The murder of former Prime Minister Abe Shinz in July 2022 focused focus on the Unification Church. The alleged murderer’s mother, a devout churchgoer, had donated the wealth of her family to the group, motivating her son to join the cause and take up arms against the politician he perceived as having done so. The problems are examined by a journalist and former lawmaker who has closely followed the church’s operations.
Three 12-story buildings in northern Tokyo are to the north of the National Diet building, and they serve as offices for members of both diet houses. The former office of Arita Yoshifu in the Associates ‘ Tower of the House of Councillors offers a vantage point from the Nagatach offices for the Liberal Democratic Party. One cloudy day after the death of former Prime Minister Abe Shinz on July 8, 2022, Arita still recalls the image from his glass.
” For individuals to place flowers on, a long column of mourners formed behind tables set up outside the LDP offices. Kids who had been brought by their parents made up some of the onlookers. Also Abe would have never imagined that the LDP’s engagement with the Unification Church may lead to his assassination in broad sun. He experienced severe misfortune, according to Arita.
On July 15, 2022, in Tokyo, members of the public pay their respects to former Prime Minister Abe. ( Jiji )
A Family Was obliterated by the Church
Arita continues,” I felt conflicted.” ” As a journalist, I spent many years covering religious issues, during which I covered the” spiritual sales” of trinkets purported to have supernatural powers and demands for excessive donations,” according to the Unification Church. I used Diet issue time to highlight the situation of religion survivors after being elected to the House of Councillors in 2010. But, the government did not take decisive action.
Yoshifu, Arita ( MicataKy)
Yamagami Tetsuya was born into a rich family and is accused of murdering the former prime minister in addition to other acts. Tetsuya’s living was turned upside down, though, when his family became a dedicated follower of the Unification Church after his father passed away. His mother gradually sold off the family’s possessions, later even the house. She gave the temple a total of more than 100 million dollars. She declared bankruptcy in 2002 due to the financial stress of the funds. Tetsuya accepted the fact that he would not attend college because the home faced extreme financial hardship.
The older brother of Tetsuya had a health problem. Tetsuya attempted suicide in 2005 after purchasing a life insurance policy that made his brother the recipient in an effort to pay for his sibling’s medical expenses. The nephew Tetsuya tried to save by giving his life, but when his death attempt was unsuccessful, he had also commit suicide in 2015.
According to Arita,” The Yamagamis were really unfortunate.” When I discuss Tetsuya’s account while on a national tour of the United States, people begin to cry. Despite having committed a terrible crime, that is likely the reason why so many packages of foods and cash addressed to him have arrived from all over the nation, he continues.
Attacks for Telling the Truth
Since the late 1980s, Arita has been covering the Unification Church. His reporting eventually inspired the Asahi Journal tabloid to launch a campaign to stop the church’s” religious sales” of items purported to have magical efficacy.
According to Arita,” The religion actually raised money by selling flowers, handkerchiefs, and socks, but that never generated substantial income, but they shifted to miracle-working trinkets in the late 1970s.”
The items with alleged mystical abilities included urns, small pagodas, seals and pendants as well as rings. These trinkets were sold by the cathedral for dozens of times more than they were for. Ariyoshi became the target of attacks when his papers were published because of his exposés.
” I usually received phone calls with no one answering, and I was often followed.” On the train steps one day, a man punched me and told me to “remember my face.” He says,” I received threatening letters in which razor blades had been hidden in such a way as to cut the person opening them.”
The post Asian economy was booming because of the property bubble when Arita started reporting on the church. But, the early 1990s bubble burst and the ensuing crisis caused a number of social issues. In this anxious environment, TV observers began to concentrate on the Unification Church.
Pop singer Sakurada Junko’s nuptials in a 1992 church-sponsored large ceremony in Seoul were frequently covered by celebrity information, both in publications and on television. A 1993 tale of a previous rhythmic gymnast who ran away from the church even attracted lots of attention.
I wrote more than 100 reports about the cathedral between 1992 and 1994. But, TV stations and newspapers just actually covered the subject as superstar rumors. The societal issues brought on by the sale of divine trinkets were hardly covered, according to Arita.
Oxygen from UC Coverage Is Sucked by Aum Attack
However, despite the Unification Church’s initial interest, the Japanese public gradually lost interest, most notably after 1995, when the Aum Shinriky cult attacked a Tokyo subway with sarin gas, killing 14 people and injuring 6,300 others. The ensuing wall-to-wall Aum cover ensured that Arita had no interest in the Unification Church, and as a result, it began to dominate work requests.
