GLOUCESTER, Mass. -- The Moonies -- plagued by scandal and behind schedule in establishing their New Kingdom of Heaven on Earth -- still insist that to know them is to love them.
But the expansion of the Moonie empire, which inextricably links religion, business and politics, to communities such as this Yankee fishing town has prompted fear, rage and even hate.
Critics of the Unification Church led by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon claim to have evidence the Moonies and the Korean evangelist they believe to be the Messiah have systematically violated laws and employed brainwashing in their efforts to fulfill Moon's pledge to 'conquer and subjugate the world.'
The Moonies, formally known as the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, deny the charges.
Moonies on the streets, according to the church, raise $20 to $25 million a year. Moon watchers contend the sales of candy, peanuts, flowers and trinkets may bring in twice that much.
The money is plowed into a world business network that includes such diverse interests as weapons, extensive real estate holdings, newspapers, chemicals, restaurants, commercial fishing and one of the most expensive films ever made -- 'Inchon,' which cost $46 million and recently premiered at the Kennedy Center in Washington.
The church -- which claims about 30,000 American adherents, 10,000 of them full-time disciples -- boasts a total membership of 3 million in the 127 countries in which it says it operates.
Opponents of the church contend the figures are vastly inflated, arguing that those who accept marriages arranged by Moon constitute the hard core of the church's membership. They say Moon has married scarcely more than 3,000 couples in several mass ceremonies he has conducted over the years.
Moonies call Moon 'Father' and consider his 'Divine Principle' their Bible. The most fervent Moon foes are former devotees, many of whom were snatched from the clutches of the church and purged of belief in it by 'deprogrammers.'
Moon announced last month the successful completion of his 21-year campaign to establish the church in the United States. There is evidence, however, the Moonies have not recovered from well publicized allegations of 'mind control' of young members, ties to the Korean Central Intelligence Agency and sensational court cases.
Unificationists increasingly have sought acceptance in the Christian mainstream, referring to themselves as Christians. With little success, they have engaged in numerous dialogues with evangelicals and other religious leaders.
This is the year Moon once proclaimed as the beginning of the earthly heaven, but the 61-year-old leader quietly passed the word to his followers several months ago that the new kingdom will not be established until 2001. Moon said his followers had failed to convert non-believers in large enough numbers and the world was not yet ready for the new age.
Moon, a renegade Presbyterian who established his church in South Korea in 1956, came to the United States a decade ago, claiming that 'God chose America as his final champion to serve as a builder of the Kingdom of God on Earth.'
The 28,000 people of Gloucester saw no such role for their particular chunk of America. The Moonies came to town anyway. They rented a house in 1977 and immediately began to fish for tuna from several small boats.
Sensitive to local opinion, they called an open meeting to 'share our hearts with you' about the activities of Moon and the Unification Church. The few citizens who attended heard Aidan Barry, head of the church in Massachusetts, describe the ocean as 'a very spiritual place.'
Things became more temporal a few weeks later when Mayor Leo Alper told a Moonie deputation that had come to his office to discuss their plans, 'You'll have strap marks on your ass before you'll get a permit out of me for any sort of harbor development.'
Four years later, Alper, 67, a huge man with an unruly mane of white hair, still bitterly opposes the Moonies, who have greatly expanded their activities in the area and are firmly entrenched in a seafood business and restaurant on prime waterfront property in Gloucester.
'The local people resent them,' said Alper, citing as evidence incidents of violence that have occurred at The New One, a seafood restaurant known as Bob's Clam Shack before the Moonies bought the bankrupt establishment at auction for $650,000.
The property lay alongside the financially ailing Gloucester Lobster Co.,which the Moonies already had acquired for $300,000, although a consortium hastily organized by the mayor had been prepared to pay as high as $250,000 for it to keep the Moonies from getting the prime location on the harbor.
The Moonies thus secured the only business in town capable of handling the catches of the local lobstermen.
They renamed the operation International Seafood Co., and began to pay top prices to the lobstermen.
The mayor said the Moonies broke their promise to inform City Hall in advance of any real estate or business purchases they planned to make.
Alper and other townspeople were enraged by what they saw as 'typical Moonie heavenly deception' in the church's acquisition of the Cardinal Cushing Villa, a showpiece estate owned by the Daughters of Mary of the Immaculate Conception in this predominantly Roman Catholic community.
