Use of money
Critics also allege irregularities in the use of money and claim that the church has enriched Moon personally.[72] The Moon family situation is described as one of "luxury and privilege"[73] and has been referred to as "lavish."[74]
Nansook Hong, who lived with the Moon family for 14 years, describes the Unification Church as "a cash operation" and reports on a number of incidents of questionable movement of money, citing this instance as one example:
"The Japanese had no trouble bringing the cash into the United States; they would tell customs agents that they were in America to gamble at Atlantic City. In addition, many businesses run by the church were cash operations, including several Japanese restaurants in New York City. I saw deliveries of cash from church headquarters that went directly into the wall safe in Mrs. Moon's closet."[74]
Allegations of fraud
In the 1990s, thousands of Japanese elderly people claimed to have been defrauded of their life savings by church members.[75] The Unification Church was the subject of the largest consumer fraud investigation in Japan's history in 1997 and number of subsequent court decisions awarded hundreds of millions of yen in judgments, including 37.6 million yen ($300,000) to two women coerced into donating their assets to the Unification Church.[76] In 2009 the president of the Unification Church of Japan, Eiji Tokuno, resigned after the church was raided, and some church members were arrested and indicted, for a scam involving selling expensive personal seals, telling people that failure to buy would bring bad fortune.[77]
Recruitment and allegations of brainwashing
In the United States in the 1970s, the media reported on the high-pressure recruitment methods of Unificationists and said that the church separated vulnerable young people from their families through the use of brainwashing or mind control.[citation needed] In 1979, Dr. Byron Lambert, in a foreword to a book highly critical of Unification Church beliefs, wrote that accusations of brainwashing were extremely dangerous to the religious freedom of other religious groups, which used some of the same recruitment techniques as the Unification Church.[78] Eileen Barker, a sociologist specializing in religious topics, studied church members in England and in 1984 published her findings in her book The Making of a Moonie: Choice or Brainwashing? Observing Unificationists' approach to prospective new members, Barker came to reject a strict interpretation of the "brainwashing" theory as an explanation for conversion to the Unification Church. Nor did she find the Unification Church's methods of recruiting members to be very effective.[79]
Future church leadership
Observers of the Unification Church, as well as some church members, have speculated about the issue of Unification Church leadership after Moon's death. Among those sometimes mentioned are his wife Hak Ja Han Moon, and their sons Hyun Jin Moon[92] and Hyung Jin Moon.[30][93][94] In 2001, Moon said:
"I have to set up a representative or successor before I can complete this mission. Is there anyone? Rev. Kwak? Dr. Bo Hi Pak? Is there? No, not one is qualified."
more info here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unification_Church
