Jerry Falwell's Deal With the Devil
Robert Parry
This article was originally posted on Consortium News on May 16, 2007. For more about Robert Parry
The Rev. Jerry Falwell’s death will elicit scores of eulogies on the good the televangelist did, even while acknowledging some hurtful actions, such as blaming gays and civil libertarians for 9/11. But there is another little-known chapter of Falwell’s career: his collaboration with a Korean cult leader bent on transforming the United States into a theocracy.
Like other prominent Republican figures, Falwell entered into a behind-the-scenes alliance with the Rev. Sun Myung Moon even as the self-proclaimed Messiah was denouncing America as “Satan’s harvest” and vowing to incorporate the United States into a worldwide theocratic empire that would eradicate all individuality.
Falwell sought to conceal his relationship with Moon, sometimes denying (falsely) that he had benefited from Moon's financial help or that he had been photographed with the cult leader. Other times, Falwell sought to justify his acceptance of Moon’s largesse.
“If the American Atheists Society or Saddam Hussein himself ever sent an unrestricted gift to any of my ministries,” Falwell said in response to a question about Moon’s financial assistance, “be assured I will operate on Billy Sunday’s philosophy. The Devil’s had it long enough, and quickly cash the check.” [See “Moon-Related Funds Filter to Evangelicals,” Christianity Today, Feb. 9, 1998]
Falwell’s acceptance of Moon’s mysterious money was first disclosed at Consortiumnews.com in fall 1997. In a pattern common to Moon’s financial operations, the Korean cult leader stepped in when a leading American conservative, in this case Falwell, was facing potential financial ruin.
In 1995, the jewel of Falwell’s life’s work – Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia – was facing bankruptcy. Then, seemingly out of the blue, money became available through a small non-profit organization to buy up a large chunk of the school’s debt.
On Jan. 28, 1995, a beaming Rev. Falwell told his Old Time Gospel Hour congregation news that seemed heaven sent. Falwell hailed two Virginia businessmen as the financial saviors of debt-ridden Liberty University.
"They had to borrow money, hock their houses, hock everything," Falwell said. "Thank God for friends like Dan Reber and Jimmy Thomas." Falwell's congregation rose as one to applaud. The star of the moment was Daniel Reber, who was standing behind Falwell. Thomas was not present.
Reber
and Thomas earned Falwell's
public gratitude by excusing the
fundamentalist Christian college
of about one-half of its $73
million debt. In the late 1980s,
that flood of red ink had forced
Falwell to abandon his Moral
Majority political organization
and the debt had nearly drowned
Liberty University in
bankruptcy.
Reber and Thomas had come to
Falwell's rescue in the nick of
time. Their non-profit Christian
Heritage Foundation of Forest,
Virginia, had bought a large
portion of Liberty's debt for
$2.5 million, a fraction of its
face value. Thousands of small
religious investors who had
invested in church construction
bonds through a Texas company
were the big losers.
But Falwell shed no tears. He told local reporters that the moment was "the greatest single day of financial advantage" in the school's history. Left unmentioned in the happy sermon was the identity of Falwell’s real guardian angel, the person who actually was protecting Falwell's financial interests.
Secret Benefactor
Falwell’s
secret benefactor was Rev. Moon,
who is controversial with many
fundamentalist Christians
because of his strange Biblical
interpretations and his
brainwashing tactics that have
torn thousands of young people
from their families. By the
mid-1990s, Moon also had grown
harshly anti-American.
So, covertly, Moon helped bail
out Liberty University through
one of his front groups which
funnelled $3.5 million to the
Reber-Thomas Christian Heritage
Foundation, the non-profit that
had purchased the school's debt.
I discovered this Moon-Falwell
connection while looking for
something else: how much Moon's
Women's Federation for World
Peace had paid former President
George H.W. Bush for a series of
speeches in Asia in 1995. I
obtained the federation's
Internal Revenue Service records
but discovered that Bush's
undisclosed speaking fee was
buried in a line item of $13.6
million for conference expenses.
There was, however, a listing
for a $3.5 million
"educational" grant to
the Christian Heritage
Foundation. A call to the
Virginia corporate records
office confirmed that the
foundation was the one run by
Reber and Thomas.
In a subsequent interview, the
Women Federation's vice
president Susan Fefferman
confirmed that the $3.5 million
grant had gone to "Mr.
Falwell's people" for the
benefit of Liberty University.
"It was Dan Reber,"
she said. But she could not
recall much else about the
grant, even though it was by far
the largest single grant awarded
by the federation that year.
