GROWING up, Sam Park always knew he was a ‘Blessed Child’ but discovering his real father was the ‘Second Coming of Christ’ who ‘owned the universe’ was a lot to live with.
Especially since his dad, the founder of Unification Church – better known as The Moonies – was busy positioning himself as the Messiah who would save the world from hell.
This revelation was to have a damaging life-long effect on Sam as he learnt how his Korean-born father, the Reverend Sun Myung Moon, used the church to satisfy his voracious sexual appetite.
The cult leader indulged in group sex with his “Disciples”, and made couples drink “Holy Wine”, laced with his own semen in mass wedding ceremonies.
There were also accusations that he brainwashed young, impressionable people drawn to the movement, looking for a purpose in life.
But even darker and more personal for Sam was the sexual abuse he received from the woman he later learnt was his biological mother which began when he was just five years old.
“I am the product of the evilness that they hid and I’m not going to be silent about it anymore because it’s destroyed my life,” says Sam, who features in the documentary, The Moonies: Married to the Cult, which can be seen on Amazon Prime from this Sunday.
Raised in poverty in Korea, Sun Myung Moon was 16 when, he claims he was visited by Jesus Christ and given his world-saving mission in life. He wrote his own version of the Bible, Divine Principle, which he used to instruct his followers who were recruited first in Korea and then in the United States.
“As a Blessed Child in the Unification Church, they put extreme pressure on me,” says Sam, who lives in Arizona. “You are responsible to save and restore mankind.
“You need to be sexually pure and marry a mate that you can procreate with and populate the world with perfected people. That way, original sin will eventually be stamped out.”
Growing up in Virginia as the youngest of six children, Sam believed his father was Moon’s right-hand man, Bo Hi Pak.
“The rest of my siblings were quintessential well-behaved, Blessed Kids, but unfortunately, that didn’t rub off on me. I caused mayhem,” he says.
“The man who I believed was my father was a disciplinarian. If we messed up, you would get a little beating. I loved my family but I knew I was different at the same time. I had a rage that something was just not right.
“My dad was busy and my mum was often sick. There was one Church member who would often come round – Auntie Annie. She was very kind to me and would bring me toys and candy and I would go to her house and talk about things with her.
“When I was 13 I had a dream that was so disturbing I didn’t know what to do with it. I dreamed that Reverend Moon came to me and took me in his arms and said, ‘You are my son.’
“Because I was confused, I went to my Aunt Annie and asked her what she thought it was about. She looked at me and said, ‘It’s true.’ And I thought, ‘What the f..k? I am the Messiah’s son.’
“Annie told me that she was my real mum and that there was something special about her and Rev Moon’s relationship and that it was important to keep this a ‘Heavenly Secret.’
“Annie came from one of the earliest families that joined the Church, known as ‘The Special Ones.’ Moonies have this concept of a ‘Heavenly Timeline.’ When Rev Moon became 40, he was supposed to marry two sisters and have 12 sons with them – a significant offering to God so he could complete his mission to save the world.
“The plan was that he would marry Annie’s sister and then after seven years divorce her and marry Annie. But Annie’s sister decided not to go through with it, so he ended up marrying a different woman (Hak Ja Han on 11 April 1960) who was 17 and she would be the true ‘Mother for all of Mankind.’
“But the Rev Moon continued secretly sleeping with Annie and told her he wanted to have a child with her.”
Moon preached that sex outside of marriage was a sin, so he knew he had to hide his illegitimate child and instructed the Paks, who already had five children, to secretly bring up Sam as if he was their biological child.
“Mrs Pak would pat her belly to feign that she was pregnant. They had to obey, otherwise it would have put at risk everything that my father was trying to do if the world found out that he had an illegitimate son.
“Annie is like the keeper of secrets and she revealed many weird practices within the Church. Some of the things she told me about my father (Moon) and what he did with the women of the founding couples of the Unification Church, shocked me.”
Twisted ‘Blessings’
The Moonies became infamous for their mass weddings, known as Blessing Ceremonies, in which he would choose who married who among his followers. It was their mission to produce “sinless children” with which to populate the world.
“As part of his first Blessing, he slept with all of the women three times and by doing that, they would be restored. It was known as ‘Purification of the Womb,’” says Sam.
