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Many conservative evangelical speakers have attended Moon-connected rallies including a Family Federation for World Peace event in 1986 where Ralph Reed, Beverly LaHaye, Gary Bauer, and Robert H. Schuller spoke. A 1998 Christianity Today article reported:

"Conservatives find Moon attractive because they share many of his moral and political values," says James Beverley, theology and ethics professor at Ontario Theological Seminary. "Those similarities are significant enough that questions of theological differences are put on hold." Beverley, who has studied Moon for two decades, also notes that speakers at such events often have their trips to exotic locales fully financed in addition to receiving generous honorariums.

During Moon's tax-evasion trial, frequent rallies were held for "religious freedom.". Well-respected Christian leaders such as Tim LaHaye spoke at these events. LaHaye told Christianity Today at the time:

"By no stretch of the imagination does my participation in that rally indicate that I support Reverend Moon's doctrine. Frankly, I don't really know what his doctrine is. But in America, Reverend Moon and (Nebraska pastor) Reverend Sileven and every other religious organization ought to have the freedom to communicate their doctrine within the framework of the law."

A Moon employee estimated that half of the several thousand pastors attending such a rally in Washington D.C. in 1984 were in attendance on a free ticket. Darrel Malcolm, at the time was senior pastor of Webber Street Church of Christ in Urbana, Illinois.

"I felt there was a hidden agenda of trying to buy legitimacy (for Moon) within the Christian community," Malcom said in the Christianity Today article. "I am not ready to grant that … I do not consider their group Christian."

Not all of this evangelical-courting is necessarily in the past. It continues. While not many Christian leaders may have realized it at the time, Moon sponsored George W. Bush's Inaugural Prayer Luncheon for Unity and Renewal on Jan. 19. More than 1,400 ministers, civic and political leaders attended the event. Moon spoke to the attendees while church members handed out Unification books and pamphlets. Southern Baptist Executive Committee President and Chief Executive Officer Morris H. Chapman told Baptist Press:

"I was shocked to see that Sun Myung Moon was on the program and in essence, the host. I was even more surprised on the way out of the banquet hall to be given a propaganda book on the Unification Church. (The experience) will serve to remind evangelical Christians that the world increasingly is filled with wolves in sheep's clothing."

And although he is 81-years-old, it seems Moon will continue making headlines with such methods of attracting spiritual leaders to his Unification Movement. In a speech at his 80th birthday celebration he said a union of religions is the only way to prepare for the "last days."

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August (Web-only) 2001, Vol. 45