1975 Missionary 40-Year Testimony from Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines

We are humbled by this unexpected and extraordinary blessing of having received the ‘True Parents’ Award for 40 Years of Meritorious Service”, bestowed upon us by True Parents. As part of the 1800 couples blessed who were sent out as foreign missionaries, we share this incredible journey we spent with True Parents, and realizations that were our privilege to experience because of our challenging course.

Discovering the Living God in Pioneer Days

My husband, Takashi Kagawa, was a student studying at a Christian University, Doshisha University in Kyoto, where he was introduced to the Christian life and the Bible, a rarity in Japan. He was searching for the meaning of life and purpose of human beings, and coming from a Buddhist background, it was the Restoration Principles and history that convinced him about the truth of the Divine Principle. After the workshop, he often visited the small Unification Church center in Kyoto which attracted him like a magnet. It was in September of 1967 that he joined the Kyoto-Carp center. It was a poor family, with 15 fulltime members. They carried out fundraising in Kyoto and other nearby cities by collecting old newspapers from the homes and then selling them to recycling shops, and used the money for their activity.

After collecting old newspapers, they sold flowers house-to-house. Another way to support themselves was by going to the market and shops for food-raising of old vegetables and fish free-of-charge or for a cheaper price. Then, they would go to the bakery for free bread. They restored new members slowly.

His most memorable experience was attending the first God’s Day in Osaka, Japan on January 1st, 1968, and meeting True Parents for the first time in Osaka, Japan. He recognized that True Father was a very strong and charismatic leader, while True Mother was so young and beautiful and sang Korean songs. Father gave very strong messages, and everyone was extremely inspired by the truth. After that, spiritual phenomenon was prevalent nationwide, and even in Kyoto. Whenever they prayed, the members were speaking in tongues. Sometimes, Biblical figures, such as Moses, would give messages. During the early days, they felt like real brothers and sisters and experienced the deepest gratitude.

Across the ocean, in Paris in 1969, I met the Unification Church, as a disillusioned and disappointed person despite 16 years of strong Christian education. I was blaming God for all evils in the world and abandoned him. But, one day, I saw a huge red symbol on the street, and followed my spiritual father Henri to study about God. He then guaranteed me the unfathomable, that if I studied the Divine Principle, I would actually have an experience of God. After studying about indemnity, I was stimulated to make a big” showdown” with God by fasting for three days and confronting him with the words: “Make your appearance!”. Later, when my spiritual father was describing the arrogance and rebellious attitude of the Jewish people towards Jesus, I deeply repented. “Yes, that’s me. I’m one of them”. The moment I felt this great remorse, miniscule gold sparks filled the tiny room, and there was spiritual fire and heat, as if from a

scorching furnace. I was embraced in a strong Father’s love, and was sobbing uncontrollably. I had found my God.

I had little expectation when I met True Father for the first time in Germany in 1972, but I was again swept away by an experience I was unprepared to digest. Father entered the hall of 500 people and turned, opening his arms wide to greet everyone. Radiating from his face and spiraling in all directions was some kind of invisible energy, filling the entire hall. True Father’s mind was universal, and he was enormous. I felt so small, like a grain of sand in the ocean. Being so young spiritually, unfortunately, Satan used this magnificent experience to drag me down into unredeemable unworthiness. My spiritual life was in a chaos, and I was wasting away, both physically and spiritually.

Later, I was part of the European team called to America in 1973 for IOWC. At a 10-day workshop at Belvedere, I was seated in the front when True Father came to speak on Cain and Abel. He was explosively enraged and banged the microphone. Dark waves of fear engulfed me. I was afraid to look at Father in his eyes. One inner voice was saying: “He’s your Father. You must not be afraid of your Father. You must look at him straight in the eyes.” Another voice condemned me: “You are nothing. You are a small speck in the vast universe”.. It took all of my strength to raise my head and look at Father right in his eyes. All of a sudden, our eyes met, and a powerful impact hit me, lunging me forward from my chair. Shocked, with my eyes opened wide, I saw Father’s blushing expression. I was swept up in the resurrecting power of Father’s love, and my spirit wanted to fly with wings spread wide. When we are filled with such intoxication of love, there is nothing to envy in this world. That moment, Father liberated me from months of internal imprisonment.

