In the year 1976 the ‘Religious Forum’ was founded where the members could get help with various legal, financial and mass media problems in their encounter with society. It was a gathering of different religious communities, sects and cults who felt that they were treated unfairly in various media contexts and that they were represented by an incorrect image in, among other things, school books and university textbooks. They wanted to work for smear campaigns and political persecution to end and for them to be treated better by giving they themselves a chance to be heard in various media contexts, including in school textbooks. They believed that if they coordinated the various religious communities in Sweden, they would have a better chance legally and had engaged the lawyer Lennart Hane (1931-2010) for this task.

“Religious Forum’s purpose in general is the following: l) To work to ensure that the UN Declaration on Human Rights is applied in matters of religious communities and individual believers. 2) To work to ensure that Sweden’s form of government, the Freedom of Religion Act and the provisions of the Criminal Code regarding incitement against ethnic groups come to application in matters relating to freedom of belief. 3) To provide a forum for factual information about religious phenomena.” (The Seeker 1978, No. 2)

Religious Forum also considered that they had been subjected to prejudiced labeling by people with a traditional Christian outlook, “who consider the new religiosity as heresy and a threat to the Christian faith”. The Religious Forum represented a variety of “new” religious denominations that had their basis in ancient Eastern religions, but which had perhaps grown out of various reform movements, and been ousted.

One of the initiators of the Religious Forum was Gun Lanciai who was a pastor in the Church of Scientology and one of the leading forces behind it was Björn Sahlin who was behind the magazine ‘Gnosis – Magazine for a spiritual culture’. Björn became chairman of the Religious Forum and Olle Hjern (1926-2016), who represented the Swedenborg Church, became vice-chairman. Bertil Persson, who was a pastor in, among other things, The Moravian Church, also acted as a temporary chairman of the Forum. Board members in the forum were Arne Björkerup from the Messianic Association (Messianska Förbundet), Lars-Erik Nyberg from Osivao-New Age Philosophy and Friedhilde Bächle from the Tongil family (Sun Myung Moon).

Religious Forum worked in four sectors, the legal sector, the social sector, the information sector and the dialogue sector, and during the late 70s had representation of 20 out of approximately 80 communities that existed in Sweden during that time. More denominations represented were also from ISKCON (Hare Krishna) and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormons).

Björn Sahlin (1947-), who was chairman of the Religious Forum, says that they faced hard resistance in the late 70s from several established denominations, conflicts with authorities, campaigns in the mass media and that several members withdrew and that this left its mark on Religious Forum’s activities. Björn says that he saw the youth movement as an important part of a social change where they were one of the means by which they could break down and challenge “the old established religious potemkin backdrops”, as he describes it as, and that these old institutions would be brought down themselves. He says that during the 80s the forum was less active, but that even the church critics calmed down and that they were no longer at the center of events.

“At the end of November 1978, the Religious Forum organized a two-day symposium on religious freedom for minority communities. Now the lectures and a selection of discussion papers have come in book form, somewhat edited. The book, called Religious Freedom – for whom? with the subtitle New religions meet society, has been edited by Religious Forum chairman Björn Sahlin and published by Proprius.” (The Seeker 1979, No. 7, New religions meet society)

Björn tells in an article (Sökaren 1978, no. 10) called ‘The Church bears false testimony about the new religiosity’ where he talks about the theologian and sect critic Friedrich-Wilhelm Haack (1935-1991) who was also called the “cult hunter” and the Danish theologian Johannes Aagaard (1928-2007) who represented the Christian countercult movement and what they called mentally and ‘religiously’ ill people who became victims of gurus and similar religious leaders. Björn believes that these “cult hunters” give a false image of new religious movements by creating a false impression that they cause mental illness in their followers.

