Moon shines in Chicago

Chicago Sun-Times

March 1, 2001

BY ANNIE SWEENEY STAFF REPORTER

The Rev. Sun Myung Moon came to the South Side of Chicago Wednesday night on his 50-state tour to promote the restoration of family values and got a family-style welcome from local clergy.

The animated, 81-year-old founder of the Unification Church walked into the filled-to-capacity Life Center Church of God in Christ amid cheers.

He spared neither time nor words, immediately launching into the message of the "We Will Stand" tour, and often pumped his arm in the air for emphasis.

"Unless we have true love relationships between a man and a wife, we cannot have God's love," he said through an interpreter.

Practicing that kind of love, Moon went on to explain, means no divorce or "free sex."

Moon, in a blue suit and sporting a bright yellow tie and red carnation, gazed upon a cross-section of leaders of different denominations, many of them African American. A representative from the Nation of Islam, as well as Baptist and Pentecostal ministers, sat side-by-side at a rally held before Moon spoke at the church.

"Who is the master of America?" Moon asked. "It is neither white Americans or black Americans. The true master of America is the person who loves America as God does."

Life Center Church member Tiffani Neubel, 19, said she didn't agree completely with Moon's message, but his ideas about family were on target. "No matter what church, what nationality, whatever, you come together as a family and let your family come first, peace will come."

The leaders gathered at Life Center Church spent a significant amount of time defending their relationship with Moon, often considered a controversial figure in America. They said they support Moon's message of breaking down racial barriers and his focus on strengthening the family and communities.

"We're not getting caught up in [the] man, we're getting caught up in [his] mission," said the Rev. George Stallings, archbishop of Washington, D.C.'s Imani Temple African American Catholic Church.

The Rev. Connie Crawford Bansa, pastor of the Church of the Living God in Englewood, will be traveling with Moon on the tour.

"Today is the day the family meets to unite under all faiths, all denominations," Bansa said.

The Unification Church, based in South Korea, has been reviled by mainstream religious groups as a cult.

A self-proclaimed Messiah, Moon started the religious movement in 1945 after he said he received a revelation from Jesus Christ.