Both my husband and I were assigned to IOWC and the Global Team, a heavenly army travelling together with 70 to 300-600 persons, working for the True Parents’ Day of Hope Tours in America, Japan and Korea. Were plunged into severe circumstances of the IOWC and Global Team life. The schedule was from 4 a.m. to midnight, spending all day on the streets, with poor food, and little personal attention. We thought we were working hard, and it was easy to feel a lot of deprivation. However, no one could say they suffered or sacrificed more that True Parents during their tours. During the 70’s, Father guided leaders’ meetings at the New Yorker, and spoke for 10 to 17 hours straight. There are no words to describe the atmosphere that emanates from his body when he stands in close proximity. I perceived the same burning fire that I felt when I had my first encounter with God when I was spiritually reborn. The warmth emanating from True Mother was extraordinary as well. With agony, Father educated us about Communism and the impending tortures that would befall humankind. We were always on the edge of our seats and feeling tense and witnessed with a sense of desperation, even teaching Divine Principle all through the night. In the 1980’s, True Parents met Kim Il Sung and Gorbachev and announced that conditions were set for the downfall of the Soviet Union. Later on, history will know that True Parents were instrumental for the world to know peace.

Pioneer Missionary’s Lonely Life

After the 1800 blessing, True Father appointed our couple as a missionaries of Malaysia. This mission was a very shocking thing for my husband who thought he would continue to work on the Global Team after the Blessing, but Japanese missionaries were asked to join a 120-day workshop and proceed to their mission countries. Takashi arrived in the tropical country of Malaysia on May 30, 1975. True Father assigned 3 missionaries representing America, Germany and Japan. The American was a blessed sister. The other sister was a young German. My husband found their messages at the Japanese Embassy and quickly proceeded to their living place. They rented a small house and started their mission with prayer and fasting conditions. They went to the university campus and downtown for witnessing. The composition of races in Malaysia are Malays, Chinese, Indians and Eurasians.

Malaysia is multi-national country, and they restored a few members, but they also had unity problems among missionaries. It was very difficult. My husband could unite with the German missionary, but with the American, who was Chinese-American, he felt very much that they had a difficult spiritual background from the past. They tried to resolve this problem many times. The Japanese army occupied China before, and they fought against each other in the war. The American missionary’s relatives suffered tremendously through the war in China. He felt the indemnity of Japan’s past. After 3 and a half years, the American and German missionaries returned to their different nations, and my husband remained in Malaysia.

In September 1979, I went to Malaysia from America to do missionary work. We started our family and continued to do witnessing, as well as opened a company to sell health products. It was an important and historical event when we could register our church in this Muslim country. A few Chinese Malaysian members who were witnessed to in England as students, came back to Malaysia. They had passion to serve their country and started to work together with the local members for witnessing and fundraising. When core members grew up, they pioneered in rural areas. My husband especially was able to work together with Chinese Malaysians who were enemies to Japan in past history and became close due to True Parents love.

Evil Sovereignty Tried to Crush Jesus

Jesus was so wrongly pushed down, humiliated and executed, even though he taught “ Render to Cesar what belongs to Cesar” and “My Kingdom is not of this world”.

The 1980’s was a suffering period for our entire movement, as True Parents had to carry the cross by offering their son and Father spent time in prison, due to evil sovereignty.

God has allowed missionaries to experience the agony of True Parents in America over sovereignty as well in our mission countries. In 1983, a former member in Malaysia betrayed the church and spread rumors to the local newspapers, turning the Christians against the Unification Church. As missionaries, we had to leave the center and go underground. The media came to our center for interviews and an under-cover-detective came to investigate. All of our telephones were tapped. We realized True Parents course of paying indemnity as our main mission in order to liberate people. Sometimes, it was impossible to move forward, but based on our forgiveness and unconditional giving, God had a chance to work. While True Father was in prison and attacked by sovereignty in America, we were underground in Malaysia, pursued by police.

When Father got out of prison, we were out of the spiritual jail, and eventually met a wonderful Sikh leader who had met Father in 1959 during the early days in Seoul. He lifted us out of our trials through interfaith work. After the persecution period, we could hold many workshops in different areas, and sent pioneers to other cities from the Capitol, Kuala Lumpur. Our couple visited the new centers and taught them and guided them. When we saw many young members in the centers, it was a great joy for us. We set up a language school to teach various languages in Kuala Lumpur. We had worked in Malaysia for 13 years, and we had gained over 120 members before going to Thailand. It will be a small result, but we felt how much God had guided our family and Malaysian members through our mission. Now, many Malaysia members have been blessed and are working in many nations around the world.

In 1990, the Asian Continental Director reassigned our couple to Thailand, where our movement was thriving, with tens of thousands of students visiting our video center during a 3-year period. But, the sovereignty was threatened by the rapid growth. 8 of our Thai leaders were arrested and put in prison, charged with treason to the monarchy. What an un-imaginable shock to see True Parents’ and our leaders’ names associated with this kind of accusation! Imagine the repeated phrases in the media, newspapers, TV stations calling out for life imprisonment and execution of 8 of our very own Church leaders. Those phrases were ringing in our ears daily, as the Crime Suppression Police kept pounding at our centers nationwide, day after day for three solid months. Not ordinary police, they were like a crack team used to raid prostitute dens or drug lords. They carried no sense of accountability. They were rough and crude and bullied our pure, harmless members. They invaded our HQ prayer room, and took away the holy chairs, slippers, and holy salt, and set up an entire floor at the police headquarters to display our traitorous activities.