“So it is claimed that followers of “gurus and similar religious leaders” would be “victims” and “religiously ill”. The idea seems to be that gurus etc. induce illness in their “victims”. In the next sentence, a warning is given about the influence of the new religious movements in general. The reader thus gets the impression that new religions would generally cause mental illness in their members, who would at the same time be deluded, exploited victims of fraudulent religious leaders.” (The Seeker 1979, No. 7, New religions meet society)

Björn continues with his criticism of the church and believes that “however, it cannot be considered the Christian mission’s but society’s business to help people socially or in other ways who have had problems in connection with their contact with a certain community or a certain religion”. Björn does not want the church to get involved, but that it is a problem that society must solve because it is also within the Christian church that problems arise. Björn also believes that the suspicion of newer religious movements makes use of what he calls the “disease myth” where the mental health of the “newly religious” involved is called into question. He also goes into a movement originating in North America where the pretext has been taken to “deprogram” religiously “deviant” people. He mentions Ted Patrick (born 1930) who was behind the deprogramming movement and the Cult Awareness Network.

“By calling him a ‘victim’, he is disqualified in his religious stance. He is considered to be in need of care. Vague terms such as ‘schizophrenic’, ‘neurotic’, ‘paranoid’ or ‘brainwashed’ are often used in this context and by people who are not even psychiatrically literate. This type of argument is especially dangerous, because on the continent and in North America it is used as a pretext to “deprogram” religiously “deviant” people. Deprogramming is a form of brainwashing that was developed during the Korean War and which since then it has been used in political and religious contexts first in the USA and Canada, now also in Europe. The phenomenon includes physical and psychological torture and is very offensive.”

Björn was behind the magazine ‘Gnosis – magazine for a spiritual culture’ which also had Willy Pfändtner, Olle Hjern, Robert Carleson and Jörgen Sundvall on the editorial board. Also included was Lisbeth Gustafsson (1951-), who worked at Sweden’s Public Service as editor-in-chief for life views at Sweden’s Television. She was also at the Sigtuna Foundation, the Swedish Theological Institute, and is chairman of the Mäster Eckhart Society Foundation, which manages the legacy of religious philosopher Hans Hof (1922-2011) who wrote about the mystic Mäster Eckhart (1260–1328). Gnosis was published between 1984 -1992 and came out with 13 issues.

Lars-Erik Nyberg represented the Osivao-New Age Philosophy at the Religious Forum which was a UFO movement that first appeared in Denmark through Knud Weiking who called his movement Orthon after his alleged contact with the spaceman Orthon. This was the same spaceman with whom American contactee George Adamski had his alleged contacts, and Orthon’s followers received a prophecy of a coming nuclear war that would start on December 26, 1968, and they had a bunker built to protect against radioactive radiation. The prediction never came true and the group was split up and no flying saucers ever came to their rescue. This movement spread to Sweden and also had spiritual teachings about “Universal Laws” and they worked for a higher understanding for the coming Age of Aquarius. They also believed in Masters who came to share knowledge of these Universal Laws which were as old as the Universe. The movement also had a connection to The Universal Link, which was founded by Liebie Pugh and whose book was published in Swedish by Parthenon publishing.

Jörgen Sundvall, who represented the Hare Krishna movement, was an accountant at the Religious Forum and he, together with Willy Pfändtner (b. 1947), was the one who brought the Krishna movement to Sweden in the 70s. Willy is a philosopher of religion and lecturer in philosophy of religion at Södertörn University and writes about religious diversity and interreligious dialogue.

“Hare Krishna leader Jörgen Sundvall’s contribution is called “The West meets Hinduism” and is about the prejudices, misunderstandings and resistance that affected the “foreign” movement he belongs to.” (The Seeker 1979, No. 7, New religions meet society)

Jörgen Sundvall later trained in hypnosis and hypnotherapy and became a Past Life therapist. He studied hypnosis in England under Neil French in 1986 and then methods developed by Terence Watts, John Landi and Gil Boyne. Past life regression he has studied under Henry Leo Bolduc. He has participated in TV productions with topics such as past life regressions in Kanal 5 and about sleep problems in TV4. In 1997, he started the Swedish School for Ethical and Analytical Hypnotherapy (SSEAH).

Curt Berg (1919-2009) was on the board of Religöst Forum and he was a leader within the Swedish section of the Theosophists in the years 1949-1953 and 1968-1978. Curt became a member of the Theosophists in 1942 and became editor of Theosophical Magazine during the 40s. He was also stationed in Adyar during the years 1987 to 1989 as treasurer and became chairman of the European Federation during the period 1990 to 1995.

