Hak Ja Han

Hak Ja Han (born February 10, 1943 January 6, 1943, lunar calendar) is a Korean religious leader.

Her late husband Sun Myung Moon was the founder of the Unification Church (UC).

Han, whose mother later became a follower of Sun Myung Moon, was born on January 6, 1943 (lunar calendar).

Han attended an all-girls high school in Korea but did not go on to college.

She speaks Japanese and English as well as Korean.

Han and Moon were married in April 1960 and have 10 living children and over 30 grandchildren.

In April 1960, at the age of 17, Han, by then a member of the Unification Church, married 40 year-old Moon.

In 1962, Moon and Han founded the Little Angels Children’s Folk Ballet of Korea, a girls Korean folk ballet company meant to promote a positive perception of South Korea.

In 1984, Han spoke at a Unification Church sponsored academic conference in Washington, D.C. to a crowd of 240 which included professors from Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, University of Michigan and the Sorbonne in Paris.

In 1992, she established the Women's Federation for World Peace, and traveled the world speaking on its behalf.

Since her husband's death, she has assumed leadership of the Unification Church, whose followers call her "True Mother" and "Mother of Peace".

In 1992, Han established the Women's Federation for World Peace (WFWP) with the support of many Unification members, and traveled the world speaking at conventions on its behalf.

The WFWP's purpose is to encourage women to work more actively in promoting peace in their communities and greater society, and it includes 143 member countries.

In 1993, U.S. Senator Trent Lott supported the Bill True Parents Day in the U.S. Senate and in 1995 U.S. President Bill Clinton signed a bill into law called Parents Day; according to this law, children are to honor their parents on this day.

This showed the relationship of the Unification Church to the Republican and Democratic Parties of the United States, according to news media.

In 1993, U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch introduced Han to a crowd at Capitol Hill; she stated at the event that she and Moon are the first True Parents.

Moon was in the audience watching her speech, along with members of the United States Senate and United States House of Representatives.

Han and Moon together presided over the mass wedding ceremonies for which the Unification Church is noted.

Han organized a conference in Tokyo in 1993, which was the first anniversary of the WFWP.

The keynote speaker was former Vice President of the United States Dan Quayle's wife Marilyn Tucker Quayle, and in a speech at the event Han spoke positively of Mrs. Quayle's humanitarian work.

In 1993, Han traveled to 20 cities in the United States promoting WFWP, as well as to 12 countries.

At a stop in Salt Lake City, Utah she told attendants: "If a family is not centered on God's ideal of love, there will be conflict among the members of that family. Without God's love as an absolute center, such a family will ultimately break down. A nation of such families will also decline."

Her 1993 speeches in the United States focused on increasing violence in the U.S., and the degradation of the family unit.

(See: Blessing ceremony of the Unification Church.) In 1997, they donned crowns and gold-trimmed robes to lead a mass wedding and marriage rededication ceremony in Washington, D.C. for 20,000 couples, 2,500 of them Unification members whose marriages had been arranged by Moon.

Ministers of other religions acted as "co-officiators."

In 1997, Han presided with her husband over a marriage affirmation ceremony for 28,000 couples, some married and some newly engaged, in New York City.

During the ceremony Han and Moon sprinkled holy water on the couples.

On July 19, 2008, Han along with her husband and 14 others, including several of their children and grandchildren, were slightly injured when a Sikorsky S-92 helicopter owned by the movement crashed during an emergency landing and burst into flames in Gapyeong.

Han and all 15 others were treated at the nearby UC-affiliated Cheongshim Hospital.

Some Unification members believe that Han and Moon's wedding established a "holy marriage" which Jesus was not able to establish, and also consider it to be a holy day, called "True Parents Day," as well as what members refer to as the "True Family."

It is believed by the members to be the beginning of a new Completed Testament Age and to have fulfilled the prophesied Marriage of the Lamb in the Revelation of John.

According to Unification members, Han and Moon are together believed to be the new messiahs.

The Moons are regarded by members to be the "True Parents" of humanity and are addressed by its followers as the True Father and True Mother.

Members have also referred to Han as "the Bride of Christ" and the perfect woman.

She is seen within the Unification Church as the Mother of humankind, the final chosen of God.

Han and Moon are also seen as the exemplars of the God-centered existence by members.

In Unification services, members bow down in respect for Moon and Han, when they are present, and to representative pictures of them when they are not.

Han has 14 children, 10 of whom are still living, and as of 2011 has 38 grandchildren.

Her children are:

In Korean culture, a married woman keeps her original family name, with the children taking their father's.