THE UNCOMFORTABLE AMBIGUITY OF THE NON-PRACTICING UM MEMBERSHIP

Years ago enthusiastic young Unificationist members blindly trusted and promoted an idealized vision of TP based on the fantastic deceitful testimonies of the complicit UM Korean court. A “True Family” had finally appeared on Earth. It was just a matter of months (or just a few years) before this glorious and perfect holy family would be warmly welcome worldwide and would in a short run illuminate the whole universe.

At that time the UM defined as members the dedicated followers who would unconditionally obey any directive from TP with absolute faith. Then came the idea to label “positive guests” as “B members”. Those would pop up from time to time without really knowing DP teachings, and they would somehow benefit from of a VIP treatment in order to give a good image of the movement. They were of course counted as members to make the numbers look more impressive. 

Then, time passing, some cracks started to appear within the fake idealized “true family”. Ugly hidden facts could not remain secret anymore. Rev Moon's great charism could still impress some UM members for a while, but the feeling that something really wrong was going on could not be totally dismissed, in spite of last minute improvised “providential justifications”.

Consequently many members progressively left the UM. They were either heartbroken and disappointed or feeling great bitterness from realizing they had been conned.

Others stayed and continued as if nothing had ever happened.

More recently a new kind of membership started to appear in UM: The “non-practicing members” who were once dedicated “A members”.

They don’t really believe in TP’s authority anymore nor follow their directives any longer. For some reason they can’t leave completely the UM. So they sometimes attend events and keep talking skillfully about DP and Rev Moon words which have so deeply impregnated their minds, after having been hammered for so many years. Such formatted mindset has become an inseparable part of their identity.

They are then perfectly able to stand up for unificationist theories as professional lecturers would do. But they don’t feel concerned anymore by the actions and behaviors that this teaching ultimately implies in term of following TP’s directives. For something is broken deep inside them.

They are quite similar to atheist theologians who can cleverly explain the Christian theories without feeling bound to live according to its specific demands.

The vicious egotist fights for power within the “true family” has left them in a state of great disarray. They acknowledge that the ideal they have been cherishing for years and which they had believed was embodied by the Moon family, alas had revealed itself to be just a constructed masquerade. However they are completely unable to draw any logical conclusion from this fact.

For these very sincere members who have sacrificed everything “for the good cause”, such a cruel reality is emotionally much too difficult to bear at the moment.

This is particularly understandable because the only few close friends they have and the great majority of people they happen to know are all UM members with whom they have precious common souvenirs. They have shared so many important experiences together during the largest part of their lives. So they fear that away from the UM community they would be lost and feel completely alone.

So that’s why they stay for the moment within this uncomfortable ambiguity of being “non-practicing members".They are not ready yet to face the huge challenge of completely leaving the movement. 

Healing takes time and the cleverest intellectual tentative from UM apologists to justify the “truthfulness” of DP can’t be satisfying anymore. Based on a false teaching, nothing sustainable can truly develop.

The only good things that existed in the UM are those which members brought themselves into it, even though Rev Moon often managed to convince his followers that all the credit was his.

Refusing to be manipulated any longer, UM members are now freeing themselves from the Moons’ illegitimate authority in order to follow their own conscience and think by themselves.

With great relief, they are now witnessing the last days of the UM. That means that better days are definitely ahead of them. May they joyfully keep an open heart and an open mind to plainly savor every second of these precious times.