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T. McDevitt: Address to Summit 2022, Session V
Written by Thomas McDevitt, Chairman, The Washington Times
Friday, August 12, 2022
Address to Summit 2022 and Leadership Conference,
Seoul, Korea, August 11-15, 2022
It’s my honor to welcome you to this session on behalf of The Washington Times. Together with our sister paper, Segye Ilbo, and supported from Japan by Sekai Nippo, we are sponsoring this session, which is on religious freedom. One can say that it is the most essential human right on the earth today. There’s a huge battle going on, driven by opposite world views. On one hand, a worldview that’s materialistic, looks at the world purely in secular terms, sees government as the central power and allows humanism to dominate discourse. On the other side are people who have a sense of faith that existence is given to us by our Creator.
I want to offer my sincere gratitude to Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon, the Co-Founder of UPF and the Co-Founder of The Washington Times. She, in every keynote speech I’ve heard for the past seven years, points out a thesis statement. It is so profound and it’s a game-changer in terms of psychology. She points out that the problems on the earth today are so complex and so deeply rooted that it is impossible for the human mind, no matter how brilliant and capable we are in execution, in management, in political strategy, and it is impossible for humanity alone to solve these problems.
The only way the world can move forward is to accept and affirm the existence of our Creator as our Heavenly Parent. Meaning God exists. And that’s the point.
We are facing challenges around the world today with regard to materialism, humanism, relativism, et cetera. But it’s a resurgence of the awareness of the existence of our Creator that will make the difference when we come together around that essential reality. So with that, I want to thank Dr. Moon for the courageous, providential essentialism she speaks of in simple, deep, practical and relevant terms.
I also want to thank UPF for putting this program together. The Washington Times is proud and fierce about protecting religious freedom, which is why we stand upon our core values of freedom, family, faith, service and citizenship. When we talk about freedom, it’s not just freedom of the press. It’s freedom of conscience, freedom of faith, freedom to worship, freedom to assemble, et cetera. We’re facing issues around the world, in China, in North Korea. We previously reported about our fact-finding trip. But today I want to talk about, just in closing, an experience I had last week.
I spent five days in Tokyo, and what’s going on in Japan now is of critical consequence. The tragedy of losing Prime Minister Abe to an assassination and the claims made in the media about the motivation of the assassin. You’ve probably read about it. You’ve probably heard about it. I have never in my 40-year media career seen such a calibrated, focused witch hunt. It’s shocking to see what’s happening. The Japanese people are amazing people. They are aligned with America. There’s so much hope from Japan. But what I saw just in five days shocks me. The world has to stand up. The truth has to come out. And thank goodness this organization, with its global network, along with The Washington Times and Segye Ilbo and the amazing speakers we’re going to have today, can make a difference.
I think it’s a transitional moment, without a doubt. It’s a critical moment for us to unite, face the truth, and move forward courageously, like Dr. Moon says, putting our hope and our faith in attending our Heavenly Parent.
Thank you all for being here. Thank you, Korea and America and Japan, for the work that we have to do going forward. Thank you and God bless you.
To go to the World Summit 2022 Schedule page, click here.