We were even accused of intoxicating youth with “white powder” (heroin). But, they couldn’t find any evidence, so just kept invading our centers repeatedly day after day.

Thai jails were like medieval prisons – dirty, dark, overcrowded and scary., and in Thailand, you were arrested first, and had to prove your innocence from the jail. During the first three months, our Thai leaders were in a very small jail cell with wall to wall prisoners. The hot air was stifling, as there was just one tiny window. Our clean-cut innocent leaders were surrounded by prisoners covered with tattoos. Some of them were hardened criminals who committed serious crimes.

There were 500 fulltime members, dispersed due to the center raids, who were called in for questioning by the police one by one. They tried to trick them into saying something derogatory against the monarchy, but not one member could be enticed to say anything negative. After one month, slowly, the fulltime students and members began to regroup themselves in small apartments of 10-12 persons each, and stayed together to pray, make conditions and maintain their life of faith. Within one year, the church foundation mysteriously remained intact, due to the courageous and brave attitude of the Thai leaders outside the prison.

After three months, a case was filed without bail, and all of our leaders were transferred to a larger prison facility. One of the difficulties of living in that prison was that during the night, our members could hear the loud and terrifying shouts of prisoners being whipped by the guards for not cooperating. Visiting the prison was such a painful, inhumane experience. The prisoners stood behind bars in one area, while visitors could only shout at them from a long distance, many feet away. It was our Thai Ambassadors for Peace who stood up and worked for the bail of our members, who could finally be out of prison after 2 years and 8 months. We shed a lot of joyful tears the day the Thai leaders could leave the jail. It took 20 more years for the entire case to be dropped by the government.

In 1991, our couple was once again reassigned to the Philippines to work for the VIP providence, another providentially thriving country. But, again the evil sovereignty felt threatened and stood up against True Parents and our movement. Many Filipino members joined the Church, and almost 2,000 were blessed in international marriage between Korean men and Filipino women. Christian groups influenced the sovereignty, and the government filed a case against our movement for mail-order-bride violations. We were falsely being charged with mass trafficking of women and even accused in the media with prostitution. And again, the penalty was execution or life imprisonment!! The Presidential Palace, the Cabinet, 9 government agencies, 9 Committees of Congress, and the Senate all united to put 8 leaders in jail and close down our Church.

In the Philippines, our Continental Director emphasized the VIP Providence in tandem with the witnessing efforts, in order to make an environment for good relations with the sovereignty. Even though we faced so many challenges, it was the Ambassadors for Peace who stood up to clarify with each government department one by one until the case could be dropped two years later. The Philippine leaders were also brave and courageous and continued to witness and teach the Divine Principle in the centers. Many members joined during that time, as well as Ambassadors for Peace, who studied the teaching and received the blessing. 8 of our Philippine leaders had one foot in the jail, but were rescued at the last minute by one righteous Senator. Especially, it was through the efforts of Hon. Jose de Venecia, Jr., the Speaker of the House of Representatives, that the legal case was finally dropped in the Congress, in the Senate and finally in the Presidential Palace. The victory was won through the unity of the Ambassadors for Peace and Filipino leaders.

True Parents Are Victorious

Since 2007, I have been assigned to the UPF headquarters in New York, in administration and with focused work at the UN. My work is of a different nature in supporting the different Summits, and conference, but it brings me tremendous joy because of my strong passion for solving the issue of sovereignty that I was burdened with in my missionary work. Compared to previous years, as True Mother has said, we are living in a miraculous time. It is truly a time of harvesting and a time of restoring sovereignty. And, True Mother, with strong faith, has declared Vision2020 for nations to be restored. Through UPF, heads of state, government officials and entire groups are able to link to True Parents. Based on the spiritual foundation that True Parents have laid through all these suffering circumstances, like fishermen, we only need to be ready to cast the large net very wide and high. My husband is also working for the Leda Providence in Paraguay, and is devoting himself to True Parents vision for the restoration of that country. We are blessed to still be continuing in this work.

Our Blessed Family

Of the 1800 couples, we were also pioneers for the international and interracial marriages in our Church. We were separated for 5 years before starting our family life, and for another 3 years, there were tremendous language barriers, which prevented deep discussions beyond the daily schedule. In addition, we faced cultural differences, not only in our marriage, but in our mission field. Four of our children were born in Malaysia, 3 daughters and one son. They are internally and externally beautiful, so much so that some people who met us did not recognize that we were the parents. When True Father matches extremes, the second generation products are so much better than the 1st generation. This is what we felt. We feel tremendously blessed, with 3 daughters having received the blessing and the 3rd generation being far superior than their parents. We cannot express enough our gratitude to True Parents for this blessing. It is our eternal treasure.