Curt held a lecture on UFOs and theosophy in 1975 in Jönköpings-Posten and in the press clip you can read:
“We on Earth have been subjected to visits by beings from alien planets for several thousand years, and after the Second World War these mysterious beings have shown us an increased interest. At least that is what ufologists and theosophists are convinced of. Civil engineer Curt Berg from Stockholm, who is secretary general of the Swedish Theosophical Society, talked about ufology and theosophy at a discussion evening in Jönköping on Thursday evening, arranged by the UFO Center and theosophists in Jönköping.” (source, Håkan Blomqvist, UFO-Aktuellt no. 4-2012 – 1-2013)

Another board member of the Religious Forum was Friedhilde Bächle who represented the Tongil family (Unification Church). Tongil is Korean and means union, unity. The Unification Church came to Sweden in 1977 and Friedhilde came as a missionary from Germany for the Tongli family in the early 70s. In a letter to the Unification Church in 1972, she tells about meetings with other churches in Sweden during a 3-day conference.

“Provoked by a big demonstration against the American support of Vietnam, a free-religious church launched a counter-action. They mainly criticized the infiltration by leftists of schools, TV and Radio and the distribution of the Marxist-Leninist teachings. Since then, there were so-called opinion-meetings which were much frequented. Reverend Stanly Sjoberg declared the war against the “ideology of Satan” how he called the Marxist-Leninist philosophy. This free religious church has printed papers (100,000 copies) which shalt be distributed in front of large business centres, on market places and schools. Several persons in this church have received from the spiritual world that in this summer there will be a serious threat of leftist extremists in Sweden. So they call their members to procure weapon for an armed revolt. The other churches, however, keep themselves aside and even criticize the activities of this free-religious church.” (Our Unification Church was very positively spoken about, Friedhilde Bachle, May 18, 1972, Stockholm, Sweden, letter to Young Hwi Kim)

Reverend Stanly Sjöberg (1936-) was a pastor at the Philadelphia congregation in Stockholm and was the second pastor to the “Pentecostal leader” Lewi Pethrus (1884-1974) who was a leader in the Pentecostal movement and a founder of the party Kristen Demokratisk Samling (KDS).

Arne Björkerup was another board member of Religöst Forum and he founded the Messianic Association in 1962. The association based its activities on the Bible and Arne called its members Sion’s Guardians, which were around 50 registered followers with 100 meeting participants.

Gun Lanciai (1920-2013) who was an initiator within the Religious Forum was a leading pastor within the Church of Scientology and one of the first Scientology churches in Sweden is said to have been founded in 1968 in Stockholm. Gun was friends with Solveig von Schoultz (1907-1996) whose brother was Lennart Segerstråle (1892-1975) (and who was friends with Gun’s father) who was active from 1939 in the Oxford Group and Moral ReArmament (MRA). Lennart’s cousin was Nils George Casper Segerstråle (1893-1979) who was a military man and a member of the Swedish Johanniter Order (Johanneniterordern). Solveig got Gun interested in the occult as she studied the Tibetan and Egyptian Book of the Dead and the teachings of Carl Gustav Jung and this may have been a basis for Gun’s religious interest. (source, The Freethinker, Christian Lanciai)

Participating in a symposium at the Religious Forum was the religious psychologist Örjan Björkhem (1946-1996) who had an interest in parapsychology, hypnosis and mysticism. Örjan wrote several books on these subjects and since 1969 conducted academic studies in modern mysticism and its connection to mental illness, and he investigating the connection between mysticism and certain types of hallucinations, mental illness and delusions. His doctoral thesis was on the connection between religious experiences and mental illness and he was also interested in the UFO phenomenon but cautioned against using hypnosis and believed that the boarding stories had their cause in inner experiences and had their similarities in stories about fairies, gnomes and goblins. Örjan was also of the opinion that it is not religion that can make a person sick, but that the ‘mystical’ experience finds its support in the new religiosity.

