A woman speaks about her experience being raised as part of a “blessed second generation” of Unification Church followers. On the table are a seal and rosary left by her mother. | CHUGOKU SHIMBUN
The fatal shooting of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has shed light on problems faced by the second generation of followers of the Unification Church.
Growing up constrained by the church’s doctrine and expected to act as role models for believers, some children suffer when trying to seek their own religious freedom. There are also cases in which children are subjected to poverty and neglect, as their parents are preoccupied with donation activities.
To change such situations, some people have begun to speak out about their own experiences.
A woman in her 30s living in Shimane Prefecture is among those who have left the church to come forward and share her story.
It has been more than 10 years since she fled her parents’ home and she thought she’d made a clean break with her past, but when she saw a series of TV news reports about the shooting incident her childhood memories suddenly came back.
The perpetrator had a grudge against the Unification Church, which is now formally known as the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification. His mother had gone bankrupt after making huge donations, the reports said. Hearing these, the woman’s heart began to pound, her hands damp with sweat.
The struggle for donations
It was in an office behind a church that her parents and other adults had talked over a chart filled with names and numbers, their expressions serious. One family was facing a pension pay day, but the consensus was that they’d have to be pushed in order for the group to make its quota. Such conversations continued until 2 a.m. or 3 a.m., while she was made to sleep in a corner of the room.
“All I can remember is my parents’ frantic work on donations and (more) donations,” she recalls. Her parents worked for the church and were area representatives. She says they must have been under intense pressure as they took her around selling seals and jars. Her mother repeatedly asked her own parents for money. The family was poor; she was made to eat only rice with bonito flakes as a side dish.
Her parents were married in a joint wedding ceremony held by the Unification Church. A child born to such a couple is called “a child of God” and “a blessed second generation.” In the living room of their home, pictures of the late Sun Myung Moon, the founder of the church, and Hak Ja Han, his wife and the current president, were on display. She was made to pray to the pictures every morning and evening.
“You are only entrusted to us by God. They are your real father and mother,” she remembers her parents telling her. But she could not accept those words. She was also told that if she disobeyed the church’s teachings, the whole family would go to hell.
“I was always anxious. I don’t remember my parents ever loving me unconditionally.”
Images of hell
After entering elementary school, she became more certain about her own sense of unease. “There is something wrong with my family,” she recalls thinking.
During the summer vacation when she was in an upper grade, she was sent to a church facility in South Korea where she participated in a 21-day training camp. She was made to keep beating herself and those around her while singing a chant, “drive out the evil spirits.” She was made to watch videos of what appeared to be hell, and she slept in fear.
Poverty, forced faith in the doctrine and neglect — the realities faced by the second generation — are becoming recognized as a social problem. “Some people cannot accept life as a believer, and become mentally ill,” says lawyer Hiroshi Yamaguchi, who has been working to help victims of so-called spiritual businesses for 36 years. “This is a very serious problem.”
As she grew up, the woman began to hide the fact that she was a child of Unification Church followers. In front of her parents, however, she pretended to respect the doctrine. She was lying all the time, in and out of the home. She didn’t know who she really was any more.
When she found a boyfriend during her adolescence, she felt for the first time in her life that someone cared about her. But as the doctrine strictly forbade free love, she was forced to fast for three days at a time as punishment for seeing him.
Running away
The turning point came when she was in college.
She made up her mind to run away from home when she learned that all the school funds her grandparents had left for her had been used up for donations. She pressed her mother to come with her. Even though the mother had given away her daughter’s precious money and devoted herself to the church, the heaven envisioned by the church was never realized. With her faith beginning to waver, the mother followed her daughter.
Eventually, the daughter married a man not involved with the church, and they welcomed her mother into their new home. They shared the joy of living a normal life together. At last, she felt like their relationship was that of a typical mother and daughter.
The woman was able to care for her mother when she later became ill, and was present when her mother died. Not long after that, Abe was fatally shot.
There are days when she feels down, thinking about her father. At the same time, she says she realized something important — that she isn’t the only one who has had a hard time. “This is not a problem of a specific family. I became convinced that it is a problem of the organization, the Unification Church.”
The woman is now lobbying the local bar association to set up a free consultation channel for second-generation followers who are unable to speak out. She has also started to share her own experiences on the internet. She is scared, but she’s not going to back down, and says the presence of her own young child gives her strength.
“I want to ensure freedom of religion for my child. That’s why I don’t want to see any organization that relies on the sacrifice of others,” the woman said, adding that she wanted her suffering to end with her and not be carried over onto her child. That was also her mother’s wish.
Source: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/10/24/national/second-generation-church/
