As I Rise: Launching of the GWPN on the West Coast with Julia Hoon Sook Moon — Hoon Sook Moon

Women leaders of all ages and backgrounds from all around the country gathered on April 6, 2019 in the City of Angels (Los Angeles) for a morning reception to launch the Global Women’s Peace Network (GWPN) in the Pacific Rim Region. The Women’s Federation for World Peace (WFWP) co-founders, Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon and her late husband, Rev. Sun Myung Moon, had predicted many years ago that the West Coast of America is indeed where the era of women and mothers would emerge and from where it would spread.

A most warm, joyful, uplifting, and festive spirit filled the ballroom of the Sheraton Gateway Hotel at LAX that morning, where nearly 100 women poured in.

The moment the newly appointed WFWP International President, Mrs. Julia Moon, arrived and entered the room, she was surrounded by the guests who expressed their love, shared warm greetings, and then requested to take photos with her even before the event began.

WFWP USA Vice President Katarina Connery skillfully and warmly guided the audience through the short but powerful program, with Mrs. Moon delivering her first message in the U.S. since her inauguration. In her address, she showed that she had deeply and insightfully studied the GWPN and its vision, despite having been involved in a completely different field prior to this, namely, the arts. She

expressed her strong commitment to moving the GWPN forward, using her background in the arts to touch souls and bring about synergy where words are ineffective. Read her speech here.

Following this, WFWP USA President Angelika Selle introduced the GWPN in more detail, its vision, areas of focus, and latest developments since the East Coast inaugural ceremony on November 11, 2018. She introduced two newly completed educational tools that were created recently by WFWP USA to assist in understanding and implementing the vision behind GWPN’s three areas of focus; women’s leadership, family and environment.

The first tool, the “Cornerstone for Happiness – Marriage and Family” seminar, introduces a new paradigm on marriage and relationships which have proven to help create healthy and happy families in strengthening the fiber of the family, and which is believed to be the cornerstone for a peaceful world. The second tool, the “Leadership of the Heart” curriculum, empowers women to become peace leaders, leading “from the inside out,” based on self-change and learning skills to transform the current toxic environment and toxic emotions in relationships into wholesome ones.

Special guest speaker Dr. Susan Taffer, founder and CEO of the World Connections Foundation who promotes the idea that “Education is Healing and Healing is Education,” completely captured the attention of the room with her riveting explanation of “What does it all mean?” She weaved the vision of WFWP, the founders and her area of education skillfully into one, thus demonstrating how this great vision can be implemented in one area of endeavor.

Following the guest speaker, WFWP honored three outstanding women with the HerStory Award: Dr. Cherilyn Lee, founder of Nu Wellness Healthcare Inc., Ms. Rachanee Jackson, member and activist of the Tri-Counties African American Alliance, and former Congresswoman Mrs. Diane E. Watson, who all shared a snippet of their lives about how they turned pain into purpose and defeat into triumph.

WFWP USA then offered an “honorable mention” to appreciate two WFWP women leaders, who have been sacrificing and investing themselves tirelessly over many years to make WFWP into what it is today: Mrs. Fannie Smith from Chicago, the National Director of the Schools of Africa project, and Emma Reed, the WFWP Southern California Chairwoman.

Between the speakers and the awards ceremony that followed, three wonderful performers lifted the atmosphere through song. Ms. Rebecca Zinke’s rendition of “Find Your Way” melted the women, reminding all to “keep your faith, even when you go through darkness.” Minister Magdalene Morris, LA gospel singer and performer, reminded the women “to lay down my burden, down by the riverside.” Mzuri Moyo Aimbaye, a well-known singer and performer from New York who closed out the eventful morning with a rendition of “Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory.” Her dramatic soprano voice permeated everyone’s heart as she also inserted words from the Fannie Lou Hamer play about the civil rights movement. It brought the history of slavery to life and rang especially true in light of the recent murder of rapper Nipsey Hussle, a few days prior to the event.

Stay tuned for announcements on the next launching of the GWPN in the Southwest Region.

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Julia Moon’s Address at the 2019 GWPN Launching in Los Angeles

Julia Moon’s Address at the Global Women’s Peace Network (GWPN) Launching in Los Angeles on April 6, 2019.

Beloved women ambassadors, leaders of the Women’s Federation from the West Coast and beyond, ladies and gentlemen, good morning! It is wonderful to be here with you today!

I would like to convey to you the heartfelt wishes, love and congratulations of our founder and leader, Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon, for the regional launching of the Global Women’s Peace Network here in Los Angeles and the West Coast.

I also want to welcome you and to thank you sincerely for joining us for this auspicious occasion. I would like to also thank WFWP USA President Angelika Selle, and Regional Director of the West Coast, Rev. Dr. Linda Nishikawa, for inviting me to speak today!

It is truly a great honor for me to have been recently appointed the International President of the Women’s Federation for World Peace, and joint President of WFWP Korea. Though she is not here with us today, I would like to take a moment to give thanks to our former International President, Yeon Ah Moon, for her great work and contribution to the growth and development of WFWP, and I wish her continued success in her new role as the head of the Universal Peace Federation in Korea.

