Vision Commissioner Says: Before Bed…Get Wed!

Until Sir John Compton accepted his gilt-edged invitation to attend one of his legendary “blessings,” few Saint Lucians had heard of the Reverend Sun Moon.

The day’s political wise men, now self-servingly referred to by their respective party leaders as “our nation’s best brains,” took full advantage of the latest opportunity to ridicule Sir John.

Among their favorite wisecracks was that the former prime minister’s admiration for Sun Moon began and ended with the reverend’s endorsement of “free love.” Alas, a typical holier-than-thou political picong.

To quote from unification.org: “The teachings of the Reverend and Mrs. Sun Myung Moon have enabled thousands of people around the world to find a new quality of love in their lives, in their marriages and in their families. This has given rise to the group weddings that are now the hallmark of the Unification movement.”

“The Blessing ceremony” that Sir John attended in 1997 in Washington DC had actually married 30,000 couples!

In any event the self-proclaimed messiah and founder of the Unification Church was no one-trick pony. Fifteen years before he extended his special invitation to Sir John, the Korean-born Reverend Sun Myung Moon had been fined $13,000 and sentenced to fifteen years after he was found guilty of   filing false tax returns—with no negative impact on his following or on his extensive commercial interests that included Washington News World Communications, the Washington Times and a South Korean business group active in pharmaceuticals, manufacturing, tourism and publishing.

To his followers, Sun Moon remained “The True Father.” But to the few Saint Lucians vaguely familiar with his name, he was an absolute nut job that somehow had persuaded similarly twisted millions to join his movement of “loony Moonies.”

Had we known about his billionaire status might our I-dollar-trust community have differently assessed the reverend?

My own interest in the Reverend Moon (he died in 2012 at age 92) had nearly always been, well, professional. During my years as a Los Angeles resident it was almost impossible to avoid encountering his young apostles at airports and malls throughout the U.S.—always eager to disburden the gullible of their dollars and sense.

And now you’re asking why the renewed interest; what brought Moon to mind? Better to ask whom. It was Cotto. Miguel Cotto. As I willed myself to stay awake while he and Sergio Martinez did their somnambulist thing late Saturday night, my mind wandered. I found myself contemplating Kenny Anthony’s most recent creation: The Vision Commission.

Came the morning after and still the madness dominated my thoughts, returning to mind the image of Steven King as he strove to convince himself at the last Senate sitting that the administration’s new baby was not, as I had pronounced it during several private conversations, stillborn; it only appeared dead on arrival.

Besides, even if I proved right, qualified medic and eternal optimist that he is, the Doc was certain he knew how to resuscitate this particular Rosemary’s Baby.

I thought, too, about his fellow vision commissioner Fortuna Anthony. At a loss as to what might’ve earned the prime minister’s ex her place on his Adrian Augier-led dream team, I turned to Google—the modern-day equivalent of the oracle of Apollo.

What immediately showed up led me for a moment to imagine I’d summoned the wrong soul: “Honorable Fortuna Anthony-Husbands.”

Honorable? But then right under that was “Former Chief Education Officer, Ministry of Education, St. Lucia,” followed by an article entitled Peace King.

Curiosity got the better of me. If it looks like a duck, I mused, if it walks like a duck, I might just as well find out if it also quacks like a duck. And so I started reading:

“Not many areas of the world have remained untouched by the scourge of corruption and evil deeds. At the highest levels of society, in developed countries as well as developing and under-developed countries, we see men and women in positions of leadership failing to set and meet acceptable standards. Why have those elected to lead failed so dismally? Could it be their character leaves much to be desired?”

Try as I might, I could not recall a single occasion when the former spouse of Saint Lucia’s prime minister had written anything so like a STAR commentary.

