Background

Providential background

Upon True Father's return to Seoul on September 17, 1953, he began investigating how to carry out his work in that city in earnest. In addition, he visited the churches in Daegu and Busan to guide and encourage the members working on the front line of those pioneer missions.

He offered many sincere conditions of devotion on behalf of Protestant pastors and government leaders who had not accepted him. In this way, he established the foundation of faith for a new beginning.

He established the standard of Abel's providential mission. On this foundation of vertical restoration through indemnity, and on the foundations of the three churches, in Seoul, Busan, and Daegu, he sought ways to carry out the horizontal providence of restoration for the foundation of substance.

Finally, on May 1, 1954, True Father founded the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity (HSA-UWC), at a small house in Bukhak-dong, Seongdong-gu, Seoul.

That address was later changed to 391-6 Shindang-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul.

The founding of HSA-UWC signified that, in a providential sense, True Father had established a church that could represent Judaism and Christianity – and that he could now stand in the position of Jesus on the foundation of having indemnified what had not been fulfilled through those two religions. It was because of disbelief and rejection by Christian denominations that ultimately True Father founded HSA-UWC.

He established it on the foundation of having triumphed in his course of restoration through indemnity in North Korea. In this manner, a new mainstream in God's providence began, with True Father at the center, and changes began to appear in all areas of society, in the nation, and throughout the world.

1. Directly after Korea's liberation, I wanted to make a new beginning together with Christianity, but because of opposition from Christian ministers that phase of the providence was blocked. Thereafter, I was supposed to work together with the nation of Korea, but that road also was blocked.

Just as Israel and Judaism should have accepted Jesus, similarly Korea and Christianity should have accepted me. They went in the opposite direction, however. As a result, the churches and the nation deviated from God's Will.

I had to restore through indemnity the fact that Christianity had become a gentile religion due to Israel's rejection of Jesus. Just as Christianity had to go through Rome, Satan's realm to develop, I had to go to North Korea, a communist nation that represented Satan's realm on the world level.

From then on, I had to carry out the work of restoration a second time. I had to pay indemnity on the individual, family, and tribal levels. This is why I have suffered until now. What could have been accomplished in one go had to be repeated several times. The Unification Church has to represent Judaism. God set up Christianity to act on behalf of Judaism, but Christianity also was unable to fulfill its responsibility.

Eventually, I established the Unification Church to fulfill this responsibility on behalf of Christianity. (039-137, 1971/01/10)

2. After the establishment of the Republic of Korea, it was not Christianity or other spiritual groups but I who stood at the center of God's Will. Ever since I began to be persecuted, I stood alone before God.

In the Bible, it says your enemies will be members of your household. Christians were like my family, but they came to stand in the position of an enemy. As a result, all the foundations prepared by God had to be discarded. God's Will came to be centered solely on me, and I had to make a new beginning at a new level from then on. It was a miserable fate for me to bear.

From then on, Christianity drifted further away from God's Will. The democratic world also drifted away from God's Will and began to go in the wrong direction. I had to go through hardships, and this is why I spent three years in prison beginning in 1948. After all, North Korea is also part of the land of Korea, so I had to go there and fight Satan on the front line.

Since South Korea was also on Satan's side, I had to fight in South Korea as well. In both North Korea and South Korea I could not avoid fighting against Satan's side. My time in North Korea corresponded to the Old Testament Age and in South Korea to the New Testament Age.

This is why I was imprisoned for three years in North Korea. In December 1950, I left North Korea and laid a foundation in South Korea for four years before establishing the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity on May 1, 1954. (087-057, 1976/05/01)

3. Jesus had to endure prison before dying on the cross. This is why the course of restoration must also begin from prison. Jesus' course should have begun from a glorious position, but his path was completely reversed and turned into the way of the cross. This is why the history of the Unification Church also had to begin in prison to advance to a new level. When Jesus was in prison, he lost his 12 disciples.

I had the mission to restore this history substantially, to restore the standard of that lost number. Though I said not a word, God mobilized the spirit world to witness to the other prisoners. Twenty-four prisoners responded to heaven's call and secretly united with me. This enabled me to make a new start.