When our founder, Dr. Moon, first told me that she would like me to take on the responsibility of WFWP, it was a big surprise for me, something that I never imagined happening in my life! Since I have three other jobs, directing the Universal Ballet, managing six elementary, middle and high schools under the SunHak Educational Foundation and overseeing a charity foundation, I already had so many responsibilities that it made me wonder how I could possibly take on more, especially such a huge and important responsibility as WFWP.

However, since the passing of our beloved founder, Rev. Dr. Sun Myung Moon, I have seen how Dr. Moon has been working relentlessly and tirelessly, day and night, to continue the mission of realizing a world of lasting peace. Knowing this and knowing her deep heart, I put my trust in God and accepted the position, and I stand here today with the hope and desire to support our founder and share her burden in fulfilling the dream of creating “One Global Family under God.”

I am brand new on the job so I have much to learn, but I will do my utmost to serve our founder’s vision and to serve you and the Women’s Federation for World Peace to the best of my ability. I know that many of you here today have been a part of the Women’s Federation for many years. The amazing dedication and service that you have shown is truly inspiring and I am deeply grateful to you for all you have done to make the Women’s Federation the great organization that it is today.

Dear women leaders,

Dr. Moon is not only our founder, but actually, she is also my mother-in-law!

For the past 35 years, as the daughter-in-law of Rev. and Mrs. Moon, I have had the great privilege and blessing of living closely with the founders of the Women’s Federation and I have seen how they have dedicated every moment of their lives to God and to the cause of peace, showing by example what it means to live for the sake of others and to practice true love.

My mother-in law, whom we lovingly call Mother Moon, is truly the epitome of grace and feminine beauty. As a professional ballet dancer, I went through many years of hard training. A ballet dancer has to be very graceful and yet at the same time very, very strong. But, when I see our Mother Moon I realize that I do not come anywhere near the grace and beauty, the calm and composure, the strength and inner force that she embodies! This is because her grace and strength comes from deep, deep within, from the knowledge that she is God’s True Divine Daughter.

I know that Mother Moon wants all the women of the world to realize and know their own unique value as God’s divine daughters. When our founders established WFWP in April 1992, they announced the arrival of the Era of Women, calling on all women to play a more pivotal role in making peace a reality. They spoke of the goals and mission we must follow in building a world of peace, starting from the values of true maternal love.

They also asked us not only to think of women’s rights, but exhorted us to serve the rights and welfare of all people by building true families with a foundation of true love centered on God, by educating, raising and supporting women leaders and by encouraging women all around the world to be initiators of peace by practicing true love and living for the sake of others.

This means we are not a feminist organization pursuing women’s rights at the expense of the welfare of men. Rather, the Women’s Federation seeks to empower women to first of all understand their own God-given value which comes from the Creator. In doing this, women have no need to fight with men or to put them down; rather we seek to assist our husbands and other men to also see the Divine within themselves and collaborate in building a world of peace.

Dear women leaders,

The twenty-first century is often referred to as the “Age of Women.” And we can see that great advances have indeed been made, giving women more opportunities for education, for equal treatment, and for equal rights. Despite this, it is the unfortunate reality that even with all these advancements there are still not very many countries in the world where women are truly given the same rights, opportunities and recognition as men.

WFWP has accomplished a great deal worldwide, but we cannot stop here. Through the Global Women’s Peace Network our founders have asked us to go one step further toward bringing sustainable peace on earth. This is not something that can be accomplished by one NGO alone.

We need to work on a broader scale, networking with like-minded organizations, bringing governments, other NGOs and individual leaders of the world to work together for peace. This is the mission of the Global Women’s Peace Network that we must carry forward. Today with the launching of the Global Women’s Peace Network on the West Coast we are taking another step towards fulfilling that goal.

Beloved women leaders,

Women in all sectors of life, in education, politics, academia, the arts and sports are needed to collaborate and create the environment and culture for peace. We need to work together in every field to bring a cultural revolution grounded in heart.

When Rev. and Mrs. Moon founded Universal Ballet in 1984, they said, “The arts are the path of service to humankind.” I have dedicated my whole life, first as a ballerina and then as director of Universal Ballet, to fulfilling the company’s vision of Ye Chun Mi Ji. Ye Chun Mi Ji translates into, “Heavenly Art Creating a World of Beauty.” Through the arts, we work to heal people’s hearts and bring beauty into people’s everyday lives.

I have realized that now I am being asked to apply this vision not only to the stage, but off the stage, on a much broader and more intrinsic level, by practicing true love and serving the world together with all of you through WFWP.

The art of ballet creates beauty in the world by expressing it through the movements of the physical body and the Women’s Federation creates beauty in the world through maternal love that is sacrificial and unconditional. The goal of creating a world of beauty is the same!

Together, as mothers and women of today, let us make a more beautiful world of peace. Following the example of our founders, let us all nurture this world as true mothers and move forward, creating a cultural revolution of heart, working

together, learning together and loving together until we have brought peace to everyone.

I am truly happy to be launching the GWPN here on the West Coast together with you, in the City of Angels, the place where Mother Moon gave her first official speech in the United States after the inauguration of WFWP in Korea.

Once again, congratulations! Let’s work together to create a beautiful culture of peace, here in the United States and beyond!

I pray that God’s blessings and guidance be with you and your families! Thank you very much!

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