The Rev. Sun Myung Moon died at age 92 in Seoul, Korea. He founded the Unification Church, a cult that taught that Jesus Christ did not finish his work, due to his unfortunate crucifixion, but that a new Messiah from Korea would, about this time, be raised up–the implication being himself–to complete his mission. Rev. Moon also established a financial empire, including a number of conservative institutions, such as the Washington Times newspaper. See Rev. Moon, religious and political leader, dies in South Korea at 92 – CNN.com.
I remember back when I was in college, the so-called “Moonies” would host interesting-sounding seminars on topics like world peace and if you were sitting by yourself they would start conversations with you. They would then invite you to a camp out in the country for more instruction, which led for many people to an initiation into the religion. That meant raising money for the cause–selling flowers at intersections was a big fund-raiser–but eventually the Rev. Moon would, if you were blessed, pick out a spouse for you, someone you had never met before but you would be married in a mass wedding with hundreds of other couples.
Parents used to hire people to kidnap their children from the Unification Church to “deprogram” them out of the cult. Now, it seems like it has become more socially acceptable.
Did any of you get sucked into any of this?
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