Thirty-nine years ago today, the Unification church center in Paris was bombed by a Communist group after several negative articles in the French liberal media. Several Unificationists were seriously injured, and other centers were also targeted all over France at this time. Klaus Schick, who lived in Lyon at the time, recounts the events on and after January 22, 1976.
On January 22, 1976, the Villa Aublet, a Unification church center in Paris, was bombed, leaving a young woman from Norway seriously injured. Persecution and bomb threats toward Unificationists in France began in 1975 and were fueled by the French media. During an intense time when France had signed the Schengen treaty that blocked True Parents from entering Europe for over three decades, the French media portrayed True Father satirically, as a monster and Nazi. This finally led to the bombing of the church center by a communist group. Other events followed, such as kidnappings and an increasing amount of bomb threats all across France, and the government did little to protect the persecuted Unificationists.
True Father gave Henri Blanchard, the national leader for the Unification church in France, instruction to organize a manifestation to protest the violence against the church. With the headline: “Accepterons–Nous la Violence et le Mensonge?” (“Are We Going to Accept Violence and Lies?”), Unificationists in France stood up for justice. The Paris City Hall was reluctant to give them a permit to protest, but in the end had no choice. The message of the protest was that the French people should not tolerate violence, and—as France prides itself in the words “freedom, equality and brotherhood”—these key values apply to Unificationists just like anyone else.
For more images of the history of Unificationists in France during this time, visit History Revealed.
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