Rumors that the villa was up for sale sent City Hall emissaries to the nuns, who said they were not bargaining with the Unification Church. Alper said the anonymous buyer turned out to be a New Hampshire businessman who paid $1 million for the property and sold it within 24 hours to the Moonies at a $127,600 profit.
The Moonies claimed subterfuge was necessary because the mayor would have blocked a straighforward sale.
'I certainly would have tried to stop it,' Alper acknowledged in an interview with UPI.
Belatedly, the mayor said, he cabled the pope that the people of Gloucester would appreciate 'any effort you can exert to reverse the sale.' The airmailed reply from the Vatican said nothing could be done and regretted 'this unfortunate occurrence.'
When the Moonies opened their restaurant, an effigy of Moon was hanged from a pole. Pickets were set up. Rocks and fists were thrown.
Shots were fired into the air when Moonies moved into Cardinal Cushing Villa. A typical bumper sticker advised succinctly: 'Save the human race. Punch a Moonie in the face.'
In an effort to improve relations, Dr. Mose Durst, head of the church in the United States, came to Gloucester to meet with the mayor. Alper and Durst discovered they had something in common -- both were Jewish and had fathers who had emigrated from the same part Russia at about the same time.
'He sounded to me like a real hometown Jewish boy,' the mayor said of Durst. 'We spoke Yiddish to each other. He's not a bad fellow if he wasn't all wrapped up in this Moon organization.'
Alper said he turned down Durst's request that he support a fishing tournament organized by the local Moonies. The tournament was not a public relations success, according to Alper, who said the Moonies themselves won $97,000 of the $100,000 prize money.
He said an offer by the church to set up a $70,000 scholarship fund with the bulk of the winnings never got off the ground. 'My answer to that was that we will take care of our own,' the mayor said.
Alper said the restaurant, which has so far been unsuccessful in securing a liquor license, has not done much business.
The mayor, who has yet to meet Moon although the leader has been to Gloucester in his 48-foot yacht, has a grudging respect for the man he expects to pour more unwanted investment money into the town.
'He's tough,' the mayor said. 'Evidently money is no problem with that organization.'
Denny Townsend, 33, who manages the church's seafood operations in Gloucester, disputes the mayor's contention that Moonies have hurt the local economy by supplying their own cheap labor for their enterprises. Townsend, a Moonie for nine years, said:
'We haven't taken away one job in Gloucester. In fact, we've created jobs. We put money into the community. We pay taxes, much to the chagrin of those who like to say we don't.'
Townsend, a musician who once played drums, said, 'We get along very well with the local people we do business with. They've come to trust us.'
Townsend, who is from Colorado Springs, Colo., said the '15 to 20' moonies who live and work in Gloucester are good for the community. He described two local organizations opposed to the Moonies as hate groups.
'You can't penetrate when someone is looking at you through the eyes of hate and bigotry,' he said. 'This part of the state is famous for religious persecution. Salem is just 15 minutes down the road. History is repeating itself. The hate is definitely intensifying. We tend to polarize communities. But there are certain people here who have come to like us.'
Townsend is engaged to an Austrian Moonie in a match arranged by Moon.
'Sure, I've met her,' said Townsend, who expects to be married soon in a mass ceremony conducted by the church leader. 'We accept the match and the blessing of Rev. Moon.'
Townsend does not understand local complaints that the Moonies do not function as a traditional church in Gloucester.
'We came to Gloucester as a business. Our intention was to alleviate people's fears. So we don't recruit here. Now we are accused of not giving the community any theology. We hope to witness by our lifestyle. We're a people with a worldwide vision of service to humanity.'
Despite opposition, Townsend said the Moonies will not leave Gloucester.
'It's our hope the people will realize we don't have horns or tails. We're here to stay.'
Among those who hope not is Kathy Hurlburt, who heads the Coalition for a Free Gloucester, one of the organizations Townsend described as a 'hate group.' Mrs. Hurlburt, an attractive mother of three, said she does not hate anyone.
'When they came here, I began to educate myself about the Moonies,' said Mrs. Hurlburt, a Roman Catholic. 'I was horrified by what I learned. The Moonies use brainwashing techniques.'
Mrs. Hurlburt said the Moonies do not dare solicit funds or recruit in Gloucester but she worries about the young members she believes are exploited by what she is convinced are 'mind control' methods. She also does not approve of the changes the Moonies have made in the town where she has lived all her life.
