In April 1935, when Sun Myung Moon was praying in the Korean mountains, he had a personal encounter with Jesus. In that vision, Jesus asked him to continue the work which he had begun on earth nearly 2,000 years before. Jesus asked him to complete the task of establishing God's kingdom on earth and bringing His peace to humankind.

The young Korean was stunned by this encounter, and especially by the request that had been made of him, and at first he refused.

However, after deep reflection, meditation and prayer, he pledged his life to that overwhelming mission.

After personally accepting Jesus' call, the young man set out to discover its meaning. If Jesus called him to complete his mission, it meant that Jesus' mission was incomplete. Was not salvation through the cross all that man needs? What was it that Jesus had left undone on earth? If sin is not completely solved, then what is the actual root of sin?

Sun Myung Moon studied the Bible and many other religious teachings in order to unravel these mysteries of life and human history. He later reported that during this time, he went into ever deeper communion with God.

Through denying his personal desires he overcame temptations of knowledge, wealth and physical pleasure. He came to understand God's own suffering and His longing to be reunited with His children. He learned the difficult steps that humankind would have to take in order to return to God and establish true peace on earth.

Reverend Moon shared some of the content of his revelation in his Founder's Address to the Federation for World Peace in 1996:

As a youth, I was called upon by God to investigate the great principles of the universe. As I searched, through prayer and study, I came to discover the great truth that mankind has been seeking throughout history, and the great [Unification] Principle through which all humanity can return to true love and consummate true world peace.

A physician needs to diagnose the precise cause of an illness in order to cure the patient.

Likewise, the [Unification] Principle clearly points to the reason human society fell into misery. It reveals the course of the human fall, which led to the unprincipled world with which we struggle every day.

Once the cause is diagnosed, the life-saving prescription can be applied. For the last forty years, I have anxiously traveled the globe with this prescription and devoted myself to sharing it with the world.

Reverend Moon went on to emphasize three key points revealed to him:

First, God is a living God, the Parent of humankind; He is our Father and we are His children.

Second, God's original personality is true love, and He created humankind and all things to fulfill His true love.

Finally, God, as the invisible Parent, intends to establish physical True Parents on earth to save the world. All people can be eternally restored by regaining true love, true life and true lineage when they achieve unity with the ideals of the True Parents. ... We indeed are living in the longed-for era of True Parents and thus we are the generation born with the greatest fortune.

At the age of 18, Reverend Moon left his hometown to enroll in the electrical studies department of Kyungsung commercial school in Seoul. While earning a living and cooking for himself, he kept a faithful religious life as a Sunday school teacher at the Myung Su Dae Church of Jesus. In 1941, at the age of twenty-one, he graduated from Kyungsung commercial school and went to Japan to further his studies.

He enrolled in the department of electrical engineering at an industrial college affiliated with Waseda University. While continuing his studies, he participated in the movement opposing the Japanese annexation of Korea, in communication with those working for the provisional Korean government in Shanghai.

He also set up a secret society with his friends to foster solidarity among his compatriots. His whereabouts and activities were continually monitored and he had to be constantly alert. Sometimes he would be arrested and taken to the police station. Reverend Moon was among those who instigated a Korean students' demonstration against the Japanese policy of conscripting them into their army.

As World War II drew to a close, Reverend Moon returned to his native land. By 1945, he had organized the teachings which came to be known as the Divine Principle, and he began his public ministry. With Japanese rule now ended, he contacted other Christians and offered to work with them to build God's kingdom on the earth.

American Christian missionaries had also heard of this young teacher, and they disregarded him as a "country preacher." Korean ministers, perhaps feeling jealous of the young man's appeal with their members, rejected him and accused him of espousing false teachings. Because the Christian churches failed to embrace him, Reverend Moon realized that he would have to establish his own foundation.