Witnessing and Blessing
by Bruce Sutchar
photo credit: Bruce Sutchar
I was witnessed to in the waiting room of a hospital by two medical people who had set a witnessing condition. It was the only public place that I ever visited. Otherwise, I would be reading a book in my own backyard in San Francisco. Six months later I was witnessing nearly every day. I brought many guests to dinner, but none stayed more than three weeks.
Finally I met my first spiritual son while fundraising on the beach at a sand volleyball tournament in California. I followed the players into a local bar and I was amazed that, for once, I didn’t get kicked out. But I also didn’t sell even one bouquet. Yet—I did witness to one brother and, a few weeks later while I was at a weekend workshop, I was told not to come back to the city because someone I had witnessed to had come over for dinner and would be coming up to the workshop that evening. We had been chanting, “Bring second self today and stay” every night and I was amazed that this brother was absolutely my second self. Even though I was, 30 years old, one of the oldest members of our church, this brother was older than I. He would be matched at the same time as me in New York in 1980. I had done a seven-day fast the last seven days of 1980 and at midnight, he fixed me an elaborate fast-break. One final point—although I had not made any money on that run along the beach, my new spiritual son donated $40,000 that he received when his grandmother had passed away.
My second spiritual child came one day, while I was working in our church restaurant. I took the name of this patron, whom I had talked to, off his credit card to recontact with him. His roommate had warned him to watch out for the “Moonies” but, as a Charismatic Catholic he had promised God that he would follow whatever God put into his path. Thus, he came over for dinner and immediately went up to the workshop and decided, while in prayer, to commit his life to our movement. Forty years later he is happily married to a lovely Brazilian sister, and they have two beautiful daughters.
While at seminary, we used to go into town and swim at the local YMCA. One day, I met a local sister in the hot tub. Another sister had been witnessing to her, but I took it from there. She came to dinner at UTS and heard the Principle. She joined and eventually was blessed to a French chef and now has three beautiful children and a handful of grandchildren.
Transition from Witnessing to Blessing
Having graduated from the seminary, I was qualified to perform marriages. One sister asked me to perform the wedding ceremony of her son to a Chinese girl he had met in college. The wedding was a beautiful outdoor affair at a local golf course. Her parents flew over from China and it all worked out. Today they have a beautiful son, and I feel deeply connected to the three of them.
One day a second-generation sister asked me if I would perform her marriage ceremony. The wedding was enhanced by my wife playing the piano and we, of course, feel a special connection to them, especially now that they have three children. So my successful marriage rate is 100% and these two marriages have produced four beautiful third-generation children.
Through the years my wife and I have blessed over 550 couples. We started out in 1997 after our experience at Cheongpyeong, blessing 180 couples and are still going. I remember that our first blessing was given to a young couple who would donate bagels from their bread route to our church. We blessed them right on their front lawn next to their garbage cans, because I was afraid that something would happen if we moved indoors. Our one failure was when meeting a couple sitting on their front steps. The woman would not drink the holy wine because it would not mix well with her vodka drink.
Our clan now includes an Egyptian Coptic couple. The wife is a world religions professor, and she invited me to speak in her class. He is an engineer. They have been to Korea and, and on their last visit he asked to go to Pusan to see Korea’s largest electrical power plant. They are currently planning on attending the April 13, 2025 holy blessing.
My wife is a piano teacher, and she has blessed one of her families. She started out by teaching many of our members’ children and has expanded out to our local physical community.
Our children have been to many church camps, Father and Mother’s speeches and Cheongpyeong workshops. They all participated in the GOP program in Korea.
We have blessed 35 couples in one ACLC minister’s church and have blessed many of our ACLC ministers, as well as holding blessings in many of their churches. When one Lutheran pastor’s wife was unable to attend our blessing ceremony, he gave the holy wine to his wife by touching it to her photo.
Our original 180 included many of the parents of our children’s friends, my own Jewish parents, my brother and several of my cousins. When we blessed my parents, we put real wine in crystal goblets and poured holy wine into each cup. Amazingly, my gourmet wine connoisseur father could taste the different holy wine right out of the glass. And my mother was concerned that the holy water would mess up her hairdo.
My favorite aunt and uncle had moved to Florida. When the AFC started doing “American Leadership Conferences” in Miami, they learned the Principle by attending one banquet every year and gradually hearing the entire Principle and hearing Dr. Pak’s testimony. This uncle truly helped support our blessing my parents.
When we moved into our new home, we found a handyman to help us with repairs. He was great but couldn’t climb ladders because he had one wooden leg. He met his wife by constantly bringing clothes to her dry-cleaning store every day. They were one of our first blessing couples and when we sprinkled the holy water, he knew that he was receiving a baptism and communion. Sometime later, he stopped me on the street to tell me that his cancer was suddenly in remission.
Recently, I brought the daughter of one of our best ACLC ministers to study the Principle with Rev. Compton in Las Vegas. She had a profound experience, especially as she began to understand the value of the blessing.
I grew up learning about natural witnessing. This meant witnessing wherever I was physically and in whatever situation I was in. As I result, I have blessed police officers, UPS truck drivers, people I met while walking our dogs and, of course, all of our neighbors. Our original 180 blessings were all completed in our own neighborhood.
It is now more than twenty-five years since we started blessing people and we are still going strong. We have blessed many couples from the group that we have met walking dogs in our local dog park and we have been meeting regularly with many of them for group dinners.
I always felt that knowing the Principle was like having a large diamond and I always thought, “Why would anyone keep this beautiful gem hidden in their coat pocket?” People wear diamond rings (especially wedding rings), diamond pendants and diamond earrings to display their beauty. Shouldn’t we be displaying the Divine Principle and the Holy Blessing just as publicly?