Religious Forum held a symposium in 1978 called “Religious Freedom for Minority Communities” and the lectures there were later published in book form in Björn Sahlins’ “Religious Freedom — For Whom? New Religions Meet Society” (Proprius 1979).

“Orjan Björkhem’s lecture is entitled “Are there religiously ill people?”. The answer is: The psychotically ill person is not “religiously” ill. He is ill and at the same time has religious beliefs, which like all his other beliefs are colored by the illness. But it is not that his religion drives him into the disease. On the contrary, the so-called new religiosity can be a better support than, for example, the Swedish church, where personal and mystical experiences are often present difficult to find a sufficiently empathetic treatment.” (Swedish Theological Quarterly. Issue 56, 1980)

Örjan was active in local politics in the political party ‘Kommunens väl’ which was formed in 1973 and which in 1976 changed its name to the Center Democrats and in 2000 to the Österlenpartiet. In the 1979 parliamentary election in the party we find Sven Rydenfelt (1911-2005) who was a writer for the newspaper Contra and Operation Sweden and who earlier in 1956 joined the Mont Pelerin Society. Together with Janerik Larsson, he wrote the book The secret register of the security police – about freedom of opinion and persecution of opinion (1966). On the parliamentary list in 1985, we find Alf Enerström (1929-2017), who also wrote a guest columnist in the magazine Contra.

In the 80s at the party’s meetings, we can find Gustaf Petrén (1917-1990) who had a background in the National Socialist Workers’ Party and was the founder of the Civil Rights Movement as a speaker. Gustaf wrote together with Anna Wahlgren in the party’s magazine Our Future at the elections in 1985. Anna Wahlgren (1942-2022) who was a writer and social debater, was a controversial participant in public debate about child rearing and also opposed forced custody of children. One of her own children, Eleonora, married into the aristocratic von Essen family where we find members of both the Catholic Knights of Malta and the Protestant Johanniter Order (Johanniterorden) (JohO).

Örjan was also interested in parapsychology and held “ghost courses” at Vettinge manor, which were courses in how to develop paranormal abilities such as Psychokinesis, Traveling clairvoyance, Sortilegi (the art of divination by cards), Radiesthesia (commuting, beat square), Psychic sensitization and Numerology . The owner of the farm was Göran Klingborg and at the courses there you could also find the mediums Dzintra Klingborg and Doris Ankarberg. Örjan wrote together with Doris the book Contact with other worlds? (1992). Other books written by Örjan included “Man and reality. About mystics in today’s Sweden” (1978), “Mystic and reality” (1984), “Parapsychology and superstition” (1986) and “The devil mobilizes” (1987) etc.

“Örjan Björkhem starts from classic mystics within Catholicism, who had visions and apparitions (hallucinations in the parlance of psychiatry) with ecstasy, crying attacks and convulsions, experienced themselves as the “bride of Christ”, believed themselves to be mouthpieces for God, etc., thus ideas where the “mystic” perceived to be God’s special favorite, to be in the middle of the events of the entire cosmos…” (Sökaren 1978, no. 8, Mysticism and Delusions, review by Sven Magnusson)

Örjan wrote an article in Sökaren magazine (1979, No. 2) entitled ‘The Murders in Guyana’ which dealt with cult leader Jim Jones and the suicude-mass murders committed by his followers in Jonestown and he questioned how this could have happened and warns of the need for to surrender to an authority and give up everything else. But he also believed that events like Jonestown could turn into religious persecution against neo-spiritual groups.

“If the new religion of Jones was crazy – well, then maybe all new religious movements are crazy. The climate will probably harden. There is a risk that perfectly innocent religious movements will suffer persecution in reference to what happened in Jonestown. A gadget society’s total indifference to people and spiritual experiences may spill over into religious persecution directed at groups that constitute a new and healthy element of society.” (The Seeker, 1979, No. 2)

John Björkhem (1910-1963), who was Örjan’s father, was a psychologist, religious psychologist, doctor and priest and also a pioneer in Swedish parapsychology and hypnosis research. That Örjan got his interests from his father was obvious as they were both interested in mysticism and John earned a doctorate in theology with a religious psychological and religious historical study of the mystic Antoinette Bourignon (1616-1680) who had an influence on Pietism. John hypnotized a large number of people and wrote his doctoral thesis in psychology in 1942 entitled “The Hypnotic Hallucinations”. John wrote several texts and books such as The Occult Problem (1956), Hypnosis and Personality Transformation (1959) etc.