'They could buy the whole waterfront in Gloucester,' she said. 'They really think they're helping us. It's not a religious issue. The issue is brainwashing and deception. They can buy anything they want. They can undersell you and then buy you out.'
Mrs. Hurlburt believes the Moonies pay high prices to fishermen as a tactic.
'They may be paying high prices right now but what's going to happen after they monopolize the fishing industry?' she asked.
'The Moonies say we are reacting out of bigotry and hate. This community is acting out of fear.'
The Coalition urges citizens to boycott Moonie businesses but it also asks them to invite Moonies to local churches and to 'express concern for their spiritual and physical lives.'
Mrs. Hurlburt described a personal dilemma.
'We've got to teach our children to be nice to the children of the Moonies but my children must wonder why Mom spends so much time fighting this organization.'
Mrs. Hurlburt said she regrets four children of Moonies no longer attend public schools in Gloucester.
'I know those children were given a hard time by the other children. I don't think they're in school anymore. It's very sad.'
Mr. Hurlburt also finds it sad that rumors have forced local businesses to go to great lengths to deny they are owned by the Moonies in order to escape the boycott.
'One man had to put up a sign saying he wasn't a Moonie,' said Mrs. Hurlburt, who sometimes has to dip into 'my grocery money' to cover mailing costs of the the reams of anti-Moon material she sends to her neighbors.
Paul Valin at first identified himself as 'one of the owners' of The New One, the Moonie restaurant which is undergoing remodeling before reopening soon for Gloucester's tourist season.
'It's a misconception that the church owns this restaurant,' said Valin, 28, a Moonie from Bridgehampton, N.Y.
Valin explained he and his partner, also a Moonie, 'bought' the restaurant after 'we were able to get a loan from a company started by church members.' Valin then acknowledged he and his partner 'lease the restaurant from Uniworld,' which he said was a Moonie company.
'Our goal is to sell the best seafood in town,' said Valin, whose parents are restaurauteurs in Bridgehampton.
Valin, who is awaiting an arranged marriage to a Moonie, said he expects more trouble when The New One reopens.
'There'll be name-calling but we can deal with the problems now. We've taken measures to guard the property.'
Valin, like other Moonies, supports the police who he said had responded promptly when there was trouble at the restaurant. But he said security guards have been hired to help deal with any more trouble.
Valin, raised a Roman Catholic, said, 'I still wear my Jesus medallion. It's still important to me.'
Most Moonies in Gloucester live communally in a house. Several live at Cushing Villa where they perform custodial duties. Neighbors say the Moonie population often swells on weekends when a dozen or so trucks and vans have been spotted in the villa.
The Gloucester Daily Times does not knowingly accept Moonie advertising but both members and critics of the church generally agree its news coverage of the controversy has been scrupulously fair.
The Moonie incursion into Gloucester has been matched or topped in other coastal communities, notably in Bayou la Batre, Ala., where the church in 1978 paid $6 million for land and a boat-building company in the town of 2,500 on the Gulf Coast.
The church's lowest point was reached on Oct. 31, 1978, when a House of Representatives subcommittee investigation of Korean-American relations concluded the church had 'systematically violated U.S. tax, immigration, banking, currency and Foreign Agents Registration Act laws, as well as state and local laws relating to charity fraud, and that these violations were related to the organization's overall goals of gaining temporal power.'
The investigation headed by Rep. Donald Fraser, D.-Minn., resulted in a recommendation that a federal task force investigate the Moon organization for lawbreaking. That recommendation was not followed.
There is evidence the Moonies, who often paraded in front of the White House in support of a beleaguered Richard Nixon, are becoming more visible politically.
Moon, who left the country when it appeared he might have to testify in the Fraser investigation, occupied a seat of honor at Ronald Reagan's inauguration, although administration officials say they do not know how that happened.
Moon is a master at getting his photograph taken with sometimes unsuspecting politicians.
At the 'Inchon' premier in Washington anti-Moon pickets carried signs warning politicians who showed up that 'you have been duped by the Moonies.'
'Are you kidding?' asked a befuddled Rep. Dan Glickman, when told the film had been bankrolled by the Moonies.
'Dan, I don't want to stay if they funded it,' said the wife of the Kansas Democrat.
Beating a hasty retreat, Glickman said, 'I can't see supporting any group that has not been exactly supportive of young folks in America.'
Other invited dignitariess said they attended the premiere of the film, which features Sir Laurence Olivier in the role of Gen. Douglas MacArthur, because proceeds were to go to the Navy's Carl Vinson Home for retired officers.