When I came out of the prison camp, four people accompanied me. In this way, I made the condition to establish the four-position foundation according to the Principle of Restoration. It was thanks to God that this condition could be made.

On this foundation, after coming out of Hungnam Prison, I went back to Pyongyang, regathered the lost members, and made a new start. That was the beginning of today's Unification Church. (071-231, 1974/05/01)

4. The Unification Church has to indemnify the course of restoration that God had led for 6,000 years. We need to indemnify the problems of the individual, family, and nation. We have to indemnify everything that should have been realized by the nation at the time of Jesus.

Today, God's providence is advancing, with Korea at the center. Before the liberation, God prepared and sent many individuals who had the mission of prophets.

Some aspects of the providence were led by women, and others by men.

Our nation and devout people of faith were not aware of it, but for God to establish His providence for His Will, He worked to raise selected individuals, both internally and externally.

This is why, after the liberation, this nation and its people had to make a new beginning based on a new development. The Unification Church was launched to convey God's Will to them. (016-055, 1965/12/26)

5. North Korea, which is on Satan's side, started the Korean War in 1950 to take over South Korea. As a result of military successes in the heavy air bombardment of Hungnam and General MacArthur landing his forces at Incheon, I got out of the Hungnam Labor Camp.

Then I trudged to South Korea. At the time, South Korea was in chaos. The foundation I had laid in Seoul and other places had been destroyed. The South Korean government had been swept away.

People who had money tried to escape, and Christian pastors sent their children abroad. It was a chaotic time throughout the nation. Under these circumstances, the Unification Church began to lay its foundation.

As the Unification Church was laying its foundation, Korea settled on a new form of government. This is the providential viewpoint. The chaos in society was because the providence of heaven was using Satan's side to create an environment suitable for God's Will.

I established HSA-UWC in 1954 and expanded that new foundation amid a chaotic social environment. The Unification Church developed while dealing with opposition from the government and Christianity.
(161-073, 1987/01/02)

6. Even though I had a mouth, I did not speak. Although I harbored bitter sorrow over the way the people of my nation treated me, I endured. It was not because I was spineless. I understood that Jesus had to endure for 30 years of his life, and God had to go through great pains to find the right time to establish His foundation. He persevered for 2,000 years since Jesus' time to lay a solid base to accomplish His Will.

Therefore, I too endured, saying, “Let the typhoons come; let the snowstorms blow.” I knew these harsh conditions were only temporary and would pass away. It is the same with those in society who boast about their success; it will pass away.

What was my responsibility?

What did I have to do when I found myself in the position of being accused, chased out and even sent to prison? For the sake of all humanity, to eradicate all the suffering of the world, I had to be struck. I thought, “In pioneering the path of suffering worldwide, can one avoid difficulties?”

I told myself it was natural to face hardship. It was not because I am a fool that I accepted these circumstances. The history of the providence of restoration had to unfold this way.

For the providence to advance, there had to be someone like me who was willing to take such a path. This was the condition on which I established the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity. (014-309, 1965/01/10)

The Bukhak-dong three-gate house

The three-gate house in Bukhak-dong where the sign of the Holy Spirit Association was hung was a shabby house with eaves so low that people could reach them with their outstretched hands.

This being the case, neighborhood children sometimes took down the sign and used it as a game board. Sometimes people who opposed us threw it down and broke it, so it was damaged often and had to be repaired and reattached to the house.

When you entered the house, you had to pass under three gates with your head bent low. They opened into a small courtyard of about ten square meters with a well at one corner. Next to the well was a small platform for clay jars filled with traditional Korean condiments.

On the right side of the house was the master bedroom, about two square meters in area, so small that when people lay down in it, their feet touched the wall and there was barely room for three. To the left was a second bedroom, a guest room that was not even three square meters in area.

The men used the master bedroom, while the women slept in the second bedroom. The rooms had a low paper ceiling that would bend upward if your head touched it.

As is apparent from this description, HSA-UWC began in a place that was little more than a shanty. Although only a few people gathered inside, True Father still prayed and spoke in a roaring voice as if speaking to thousands of people. He spoke so passionately that his shirt would be drenched in sweat.

