A text message received last year by the Shincheonji Volunteer Group Pyeongtaek Branch from the Gyeonggi Provincial Volunteer Centre regarding the "Notice of Selection Results for the 2025 Pyeongtaek City Volunteer Day Award Recipients." The message informs that the Pyeongtaek Branch was selected as a recipient of the Center Chairman's Award and that the award will be presented at the ceremony on 20th November.

The Gyeonggi Volunteer Center has come under scrutiny after the Shincheonji Volunteer Group’s Pyeongtaek and Guri-Namyangju branches, which had been selected for the Center Chairman’s Commendation last November, were removed from the award list just one day before the ceremony.

The two branches were notified of their selection on 1st October after their volunteer activities had been reviewed. However, on 19th November, they were told the awards had been cancelled.

The Center said the decision was unrelated to religion and resulted from accounting deficiencies identified in a public contest project, including improper expenditures and repeated requests for corrections. It cited Article 15 of its awards regulations, which allows a commendation to be revoked if an eligibility issue is later discovered.

The Center also acknowledged that there had been no problems with the branches’ volunteer achievements themselves, stating that the cancellation followed a re-examination by its Public Service Review Committee. A Center official said the same standards are applied regardless of religious affiliation and expressed regret that the issues had not been identified earlier in the screening process.

The Shincheonji Volunteer Group, however, questioned the timing and consistency of the decision. It argued that the volunteers’ years of community service—including environmental cleanup, disaster relief, support for vulnerable groups and cultural activities—should be distinguished from administrative shortcomings.

The group also called for clarification on whether other organisations with similar accounting issues had faced comparable measures. It said that without disclosure of the specific grounds for the decision, questions about fairness are likely to remain.

The controversy has also drawn comparisons with Gyeonggi Province’s 2024 cancellation of a Shincheonji event at Imjingak Peace Nuri Park on the day it was scheduled to take place. Shincheonji previously alleged religious discrimination in that case.

There is currently no confirmed evidence that the latest award cancellation was motivated by religious considerations, and the Center firmly denies such a connection. Nevertheless, the combination of a completed selection process, the last-minute cancellation and the Center’s acknowledgment that the volunteer achievements themselves were not at issue has intensified calls for greater transparency and consistency in administrative decision-making.

The Shincheonji Volunteer Group said it will continue its community service activities, emphasising that evaluations should be based on the sustainability, social contribution and transparency of volunteer work—not an organisation’s name or religious affiliation.