User:Dckewon5131/갈홍기

Gal Hong-gi (14 April 1906 – 25 August 1989) was a South Korean Methodist pastor, politician, and diplomat. The pen name is Sangpa. His name was Hiroki Amazushiro after the change of name.

Life
He was born in 1906 as the son of Galhyeongdae, an educator and maintenance officer who established a private school in Ganghwa-gun, Gyeonggi-do. He grew up in a Protestant family and graduated from Baejae High School and Yeonhui College of Liberal Arts in 1928. He studied theology at Garrett Theological Seminary and the University of Chicago. After returning to Korea, he worked as a professor at Yeonhui Specialized School and taught religious philosophy at the Methodist School.

In 1937, he was appointed as the first homeroom pastor of Changyoung Church and served for two years. In 1943, he became a leader of the Church of Japan, serving as the director of the Choson Methodist Church of Japan. At a time when the Hwang Min-hwa movement was active in the denomination due to the Pacific War, Gal Hong-gi, who played this role, along with Chung Chun-soo, Lee Dong-wook, and Shim Myung-seop, was considered a representative pro-Japanese pastor of the Methodist Church.

Starting with the secretary of the Incheon Christian Association organized in Incheon in 1938, he was included as a representative of Methodist Church in the Joseon War Religious Security Council organized by various religions to encourage support for school soldiers. He served as a reporter for the Dialogue World and was appointed as the director of the Hwangdo Cultural Center, which closed and established the historic Sangdong Church.

After Korea's liberation from Japanese colonial rule, the relationship with part of the Methodist Church was estranged as such activities were criticized for their pro-Japanese activities, including the revelation of such activities

After a while as a professor at Sookmyung Women's University, he was selected as a high-ranking official in the Rhee Syng-man government and expanded his scope of activities toward political relations. He served as vice foreign minister, starting with the deputy chief of staff for Japan and Korea-Japan talks, and in particular, he served as the head of the press department for three years from 1953 and was said to be an ideological spokesman for President Syngman Rhee.

At the time, Syngman Rhee had been criticized by some in the international community for calling for peace talks because of his militant stance that peace between the two Koreas is bound to be temporary. Gal Hong-ki faithfully represented Syngman Rhee's position and was criticized for defending the round off constitutional amendment, which effectively guarantees Syngman Rhee's permanent presidency, as an excuse for security. In 1955, when he was the head of the public affairs department, he praised Syngman Rhee by comparing him to saints such as Jesus and Sakyamuni.

After resigning from his post as press secretary, he was the president of the Korea Basketball Association (1956) and ambassador to Malaysia (1967), He served as secretary general of the Aspak Center for Social and Cultural Affairs (1973) and died in California, United States.

After death
It was selected in the religious section of the list of prospective people to be included in the National Research Institute's pro-Japanese life dictionary released in 2008, and was also included in the 705 list of pro-Japanese anti-national activities announced by the pro-Japanese anti-national activities committee in 2009. It is also included in the "Yonsei University pro-Japanese group List," which was selected in 2005 by the Student Committee of the Democratic Labor Party, an on-campus organization of Yonsei University.

In the late 1980s, it was belatedly revealed that the "Samgukji" edition of Samsung Cultural History, published in the mid-1980s, almost copied the version recognized as a pirated version.

See more

 * Changyoung Church
 * round off the constitutional amendment