Occasionally, he would speak to just one person, yet afterward he would weep for more than an hour and offer a heartfelt prayer. Everyone who came there was filled with so much divine grace that they all wept their hearts out, and the floor would be soaked with their tears.

7. The name I created for the Unification Church was “Holy (Divine) Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity.” It was hard enough to bring unity within Christianity on earth, yet I was striving to bring unity in the spirit world as well. Back then I did not have any money.

So I rented this place where the rooms were so small that when I lay down my feet would touch the wall. It was from such a humble place that I started the church. I took the position of a servant, doing everything for the people who came. In this way, I advanced from the position of a servant to that of an adopted son. This was the path of my liberation. (093-057, 1977/05/01)

8. The first house where we displayed the Unification Church sign was a small shanty. The entrance had three gates. People who were tall and wide like me had to enter sideways, with our heads down. It was there that we mounted the sign, “Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity.”

It is an enormous task to unite Christianity on earth, and yet this was an association that aspired to unite Christianity not only throughout the physical world but in the spiritual world too. Isn't this a formidable vision?

We had placed the sign under the eaves, at one end of the house. Yet despite the grand name on the sign, when you looked at the house, you would see nothing but a shanty. (200-081, 1990/02/24)

9. We put up the first sign of the Unification Church at the Bukhak-dong house in Seoul. That house was probably the smallest in Seoul. When I lay down sideways, my feet touched the wall. Only when I lay down lengthwise would my feet not touch the wall. One room was like that, and a second room was about the same. This house was known for its three-gate entrance, and so it was called “three-gate house.”

Those gates were tiny, so we had to lower our heads to enter. The sign was hung up under the eaves, which were so low that even children could reach up and touch it. Our sign was not hung on a great big house but on the smallest house in the city.

Who would be interested in us? People even pitied the sign because it was so mistreated. The neighborhood children often took it down and played with it, and it was often damaged. Once a person who opposed us came and said, “You want to unite Christianity?

That's heresy!” Then he smashed the sign with a rock, breaking it into pieces. I could not throw away this historic sign, so I put the two pieces back together with metal braces and hung them up again. (200-162, 1990/02/25)

10. Whether I lived under the eaves of some house or in a shanty, my thought was, “I have to attend God here and offer greater devotion.” My belief was, “According to the Principle of Restoration, the leader who can offer sincere devotion to the world should be able to do it even in the tiniest house.”

This was my way of thinking. Then I would say, “Now that I have offered sincere devotion in this tiny house, I should be able to offer it in a bigger house befitting a world leader.”

The Unification Church began in this place. The Unification Church has grown to this size starting from this tiny Bukhak-dong house with its three gates. This is the main philosophy of the Unification Church.

Although there have been many rumors about us, so much so that all the world has heard about us, no has one criticized the Unification Church for its small size.

What was most important was what we did in that place. (062-241, 1972/09/25)

The mission of HSA-UWC

The founding of the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity (HSA-UWC) is significant in that it was to fulfill the mission that was to have been carried out by Christianity.

Of course, HSA-UWC is the parent religion that needs to ultimately take charge of God's providence of restoration. This is why the name includes the words “World Christianity.”

“Unification” signifies uniting not only Christianity but also other religions and even all humankind. The words “Holy (Divine) Spirit” incorporate the goal of establishing a foundation for the kingdom of heaven on earth and in heaven, through the harmony of the spiritual world and the physical world based on God's truth.

The word “Association” refers to an organization that realizes the originally intended, ideal world by perfecting the united realm of the spiritual world and the physical world.

11. Why did we take the name, Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity?

Because we had Christianity in our name, we were persecuted. But without it, we would have had to give up the Old Testament Age and the New Testament Age.

Without the Old Testament Age, the New Testament Age could not have come.

Since the Old Testament Age went wrong, the New Testament Age was needed. Without the New Testament Age, the Completed Testament Age could not have emerged.

The New Testament Age came on the foundation of the Old Testament Age, and the Completed Testament Age came on the foundation of the New Testament Age, so the Unification Church has to be connected to Christianity.