“Being the Messiah has its benefits. You are mandated, by God Almighty, to shag every female on the planet!
“When his followers would get married, the couples would drink the ‘Holy Wine.’ He can’t copulate with every woman to make perfect people so what can he do? What makes the wine ‘holy’ is that it contains some of the Rev Moon’s semen. It’s father’s way of sanctifying these couples.
On New Year’s Day, in order to inaugurate that spiritual holiday, he slept with six women at the same time
Sam Park
“Sex was used around very important ceremonies. On New Year’s Day, in order to inaugurate that spiritual holiday, he slept with six women at the same time.
“Blessings are huge money makers for the church. We are talking thousands of dollars per couple.
“When people join, one of their responsibilities is to give up everything – cash, personal belongings, assets. And because of that, the Unification Church hit the big time, making hundreds of millions of dollars that they could invest in real estate, hotels, casinos, banks.
“When I found out that the Rev Moon was my father, it felt like winning the universal lottery. Not only was he the Messiah, he was my dad who will love and protect me.
“I wrote to him every three to four months but it got to the point where I realised my efforts were futile. I was absolutely devastated. He’s the father of all mankind. Why is he not acknowledging his own flesh and blood?”
Meanwhile, many loving parents of the young adults who had joined the Moonies were desperate to get them back, believing they had been brainwashed into the ideology.
Moon was feeling the heat and it was when his estranged daughter, Un Jin and his ex-daughter-in-law Nansook Hong, went on a TV show and claimed that there was drugs, sex and corruption within the Unification Church, that they also let slip about his illegitimate son, “Sammy.”
He quickly became identified and, although he never wanted the secret to come out, he pushed for some kind of acknowledgment, at last.
“I am the oldest living son the Reverend Moon has and therefore I am entitled to inherit the mantle of the church,” he says. “But they were never going to want to give it to me.”
Instead, in return for waiving any inheritance claim, he was paid off with $1.5m.
The darkest secret of all
Annie is now in a care home and Sam visits her regularly but he has been hiding the darkest secret of all – until now.
“The Unification Church has been nothing but dark masquerading as the light,” he says.
“It’s about keeping secrets. But I don’t want to pretend any more. There is one major secret that I have kept and I expected to keep to my grave and that regards my mother (Annie) and our relationship.
“I loved her company and when I was little I would ask if I could sleep with her in her room. I was five or six when at night in her bed she opened up her nightgown, showed her breast and she took my hand and said, ‘If you want to touch this, you can.’
“By the time I was 15, our relationship was sexually consummated. She talked about me and her being sexualised as a providential thing.
“She believed that my father’s mission had failed. Rev Moon swore before God that Annie was the next True Mother and I am heir apparent to my father.
Being the Messiah has its benefits. You are mandated, by God Almighty, to shag every female on the planet!
Sam Park
“She explained that by having sex with her, I was able to prepare myself to become the next True Father. All of this made sense to me at the time. It gave me something to hold onto.
“The last time I saw my mother was a few months ago, at her nursing home and I said to her, ‘What possibility do we have to be in a relationship if we don’t heal this in some way? Help me.’ And she said, ‘Many people knew what was going on.’ And I said, ‘I thought this was our secret.’ And she said, ‘No.’
“When I heard that, I was so angry. They didn’t care about what was happening to me. They only cared about protecting themselves. I’m nearly 60 now and that pain stays with you.”
Sun Myung Moon died in 2012, aged 92. The Unification Church remains active, led by Moon’s widow, Hak Ja Han. It is claimed the church has three million members worldwide and controls a vast range of companies worth in excess of $1 billion.
“I remember when I got the news that my father had died, I didn’t care and that surprised me,” says Sam, who has found love with Donna, the first Western ‘Blessed Child’ in the Unification Church who left decades ago.
“So much of my life was built around the identity of this man. I wasted so many decades believing something that was absolutely shite, ridiculous.
“My father believed that the whole universe belonged to him. That’s how big his ego was. He destroyed lives. Tore families apart. I’m just one of many. I was lucky, I had privileges. The vast majority of members were slaves.”
The Moonies: Married to the Cult, is available from Sunday 2 November on Prime Video
0 Comments