He claims that” I would try to sell the tabloids stories about UC, only to have the editor say that my story would n’t pique the public’s interest the way Aum would.”
Around this time, it is thought that the chapel slowly developed relationships with politicians. Almost half of the party’s 379 Diet people, or 179, had some connection to the Unification Church, according to a survey conducted by the LDP in September 2022. Additionally, it was reported that a Unification Church connection firm entered into policy agreements with LDP candidates during the 2021 House of Representatives and Councillors elections. The agreements mandated that the candidates pledge their support for child discipline, increased regional security, constitutional reform, and a careful attitude on LGBT issues and same-sex relationship. Individuals were required to sign support contracts from the church that explicitly stated their help for these policies.
The connection between the LDP and the original Unification Church has been described by Arita as follows:
In 1954, the Unification Church was founded in South Korea. Vietnamese adherents who had illegally immigrated to Japan started converting there in 1958. In the same year, the church even started converting people to Christianity in the US. The International Federation for Victory over Socialism was founded in South Korea and Japan in 1968. When approaching officials, the temple used the catchphrase “victory over marxism” because doing so as a religious organization would have raised red flags. Former Prime Minister Kishi Nobusuke, Abe Shinz’s uncle, strengthened his ties with UC thanks to the Federation.
Abe Family’s Close Relatives in the Church
Abe Shinz has a long history with the Unification Church dating up to his father. According to Arita, a former secretary in an LDP government previously informed him that Abe was in charge of mediating between the Liberal Democrats and the Unification Church. The chapel also valued Abe. Abe recorded a five-minute video message in September 2021 that was broadcast at heists organized by the Universal Peace Federation, an organization connected to the chapel, in Seoul. According to reports, Yamagami Tetsuya decided to attack the former prime minister after watching this film. Abe says the following in the picture:
” I want to thank UPF creator Han Hak Ja and the rest of you for collaborating with the organization to end issues all over the world, particularly with regard to the unification of the Asian peninsula.”
Han, who is currently in charge of the group, then known as the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, is the wife of Sun Myung Moon, the leader of United Church. Due to his clout in the LDP, Abe remained a crucial alliance for the business even after he resigned as prime minister.
Arita, however, finds one element of Abe’s interaction with the church odd.
” When Abe served as LDP director standard in 2003 and 2004, I questioned him about the Unification Church’s attempts to approach him, and he replied that they usually did. He said he tried never to meet with temple staff when I questioned him about it. LDP officials at the time continued to distance themselves from the temple. As a result, the LDP occasionally stopped sending congratulations to get read at UC events. However, as interest in the church’s spiritual revenue waned, Abe began to mingle with religion representatives, even going so far as to record a video message for their function, he claims.
He developed relationships with older police officers as a result of Arita’s Aum Shinriky policy. He still remembers a remark made by one of those soldiers:
We were all fired up and prepared to find our teeth into the Unification Church after the Aum investigation was over.
But, no advances were timely. Arita questioned the policeman about why they had n’t pursued the church about ten years later. His answer was straightforward: “politics.”
Also Waiting for Justice: Children of Followers
The Diet passed a bill in December 2022 with the intention of aiding the survivors of the original Unification Church. Whether the act will result in the business losing its status as a religious organization is now the main topic of discussion. However, some claim that not enough is being done.
The church will also lose its preferential tax status if it loses its spiritual standing. But the former Unification Church, a personal organization, will continue to exist. It will be challenging to prevent people from making donations to the church in an era where you can send money across frontiers using a smartphone. The cathedral will assert that it is the target of spiritual discrimination and attach an all-out protection.
Following Abe’s passing, Arita ran unsuccessfully in the by-election for the Yamaguchi Prefecture chair. The original Unification Church is currently suing him for defamation for remarks he made on television. He said the following at a meeting held in May 2023 to assist his constitutional battle:
” I adopt the stance that being sued is an pride.” As long as I am alive, I will fight until the very close.
( Japanese was the original language. Power News, Nishioka Yukifumi, and Mikata Ky provide the monitoring and language. Banner image: On November 3, 2022, Arita Yoshifu addresses the problems surrounding the unity of the Church. Mikata Ky. )
