The Words of the Shioya Family
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The Words of the Shioya Family |
My name is Tomoko Shioya.
After I was wedded in August 8, 1992 in the 30,000 International Joint Wedding Blessing Ceremony in Seoul, Korea, we started our family life. Presently we are having three children.
In August 2006, I fell sick with the Depression disease. At that time I became unable to do any house chores or even take care of my children. I experienced then such mixed feelings as if I am falling into a pitch-dark tunnel, I recalled then such mixed feelings… I had experienced such feelings before.
This was the abduction and confinement experience which I had to undergo 13 years ago.
That’s when I had to face up to the past which I tried so hard to forget, and could realize that it was not just me but also my husband (fiancé at that time) who had been deeply wounded in heart from this abduction and confinement experience.
This is the story of such experience.
In December 23rd 1993, my parents have asked me to come back to my hometown to do some hair cut there, and when I went there I was abducted.
I was confined in a mansion in Kyoto for 69 days, and then by the Japan Church of Jesus Christ in the Kyoto I was put in captivity inside the Kyoto Saints Church for 38 days, in this 38th day I could manage to escape.
My parents were introduced by a friend to the Lutheran Church where they said that they were baptized and advised to study the Bible. At the Lutheran Church, my parents were introduced to minister Takeo Funada of the Kyoto Saints Church.
My parents said that when they became to attend these consultation meetings of minister Funada, and received his counseling, he taught them to carry on this plan of abduction and confinement.
I had to spend two weeks also in the same mansion in Kyoto with my mother’s cousin Mr. Ichiro Ninomiya who is a member of the United Church of Christ in Japan and who was the missionary of Taiwan at that time.
It was after I finished doing the hair cut and was about to go back that my parents offered to accompany me until the station and we all went together, we haven’t gone so far when all of a sudden more than one man with sunglasses surrounded us.
It was so sudden that I really couldn’t figure out what is really going on, dread filled me as I screamed with fear for help, yet unable to do anything I was dragged into a car.
The car I was squeezed into was having another car in the front and one more following in the back and they were communicating with the transceivers while driving. It took me a while to realize that it was my uncle who is driving the car into which I was forced, and those who are holding my arms were my own mother and younger sister. I was taken like that to the mansion in Kyoto.
When we left the car my family held my hands firmly to the elevator and was not allowed even to see to which floor are we going.
After I was forced into one room in the mansion, my uncle locked the room with a key and a chain, and again with a padlock, and they have even hidden my shoes a way.
It was such a shock for me to have my own parents do such things to me, and my feelings of pain and frustration made me unable to be in my right mind.
That’s how my life in captivity started.
When I asked my parents in my panic "Doesn’t your conscience bother you doing such things!" they would repeat over and over "We are sorry Tomoko, there was no other way'. The room was heavily locked, and even when I had to go to the toilet I was strictly guarded.
Forcing me into such a place, my body still remembers this horror and the extremity of it all, I was guarded all the time, even when I went to bed.
I was everyday under a strong mental stress which made my days full of bitterness.
Even though my parents kept saying things like "We want to talk it over." "We want to know the Unification church', "We want you to listen to a minister who knows the Unification Church well" our talk always has remained as far apart as ever.
It turned out to be that what their let us talk it over was nothing more than mere slogans.
It was their determined and one-sided approach to force me out of the Unification Church at any cost.
"No matter what, I must run a way', thinking that I succeeded to unlock the door of the balcony in the evening of the third day and as I looked from there I found out that it is the 8th floor.
Realizing that it was then impossible for me to descend down, I decided to leap through the fences and under two eaves to the next house. I thought that in the next morning the people of that house would find out about me and I will ask their help.
However, my parents could find me and I couldn’t do anything but return back to the room.
A former Unification Church woman together with minister Funada started coming to this mansion bringing with them many books about the Unification Church. Every time they came, they talked about the faults of the Divine Principle… etc. and then left.
Unable to know what to do, I was always praying for God to guide me. I was forced to always listen to their one-sided talk and criticism, I was wondering if I should just simply laugh, or shall I cry? Should I just counter their argument? I was always worried, struggling to know how can I relate to them. They didn’t accept or agree with anything I said, especially minister Funada, for him anyone who is believing in the Unification Church is absolutely mad.
