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UPF-UK Celebrates UPF Founder and Founding Anniversary
Written by Robin Marsh, secretary general, UPF-United Kingdom
Tuesday, August 29, 2023
London, United Kingdom—Distinguished friends and supporters remembered the UPF founder 11 years after his passing on September 3, 2012, and also celebrated the 18th anniversary of the establishment of UPF on September 12, 2005.
The event, held on August 29, 2023, at the London Peace Embassy, was an opportunity to understand the original vision that Rev. Dr. Sun Myung Moon and his wife, Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon, had for UPF.
Father Moon expressed this vision in speeches he gave during a series of world tours. These speeches were rooted in his perspective of a world that recognizes its interdependence and seeks to build mutual prosperity based on universal values aligned with God, who loves us all equally as one family of humanity.
Several major events, such as the UPF World Summit in February 2020, highlighted the centenary of Father Moon's birth and further explained his vision for building an extensive culture of peace. The website www.thelegacyoflove.org provides more information about the centenary and the successive Rallies of Hope.
The World Summit in February 2022 demonstrated the reach and capacity of UPF to influence a global audience. (See www.upf.org for reports of the World Summit series.) This was attended by many prominent VIPs and has given impetus to Father and Mother Moon's work for the peaceful reunification of the Korean Peninsula.
The speakers (Click on the links for a video of each speaker’s presentation.)
Rev. Dr. David Hanna, UPF chair for Northern Europe, highlighted eight points that Father Moon, late in his life, proclaimed as his victories when reflecting on his life.
Keith Bennett, deputy chair of the Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il Foundation, has visited North Korea 50 times and received two Friendship Awards directly from President Kim Il Sung. Father Moon’s meeting with Kim was a remarkable occasion, Mr. Bennett said, when adversaries reconciled for the sake of the Korean Peninsula. They were said to speak with the same dialect, and they commented that “blood is thicker than water” when reflecting on their relationship. It was intriguing for Kim Il Sung that Father Moon's life course had been set by the revelations received on Mount Myodu in what is now North Korea.
Rev. Dr. Dato Sumana Siri is the Chief Sangha Nayaka of UK and Europe. In 2023 he celebrated 50 years of monkhood. He has been the leading light in modern Buddhist missions and a long-standing friend of the wider Unification movement.
Keith Best TD, MA, chairman of the UPF-UK Board of Trustees, is currently also the chair and CEO of Wyndham Place Charlemagne Trust; chair of Charity 2020; executive chair of the World Federalist Movement; secretary of the Parliamentary Outreach Trust, European Movement; patron of the European-Atlantic Movement; freeman of the City of London.
Ahmed Shebani, founder and president of the Democratic Party of Libya, is also a long-standing Ambassador for Peace who has attended several UPF International Leadership Conferences in Seoul, Korea.
Nic Careem, the founder of the Blue Sky Network, a social campaigns organization in which like-minded people use their skills and connections to improve the world.
An Ambassador for Peace certificate was presented to Dr. Yehoeshahfaht Ben Israel, who has campaigned for peace, fairness and justice on many issues. In 2019 he gave a talk at UPF-UK headquarters, introducing Martin Luther King’s Principles of Non-Violent Reconciliation. His speeches, particularly during a UPF Africa Day program, have shown his passion for the search for peace, development and justice for Africans.
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