Coalition for Religious Freedom Update, July 4, 2011

July 13th Event at the Washington Times. ICRF, in cooperation with The Washington Times Foundation and the Universal Peace Federation, has confirmed plans for our educational event at the Washington Times Arbor Ballroom July 13. We expect between 100-150 guests for the 1-day event, beginning at 10 am and lasting until 4 pm. Government officials, legislators, representatives of persecuted faith groups, media experts and NGO leaders are invited to speak (several have already confirmed their intention to participate). Rev. In Jin Nim Moon is scheduled to give the keynote address at lunch, and we hope to also have entertainment from members of the Lovin’ Life Ministries band, SonicCult. The program theme will be “Stop Religious Persecution Now.”

Dan’s Trip. I have just returned from a trip to Taiwan and Korea. The Taiwan leg of the trip featured a presentation by our delegation at the annual conference of the Center for Studies on New Religions. Our panel included myself, Mr. Toru Goto and Mr. Luke Higuchi (leaders of our victims’ associations in Japan and the USA), and Mr. Shunsuke Uotani. Our papers will be published soon on CESNUR’s web site (www.cesnur.org). Our session also included a book review of True Father’s autobiography by Prof. George Chryssides (himself the author of a biography called “The Advent of Sun Myung Moon”) and a presentation on the struggle between the UC and UCI by Prof. James Beverley. After the conference, I traveled with Dr. Beverley to Korea, where we had several excellent meetings with UC officials, including a long interview with Kook Jin Nim (see photo). Dr. Beverley is preparing an article for a major Christian magazine. His interview with Kook Jin Nim was excellent because he is particularly well- informed about our movement and Father’s teachings (he did his Ph.D. thesis on the sermons of Rev. Sun Myung Moon). More about this in a future report.

Religious Freedom Roundtable. Before leaving for Taiwan and Korea, I attended the meeting of the Religious Freedom Roundtable at Freedom House in Washington DC June 10. About 60 religious freedom activists attended with Dr. Suzan Johnson Cook, the White House State Dept. Ambassador for International Religious Freedom, as the featured speaker. I raised the Japanese faith-breaking issue in the Q & A session, in the context of encouraging Dr. Cook to use her offices to effect change not only in “Countries of Particular Concern” but also in nations with good-to-moderate records, in which US influence is most likely to succeed. I also invited the participants to attend our July 13 event and expressed a desire to brief the roundtable meeting more fully on the Japanese issue at a future meeting.

SAFE Educates US Law Enforcement Officials. SAFE, our survivor’s association had a strong presence recently at the US Asian American Law Enforcement Foundation meeting at Fairleigh Dickinson University. SAFE president Luke Higuchi is a member of the board of directors of this organization. Government agencies that were represented included the Attorney General, FBI, IRS, NJ State Police, Homeland Security, Secret Service, and the Department of Labor. During the Q & A session, Ichiko Sudo informed the panel about the human rights violations against religious groups taking place in Japan, and she asked the Law Enforcement representatives for advice about how to stop the abuse. Her testimony revealed that Luke was one of the victims abducted by faith-breakers and held against his will, left the audience at a loss for words. The Law Enforcement agencies who attended the event are now aware of the human rights violations in Japan and we hope that this will result in some influence on their Japanese counterparts.

Mr. Goto’s Civil Suit. Mr. Toru Goto’s civil court case is being translated on the following blog: http://humanrightslink.blogspot.com/.

ICSA. Our delegation to the International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA) next week is now finalized, and we are looking forward to presenting our information to this meeting for the first time. ICSA is considered the leading academically-oriented “anti-cult” organization. We expect our presentation to be to be challenged by the representatives of the National Network of Lawyers Against Spiritual Sales who claim that our reports are unreliable. The issue of using force to “deprogram” members of “cults” is controversial within ICSA because it is illegal.

Takako Fujita. The anniversary of the tragic death of our sister Takako Fujita (while during confinement) is coming up on July 13. By coincidence, this is the date of our event at the Washington Times. However, this is also a good opportunity for us to organize local memorial events in honor of her martyrdom. Dan Fefferman has written a song in Takako- san’s honor and hopes to share a recording of it the week of her anniversary.

Ray Mas. Ray is now back at home and has begun work again (although not full time yet). Health-wise, he is doing very well. He is able to get around with a cane, use his computer, and can again eat normally. It looks like Ray is well on the road to recovery. Welcome back, Ray!

2nd Gen Intern Program We are proud of our 2nd Gen Intern training program that we started several months ago. Our Interns are helping ICRF with the global country reports and our website. We have tons of work for them and it’s a fantastic chance for them to use their research and writing skills, as well as to assist our staff with visits to Capitol Hill and other events on religious freedom. Please support our interns! Please consider supporting ICRF on a monthly basis. Go to www.religiousfreedom.com and click on the Donate button on the lower left side of the home page. Thank you to all who are ccurrently ontributing; we invite all brothers and sisters in America to show their love and gratitude to our Japanese members through their support of ICRF activities!

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