Rev. Sun M. Moon - 92-year-old leader in hospital

Преп.Сан М. Мун с пневмония в католическата болница Св. Мария в Сеул. Though he doesn’t get much attention at home, Rev. Moon Sun-myung is likely the most famous Korean in the world, except perhaps for the North’s dictator. The news that the 92-year-old head of the Unification Church is hospitalized with pneumonia made the front page of only a few South Korean newspapers on Thursday, including, of course, the one that the church publishes, Segye Ilbo. Mr. Moon went into the St. Mary’s Catholic Hospital in Seoul on Monday with a severe cold that doctors later said was pneumonia. A spokesman for Tongil Group, the foundation that controls the newspaper and other businesses that support the church, said on Thursday morning that Mr. Moon’s family is with him. Until his illness, Mr. Moon had been involved in church activities. And he has flown to the U.S. several times this year. In July, he participated in opening and closing ceremonies of a soccer tournament, called the Peace Cup, sponsored by the church. The chairman of the church in South Korea, Seuk Jun-ho. asked members to participate in a 40-day “special support period” for Mr. Moon, during which they should join prayer services and fast for three days. Mr. Moon in the 1950s started the Unification Church and rooted it in Judeo-Christian teachings but with one important twist – he preached that he represented the Second Coming of the Messiah promised in the Bible. While he built connections with powerful political and religious leaders around the world, that claim has always made Mr. Moon a controversial figure. His church has been called a cult that brainwashes its members, sometimes called Moonies. His mass weddings, in which thousands of people meet their spouse shortly before getting married, draw enormous media attention – and, in some places, become a punchline for comedians. His staunch conservative political and social views are often derided. And after he dies, factions of his church are sure to fight for control of the institution and businesses that range from sushi distributors in the U.S. to a car manufacturer in North Korea. Beyond all those controversies, Mr. Moon has lived a fascinating life, one that is uniquely a product of Korean history and culture. He was born in what is now North Korea and his family suffered at the hands of Japan’s colonization of the peninsula. When he was a teenager, five younger siblings died from starvation in one year. As a young adult in the late 1940s, he was thrown into a labor camp by North Korea’s budding communist leadership, which was unnerved by religious leaders like him. When he moved to the South, he became a staunch anti-communist, only to fall under the suspicion of the South’s military leaders in the 1960s who worried about the growing power Mr. Moon had to sway public opinion. They jailed him, too. Through it all, however, Mr. Moon in his teachings and writings promoted Korea’s importance in the world, perhaps more than any other figure in his lifetime. That boosterism can be seen in his 2010 autobiography, which includes chapters with titles like “Korea’s Unification Will Bring World Unification” and “Global Harmony Starts on the Korean Peninsula.” “In the past, everything we loved was taken away from us,” he wrote in the book. “During Japan’s forced occupation, our country was taken away. Our country was split in two, and we were forcibly separated from our loving parents and siblings. So Korea became a land of tears.” But he wrote there is “deep meaning” to that history: “Because it has endured suffering and difficulty for such a long time, Korea can now become the central nation from which God brings peace to the world.” Damian J. Anderson Damian.Anderson@gmail.com