“In room IX of Uppsala’s venerable university building, 30 years ago John Björkhem conducted a series of peculiar age regression experiments: through hypnosis he brought subjects of various ages back in time through their own lives so that they felt younger and younger right up to the stage of toddlerhood, and on to the time before their birth, until their psyche seemed to be possessed by another personality, a man who claimed to have lived in a once upon a time.” (The Seeker 1974, no. 7, “The New Man”, Ragnar Alcen)

Eva Hellström was behind the initiative that the Society for Parapsychological Research was formed in 1948. She had previously participated in spiritualist seances and became a member of the English Society for Psychical Research and started the Swedish equivalent and became its first secretary. Eva also founded the foundation John Björkhem’s Memorial Fund in 1963, which was the year of John’s death.

Gustaf Petrén (1917-1990) was at the Religious Forum’s symposium in 1978 and spoke about “Human rights” and whose talk later ended up in the book Religious freedom – for whom? written by Björn Sahlin. Gustaf was a trained lawyer and is said to have been pro-Nazi during his student days and was part of the National Socialist Workers’ Party in 1935. He was also active in politics and was part of ‘Medborgerlig samling’ as vice chairman between 1965–1968 and also during the 60s chairman of the Brunkeberg discussion club, where we find Gustaf Reuterswärd (1882-1953) as one of the earliest board members, who worked at the State Information Board and at the same time at AB Radiotjänst. A former board member at Brunkeberg was also Carl Petersén (1883-1963) who was head of the military intelligence service C-byrån and who volunteered in the Finnish Civil War. Gustaf Petrén is said to have been friends with Jan Rydström (1914-1990) who was involved in Thede Palm’s intelligence network called T-Office. Gustaf is also said to have written in the newspaper Operation Sweden.

In 1974, Gustaf founded the Civil Rights Movement where he became the first chairman and where they worked to strengthen civil rights in the Swedish constitution. They changed names several times and also merged with ‘Friheten i Sverige’ (Freedoom in Sweden) in 1988, which was led by Andres Küng (1945-2002). Andres waged a struggle against communism and was one of the founders of the Monday Movement, which pushed for the independence of the Baltic states from the Soviet Union. Gunnar Hökmark from the Right Wing Party started new meetings with the Monday Movement when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. Gunnar is also chairman of the Swedish Pan-European Union where we also find Walburga Habsburg Douglas as a board member and who is the youngest daughter of Otto von Habsburg (1912-2011). She co-founded Paneuropa-Jugend Deutschland (Pan-European Youth Union in Germany) in 1973 and has been vice-chairman of the Pan-European Union. She is also active within the Swedish Order of Malta and was president ‘ad interim’ during part of 2008.

Andres Küng became chairman of the Civil Rights Movement when Gustaf passed away and he held that position between 1990 and 1993. Allan Ekström (1927-2017) was chairman of the Civil Rights Movement between 1993 and 1994 and the lawyer Brita Sundberg-Weitman between 1994 and 1997. Brita is the daughter to Halvar Sundberg (1894-1973) who was professor of constitutional law at Uppsala University and brother of Jacob W.F. Sundberg (1927-2023) who was also a member of the Civil Rights Movement. Brita and Jacob were also involved in the Nordic Committee for Human Rights (NKMR), which pursues legal measures for children who have been forcibly taken into care by the social services (LVU).

The count and jurist Gustaf Lagerbjelke (1938-2022) was chairman of the Civil Rights Movement between 1997-98. As a member of the noble family Lagerbjelke, he was a member of the Riddarhus directorate (House of Knights) between 1974 and 1995 and he has been vice-chairman of the Johanniterorden in Sweden. Other chairmen of the Civil Rights Movement have been Anita Enflo, Dick Erixon and Leif V Erixell.

