A different example is the Waco Siege of 1993, when an investigation into Davidians in Waco, Texas, led to a clash between police and cult followers. Altogether, 86 followers died in a fire and 10, including four police officers, died in gunbattle. Besides, the authorities have to find out the social causes behind the spread of destructive cults and deal with them appropriately. "You cannot forever stop water in a pot from boiling by keeping on adding more water ... you need to extinguish the fire," Lu says, quoting a Chinese proverb.

Disappearing traditions - like the bonds within extended families and the sense of belonging in a community - have left a void in society which cults have rushed in to fill. Many scholars in religion believe cults are popular mainly in certain rural regions of the country that are relatively underdeveloped, and appeal chiefly to uneducated women and senior citizens. Such people believe cults can help solve some of their problems, which are not merely material.

However, material benefits, like donations for medical treatment, and physical help in times of need do help cults to attract followers. That explains why some local authorities find penalizing people for being cult followers has not fully succeeded in reining in cults. Since not all followers join cults for material benefits, they don't leave them when they suffer material loss.

The authorities, therefore, need to improve social services to prevent more poor people from falling prey to cults to seek spiritual (and perhaps material) comfort. Moreover, they also need to help strengthen social relations and encourage the development of bona fide social organizations which would provide spiritual comfort for ordinary people. For instance, Lu says, local governments could help build "love families", where former cult followers can interact with anti-cult groups to understand their mistakes.

For several years, Lu has been deliberating on a deeper question: How to transform China's religion policy into a national strategy? Giving the example of the US, he says the country's Constitution clearly states "freedom of religion", but all US dollar notes carry "In God we trust" in capital letters, and US presidents have been ending their speeches with "God bless America" for the past several decades.

That, Lu says, is quite a smart strategy, of including Protestant tradition in the US' national identity. The practice is well explained in US scholar Samuel P. Huntington's Who Are We? The Challenges to America's National Identity.

Lu advises Chinese to ask the same question: Who are we? The answer may be hard to fathom. But Chinese people do need to follow certain values that conform to traditional Chinese culture and are linked with China's national identity. Only when they succeed in doing so will destructive cults lose their appeal and be rooted out of society.

The author is a writer with China Daily.

zhangzhouxiang@chinadaily.com.cn.