Christianity is the extension of Judaism. If I threw that away, I would have no ground to stand on. The national level that Satan rules is the completion level of the growth stage, and until I can go over that stage and gain an independent foundation, I have to stand on Christianity, the Old Testament, and the New Testament Age. (284-189, 1997/04/17)

12. I gave such a grand title to our church: the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity. Is such unification even possible? Yes, it will be realized undoubtedly. Christianity alone has over 400 denominations that have been fighting each other. But I do not think the unification of Christianity will be that difficult. I believe that if we are a religious group that follows the principle of living for the sake of others, and all other religious groups try to do the same, we will all become one without fail.

Even if religious leaders call this heresy, if we can demonstrate greater love than they do, I believe we can embrace even them. This is because God, the subject partner, is such a being. When we establish a relationship with God, I believe we are bound to come into unity by the power of God. This is logical. It is not so difficult to achieve oneness. The Unification Church was founded on this principle. (072-022, 1974/05/07)

13. When we say “Unification,” Tongil, the character tong does not mean “to be guided” but “to lead.”

You have to lead. When you want to lead someone, you must have qualities with which you can lead. As the subject partner, you need those qualities so that you can take responsibility to protect and raise people.

Therefore, the Unification Church has to take responsibility for heaven and earth. The scope of what the Unification Church is trying to do is different from that of other groups.

You then have to protect this world that is being attacked by the realm of evil. You have to protect it by creating an environment in which there is only goodness. You must not only deter the evil things but also develop the good.

The Unification Church is to lead the world and make it one. I am not saying that we should unite the world centering on the Unification Church. We have to unite the world centering on God, the Creator of the universe, the subject partner and root of all. (209-121, 1990/11/28)

14. Unification is simple. The word “unity” is the best gospel. If you want to stand with confidence in front of your father and mother, you have to stand in a place where your mind and body are united.

When you look at yourself, if your behavior is aligned with your conscience, or if you are aligned with the standard of the moral teachings you learned in school, you can stand tall. If your mind and body are united, you can uphold your dignity.

This is why filial children can stand confidently before their parents in their thoughts, emotions, and behavior in daily life. It is upon this foundation of dignity that parents find the will to live and establish the dignity of their family.

This is the principle of heaven and earth. This is why the term “unification” is great. After searching through all of heaven and earth, I found that the only appropriate word for the name of our church was

“Unification,” and this is why I chose this word for our name.
(233-030, 1992/07/20)

15. The religion of the son, representing the desire of all religions throughout the Old Testament Age and New Testament Age is connected with the religion of the servant and the religion of the adopted son. At the same time, the religion of the son has to reach the realm of the religion of the parents and form one system that can be recognized officially by God and the spirit world. When that happens, the unification of worldwide Christianity will be accomplished automatically.

Based on this, I put up the HSA-UWC sign. I am saying that it is the association by which the Divine Spirit can unite Christianity. Some may think that it is simply an association of Unification Church members, but it is an association led by the Divine Spirit of God to unite Christianity.

We include the word “spirit” in the name of our church because people in the world do not fully understand the meaning of the Divine Spirit of God that we are centered on, they say we are connected to spirits or ghosts. This is why we Unification Church members are called “michin” (crazy) people.

However, this word used as a verb, Machida, means “to reach.” We are michin people because we are reaching the goal. Ours is the religion that is striving to fulfill the goal of the Old and New Testaments, which is the Will that all the spirits in the spirit world want us to fulfill centering on God's love. This is why in the Unification Church the work of God's Divine Spirit continues.
(113-098, 1981/05/01)

16. The Unification Church needs God's help. Of course, it receives support from good spirits such as our good ancestors, but I am saying we should also receive the spiritual support of the founders of the world's religions. We need to expand our scope. We cannot expect cooperation only from the Christian spirit world. The Christian spirit world is only concerned with the Christian world; this is why it is not enough.