At the Religious Forum symposium in 1978 was also the lawyer Lennart Hane (1931-2010), who with the title “Protection against religious persecution in Sweden” talked about what legal protection Swedish law provides against religious persecution.

“Society’s problems are of various kinds. The newer communities mainly have problems of a legal nature and with the mass media. On their own, the communities often do not have the knowledge and strength to resolve such situations themselves. Within the framework of the Religious Forum, we want to provide such opportunities. Within the framework of the Religious Forum, we want to provide such opportunities. That is why we have attached a very skilled jurist, lawyer Lennart Hane in Stockholm, to us. He is one of the few lawyers who has experience of legal issues in a community context, in addition to having a documented interest in human rights and freedoms. He also has interesting views on the current religious freedom legislation. Our collaboration began with his giving a public lecture on these matters on January 23, 1978.” (The Seeker 1978, No. 2)

Lennart was a board member of the Swedish-Chilean Society where we find Ulf Hamacher (1920-1993) and Åke Lindsten (1921-1994) who we also find at the World Anti-Communist League. He was also a board member of Gustaf Petrén’s Civil Rights Movement and wrote articles in the newspapers Contra and Operation Sweden. He later worked as an accountant in the Nordic Committee for Human Rights (NKMR). He wrote the book Creeping Dictatorship: A Study in 1970s Swedish Reform Policy (1972) which dealt with the “undermining activities” of the Soviet Union and Right’s ghost: an analysis of the new social democracy’s socialization and erasure of Sweden’s civilization (1976) and The nationalization of our children (1980) (wiki).

Bertil Persson, who was chairman of the interim board of the Religious Forum, wrote the book ‘Sect Fighters: A Summarized Idea-historical Study’ (2008) where he makes arguments in defense of religious sects. He gives in the book a summary in the history of how certain religious orientations have been persecuted, including the persecutions of the Catholic Church, and also the persecutions in Germany during the Second World War, and in which he selects facts to present his point of view on this side of a long conflict between different religious groups. He also attacks these religious groups who are committing these persecutions in these days and goes through who they are:

“In some countries apology-movements (“sect-expert-schools”) launch lists over the most dangerous sects, accentuated by horror propaganda from evil religion. It is not the indicated religious movements which are dangerous but the “sect-experts.”

He also says that the Religious Forum, which was founded in 1977, had the German ‘Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Kirschen und Religionsgesellschaften’ (AKR), which was founded by Heinrich Grüber in 1947, as a model for its work in Sweden.

“The basic ideology is that the fight against sects does not reach any positive result. It is important for true knowledge and peaceful living that every religious community is responsible for information about history, beliefs etc. AKR paves the way for and supports congregations in their right to present themselves in mass media, schoolbooks, education at universities and other kinds of influencing public opinion.” (Sectfighters, p56)

It was not only in Sweden that these “sect-apologists” started up, but it was in several countries in Europe and America and with an obvious collaboration between them.

“To inform of and to combat movements that spread false knowledge on religion, a number of organisations have been established,… Centro Studi sulle Nuove Religioni (CESNUR), Turin, Italy, 1988, Network Focus on Religious Movements (INFORM), London, Institute for the Study of American Religion (ISAR), Santa Barbara, Ca, USA, Religionswissenschaftlige Medien- und Informationsdienst (REMID), Marburg, Germany och Interreligious Peace Council (1977), Sweden (original name, Religiöst Forum).” (Sectfighters)

The Center for Studies on New Religions (CESNUR) was founded in 1988 by the Catholic Massimo Introvigne, Jean-François Mayer and Ernesto Zucchini. We can also find the esotericist Antoine Faivre (1934-2021) as President of CESNUR. Massimo is associated with the ‘Groupe de Thèbes’ where we find several occultists and esotericists among others Christian Bouchet who is involved in several societies and rites such as the Ordo Templis Orientis, Memphis-Misraim and extreme political movements. At the ‘Groupe de Thèbes’ we also find Gérard Kloppel, Jean-Pierre Giudicelli de Cressac Bachelerie and Robert Amadou who was a member of several orders such as the Martinist Order, the Memphis-Misraïm Rite, the Kabbalistic Order of the Rose-Croix, the Gnostic Church Universal and Freemasonry.

