It's The 70th Anniversary Of The Holy Spirit Association!
Take a trip back in time to when Rev. Sun Myung Moon first established the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity (HSA-UWC) and remember the core founding values ...
Rev. Sun Myung Moon, affectionally called True Father by Unificationists, established the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity (HSA-UWC) in Seoul on May 1st, 1954 after several years of mission work in South Korea following his arrival in Busan as a refugee in the Korean war in January 1951.
With the signing of the armistice agreement ending the Korean War in July 1953, Sun Myung Moon moved from Pusan to Seoul. There, with four early followers, he established the new association. According to the late Dr. David S.C. Kim, who was present, Sun Myung Moon submitted three possible names, two of which “were so complicated that we could not even comprehend the meaning of the Chinese characters.”
Sun Myung Moon later stated in his autobiography “As a Peace Loving Global Citizen” that the small group settled on the name HSA-UWC hoping “to signify that we belonged to no denomination, and … had no plans to create a new one.” He said: “I did not want to place ourselves in this separatist type of category. My hope was for the rise of a church without a denomination. True religion tries to save the nation, even if it has to sacrifice its own religious body to do so. … It was necessary to hang out a church sign, but in my heart, I was ready to take it down at any time.”
In 1994, on the 40th Anniversary, Rev. Sun Myung Moon and his wife, Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon launched the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification as the next stage of HSAUWC. Its mission broadened to include working for the unification of all religions and all nations. They said:
“Our 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.”
Thirty years later, as we mark the 70th Anniversary, the mission remains the same. In recent years, Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon, affectionally called True Mother, has explained that she is working and praying hard to see the growth of the Heavenly Parents’ Holy Community, people of all faiths and none living in peace as one family under God.
