+1

I did however post her late husband’s 1994 letter and several others that are very revealing, from the prior reform movements.

But of course that is just pure bullshit. SLee intentionally broke ties with the Presbyterian church and purposefully created ubf as an anti-church group.

One of my mantras since before I left ubf is this: You are not alone!

That applies here, GC and Charles– I know there are about 7 or 8 other families from Toledo ubf who left in 2011-2012 who deal with these exact issues currently. Most don’t have the energy or the desire to share details here publicly, but know that they exist and their problems are real and similar to ours.

When ubf shepherds snatch away your identity, they then pair you up for arranged marriage in order to puff up their own glory. They are seeking a kind of eternal life, lived vicariously through sheep. It doesn’t work.

Here are a few thoughts that came to mind while reading the article:
* The answer to the title is a resounding, Yes!
* I can think of several cases off the top of my head from the LA chapter where marriages were divided because one person either wanted to leave or had already left. In one case, with a good friend, a few of us actually encouraged him to stop coming to UBF for the sake of taking care of his wife and kids. He was coming by himself for a while but it was clearly not good nor was it necessary. His family should come first.
* In my family’s case, UBF has and continues to cause division although we left 1 year ago. We left together, but I my wife and kids attended Sunday services for a month longer than I did. Unfortunately, I can’t say too much without breaking my wife’s trust and causing further division, but I can (maybe) say the following:

– I was the UBF supporter in the marriage. My wife was uncomfortable about many things and often felt alone. I didn’t help her and listen to her as I should have. I tried to help her get along on most things, but it had to fit inside being a UBF family.
– Our reasons for leaving were mostly different, but you can imagine that when I was done with UBF how selfish an act it appeared to my wife. Suddenly, when I think things have gone wrong and it’s time to go, it’s okay. We stayed on my direction, and left on my direction. Even before leaving, it was difficult to talk about issues of UBF and our family. Not because we would betray UBF or each other, but because it became too divisive, heated, and angry all too quickly. I avoided those discussions.
– UBF haunts my marriage like a ghost. Having any kind of interaction with anything person UBF related causes division and tension in the house. It’s very unpleasant. Even mentioning contact with former members can make it uncomfortable in the house. You leave UBF, but UBF may not leave you.
– We have kids. They were very happy that I stopped doing UBF activities so that I could spend time with them. In many ways, leaving UBF has and is uniting my family.
– The next difficult struggle and division caused by leaving UBF: where do you go next? I’ve expressed here how I don’t even want to look anymore. I don’t want to go to church right now. I want to stay far away, actually. But my wife wants to go to a church. She also thinks that’s it good and necessary for the kids. I grew up going to Catholic churches and don’t have fond memories of that. I don’t want to subject my kids to what I had to go through each Sunday, just because you ought to go to church! So, we’re divided on that which is unpleasant. But the UBF history makes this doubly difficult. She continued at UBF because of me. But now when she wants me to go to a church with her, I don’t want to. Again, on this she tells me how selfish I am, and understandably so.

Yes and yes. Divorce, re-marriage and abortion by order of a pastor are unthinkable! And this is why I would add “broken logic” to your list of broken things. I am glad that Chris/BK made the distinction between evangelicalism and ubfism. There are a lot of things wrong about UBF and I’m going to be open and honest about that. Your Pastor should NOT dictate how you live your life, who you marry, what job you take, how you spend your money, where/if you go on vacation, etc. And they have NO right to make you feel guilty for the choices you make. If that is happening something is WRONG.

I only say this, because for a long time I did not know it was wrong. I did not know I was able to speak up against these types of actions. I thought this was what God wanted for me. I thought God would never want me to enjoy my life because that is from flesh. The one verse used over and over was, “Deny yourself,” meaning if something hurts me it is obviously God’s will for me.

And now, I am unlearning these things and undermining my jacked up view of God, by his grace. He is my Father who loves me and enjoys me. Not a slave driver who puts up with me begrudgingly. This is a drastically different way of viewing God and the world, and I cannot and will not see/live the way I did before under fear and shame.

The gospel is too precious a message to be screwed up. God freed us for freedom, not so that we would be yoked to another burden. God is good. Praise His name!

The way I understand it is like this; UBF missionaries have a screwed up life. Their life was originally ruined when they joined UBF many years ago and are now (unfortunately) “trapped” inside the UBF cult culture.

These men and women are so immensely dissatisfied with their own lives that they try to live through “sheep”, students and even their own children.

It’s not enough that they ruined their own lives with poor decision making (joining UBF) as well as failing to have a spine and standing up to the abusive UBF leaders or false UBF doctrines. They feel they can help AND hold the authority to help others… But how could they when these so-called missionaries can’t even help themselves!

When we left the NYUBF cult members began to attack my wife – God bless her heart… She thought these cult members were normal people. They tried to plant seeds of divorce into the mind of my wife saying things like ” since your husband is not UBF he is demon possessed and will hurt your daughters physically or mentally”.

