Unificationism

The Unification Church was founded in 1954 by Sun Myung Moon, a religious minister who was raised in a Christian household. Moon was originally from northern Korea and founded The Washington Times, a conservative newspaper. The church's adherents are known colloquially as "Moonies". The church preaches a universalist doctrine of salvation based on a doctrine called the Unification Principle. Rev. Moon, calling himself the Lord of the Second Advent, believes he is the new messiah, sent to complete the elimination of evil, the establishment of a perfect society on earth and the cleansing of mankind of original sin.

Controversy

Unificationists deny that they are anti-Semitic, yet the Church has been dogged by charges of anti-Semitism for many years, and in 1976 the American Jewish Committee published the report "Jews and Judaism in Rev. Moon's Divine Principle", noting that "every time Rev. Moon mentions Jews or Israelites he portrays them collectively as reprobate, with evil intentions." As recently as 2003 Moon stated in a sermon at Arlington, Virginia, that the death of six million Jews in the Holocaust was a form of divine retribution: "Through the principle of indemnity Hitler killed 6 million Jews. That is why. God could not prevent Satan from doing that because Israel killed the True Parents."

In the aftermath of the Jonestown Massacre, rumors circulated that Unification Church members were of like mind to members of the People's Temple. However, basic differences include a prohibition on suicide (classed by the church as a worse sin than murder), an international base (as opposed to one large, local community); minimal pressure to maintain membership, resulting in a 94% voluntary dropout rate in the years 1975 to 1995, a repudiation of the doctrine of Reincarnation, and an God-centered ideological opposition to Marxism.