Yes, this is what happened.
Reminds me of bullies as a kid. The best thing to do is to ignore them and walk on. They eventually get tired when you don’t give them anything to feed off of (eg, any kind of response/reaction by you). They find someone else to bully.
Agree with glido, student religious organizations can operate on public U just like any other student organization as long as they don’t indicate/infer that the public U is supporting, endorsing them.
Bullies are good at finding the vulnerable targets, unfortunately. 
No one said it was. But intimidating others blocking their free movement is probably either against policy, harassment, possibly even false imprisonment in some cases if a person potentially finds themselves up against a wall or something.
Basic mis-interpretation of the First Amendment.
“In discussing the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, Justice Black said that the clause erected a “wall of separation between church and state.” He explained that this means, among other things, that the government cannot participate in the affairs of a religious group, set up a church, aid or prefer one religion over another, or aid or prefer religion over non religion.”
https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/separation_of_church_and_state
Note, he does not say that Church and State must be separated, as is the popular misconception.
btw: as noted upthread, this is a public school, where I’m guessing that the open spaces are generally open to public.
When I was about 15, my HS chorus went on a trip to Philly. We had some free time to wander on our own and a friend and I did, on U Penn’s campus. A guy approached us about seeing an art show and pointed to a gathering in a wide open space just a few yards away. We thought “Sure”, it’snot like we’re going off with some stranger down an alley.
We looked at the art…paintings, maybe religious, nothing major, and when we reached the end about 12 of the students (looked like students anyway) literally surrounded us and would not break their circle unless we agreed to get saved, which meant saying some words.
We were not naive, but we were young and our bus was leaving soon and we had to get over to it, several blocks away. We said the words to get out, rather than cause a huge screaming scene that might delay our departure.
We talked about that at a reunion recently, how that happened and what we might have done differently.
They called themselves “Get Smart Get S–ved” (there, not google-able).
https://www.aclu.org/joint-statement-current-law-religion-public-schools
Read #12. The problem as to harassment, (or say false imprisonment) is the last sentence which goes to facts of situation (“where this line is to be drawn in particular cases will depend on the age of the students and other circumstances”.). So a he (they) said/she (they) said thing; something perhaps difficult to prove, something public U “prays” it doesn’t have to get involved in. Again best advice, walk away.
I’ve had similar encounters with people who want you to complete a “survey” which then turns into a lengthy attempt to sell you something. This has happened to me on the street or in malls. I’ve learned when I recognize one of these types nearby or approaching me to walk really fast and appear to be in a heck of a harried hurry. If you are wearing a bluetooth or carrying your cellphone, you can suddenly be “engaged in animated conversation”.
Public universities do have chaplains, although they may be multiple chaplains who are part of the student activities structure. See, for example, http://thestamp.umd.edu/memorial_chapel/chaplains
Just need to master the RBF http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/02/fashion/im-not-mad-thats-just-my-resting-b-face.html?_r=0
Kind of reminds me of community college. We had a preacher who’d set up in the quad and rant about how all homosexuals will burn in hell and women need to marry early and obey their men. He even told a student’s boyfriend that he needed to get control over his girlfriend because she called him out, and told another female student that she needed to get a man to take care of her. He also had a massive sign with a list of groups common on campus who were all going to burn in hell in his eyes. All you could really do about that was ignore it, because the law says he has to be allowed to say what he wants.
Of course, following people around and spitting is different. I’d just contact campus police if it happens again. Build up enough complaints, and the university might be able to act.
I am reminded of the repeated occasions in the mid-1970s when I was approached by ultra-friendly “Moonies” (always women) in Cambridge, MA. I used to wonder what it was about me that made them think I was amenable to their blandishments. I was very small for an alleged guy, and looked considerably younger than my age, so maybe they saw me as lonely and/or vulnerable. The very first time it happened, it took me a few minutes to figure out why this stranger was talking to me and inviting me someplace (who, me?), but after that I got better at brushing them off.
^Remember the vegan peanut butter cookies they used to give out?
I don’t know why everyone’s being so coy about who this group is. If they are a problem, they should be called out.
What “religion” (and by religion, I mean cult) is this?!!
ETAç I see now the above comments that the religion cannot be named without likely future spamming (so it’s the Voldemort of Religions).
Or perhaps the Candyman of religions.
It’s probably the one described here: http://www.nytimes.com/1994/11/30/nyregion/ex-members-compare-campus-ministry-to-a-cult.html?pagewanted=all
Hey everybody, sorry for not posting for a few days. I know I haven’t responded to anyone specifically, but I do read everyone’s posts.
I’ve been incredibly busy and stressed with school work… this week has been quite tough, work wise, so these emails kept getting pushed to the bottom of my priority list. But as of now, I have contacted Student Life and the Campus Police. I’m a bit hesitant about contacting the chaplain as of now because they have several chaplains for certain religions and they don’t have any chaplains for their religion, in general. I think I will wait and see what the response from Student Life is before I attempt to contact the chaplain.
The reason I haven’t named the organization is for reasons already mentioned… I’m afraid they may come here and start spamming the board. There are certain things I haven’t written here because it would give some hints to what this organization is or where it originated. I will go ahead and say that this organization always defends themselves by saying that there are “cultural differences” because people keep calling them controlling. It seems to me that a lot of people just accept that it is a cultural misunderstanding without looking into all the things they have been accused of doing.
Since some of you seem to be curious about the name of the organization, I can send it to those who actually want to know. I didn’t want to at first, but I think it would be best to let some people know about this organization, even if it’s only a few people. They also operate on other campuses across the world. But I still don’t want their name to be put on this board. Even at the clubs fair, they were promoting “trips” (i.e. missionaries) to other countries. It caught my eye initially, but when I realized it was THAT group, I walked away quickly. But it doesn’t seem that they are a really famous organization or anything, except in their country of origin, where they are known for being crazy.
My school has a website for a list of organizations. They are listed on that website under religious organizations, so my university definitely knows that they are there. However, they do not use the school’s chapel. I can’t prove if these members are students or not, but I have only seen adults soliciting students. They could be part-time students, but I don’t know. I’m hoping that there may be a list of complaints against them and that it’ll continue to accumulate.
I haven’t seen them since the last altercation but I can never be too sure with these groups
OP- at most colleges, the chaplains are employees of the university (i.e. getting a paycheck from your college) in addition to whatever stipend they may be getting from their own denomination. You should not hesitate to reach out to a university chaplain for any reason, whether or not you are a member of their religion or denomination. They are paid to help students- first and foremost- apart from their theological or sectarian responsibilities. They can be very persuasive in letting the administration know if there is a religious group operating on campus which is using heavy-handed techniques to recruit students.
This sounds like a “growing up” moment. OP, as an adult you will not be shielded from ideas you don’t like anymore. All you can do is learn to walk away. If someone spits at you, decide if it is worth the trouble to prosecute. It probably isn’t. The organization dug its own grave by offending you, so move on and forget about it.