Network Focus on Religious Movements (INFORM) was founded by Eileen Barker who is a professor of Sociology of Religions at the London School of Economics. We find Eileen at the NGO Foundation for Holistic Spirituality where we also find David Lorimer who sat as Chair at Sir George Trevelyan’s Wrekin Trust and as Vice President at the Swedenborg Society and the Horizon Research Foundation etc.

Bertil explains that he helped influence so that a number of authors’ books were removed from schools as reference literature and he believed it was time to blacklist books with a Christian character that gave an incorrect image of various sects.

“I believe the time has come for blacklisting the type of books that, with a Christian label, give a false image of our “sectarian” forms of religion, e.g. Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons, Christian Science, immigrant faith and episcopivagantes churches. These books have done enough damage by its prejudicial, fanatical and divisive character.”

“The first ones I think of are the signed “experts” Efraim Briem, Axel Gustafsson, David Hedegård, Wilhelm Bergling, Erik Beijer, Thoralf Gilbrant and Folke Thorell. I am happy that through my involvement in the Association of Teachers of Religion books are removed from schools and as reference literature in religious textbooks.” (Tro på Villovägar, Interview with Bertil Persson, Sökaren 1977, no. 2)

Religious Forum later changed its name to Sweden’s Interreligious Peace Council (Sveriges Interreligiösa Fredsråd) and as a member we later find Tommy Hansson who was publisher of the magazine Contra between 1993 and 2008. He has also been politically active in the Democratic Alliance and Sweden Democrats and a member of the Moon movement (Sun Myung Moon), the Scandinavian Swedenborg Society and the Liberal Catholic Church. Tommy was interviewed in the magazine Sökaren (1981, no. 7) where he had his say about Christopher Edwards’ book ‘Himmelsk Hjärntvätt’ (Original title: Crazy for God) which deals with the “deprogramming” of people in new spiritual movements. Author Edwards was a former member of Moon’s Unification Church and Tommy comes to the defense of the neo-spiritual movements, comparing “deprogrammers” to the Soviet mental hospitals.

“A notable feature of the criticism of the so-called neo-spiritual movements is the tendency to want to label the followers as mentally ill and not responsible for their actions. This condition is explained as a result of the movements’ ‘brainwashing’, so a legitimate antidote is a ‘deprogramming’. This is a form of physical and psychological torture practiced against members of neo-spiritual movements, primarily ‘in the United States.’

“To link back to the tactic of labeling followers of certain beliefs as mentally ill, this is of course nothing new. The Soviet mental hospitals housed many cases where an uncomfortable religious or political opinion was a valid entry ticket. A totalitarian society cannot accept that opinions are formulated that go against the norm accepted by the party. Anyone who dares to criticize becomes, in that perspective, either a criminal or a lunatic.” (The Seeker 1981, No. 7)

In 2008, Sweden’s Interreligious Peace Council (Religious Forum) published the study ‘Tro på villovägar i skolans läroböcker’ (Belief in misguided ways in school textbooks) where they criticized representations of new religious movements as impartial and where they are described as dishonest, manipulative, dangerous and destructive and that students studying at colleges or universities get incorrect knowledge about new religious movements. Peter Åkerbäck, who is part of the study together with Bertil Persson, describes that there is a lack of source criticism and that it is “also desirable to have contact with the group to be described in order to be able to correct various basic facts”.

“The prejudiced and disrespectful trait is otherwise something that characterizes the way in which the various groups are described. However, this means that the presentation succeeds in achieving its purpose, namely to describe these groups as extreme, manipulative and dangerous.”

Peter Åkerbäck (b. 1967), who has a doctorate in the history of religion and conducts research on new religious movements at the University of Dalarna and director of studies in sociology at Stockholm University, researches various destructive sects and wrote the thesis The Impermament Religions: On collective suicide and salvation in the Peoples Temple, Ordre du Temple Solaire and Heaven’s Gate (2008). Peter believes that these sects can influence the perception of other religious movements.