For details on the grant,
Fefferman referred me to Keith
Cooperrider, the federation's
treasurer. Cooperrider was also
the chief financial officer of
Moon's Washington Times
and a longtime Unification
Church functionary. Cooperrider
did not return several phone
calls seeking comment. Falwell
and Reber also failed to respond
to my calls.
But I was able to learn more about the secret Falwell-Moon relationship from a civil lawsuit that was on file in the Circuit Court of Bedford County, a community in southwestern Virginia. That evidence suggested that Falwell had solicited Moon’s help.
Two
of Reber's former business
associates alleged that Reber
and Falwell flew to South Korea
on Jan. 9, 1994, on a seven-day
"secret trip" to meet
"with representatives of
the Unification Church."
The court document said Reber
and Falwell were accompanied to
South Korea by Ronald S. Godwin,
who had been executive director
of Falwell's Moral Majority
before signing on as vice
president of Moon's Washington
Times.
Reber, Falwell and Godwin also
had discussions at Liberty
University in 1993 with Dong
Moon Joo, one of Moon's
right-hand men and president of The
Washington Times, according
to the court records.
Though Reber was queried about the purposes of the Moon-connected meetings, he settled the business dispute before responding to interrogatories or submitting to a deposition. He did deny any legal wrongdoing.
Clinton
Scandals
But Moon's secret financial ties
to Falwell raised sensitive
political questions. For
instance, did the $3.5 million
from Moon's front group give
Falwell the means to become a
national pitchman for "The
Clinton Chronicles" and
other conspiracy-mongering
videos which fingered President
and Mrs. Clinton in a wide range
of serious crimes?
During the period of the Liberty bail-out, Falwell was using his expensive TV time to hawk the conspiracy videos. Many of the lurid right-wing conspiracy theories were later discredited, including allegations connecting the Clintons to the death of deputy White House counsel Vincent Foster.
But
the Falwell-promoted videos did
feed a Clinton scandal fever
that helped the Republicans
seize control of Congress in
1994. The Clinton-scandal
impetus eventually contributed
to Clinton’s impeachment in
the House in 1998 and ultimately
created the conditions for
George W. Bush’s hard-fought
ascension to the presidency in
2001.
Moon's largesse was suspect,
too, because Moon has never
publicly accounted for his
mysterious sources of wealth.
Much of the money apparently
comes from Asian and South
American businesses with links
to drug trafficking, money
laundering and other criminal
enterprises.
Falwell
also may have been shy about
disclosing his secret alliance
with Moon because the Korean's
theology upsets many Christians.
Moon asserts that Satan
corrupted mankind by sexually
seducing Eve in the Garden of
Eden and that only through
sexual purification can mankind
be saved. In line with that
doctrine, Moon says Jesus failed
in his mission to save mankind
because he did not procreate.
Moon sees himself as a second
Messiah who will not make the
same mistake. He has engaged in
sex with a variety of women over
the decades, including some as
part of sexual purification
rituals. The total number of his
offspring remains a point of
debate inside his Unification
Church.
Moon’s
continuing practice of selecting
the spouses of his followers and
strictly controlling their
sexual activities derives from
Moon’s earlier more hands-on
practices. [See Robert Parry, Secrecy
& Privilege.]
Hating
America
In the 1990s, Moon's rhetoric also turned stridently anti-American, another problem for U.S. conservatives.
On
May 1, 1997, for instance, Moon
told a group of followers that
"the country that
represents Satan's harvest is
America." In other sermons,
he has vowed that his victorious
movement will "digest"
any American who tries to
maintain his or her
individuality.
Still, despite his controversial
remarks, Moon continued to buy
friends on the American Right
– as well as others among
African-American religious
figures – by spreading around
lots of money.
The
totals are estimated in the
billions of dollars, with much
of it targeted on political
infrastructure: direct-mail
operations, video services for
campaign ads, professional
operatives and right-wing media
outlets. [See
Consortiumnews.com’s “The
GOP’s $3 Billion Propaganda
Organ.”]
Through The Washington Times
and its affiliated publications
-- Insight magazine and
The World & I --
Moon not only showcased
conservative opinions, but he
created seemingly legitimate
conduits to funnel money to
individuals and companies that
he sought to influence.
In
the early 1980s, for instance, The
Washington Times hired the
New Right's direct-mail whiz
Richard Viguerie to conduct a
pricy direct-mail subscription
drive. The business boosted
Viguerie's profit margin.