My days in captivity went on, until one day I found in the report pad of my mother a paper with a detailed plan of the way of abducting me and the contents of the daily living in the mansion, as well as a precaution statement and even the posture which the parents should take, and that two people should be there when bathing and many other details.
Moreover, it was written in this paper that after I write down my withdrawal from membership and deliver it, that I should go through a rehabilitation course… .etc.
I could then understand from these contents that my parents had been following to the letter all the instructions of this minister. The shock and pain of it all made me vow and determine to never trust any of them.
Reading the contents of their plan I came to the recognition that they are determined no matter what it takes to never free me until I determine to withdraw from the church.
For almost two weeks after my confinement minister Funada continued his visits almost everyday to the mansion. In his visits he would always go on talking about the contents of the Unification Principle and compare them with the traditional teachings of Christianity, he would go on also criticizing Reverend Sun Myung Moon, and he would deny and contradict everything in my faith.
In my heart I would be thinking" if someone had received a revelation from God, then how can a person be so certain that it is a lie? Where is his proof that it is a lie? This is a phenomenon which no one can know a bout except God and this person, how can this minister say that it is a lie so definitively!'
I felt looking at this minister "who is the one who did lie and brought me to this place! And who is the one who instructed all these lies!! Wasn’t it you who did that!'
To be confronted with such a minister who is full of contradictions became for me absolutely unacceptable by any measures.
Knowing that my parents were reporting to that minister everything I say and all my behavior in the mansion, I have decided that in order to be freed from this place I have to fake a false withdrawal from the church and therefore I stopped resisting anything they say, and just continued to endure my days and persevere, that was all I could do.
Full of frustration as I was, I could find no one and nothing to relieve all this frustration except biting the blankets crying.
To be freed from the confinement I was every day repeating to myself that "today is the day! I will say today that I will leave the Unification Church" but I was unable still to have the courage and say it.
"Can I really fake a withdrawal… and if I said such and yet returned back to the Unification Church, will my parents be sad again… thinking like that, I couldn’t really determine what to do.
Exactly on the 40th day of my confinement I had a dream in which True Mother was pregnant and wearing a red Chimachogori, she was sitting and seemed to be really in pain.
Then True Father who was sitting beside her said" today is a tough delivery'.
The time of my confinement was the time of the 1600 Japanese members’ workshop, the time in which Japan was in the midst of that urgent mission entrusted on her, the mission of standing as the eve nation in the providence of giving life to the world.
Thinking of that I redetermined in my heart that I also must overcome this situation.
In the evening of that day, the sister of the member who had withdrawn from the Unification Church came to the mansion; she asked me "how do you feel now?'
Desperate to find words I thought "now is the time… I must say it" I answered her finally "I want to leave that faith of the Unification Church'.
But, what will happen after I proclaim my withdrawal… my heart was anxious and insecure, there was nobody to whom I could reveal my true feelings.
Regardless how anxious and troubled my heart was, this minister Funada began to bring more written criticism and character assassination material of the True Parents themselves which is written by the opponent group.
My heart was vacillating in pain as I prayed over and over again asking God to guide me to the true road of His divine will. I asked God why is it that my own family would go that far in making me suffer like that.
And as I go to bed, and as if to test God Himself I would seriously implore Him to answer me "God, who is that person who has truly lived Your divine truth in front of You? God, who is that person who had truly shed authentic tears for You?"
In that night, I had another dream in which I saw myself washing True Father’s back for him.
His back was badly-scarred from the torture he had undergone.
In the face of all these persecutions, how much humiliation and pain did True Father endure… True Father had really been in the dungeons of hell…
I was locked in that mansion facing an all alone battle there, God, knowing how ignorant and young in faith I was, He had provided me with the courage and wisdom and protected me through my dreams.
It was like True Father encouraging me "be patient, persevere, and hang in" I started also seeing many brothers and sisters of my church in my dreams, which made me realize that they are also praying for me.