If we are to unite the entire world, we cannot do so only with the support of the Christian spirits centered on Jesus. We have to receive the spiritual support of all religions. We should receive help from our good ancestors, from the loyal patriots and virtuous women of Korea, and further, we should have the cooperation of the founders and saints of the world's religions. (084-067, 1976/02/22)

17. What is the ultimate goal of God, who has been leading human history for 6,000 years since the Fall?

It is to find His sons and daughters, loyal subjects and virtuous women, upon whom He can bestow the marriage Blessing before all heaven and earth. This is God's work, and it will be done with one place on earth as the central point. In this place, words conveyed with a heart on behalf of God will move the spirit world.

If these words can reach the hearts of people who are true to their conscience, their hearts will be greedily moved. When these activities become widespread on earth, Satan's world will collapse.

We who are striving to achieve this goal are raising the torch in front of the world and all heaven and earth. Because during this era we shoulder this tremendous name, the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, we must not allow ourselves to collapse.

We must penetrate God's heart. This is the source of the message by which we can reach every level, from the individual and family to the society, nation, world, and cosmos. If we cannot do this, we had better take down the sign. I, whom you have been following thus far, am focused on making this breakthrough. This has been my lifelong goal. (009-115, 1960/04/24)

18. The fact that we established ourselves as the Unification Church was a risky venture. Our name, which includes the word “unification,” describes our purpose to unite all religions. What a vast and incredible ambition!

When we look at the 2,000-year history of Christianity, numerous theologians came and went, and numerous denominations were created, presented new doctrine, and set up traditions. Those theologians who started new denominations criticized the older doctrines as mistaken and rejected them. In this way, the Protestant cultural sphere was formed.

Eventually, Protestantism established a worldwide foundation, yet at the same time, it divided into numerous denominations.

Therefore, Christianity itself is not united. It will not be easy to unite Christianity alone, but we claim that we will unite not only Christianity but all religions, and even the physical world and the spiritual world. (202-008, 1990/05/01)

19. To transform the world of Satan's sovereignty back to the world of God's sovereignty, you must follow God's Word absolutely and unite with Him to defeat the world of Satan's evil.

If you do not win this fight, then the Lord at his Second Advent will have to find others and re-engage in this struggle. You have to raise a worldwide movement in which you volunteer to take up this laborious path in order not to leave the Returning Lord in such a difficult and lonely position. Unless you do this, there will be no way forward for Christianity.

Then what should the Unification Church do? We must become a group that believes in God's Word. No matter how much persecution we face from Satan's world, we must unite with God. The mission of the Unification Church is to grow into a movement that can, with God's love, liberate the world from Satan.

We need to establish the worldwide foundation for a new Christianity that transcends national boundaries. What I am saying is that we need to establish a foundation for the Returning Lord to carry out new works worldwide, realizing the sovereignty that the people of Israel could not accomplish on earth.
(053-046, 1972/02/06)

20. What kind of truth is religion meant to express? We do not need the truth that simply presents doctrines.

It has to be a truth with which your body, mind, and heart can all agree, saying, “That's it!” We need such principles and teachings. If you hear something about them and then encounter them, your heart will be drawn to them.

If you hear teachings that attract you, that make you feel as if you are transcending time and space, then you had better pack up your bags and follow those teachings. You will not perish. You will be remembered in history.

If you want to become such a person, you cannot do it with your old self. Please take off your old, defective mask and throw it away. If you are a religious person, please take off your religious mask. If you are a conscientious person, please take off that mask. Please take down your religion's sign. Currently, you are all part of the Unification Church, but I long for the day when I can take down the Unification Church sign. I had to put up the Unification Church sign only because of the prevailing circumstances because there was an opponent to struggle against.

We have to take down that sign someday. What kind of sign do we need in the world of mind and heart?

Even without a sign, you will already know yourself. Even without making an intentional effort, you will naturally know and do what is right. This is the primary standard through which you will be able to resolve anything.
(007-253, 1959/09/20)

21. My purpose for founding the Unification Church was not only to benefit our church. On this anniversary of the founding of the church, we have to broaden our scope. We need to make this day the day for guiding our nation to God's Will, and we need to make this day the day we guide the entire world to build the kingdom of heaven on earth that God hopes to see. It is to fulfill this mission that the Unification Church was founded.