Another element of Moon's
strategy was to approach a
conservative leader who was in
financial trouble. Moon quietly
infused money, gaining the
leader's gratitude.
Again,
Viguerie was an example of that
tactic. When he fell on hard
times in the late 1980s, Moon
directed more business his way
and had a corporation run by
Moon's lieutenant, Bo Hi Pak,
buy one of Viguerie's properties
for $10 million. [ Orange
CountyRegister, Dec. 21,
1987 / Washington Post,
Oct. 15, 1989]
With Moon's timely intervention,
Viguerie survived financially
and remained an important
fixture in conservative
political campaigns. For some
smaller enterprises,
Moon-connected business
represented a huge percentage of
total income.
That was the case with Falwell's friends, Dan Reber and Jimmy Thomas, who – besides their non-profit – ran a small for-profit company called Direct Mail Communications. According to court records, $5 million – more than one-third of its income in one year – came from a direct-mail subscription drive for Moon's Insight magazine.
Red Flags
From time to time, Moon's penetration of conservative ranks raised red flags among Republicans. In 1983, the GOP's moderate Ripon Society charged that the New Right had entered "an alliance of expediency" with Moon's church.
Ripon's
chairman, Rep. Jim Leach,
R-Iowa, released a study which
alleged that the College
Republican National Committee
"solicited and
received" money from Moon's
Unification Church in 1981. The
study also accused Reed Irvine's
Accuracy in Media, an aggressive
press watchdog group, of
benefiting from low-cost or
volunteer workers supplied by
Moon.
Leach said the Unification
Church has "infiltrated the
New Right and the party it [the
New Right] wants to control, the
Republican Party, and
infiltrated the media as
well."
Leach's news conference was broken up when then-college GOP leader Grover Norquist accused Leach of lying. (In the nearly quarter century since then, Norquist emerged as a powerful right-wing lobbyist with close ties to leading Republicans, including White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove.)
For
its part, The Washington
Times dismissed Leach's
charges as
"flummeries" and
mocked the Ripon Society as a
"discredited and
insignificant left-wing offshoot
of the Republican Party."
Despite periodic fretting over
Moon's influence, conservatives
continued to accept his
deep-pocket assistance.
When
President Ronald Reagan and
White House aide Oliver North
were scratching for support for
the Nicaraguan contras in the
1980s, The Washington Times
established a contra
fund-raising operation. Moon's
international group, CAUSA, also
dispatched operatives to Central
America to assist the contras.
By the mid-1980s, Moon's
Unification Church had carved
out a niche as an acceptable
part of the American Right. In
one speech to his followers,
Moon boasted that "without
knowing it, even President
Reagan is being guided by Father
[Moon]."
Yet, Moon also made clear that
his longer-range goal was the
destruction of the U.S.
Constitution and America's
democratic form of government.
"History will make the position of Reverend Moon clear, and his enemies, the American population and government will bow down to him," Moon said, speaking of himself in the third person. "That is Father's tactic, the natural subjugation of the American government and population."
Iran-Contra
Though Moon's money sources
remained shrouded in secrecy,
his cash gave the Right an
important edge in attacking its
enemies and defending its
friends.
After the Iran-Contra scandal exploded in 1986, The Washington Times and other Moon operations battled aggressively to protect Reagan's White House and its key operative Oliver North.
Godwin,
the link between Falwell's Moral
Majority and Moon's Washington
Times, raised funds for
North through a group called the
Interamerican Partnership, which
was a fore-runner to North's own
Freedom Alliance. [ Common
Cause Magazine, Fall 1993]
Another Moon-connected group,
the American Freedom Coalition,
also went to bat for North and
later George H.W. Bush.
According to Andrew Leigh, who
worked for a Moon front called
Global Image Associates, AFC
broadcast a pro-North video,
"Ollie North: Fight for
Freedom," more than 600
times on more than 100 TV
stations.
Leigh quoted one AFC official as saying that AFC received $5 million to $6 million from business interests associated with Moon. AFC also bragged that it helped put George H.W. Bush into the White House in 1988 by distributing 30 million pieces of political literature. [Washington Post, Oct. 15, 1989]
Direct Mail Communications, the firm owned by Reber and Thomas, also aided North in building his mailing lists. The firm did direct-mail work as well for Texas Gov. George W. Bush, the Republican National Committee, and the National Rifle Association, The Roanoke Times & World News reported Nov. 2, 1994.
