Thousands of couples from more than 100 countries traveled here to tie the knot on Wednesday in what was seen as the last mass wedding officiated by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the enigmatic founder of the Unification Church. The mass wedding — often involving the exchange of vows between partners selected by Reverend Moon himself — is perhaps the best-known and most controversial feature of Reverend Moon’s church.
But for members of his flock, the weddings symbolize his teachings of “trans-religion, transnational and trans-racial” love.
The confetti-filled 90-minute spectacle involving 10,000 couples, broadcast live on the Internet in three languages, was the largest Reverend Moon had organized since 1999, when 21,000 couples filled Seoul’s Olympic Stadium.
It came as the church has been struggling to revamp its image and increase its stagnant membership under Reverend Moon’s three sons, who have begun taking over day-to-day responsibilities for his religious and business empire.
The three sons, all educated in the United States, are more media-savvy than their reclusive father and have given a series of interviews in recent months. The church has also revamped its Web sites, which are filled with video clips of Reverend Moon and his sons.
Reverend Moon, who is 89, and his wife, Han Hak-ja, are known among his followers as the “true parents of all humankind.”
Seated at an altar festooned with flowers and shaped like an ancient Korean royal throne, they smiled and nodded when the couples, gathered at a lawn of the church’s Sun Moon University, south of Seoul, bowed to them on Wednesday.
Row after row of brides in white gowns or traditional wedding costumes of their countries stood holding hands with grooms mostly clad in black suits. Half of them were declared married, with the rest renewing their wedding vows.
When Reverend Moon led three rounds of “Hurray” at the end of the ceremony, firecrackers exploded and confetti rained down.
Similar mass weddings, smaller but hooked up to the South Korean event via Web links, took place in Norway, Sweden, Japan, Venezuela, Honduras and the United States.
“The blessing you are receiving today is the most precious thing,” the Rev. Moon Hyung-jin, the 30-year-old son of Reverend Moon, said as he opened the ceremony.
Reverend Moon began the group weddings in the 1960s, marrying a few dozen couples at a time. But they grabbed world attention when they grew in size.
Some 2,500 church couples exchanged or affirmed their vows in November 1997 in a ceremony at Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium in Washington. A crowd of nearly 40,000 turned out for that event.
The global mass weddings on Wednesday were to celebrate Reverend Moon’s 90th birthday in January, church officials said.
In recent years, the ceremonies became smaller as Reverend Moon came under pressure amid accusations at home and abroad that he was brainwashing his followers into donating their life savings to his church and marrying partners selected by him.
Previously, most couples met their spouses for the first time at the wedding, but the church has modified the practice to allow couples to meet and date, Moon Hyung-jin said in recent news interviews.
The elder Reverend Moon also arranged for South Korean church members, including some of his own grandchildren, to marry followers from Japan, the former colonial ruler of Korea, saying that the two nations could build love through marriages.
Moon Hyung-jin, who married a bride chosen by his father when he was 17, was designated last year to take over religious leadership of the church.
Another son, Moon Kook-jin, 39, was put in charge of the church’s business ventures in South Korea, which include construction, newspapers, hospitals, schools, tourism, ski resorts, beverages and a professional soccer team.
A third son, Moon Hyun-jin, 40, oversees international operations.
The church owns the Washington Times newspaper and the New Yorker Hotel in Midtown Manhattan, as well as the New York-based gun manufacturer Kahr Arms.+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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SIC: NYT