If I was just pulling off on my own, I would have lost even the energy to think of anything anymore, I wondered what would have become of me.
Being a person who don’t speak his mind out, as well as one who have received the holy blessing of the Unification Church, I felt them, including minister Funada, behaving towards me with too much precaution.
As for my parents, they started by the end of the second month of my confinement to be really grumpy, with my mother often crying and saying "I wish to go back home!', and my father reproaching her saying "what are crying about! There are so many parents even now are crying because of such a problem!'
My mother would then redetermine herself again and say "Yes, I understand, Tomoko will never leave here until she understands that her joining the Unification Church is a mistake, even if she dies'
Seeing my parents like that, minister Funada would go on imprinting more one-sided information on my parents, but even though they are already suffering under this emotional and psychological stress, they would just endure, trusting his words "It is for your daughter’s sake'.
When I saw how hard my parents are working like that following to the letter whatever this minister instruct them, I couldn’t but pity them, while my anger towards this minister couldn’t be suppressed anymore.
Life in the mansion became increasingly just like hell. I was reaching already physically and mentally my limits in dealing with all of that. Unable to trust or relate my real heart to my own parents or to my own sister and continuously living in tension, I was afraid that I will lose my senses.
Eventually, I started having headaches and feelings of vomiting and numbness in my fingers, I was already bruised mind and body, and became unable even to breathe the air outside; I have lost also my appetite and lost all my energy. My weight which was 46 kg before I was confined dropped to 40 kg and I became thin so quickly, now, and for 14 years since then, my weight is never back.
My mother said to me once that" one of the members of the Kyoto Saints Church have said to me that "they cannot understand what Tomoko is really thinking, you have to be clear and say how you are really feeling!'
But again if I speak honestly how I feel, I would never be released from living in this confinement. For me to escape from here, I must pretend that I have already thrown away my faith in the Unification Church and fake my withdrawal, this is the only way left for me.
Finally, and after 69 days of captivity I was given the permission from minister Funada and could go out of the mansion.
When I was in the mansion minister Funada used to always heel a lot of criticism saying "The Unification Church is a one-sided inoculation teachings, it is a brain washing" and "the Unification Church is nothing but a dreadful terrorist group, that if Rev. Sun Myung Moon ordered someone to be killed, he would just be killed just like that'
Though it is actually him this minister who had been heeling one-sided information to my parents and relatives, he is the one who would go on imprinting on them all his hatred towards the Unification Church.
Even though my parents did not really want to go that far, and in their heart they "didn’t want to do such things" and yet they had to follow his instructions as he said "it is for the sake of your child, there is no other way'.
They followed his instructions even to the extent of carrying out such a criminal act of abduction and confinement. He had exploited and took advantage of the parents’ worry about their children the real problem is actually his way of igniting the anxiety in people.
On top of that, it is he who had completely disregarded my basic human right of the freedom of religious belief.
As I with my family was undergoing such suffering in that mansion, my husband also was facing so much bitterness. As it is that he also had suddenly received a letter from my mother saying" we are going to have a discussion with Tomoko'. That was all he could know and no matter where he searched he could never find out my whereabouts. That’s how my husband (fiancée at that time) was also emotionally hurt.
After I left the mansion, the minister instructed that I should live in Kyoto Saints Church for rehabilitation and for me to lead a life of honor, as he explained. Yet it the whole situation and conditions there was nothing but a confinement living.
Explaining the reason for such instructions, minister Funada said" withdrawing from the church, the things one used to believe in as the truth is completely denied, this makes the person falls in despair and pain from the emotional hurt he got, and therefore if that person was left without rehabilitation and without clearly realizing the falsity of the Unification Church, this person will not be able to associate with people or lead a normal life anymore, that’s why this person must be taught the right Christian faith" that’s why, he said, I must live a rehabilitation life in Kyoto Saints Church.
Minister Funada said then that "One is free in his religious belief "and then again he said "It is good if you believe in Christianity'. Such a minister who is actually practicing the enforced conversion of faith, with all of these contradictions in this minister I felt that there cannot be any truth in here, this is not what I am really searching for.
