of my mother's unexpected death.
In January 2008, I hurried back to my hometown in Henan. The moment I saw my mother lying in the coffin, my heart felt like it was being torn apart. I clung to the coffin, crying out for my mother with all my might, but my dear mother never responded to me again...
I didn't expect that just after the funeral ended, I would receive a call from a sister of Almighty God, saying things like “God's work time is running out, it won't wait for anyone,” urging me to return quickly. But not being able to see my mother one last time before she passed away had filled me with regret and remorse. Watching my father, with his head full of white hair and his unsteady steps, I really didn't want to experience the sorrow of “wanting to care for my parents but they are no longer there” again. I had the idea of staying home to take care of my father, so I told the sisters that I would stay in my hometown and not return. After hearing this, the “sisters” took turns calling me, constantly using God's words and so-called “testimonies” to communicate with me: “Leaving after believing in the Almighty God is more detested and punished by the God than never believing at all,” “Your mother passed away because she didn't believe in the Almighty God, and didn't have the protection of the Almighty God”, “If you don't come back quickly, then your father is the evil spirit preventing you from believing in God," and “the Almighty God will destroy him”...
In order to avoid the punishment of Almighty God and to prevent my father from being regarded as an evil spirit, in February 2008, I had to bid a tearful farewell to my hometown and return to Zhuhai to continue participating in the activities of the Almighty God cult organization. During church gatherings, the sisters constantly indoctrinated me with the idea that “only by fulfilling more duties can one understand more truths and have the hope of being saved”. Under their instigation, I left the factory without even asking for my salary and started “fulfilling my duties” full-time. The Almighty God cult organization has strict requirements for full-time duty-performing believers, telling us that to protect the safety of the God's family, we must no longer contact family and friends, and we must discard the phone cards we used before... At first, I missed my father very much and tried several times to call him, but the sisters found out and blamed me for being too emotional. They said that since I believed in Almighty God, I should entrust my family all to Almighty God's care.
Just like that, I suppressed my longing for my family. In order for my family to receive the care of Almighty God, I devoted myself wholeheartedly to “God,” adhering to the so-called “divine rules”, and severed all contact with my family.
Little did I know that after I lost contact, my father and brothers were extremely anxious. They traveled south to Guangdong several times, searching through all the cities and counties in the Pearl River Delta, and even reported to the police twice, just to find me. I never imagined that this search would last fifteen years, and I was mentally controlled by the Almighty God cult for a full fifteen years.
Lost in obsession, I dared not question
Because I obeyed the Almighty God cult organization without question and worked diligently, I was quickly promoted to a church leader. This gave me immense psychological satisfaction. In reality, it was just a means for the cult to exploit people's vanity and desire for power to mentally control them. However, at that time, I was deeply entangled and unable to extricate myself.
After becoming a church leader, I followed the requirements issued by the Almighty God organization, actively “preaching the gospel,” desperately recruiting new members. Under the influence of the cult's twisted logic that the more you donate, the more peace and grace you receive, I encouraged the brothers and sisters in the church to perform good deeds, submit donations, and willingly contribute their savings to expand the “gospel kingdom.” In the church, there were specific regulations for submitting offerings. They had to meet certain standards. If the offerings submitted in a particular month were too low, the higher-ups would send a letter criticizing the lack of “gospel expansion”. If the situation did not improve, the person responsible would be replaced. Several times, I was questioned for not submitting enough offerings. At that time, I only knew to look for “God's words” to self-reflect and self-examine. I never thought about why voluntary offerings had to increase month by month. Nor did I consider what all those offerings were ultimately used for. It wasn't until anti-cult volunteers gave me an in-depth analysis that I realized all the offerings were eventually transferred abroad for the enjoyment of the leader Zhao Weishan and the so-called “female Christ” Yang Xiangbin, to achieve their undisclosed goal of amassing wealth.
I remember one day in 2013, I received an order from the higher-ups to move in with a sister responsible for managing the “God's” money. I was required to live, eat, sleep, and travel with her, following her every step. Although I didn't understand why the higher-ups arranged it this way at the time, Almighty God always emphasized “obeying God's arrangements and fulfilling God's will.” Having been accustomed to following orders, I stuck to this sister, accompanying her to various churches to collect “offerings,” keeping them at home, and then watching her closely to ensure she handed over every penny of the “offerings” to the designated custodian... Now I realize that the higher-ups arranged for me to monitor her to prevent her from embezzling “God's” money. Sadly, that sister, like me, thought she was being valued by the cult organization. She didn't hesitate to repeatedly write guarantees, swear oaths, and wholeheartedly dedicate herself to deceiving and collecting money for the Almighty God cult organization, even to the point of risking her life. In return, she was monitored and guarded against.
Too terrified to leave
At the beginning of 2020, I was responsible for a functional group in a certain parish. Due to the large volume of written articles and video scripts needed overseas and the tight deadlines, I constantly reviewed and revised drafts from lower-level churches during that period to fulfill my duties. Once, I worked continuously for two days and nights without sleep. On the third morning, I was so tired that I thought I would rest my eyes for a moment, but I ended up sleeping until noon. I didn't even have time to eat and rushed to another meeting point to work. But for this small matter, I was repeatedly “dealt with” by the higher-ups. They not only ignored any of my explanations and condemned me as “disrupting” the church life, but also demoted me from the position of functional group leader to a role within a small church. They even required me to work night shifts while fulfilling my duties for the church. This hurt me deeply. For many years, I had wholeheartedly worked for “God”, but this was the result I received. After that, I lost my previous enthusiasm and didn't want to attend gatherings anymore.
When the sisters of the church found out, they came to “communicate” with me every day, urging me to continue fulfilling my duties. They even brought up an incident where I was followed by a drunk person after a night shift, saying: “Without believing in God, there is no protection from God. If you don't continue to fulfill your duties for God, you will face persecution from Satan.” This made me, already terrified, even more fearful, afraid that I would continuously encounter similar or worse situations.
Thus, under the relentless bombardment of their constant sharing of “God's words,” examples, and reading of “testimonies”, I once again mustered the energy to continue fulfilling my duties for “God,” repeating the life of being demanded, corrected, promoted, and then replaced in the belief of “God.”
I always felt that believing in “God” was exhausting and painful, but at that time, being deeply involved, I only dared to blame myself for not being proactive enough, hoping to quickly pass through “God's” trials and obtain the entry ticket to the “Kingdom Age” as soon as possible. I never dared to question the Almighty God cult organization, let alone leave it.
It wasn't until I was arrested for the crime of “using a cult organization to undermine the implementation of the law,” and with the help of anti-cult volunteers, that I gradually recognized the cult nature of the Almighty God organization. I realized that the Almighty God cult uses the propagation of heretical doctrines and the intimidation of believers to exercise strict mental control, driving them to act as puppets for the cult, risking their lives to swindle money and amass wealth for it.
Now I hope that by sharing my own experiences, I can help more people recognize the dangers of the mental control exerted by the Almighty God cult, so that they won't be taken in.
Source：https://www.chinafxj.cn/n174/c863831/content.html