The Unification Church is different from all other churches that have appeared in history. Representing the entire providence, it has to indemnify everything and settle all accounts. At the same time, the Unification Church carries the overall responsibility to leave behind a victorious foundation with which God can be happy and that gives Him hope for the future.

Therefore, the Unification Church was not founded merely to build a denomination. It was founded to take on the whole providence and to build the one foundation that is centered on the Will. Based on the founding of this church, individuals are to stand anew before God.

These individuals must solidify a philosophy of life and establish a tradition for new families, new tribes, new peoples, new nations, and the new world that will continue. (043-232, 1971/05/01)

The mission of church members

HSA-UWC aims to build a community of family members centered on true love. The term shikku, meaning “family member,” refers to the members of a church family who eat together at the same table. Family members have the mission to realize the kingdom of heaven on earth, centering on God's love and the ideal of creation.

They also have the responsibility to dissolve the bitter sorrow of Jesus, who was unable to love his parents, relatives, the synagogues, the people of Israel, the nation of Israel, and the world.

This is why members of the Unificationist family are devoting all of their energy to realizing one world under God, as members of one great family transcending all barriers of ideology, religion, race, and nationality.

22. Jesus and the people of Israel in his day were chosen to represent the 4,000-year history of God's providence. Likewise, you, the saints on earth who are chosen today, represent the entire world and its 6,000-year history, transcending peoples and nations. If you do that, then God's judgment as foretold in the Bible will be removed from the earth.

To achieve this standard, we hung up the Unification Church sign, and we called each other “family members.” We are a family. We are brothers and sisters, although not blood-related, and we are one tribe.

We are one brotherhood and one tribe, and we are building the Israel that will take responsibility for establishing the Parent-child relationship with God. To achieve this, we must experience Jesus' bitter sorrow, take the path of pioneers, go through the course of fighting against Satan, and fulfill God's Will. (002-221, 1957/05/26)

23. When we established the Unification Church, it was as if we were finding and reestablishing Judaism as God intended it to be. To build up the Unification tribe is as if we are recovering the lost tribes of Israel and recovering the brothers from whom those tribes stemmed.

In this sense, all Unification Church members need to become brothers and sisters. It is only by making that connection of brotherhood that we can form a tribe. Unless we connect as brothers and sisters, we cannot build a church, nor can we form a people or a nation.

Therefore, the Unification Church has the mission to connect all people centering on this relationship of brothers and sisters. This is the meaning of the term “family member.” Because we are family members, we call each other brothers and sisters. The term “family member” is foundational to building the kingdom of heaven. This is why in the Unification Church we use this term. This is also the reason Unification Church members should love one another. (037-171, 1970/12/25)

24. Today, in the Unification Church we call ourselves a family. However, you also use the term “family” when referring to your family by blood. Then on what basis do we in the Unification Church call ourselves a family? We call one another family based on God's love for us.

We do so because God desires to have that precious, loving relationship with all humankind and for each one of us. And we do so because we are striving to fulfill the ideal of creation that God originally intended to realize. All people in history have wanted to have the kind of connection to one another that we have. These are the kinds of relationships implied in the word “family.”

We are here in this movement having this central relationship with one another. Therefore, if we are close to someone, we should love that person with a love surpassing that of anyone in the world. And if we are loving someone distant from us, we should love that person with a higher love than others do in the world.
(025-285, 1969/10/05)

25. While you are sleeping, some of your brothers and sisters are following the Will, staying up late at night and shedding tears. While you have a full stomach, some of your fellow family members are going hungry.

Therefore, even when you are eating or sleeping, you need to have a tearful heart, help them through spiritual power, pray for them, and make an altar for them.

You should always keep the altar clean and pray to God, telling Him that you are ready to submit yourself as an offering, day or night. Especially when a brother or sister is going through a difficult course of the cross, you should at least prepare internally to fight alongside the person.

Otherwise, eventually, you will be separated from those who are fighting on the front line. If that happens, you will fall behind and end up a defeated soldier. (156-069, 1965/12/07)