Still only half convinced the author of the above-quoted truths was who I imagined she was, I read on:

“When man was crafted in the image and likeness of God, there is ample evidence to suggest that good character was the foundation upon which all men were expected to live. Good character entails embracing and modeling the virtues that are the foundations of life. ‘Character’ can be defined as the individual’s actions which are based upon his values. Values such as love, care, trust, honesty, selflessness, integrity, humility and self-control are the foundations for character and are shaped through the process of character education.”

The writer cited a 1999 World Bank report that in Saint Lucia “85 percent are born out of wedlock, which means many fathers are absent from the lives of their children. This exclusion of fathering, if allowed to go unchecked, can damage the very fabric of the society, the family.”

As if quoting from last weekend’s issue of this news-paper, the writer went on:

“We are faced with numerous problems. Our societies have sunk to a level of decadence and few persons take responsibility or want to be held accountable.”

In direct opposition with the Kenny Anthony government’s pronouncements at the time the so-called abortion bill was debated in parliament, “Honorable Fortuna Anthony-Husbands” cited research she claimed indicated “an individual receives the first nine months of character formation in the womb. The coming together of a man and woman produces a new offspring. One needs to look at the characteristics that the mother as well as the father possesses.”

Forget about the eugenics theme here. Where was Honorable Fortuna Anthony-Husbands when her former husband and his single-minded crew were jumping all over a parliamentary colleague (and Father Clovis) for voicing views about the unborn child similar to those expressed in her article, easily accessed online.

What might Mario Michel, Menissa Rambally, Philip J. Pierre, Damian Greaves and Kenny Anthony—all but the last of the Roman Catholic faith—have tossed at Sarah Flood-Beaubrun at the time of Section 161, had she dared to say, reminiscent of Hitler’s Nazi regime: “Lineage is important for the type of individual we become.”

Again the line is straight out of Eugenics 101 that advocates the sterilization of men and women deemed “inferior”—and not only on racial grounds!

The Honorable Fortuna Anthony-Husbands goes on: “There are other factors which cannot be ignored. While she carries the baby, the mother’s state of mind, nutrition, thoughts and other personal habits are all channeled to the fetus through the umbilical cord. Hence we must be aware than individual’s character education begins in the womb.”

In support of Section 161, one government MP had cited “literature by Saint Augustine,” in particular the following: “Where a pregnant woman aborts an unformed fetus, she is not to be accused of murder because in truth the question of homicide is not even pertinent where the fetus is unformed.”

As for Kenny Anthony’s own contribution to the abortion debate, he dismissively observed that Catholics had “no choice but to argue as they have argued. No amount of logic, no amount of scientific evidence would lead them to change their position.”

If her own expressed views about the relationship between a fetus and its carrier, if her belief that “an individual receives the first nine months of character building in the womb” sounds somewhat off-the-wall, the Hon. Fortuna Anthony-Husbands gives due credit to her mentor. (My italics)

She proudly acknowledges: “Reverend Moon’s work has stimulated me, as an educator, to emulate his teachings, and for this reason I have worked hard with other Ambassadors for Peace of Saint Lucia to organize summer camps for students on character education. We have the burning desire to share with our sister islands this practice which would encourage young persons to remain pure and to abstain from premarital sex . . .”

So much for implying that the Reverend Moon was an advocate of free love. On the contrary, this is Honorable Fortuna Anthony-Husbands’ inspired view on the matter: “If we all model Reverend Moon’s philosophy of ‘living for the sake of others,’ it will have a positive impact on children and produce individuals, families, communities, societies and a world of peace for all.” Needless, to say, in reverend Moon’s world there is no place for “deviants from the God-centered family,” chief among them gays.

Who could ask for a clearer vision for a nation? But the prime minister’s ex-wife a “loony Moonie?” Who’da thunk it?

By the way, the Honorable Fortuna Anthony-Husbands’ article entitled Peace King was written “in commemoration of Rev. Moon’s 88th birthday,” in 2007 when her former husband was in opposition “purgatory” and Saint Lucia’s prime minister was Stephenson King!