Falwell’s
Friends
The Falwell-connected story of
Direct Mail Communications, a
small company based in a
strip-mall shopping center off
Route 221 in rural Forest,
Virginia, further underscored
how intertwined Moon's
operations were with American
conservatism.
Reber and Thomas founded the
company in September 1989,
roughly the same time that
Falwell's Liberty University
began trying to refinance its
worsening debt. Also, in 1989,
Charles P. Keith, Roger M. Ott
and Ronald Godwin – all Washington
Times executives –
created another firm called Mail
America.
According to court records,
Godwin introduced Keith and Ott
to Reber and Thomas. The
get-to-know-you quickly led to a
deal. Keith, Ott and Godwin –
executives on Moon’s payroll
– bought Direct Mail
Communications [DMC] for $2.5
million on Oct. 6, 1989, even
though the company had existed
for only one month. Reber and
Thomas were retained to run the
business.
Inside the firm, however,
tensions grew. In 1991, Godwin
left, selling his share of the
business to Keith and Ott.
Reber,
who was getting a salary of
$1,000 a day or $365,000 a year,
spent too much time on discount
work for conservative causes,
Keith and Ott later complained.
In one court filing, they
alleged that a paid DMC staffer
was sent to help a conservative
Republican named Gene Keith run
for Congress in Florida.
Falwell's Liberty University,
Old Time Gospel Hour and Liberty
Alliance also got discounts on
their direct-mail solicitations,
the owners charged. "Reber
and Thomas never even collected
an amount sufficient to pay all
of DMC's actual postage
expenses," Keith and Ott
stated.
By
summer 1993, Reber began long
absences from DMC while working
on the bail-out of Liberty
University, according to the
court papers. Keith and Ott
alleged that Falwell, Reber and
Godwin met with The
Washington Times' publisher
Dong Moon Joo in Lynchburg in
1993 and flew to South Korea in
January 1994 for other meetings
with Moon's representatives.
Reber's travels took him to
"South America, Montana,
Europe, Russia and the Republic
of Korea," Keith and Ott
said. Meanwhile, DMC was sliding
into "extreme financial
distress."
In
Moon’s Orbit
For his part, Falwell, who once
boasted that he had spurned a $1
million speaking fee from Moon
in the mid-1980s, now found
himself caught in Moon's orbit.
On
July 26, 1994, Falwell
prominently sat at the head
table for Moon's inauguration of
yet another front group, the
Youth Federation for World
Peace. Falwell posed for a group
photo with Moon and other
dignitaries. Next to Falwell
stood Ronald Reagan's daughter,
Maureen.
Despite the DMC court battles,
Oliver North still sent the
direct-mail company some
business during his 1994 Senate
campaign. According to FEC
records, North paid DMC $138,561
for its direct-mail work.
DMC
also extended North the most
credit of any vendor. When the
$19 million campaign ended with
North's narrow defeat, his
largest single debt – $89,033
– was to DMC.
At about that same time, in
January 1995, Reber and Thomas
were completing their purchase
of about one-half of Liberty
University's debt, much of it
for a fraction of the face
value.
The
big losers included 2,500
bondholders who invested in the
Texas-based Church &
Institutional Facilities
Development Corp., which had
owned $12 million of the
school's debt. Reber and Thomas
scooped up the bonds at a
bankruptcy fire sale for about
20 percent of their value, or
$2.5 million.
Many bondholders were "mom
and pops cashing in their IRA
money because their local
minister and Falwell's letters
said they'd be doing God's
work," said Doug Hudman, a
lawyer in the case. "The
true victims are the mom-and-pop
believers who think their money
was going to a good cause. All
it was doing was going to fund
Mr. Falwell's continued
indebtedness. It's kind of
sickening."
But Falwell told reporters that
it was just a question of luck.
"When the bankruptcy
trustee called in all the notes
and put them up for sale, anyone
could have bought them,"
Falwell said. "That was
fortunate for us."
After months of complicated
legal maneuvering, Dan Reber
also seemed fortunate enough to
win out in the DMC power
struggle. He took over the
direct-mail factory in Forest,
Virginia, under the name,
"Mail America."
But behind the good fortune that
blessed the Rev. Falwell and his
friends was a timely
contribution of $3.5 million
from the Rev. Moon's Women's
Federation for World Peace.
Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories in the 1980s for the Associated Press and Newsweek. His latest book, Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq, can be ordered at secrecyandprivilege.com. It's also available at Amazon.com, as is his 1999 book, Lost History: Contras, Cocaine, the Press & 'Project Truth.'
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