“Although mass suicides are uncommon, they have consequences – one such being that they affect the perception of certain forms of religious groups. In particular, when contemporary religious minority groups are discussed, they are often compared to the three groups that committed mass suicides, Peoples Temple (1978), Ordre du Temple Solaire (Order of the Sun Temple) (1994) and Heaven’s Gate (1997).”

Peter has appeared on Radio, TV and Newspapers and we can see that the work at the Religious Forum has been effective as we have gained new “experts” who tell us what new religious movements and sects are and are not. We no longer have anyone to warn us if these movements are extreme, manipulative and dangerous and what we can do about it. It is no longer the Christian Church that should help us if we have problems with our “soul”, but we should seek help from society and its psychiatrists.

The association Forskning och Information om Nya Religiösa Rörelser (FINYAR) (Research and Information on New Religious Movements) was founded in 1997 within “religious science and behavioral science disciplines” with connections to various universities in Sweden and with the aim of studying new religious movements and new religiosity within “historical, sociological, psychological or anthropological perspectives”. They also publish a journal that in 2009 was named Aura: Journal for academic studies of new religiosity. In 2009, in connection with FINYAR, the International Society for the Study of New Religions (ISSNR) was founded, which operates internationally.

“Equivalents to FINYAR exist in other countries, for example CESNUR in Italy, INFORM in England and ISSNR (International Society for the Study of New Religions).” (finyar.org)

Liselotte Frisk (1959-2020) took inspiration from INFORM in England to found FINYAR and was the driving force and chairman for several years. She was also chairman of the International Society for the Study of New Religions (ISSNR) between 2009 and 2013. She is also listed as being on the Editorial Board of the journal CESNUR. She wrote several books where they were also used at colleges and universities around Sweden such as A religious studies perspective (1998) and The new religious movements where did they go? (2007). She wrote Gods new grandchildren (2017) and The meditating dalahorse (2013) together with Peter Åkerbäck.

At FINYAR, we find in the editorial staff Olav Hammer, Anne Kalvig, Margrethe Løøv, Erik A. W. Östling, Karen Swartz and Henrik Bogdan. Olav Hammer has written several books on New Age, Esotericism, Theosophy and religion. Henrik Bogdan who is associated with societies such as the Ordo Templi Orientis has written texts such as Death as Initiation: Order of the Solar Temple and Rituals of Initiation (2006), Preface to the Apostles of the Dark – Satanism in Ancient Times (2006) and texts on Aleister Crowley and Freemasonry. He is secretary of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism (ESSWE).Henrik Bogdan wrote together with Andreas Önnerfors, Jonas Andersson and Anders Simonsen the study ‘Mystical brotherhood – powerful network : studies in Swedish 18th-century Freemasonry’ (2006). Önnerfors was initiated into Freemasonry in 1996 and has degree X and is a member of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Scania which belongs to the Royal Order of Scotland located in Edinburgh in Scotland. He is also a member of the Swedish research lodge Carl Friedrich Eckleff, located in Uppsala.

“New Age sources identify Cancer as the “Gate of Men” or the gateway in the heavens through which souls descend into matter, i.e. human bodies. This is the Gnostic doctrine of the pre-existence of souls, i.e. that all humans were once part of a Universal Soul from which certain souls, whether on a mission for the gods or enticed by materialism, descended from their ethereal state into bodies.”

“Members of the Heaven’s Gate cult were led to believe that a literal UFO would transport their individual souls to the clouds, which were a giant mothership that would convey them to a literal Kingdom of Heaven. Reports on the Heaven’s Gate deaths portrayed the cult as a group of suicidal religious fanatics, whose aberrant beliefs were abnormal rather than mainstream occultism. The reader may be surprised to learn that the dualistic doctrine of Heaven’s Gate cult — that matter is evil and to be escaped — is the secret doctrine of all pagan religions and occult societies. This false doctrine was behind the mass suicides of the Order of the Solar Temple — in Quebec on Dec. 23, 1995 and France on March 22, 1997, just days before the Heaven’s Gate episode in California. Before that was Jonestown, Guyana in 1978.” (watch-unto-prayer, Barbara Aho)