When we left this mansion, my family was really exhausted, and just three days before we left the mansion, my father had already started to go back to his job. In Kyoto Saints Church, there were 5 more people living such a rehabilitation life, and 3 more full time members who are living in what they called, the Persuasion Shelter place with the mission of visiting the places where people are being abducted and confined to carry on the enforced persuasion for conversion activities. There were also one Christian ministrant woman, and the family of minister Funada who were living there as well.
Except for minister Funanda’s family, we were all living in one place. We also had to buy the food supplies for our meals, and cook it ourselves. My younger sister who stayed with me and my mother only in the first day of the rehabilitation life, said that "I cannot bear such a group way of living" and left right the next day leaving me and mother there.
Life there would start by the sunrise service (a bible teaching), and then what follows this would be different each day, like prayer service, or bible study sessions, witnessing or worship conventions, family gatherings.
On Sundays we would be having the Sunday service followed from one o’clock in the afternoon by the consultation meeting of the Unification Church problem which will be changed after half a month to become the actual going out for countermeasure conventions against the Unification Church, in which we were not forced to take part in but, as they have asked us saying "basically you need to participate in them".
My mother who had to guard and watch me wherever I go, even to the toilet or to the lavatory, started showing signs of bitterness over such a life of confinement, and even though she was asked to do such things, she actually "wished to trust my daughter!" as she said in bitterness over such a surveillance living. They are very suspicious to the extent that one of the members would always be sleeping just at the door of the room where I sleep and as if thinking she might run away! They also told me to sleep in the place which is farthest from the door.
One day I found my mother so bitterly crying, and when I could finally get her to answer me she said that those church members have reproached her saying "Please be careful in your behavior for the sake of your daughter" and that this really has been painful for her because she has been really so endeavoring in cooperating with them…
After one week of my rehabilitation life, they asked me to write down the papers of withdrawal from membership, in order to know what to write minister Funada showed me copies of the same forms written by those who have gone through the same process and instructed me with what should be written. And again I was confirmed that I must do it to gain their trust, it was really the only way for me to be released from this place.
It was after I wrote the withdrawal papers that they have allowed me to go out only if I am accompanied with my mother, and so I asked my mother to go to the hair salon.
It was such a long time since I was allowed to be outside and for me it was like the coming of spring after the cold winter, filled with hope I said to myself with perseverance the road will surely be opened.
I got to know later that my husband also had come to see me in this Kyoto Saints Church but they sent him a way saying? "Tomoko doesn’t want to see you now".
Even though my husband came all the way from Tokyo to Kyoto just to see me, they sent him away without allowing him even to meet me, and they didn’t even tell me that he came.
When 20 days have passed since I started this rehabilitation life, my mother’s physical health started deteriorating little by little, so when the members of the Kyoto Saints Church saw that, they said to her "Tomoko is already strong enough, you can go back home now" and so she went back home.
When my mother was with me I used to have my bath at the bathroom of the family of minister Funada, and my mother used to take our laundry to the coin laundry outside, but after my mother went back home, the whole situation for me had changed. Also they prohibited me from going outside at all unless it is for washing my clothes at the coin laundry or for going to have my bath at the public bathhouse, and even that have to be done in the company of one of their members.
In the midst of all of that, I thought, my parents and my younger sister had become really a sacrifice for me and did all that thinking that it is for my sake, how can I after all that have the heart to go back to the Unification Church, maybe there is no other way for me but to live somewhere like those secret Christians in the Edo period in Japan …
All kinds of thoughts came to me, I felt like I am really losing my mind, and that I have no power anymore to think anything clearly. And yet it is through the teachings of the Unification Church that I really felt saved, this is something I cannot deny how much pain and agony is my husband also going through… thinking like that while such chaotic situation continues, I felt like screaming for heaven’s sake! To who does my life belong!
It was really a life of continuous pain. In the bottom of my heart I wanted to be really honest with myself.
When the ministers of this church started to think that there is no problem with me now they started showing signs of trust in me by taking me with them to visit the place of captivity of some brothers, and sometimes they would ask me to "Witness to them about your experience" in front of the parents or relatives of whom they are planning to abduct and confine. And I have also done that.
