Rev. Sun Myung Moon
As a Peace-loving Global Citizen is the autobiography of Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the founder of the Unification Movement. It was published in 2009 in both Korean and English by Gimm-Young Publishers of Seoul, South Korea. The book was released in South Korea on March 9, 2009 and debuted at #3 on the Businesss bestseller's list. It has ranked in various bestseller lists since then and was ranked 15th on the General bestseller's list as of October 14, 2009.
CHAPTER ONE - FOOD IS LOVE
The Joy of Giving Food to Others
I have very small eyes. I am told that when I was born, my mother wondered, “Does my baby have eyes, or not?” and spread my eyelids apart with her fingers. !en when I blinked, she said with joy, “Oh my, yes. He does have eyes, after all!” My eyes were so small that people o.en called me “Osan’s Little Tiny-Eyes,” because my mother was from the village of Osan.
I cannot remember anyone saying, though, that my small eyes make me any less attractive. In fact, people who know something about physiognomy, the art of understanding a person’s characteristics and fortune by studying facial features, say my small eyes give me the right disposition to be a religious leader. I think it is similar to the way a camera is able to focus on objects farther away as the aperture of its iris diaphragm is reduced. A religious leader needs to be able to see farther into the future than do other people, and perhaps small eyes are an indication of such a quality. My nose is rather unusual as well. Just one look and it is obvious that this is the nose of a stubborn and determined man. !ere must be something to physiognomy, because when I look back on my life, these features of my face seem to parallel the way I have lived my life.
I was born at 2221 Sang-sa Ri (village), Deok-eon District, Jeong-ju Township, Pyong-an Province, as the second son of Kyung Yu Moon of the Nam Pyung Moon clan and Kyung Gye Kim of the Yeon An Kim clan. I was born on the sixth day of the first lunar month in 1920, the year after the 1919 independence movement. I was told that our family settled in the village of Sang-sa Ri during the life of my great grandfather. My paternal great-grandfather worked the farm himself, produced thousands of bushels of rice, and built the family fortune with his own hands. He never smoked or drank liquor, preferring instead to use that money to buy food to give to those in need. When he died, his last words were, “If you feed people from all the regions of Korea, then you will receive blessings from all those regions.” So the guest room in our home was always full of people. Even people from other villages knew that if they came to our home, they could always count on being fed a good meal. My mother carried out her role of preparing food for all those people without ever complaining.
