ICC NOTE: North Korea has been one if not the most difficult country for the gospel to reach its people due to the repressive regime of Kim Jong-Un. Non-profit organizations have worked tirelessly to try various methods to enter from hot air balloon drops to illicit DVDs masquerading as something else. The latest approach has been through state propaganda music, but instead of praising North Korea’s leader, the names have been changed to praise Jesus. No Chain is an organization initiated by former North Korean political prisoner Jung Gwang-il and work towards offering the same goal as many others to free the North Korean people. 

6/8/2016 North Korea (The Guardian) – From giant balloons and illicit DVDs to portable media players, campaigners have been extremely persistent in finding ways to smuggle information inside North Korea.

But “stealth gospel”, whereby adoring references to the ruling Kim dynasty in classical propaganda music are replaced with mentions of Jesus and the Holy Spirit, must be one of the most creative.

No Chain, a project initiated by former North Korean political prisoner Jung Gwang-il, has recorded 32 new songs almost identical to the ones played on state-run radio – but with a twist.

“It sounds exactly the same as what you would hear in North Korea, the same accompaniment, the same type of voice, but the names have all been changed,” Jung said.

“[The customs officials] aren’t going to sit there and listen to each song, because the music sounds the same to what they’re used to hearing,” he added.

No Chain uses its network of smugglers along the China-DPRK border to distribute the music, which is secretly loaded on USB sticks and SD cards. They do so at great risk: the penalty if they’re caught is public execution.

Jung, who presented the project at the Oslo Freedom Forum recently, was stressed that his aim was not to proselytise. Instead, he said he was using religion as a way to expose North Korea’s isolated citizens to alternative ways of thinking.

“In the DPRK there is no concept of love that isn’t about loyalty and love for the regime and the ‘dear leader’. We’ve done this to show that outside, people believe in whatever they want,” he said.

Jung hired a music studio, a producer, and enlisted the help of a defector who used to work as a singer in Pyongyang. “We took great pains to reproduce the exact sound – the singing, the intonation, the methods,” Jung said.

But it’s also about bringing a bit of cheer. Testing the songs on fellow defectors in the US, Jung says: “They hear the words and they’re like, ‘what the hell?’, chuckling and laughing. They’re so surprised.”

[Full Story]