James Gavin, a Moonie leader who helped organize the premiere, told the Washington Star the producer, Mitsuharu Ishii, a Japanese member of the church, 'told me to thank the protesters for giving the movie so much publicity.'
Gavin said members of Congress who were asked to serve on the premiere committee were told of the church backing 'right up front because we were aware of the controversy.' Gavin acknowledged five legislators, whom he did not identify, declined to serve on the committee because of the Moonie connection.
Sen. Alphonse D'Amato, R-N.Y., committee chairman, refused to attend after being informed of the church's link with the film. His office said he allowed his name to remain on the committee because proceeds were going to the Carl Vinson home.
The News World, the church-owned New York daily newspaper, reported the premiere raised $50,000 for the home.
Michael Young Warder, former News World publisher who left the church and now works for the Heritage Foundation, a conservative research center, said in an interview in Washington, 'You'd better believe this movie is 100 percent funded and approved by Moon.'
Warder, 34, said he left the Moon organization in November 1979 because of the increasing 'Koreanization' of the church in America, which he said had resulted in authoritarian control and 'increasing personalization of Moon's authority.'
Warder, whose marriage was arranged by Moon, said he also was unhappy with the lack of 'support for the nuclear family' in the church.
A political science graduate of Stanford, Warder spent 10 years in the church and rose to the top ranks of its leadership. One of his duties was organizing the controversial scientific conferences sponsored and funded by the church and attended by eminent scientists.
Even Nobel prize-winners accepted free airfare and accommodations in places like Hawaii and the Bahamas for the conferences which Warder said were organized to gain prestige for the church.
Warder's arranged marriage has been a happy one which produced three children.
'If you're a devoted follower, an arranged marriage in a privilege,' he said. 'Fortunately, my wife and I hit it off.'
Ironically, the success of the marriage helped drive Warder from the church. Moon gave Warder and his wife jobs that separated them and advised him to put their youngest child in a nursery.
'My wife was devastated,' he said. 'That was the beginning of the unraveling.'
Warder said he was 'flat broke' when he left the church and had difficulty landing a job because 'a lot of people wouldn't touch me with a 10-foot pole.'
Unlike other former devotees, Warder has resisted writing a book because 'I don't think there's a market for it.'
Perhaps because he appears somewhat reluctant to criticize his former associates, some Moonies who have left the church consider Warder a 'mole' sent to Washington under cover by the church to act in its interests. Warder scoffs at the charge.
Unlike Warder, Steve Hassan,is a militant critic of the church he left five years ago.
Hassan, 26, of New York City, is president of Ex-Moon Inc., an organization that seeks to lure Moonies from the church. Hassan was successfully 'deprogrammed' over a four-day period and now uses the controversial technique to pull others from the church.
'I attended about 25 top leadership meetings where Moon spoke,' said Hassan.
He said the meetings were held at the church's estate in Tarrytown, N.Y. 'We'd walk into the room and bow to the floor,' he said.
Hassan once headed a Moonie fund-raising team which he said raised $35,000 in eight weeks on the streets of Baltimore. Hassan, who worked up to 20 hours a day seven days a week, said he wired the money to a Moonie bank account in New York.
Over a 27-month period, Hassan became a top fund raiser but after one long day of street soliciting he fell asleep at the wheel of a van on the Baltimore Beltway and veered into oncoming traffic. His leg was broken in the crash.
He persuaded the Moonies to permit him to recover at home. His parents took away his crutches and put a team of 'deprogrammers' to work on him.
Hassan admits he had thoughts then of killing his father but after the grueling session he had lost his belief in the church, which he now considers a a dangerous cult.
'I consider myself a Jew,' he said. 'I very much believe in God. I still believe in working for a better world.'
Hassan said he remains a political conservative.
'I'm against the Russians and the way they treat dissidents.'
Hassan believes many Moonies have 'an elitist frame of mind.'
'They believe it is necessary to work hard now so they can be celebrities later. Of course, some of them are just looking for brotherhood.'
Hassan said recruiters do not at the outset mention Moon to prospective members.
'You befriend them, get them to talk about themselves, what they are interested in. You have to find the right hook.' PRf n Fsaid he was susceptible to recruitment because he and a girlfriend had just broken up and he was depressed.
'The Moonies did not want to lose me,' he said. 'I was a true believer.'
