BEIJING — A Chinese court announced on Monday that two members of a banned religious sect had been executed for the death by beating of a woman at a McDonald’s restaurant in May, an episode that was caught by a cellphone camera and sparked outrage across China.
–
The Church of Almighty God, also known as Eastern Lightning, was founded in northeastern China in 1989 and teaches that Jesus Christ has returned to Earth as a Chinese woman who will save followers from the apocalypse. The sect has pledged to slay the “Great Red Dragon,” a reference to the ruling Communist Party. After the killing in May, the Chinese authorities began a sweeping crackdown on the sect and claim to have detained hundreds of its members.