This is only part of the sick and demented cult that us UBF. I honestly pray that God have mercy because their is a God who will judge us one day and I pray that these people may turn away from this kind of Christianity.

When this is manipulated as such in a marriage it is tragic and unfortunate.

Sadly such arbitrary dichotomous categorizations invariably applies to virtually most if not close to all relationships, conflicts, differences, disagreements, etc, in UBF.

Additional dichotomies include: senior/junior, older/younger, controller/to be controlled, leader or elder/member, missionary/native, etc. Whenever it rears its ugly head, all it does is weaken the ministry, promote schisms and divisions, cause everyone to take sides, and breaks down trust, friendships and relationships.

Sorry for stating the sorry facts point blank. Those on the unfortunate or receiving end basically has to suck it up, take it or leave it, and regard it as UBF’s way or the highway. Is there any wonder why people continue to leave, even after 30 to 40 years of being committed to UBF!

But if you’re a beloved 2nd gen of a senior older missionary leader, then you have more rope, leeway and space with such games not played on you as much.

When this happens in a marriage, as well explained by Chris, the result can only be devastation.

However, I know we were very lucky here. There were many other highly problematic cases of marriages where one spouse wanted to leave and the other wanted to stay. Usually, the one who wants to stay will be called “spiritual” and given the mission to “help” the “weaker on”. This only serves to alienate the two even more from each other. As soon as there is a “helper-helped” “shepherd/sheep” “spiritual/unspiritual” division, frank discussion will stop. The “shepherd” will start to tell you only “helpful” things, not tell you what he/she really thinks and where he/she *also* sees problems.

The most extreme case I experience was when a wife wanted to leave together with her husband who was considered the precious “ancestor of faith” of our chapter. The wife was considered immature. Yes, she was much younger than him, but their marriage had been arranged by UBF with that age difference in the first place. UBF often liked to marry people who do not really fit together, to make them focus their lives more on UBF than on their marriage. That marriage was such a case. Anyway, the wife didn’t want to divorce her husband, she just couldn’t bear with UBF any more and so she stopped attending UBF. After that, the husband was told by Samuel Lee to issue an ultimatum to her to rejoin UBF or he would divorce. Since the husband was absolutely loyal to UBF, he obeyed and filed for divorce when she refused. Only one year later, he was re-married to another girl in UBF. That marriage was also arranged by Samuel Lee. (My chapter was in Europe, but the first wife was from Chicago, that’s why Samuel Lee interferred directly). I know that there were many other cases in Chicago where UBF couples were divorced and re-married, by instruction of Samuel Lee.

This fact alone shows that UBF and the worldview of Samuel Lee is not evangelical at its core, since in an evangelical church (and in Catholic church as well) divorce and re-marriage by order of pastor (and even abortion by order of pastor!) is unthinkable. Brian is correct to call Samuel Lee’s “theology” UBFism for that reason. I know that UBF chapters are saturated with UBFism to different degrees, but all chapter are still tainted by it, since the teachings of UBFs go top down and at the top was Samuel Lee.

So gc, you’re touching a crucial issue. I have seen many unlucky and divorced marriages in UBF because on partner wants to stay and the other wants to leave, or because the partners were too different in their mindsets, or both. Their marriage was built solely for the purpose and with the background of UBF, and when that fails for whatever reason for one spouse, this creates a huge problem.

But I learned there are people in UBF who are even worse off. I have a friend in UBF whose parents are UBF honchos, and whose wife and her parents are also UBF Koreans. He knows all the problems of UBF and hates UBF, but cannot leave, because this would immediately break his complete family who are completely irrational about their involvment with UBF, so he cannot even discuss with them.

This is a really good article raising critical questions that need to be processed. I am holding off sharing though so that others might chime in. I plan to be offline for a while, thanks.

“How about you? What else can you add to brokenness? What can you share as a single or married person who struggled to leave UBF? What conflicts did you face? Alone or with your spouse? – See more at: http://www.ubfriends.org/2015/09/11/can-ubf-divide-a-marriage/#comment-19413

How many more open forums are needed? We’ve been discussing these topics in open forum since 2004, at least 11 years.

How many more open letters need to be written? We’ve had well articulated letters that expose the problems clearly.

A major significant problem which I have been expressing more and more is that some older leaders feel as though it is their absolute right to be in control of UBF and that they are the authentic vanguards of UBF with all of her legacies, traditions and so-called “core values,” which Brian appropriately calls “UBFisms.”

Until this is addressed and discussed in open forum (rather than in closed circles comprised primarily of the oligarchy) things will continue as they are.

Recently, an older ubf leader mentioned that ubf is getting weaker. So I asked him an obvious question, “why?” He has not answered or responded.

As Jeff Daniels of the HBO hit Newsroom says, “The first step in solving any problem is recognizing that there is one.” (http://www.westloop-church.org/index.php/messages/old-testament/32-isaiah-messages/415-god-will-humble-the-proud-isaiah-14)

Is UBF ready to recognize the truth about herself?