My heart, even in the midst of such doing, was always in pain, I was deceiving my own heart and working against my own will, it became beyond my endurance.
If I don’t leave this place I will surely lose myself and so I prayed and prayed for God to guide me.
One day, I found a Bible verse which says: "For I, the Lord your God, hold your right hand. It is I who say to you, 'Fear not, I will help you.'" Isaiah chapter 41: verse 13
This is the voice of God! I was assured, and my tears went flowing. I don’t want to lie on my own heart anymore; I want to be true and honest with myself.
I don’t want to be lost in the battles between religions.
With this, I determined to escape trusting that God will guide me.
It was the 38th day of my rehabilitation life, and the 107 day from the day I was abducted that I could escape from this abnormal environment of bondage.
Since my escape and for 3 years I couldn’t meet my parents or relate to them except through letters. When I escaped, I didn’t go back to the Unification Church and stayed with the family who helped me to escape and there my heart was gradually healing.
Then I started my family life with my husband and was truly grateful to God also for that.
For a virtuous man like my husband such incident of abduction had made him lapse into distrust of humanity, and began to dislike coming into contact with others.
My parents in law were so happy of our marriage and had even planned for us a wedding ceremony. But when they were told by my parents about my abduction and confinement, my wedding ceremony was not carried out and instead we started our marriage life secretly.
The pain and bitterness my husband felt towards my parents from abducting me and putting me under such bondage has really trampled upon his heart so hard.
If as we talk something that had to do with my parents came up, my husband’s facial expression would suddenly change, and he would become so agitated at me.
I couldn’t deal with his irritation, and we had to face so many sleepless nights and driven evenings which made him finally end up with the" Depression" disease. He couldn’t work anymore; he would quickly quit anything he starts on doing. And I couldn’t stop my pain over blaming myself for all of that.
This infernal situation went on for 6 years. Finally I became also sick with this "Depression" disease in the summer of 2006. Even now, my husband’s unresolved resentment makes him get angry and as if he flashes back to that past whenever the subject of this abduction incident comes up.
Such an incident of abduction and confinement even not directly involving them, those related family members are also deeply wounded. For many years now, I was unable to really understand my husband’s pain and blamed him for his reproachful attitude towards me, but when I became also sick with the "Depression" disease, and my pain of this disease became stacked up with that of my abduction period, I started to give more thought to my husband’s feelings.
Of course I had times when I did make him angry, but it was then that he said "My anger at you is stemming from my bitterness at this slap in the face I got from your parents; the pain of such affront is still vividly deep in my heart'. Hearing that from him made me realize that this is not just the problem of me and my parents, that is a more serious and unresolved situation.
My inadequacy and impotence fell really hard on me, I felt sometimes as if there is no value to my life.
Trying to find myself again I started going to the nearby church and I am still obscurely practicing my faith there.
We are blessed now with 3 children, and it is our wish to raise them truly centered on God.
Those ministers who are depriving people from their freedom just so that they can leave the Unification Church, and exploiting the parents’ love for their children, hiding the reality of abduction and confinements they are practicing under rosy and beautiful words like" sheltered persuasion', ignoring the human beings’ free will and treating them as if they are crazy out of their minds.
What makes it even more painful to the heart is that it is their own parents who are doing that to them, the very ones whom they trust above anyone else.
Usurp one’s freedom of faith, and bruising the relationship between parents and their children, how much time and vigor will be needed for such to be mended.
Such a conduct of destroying ones’ personality and jeopardizing the person physically and spiritually is an unforgivable conduct.
And those who are family related even though they haven’t gone through the abduction personally like my husband have also through such a shocking blow been emotionally hurt as well. It is very hard to forgive those opposing ministers who are continuing such self-righteous conduct of abducting and confinement without any sense of guilt in their hearts.
This experience of mine is nothing but one corner in an iceberg, there are many more with much more painful and bitter experiences of such, much more than mine.
To solve such a problem of abductions and confinements we really need every one of us, every one of us must speak up!!!