Once highly visible, Moon now operates behind the scenes at his heavily guarded home in Irvington, N.Y. He is believed not to have spoken before a non-Moonie audience since late 1976 when he addressed a patriotism rally in Washington. He does not give interviews to newsmen.
Moon said last year his public ministry had ended. Moon watchers say he has turned the day-to-day operations of the church over to leaders -- many of them Koreans -- he has groomed.
Moon was born in a rural town in what is now North Korea to parents who became Presbyte9wPtwPtP was 16, Christ appeared before him on a mountain top and told him he had been chosen to complete his mission.
For the next nine years, according to his biographers, Moon developed what was to become the 'Divine Principle,' the book that sets down the church's theology.
Moon went to Japan in 1938 to study electrical engineering. He began preaching after the war.
In 1946 he moved to Pyongyang, now the capital of North Korea, which was then occupied by Soviet troops.
Because of his preaching, Moon said he was arrested, tortured and sent to a labor camp in 1948. He said he was freed in 1950 during the Korean War by United Nations soldiers.
With two disciples, he went to Pusan in South Korea, working there on the docks and preaching. It was in Pusan that Moon founded his church.
After a divorce from his first wife in 1960 he married 18-year-old Han Hak Ja, who bore him 12 children -- one for each disciple, according to church members.
Moon, who wears colorful print shirts and business suits, lives with his family on his estate at Irvington.
The church is constantly in the courts litigating cases involving libel, kidnapping and tax exemption.
The church recently lost a libel suit it filed against London's Daily Mail, which headlined an article on the Moonies, 'The Church that Breaks up Families.'
After a five-month trial -- the longest and most expensive in $(TEXT ILLEGIBLE$) the suit and ordered the church to pay $1,650,000 in court costs.
Some of the sharpest criticism of the Moon organization is directed at its far-flung business interests.
The Fraser subcommittee concluded that some of the church's tax-free money raised by young Moonies on the streets goes to bankroll interests that would appear to be far removed from religious goals.
Former Moonies say the church tolerates 'white lies' that prompt those solicited to believe the money they give is destined for charitable uses. They also say the church is absolutely dependent on a steady cash flow made possible by the hard-working youngsters in the streets.
Since church enterprises operate under more than 100 different names, it is impossible to determine the value of the church's holdings, but some investigators in the Fraser 'Koreagate' subcommittee estimated the total value at $200 million.
Moon is particularly interested in the potential of the fishing industry. The church has acquired boat-building plants.
Outsiders do not easily gain entrance to the church's Belevedere estate in Tarrytown but from outside the gates it is easy to spot the spanking new fiberglass fishing boats awaiting transport to operations such as the one in Gloucester.
Moonie defenders note that many churches own businesses. Moonie critics say other churches do not operate them with 'coolie labor.'
The opponents contend the church has smuggled hundreds of aliens into the United States under the guise of 'students' so they could be put to work in Moonie businesses.
The church is strongest in California, New York and New England. Nearly two-thirds of the entire membership is believed to be under 30.
Church statistics show nearly half of the members were Protestant before joining, 43 percent were Catholic and fewer than 6 percent were Jewish. Church leaders, some of them converted Jews, deny the church is anti-semitic.
After three years in the church members are eligible for the 'honor' of a marriage matched by Moon, sometimes to a person they have never met. Church critics say the marriages serve the purpose of gaining American citizenship for foreign members. Many married couples live apart, working for the church in different places.
The church forbids sex outside marriage. Relationships between members are platonic.
Moon watchers expect the church to continue to grow but at a much slower pace than it did in the 1973-76 period, when almost half of the current members joined.
The citizens of Gloucester, fighting what they see as an invasion of their town, take no comfort in such predictions.
Mrs. Hurlburt, sitting at her kitchen table piled high with her anti-Moon material, was discouraged.
'Dialogue with Moonies is like talking with a computer,' she sighed. 'They all say the same things. Their emotions are so suppressed their minds could snap at anytime.'
Mose Durst, 40, leader of the American church who clashed with the Gloucester mayor when the Moonies came to town, scoffs at such notions.
'We're not the new kid on the block anymore,' said the Brooklyn-born Orthodox Jew with a Ph.D. in English from the University of Oregon. 'We have been persecuted and have stood up to it. w9 w96PxUrst, a reputed hard-liner who directed the church's aggressive California branch, said, 'By the end of the 1980s I expect to see someone from the Unification Church running for President of the United States.'
