WATCH: Inside Tennessee’s Notorious AR15-Worshipping Church
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Follow the Leader is a four-part docuseries investigating various fringe cultures across the Americas, beginning with vigilante predator hunters in the first episode and continuing on with the “Passport Bros” in the second segment.
In each mini-documentary, host Jamali Maddix speaks with leaders and members of these groups to explore their driving forces and core values. In the third and latest episode of Follow the Leader, Jamali traveled to Tennessee to speak with Pastor Hyung-Jin “Sean” Moon and the Rod of Iron Ministries to investigate the AR15-worshipping community.
Pastor Sean isn’t just the figurehead of the Rod of Iron Ministries, aka The Sanctuary Church, he’s the son of Reverend Moon, the self-proclaimed second messiah and founder of the Unification Church in Korea. In addition to cultivating a tight-knit, Trump-loving community in Tennessee, he’s also a rapper creating content that pushes far-right propaganda.
Some of his sermons include anti-left sentiments, one of them being: “The cult of the left keep women unmarried because unmarried women will vote heavy heavy leftist.”
And, of course, anti-LGBTQ beliefs like: “Love is not love. God is love … and God does have wrath against those who sin.”
These influences bleed into all aspects of these worshipers’ lives, especially when it comes to marriage. Couples are matched by their families, and their wedding receptions are held at the gun range, boasting more AR-15s than one can imagine.
Members of the Rod of Iron Ministries go to extremes to prove their faith and loyalty, with some offering their biological children to other members. Many also have lost touch—or even cut off—loved ones with different beliefs/conflicting lifestyles.
Follow the Leader is only available in the US but shared in its entirety on the VICE YouTube channel. To learn more about the Rod of Iron Ministries, you can watch the third episode below. To learn more about the series, read our interview with Jamali.
Content retrieved from: https://www.vice.com/en/article/watch-inside-tennessees-notorious-ar15-worshipping-church/.
