True Parents Really Love You

In Jin Moon
February 8, 2009
Columbus, Ohio

The following is In Jin Nim’s sermon to members from Ohio, West Virginia, Indiana, Tennessee, Kentucky, and North Carolina, given at the Ramada Plaza Hotel in Columbus, Ohio on February 8, 2009 8:30 AM.

Good morning, brothers and sisters. Doesn’t George have so much energy? If we could bottle your energy and mass produce it -- good Lord. America would be a new country. But really, brothers and sisters, I’m delighted to be with all of you here on Sunday morning. As I was meditating a little bit for a brief moment about what I can say to the Ohio district members, you know, the only thing that keeps on coming to my mind is how much True Parents really love you. In a way I know that if they could be here, standing at the podium where I am standing right now, they would tell you the same thing. You are their children and they love you very, very much.

As somebody who lived with them and who works with them, I feel like it’s truly incumbent upon me to kind of express that to you, to let you know that True Father and Mother are always thinking about America, are always praying for America, and always praying for the brothers and sisters who’ve given so much to this country. And they never forget. Just like the way they never forget when they saw the New Hope Singers International come on stage.

I saw the way my father watched everybody come and take their places on stage, one at a time. Father was sitting in such a way that he could not see the faces, but he was still watching the backs of these brothers and sisters that took their places. I can hear what was going on in my father’s mind. My father and my mother, they were remembering all the great things that they did together with you, that they did together with the New Hope Singers International -- the Yankee Stadium, the Washington Monument, and all the great blessings that they attended together with you. And all the great hope.

Do you remember the New Hope city tour, rallies that you had, right? Where you had musical entertainment with the New Hope Singers and Go World Brass Band, and all of you guys were much younger. But so full of life. And my father in his 50s was such a strong, virile man and he had so much energy and so much hope. I literally heard those things going through my father’s mind as I watched him prepare to listen to the voices that represented America during those crucial moments in time.

At that time I was also reliving how I as a very young girl -- I came to this country when I was eight years old and for the first time in my life saw American faces, saw blue eyes. This morning I had breakfast with Joe Willett, and at East Garden he was a security guard taking care of us. For the children, you know, he had the reputation for having the bluest eyes. I don’t know if they’re still as blue as I remember them to be, but for us that was just so incredible. They looked like two sapphires. I remember my siblings and I calling him the blue eyed one. And he had such pretty eyes. For the first time, you know, we saw blonde hair. We saw red hair. And coming from a country where everything is the same, everything is black hair and everything is black eyes, it was just such a land of amazement for me, and I know for my younger brothers and sisters too.

As we came to know different members of the American movement, getting to know and getting to speak and finally learning the language -- and I remember my father saying to the family, from the moment we hit East Garden and Belvedere, my father said, your mission, children, is to love America. And I remember all of us looking at Father and thinking in our mind, what does it mean to love America?

And then Father going on saying, in order to love America you must speak English as well as the American people, and better. And when you learn to speak the American language, then you can truly love America. So from the get-go we had a mission. We’ve got to learn English and we’ve got to speak it very, very well so we can heartistically connect to the American people, so we can understand them. It’s only in truly understanding somebody can you say you truly love them. So in a way that was the True Children’s mission from the beginning.

So we kind of took that to heart and we tried our best at school, and Father always urged us to be the best in everything that we do. So be the best in sports, be the best in school, and be the best at home. So in a way, even though I was a girl and my mother was a bit apprehensive, coming from the Korean tradition, about her daughters playing sports, my father said, go and play. So by the time I graduated middle school I was the captain of field hockey and my father was very proud of that. So I came home with a field hockey uniform and I said, Father, this is a really great day for me because I was just chosen to be the captain of my field hockey team and it’s a great honor.

And they gave me a choice, to choose my number. I remember Father just kind of thinking about it a little bit, and I said, what number should I be? Should I be number 3 because I’m the third one in the True Family, or should I be number 2 because I’m the second daughter in True Family? What number should I be? And Father just sat there for the longest time and he closed his eyes, and then he looked at me and he said, your number should be 43. That was a long time ago when I was in junior high school.

But in a way, when this great responsibility came to me because of the passing of my elder brother, and Father gave me an offer I could not refuse, which was to carry on my brother’s vision at Manhattan Center, and then a couple of months later Parents, having gone through the whole resurrection from the helicopter accident, and Father asking me again to head up HSA, I was 43 years old. So in a way, it kind of brought back a lot of memories for me. And it brought back a lot of memories about what America was to a little girl of eight years old.

I remember when I was looking into the audiences at Belvedere speeches, and I saw you looking and listening and jotting notes and laughing together with my father and mother. I saw this sparkle in your eyes. I was so amazed and so excited that I saw something magical. I saw something literally magical right before my eyes. I remember writing little notes to my brothers and sisters, saying, did you see that? Did you see that? Did you see that sparkle in their eyes?

And I was so inspired, so much so that I drew a little picture on a piece of paper that to this day I carry in my wallet. It’s not a good picture. It’s a very simple smiley-face picture, but next to the eye is a sparkle. And for me that represented the spirit of the American movement, the spirit and the promise of something great that we were going to create together as a community and as a movement. There was incredible excitement in the air, incredible hope. That is something that I have kept with me over the years.

I know that, you know, since that time, since I was an eight-year-old girl, and now I’m 40-something, you know, when I look back in my life, we’ve gone through a lot as a movement, haven’t we? You guys are no longer single, enthusiastic, young American brothers and sisters. Now you have children. Now you have a wife, a husband, now you have a family. And for those of us who have families of our own, you know it’s not a walk in the park, right? In a way when we promised and we pledged ourselves to build an ideal family, to Heavenly Father -- in a way I always tell my children, be careful what you ask for, or be careful what you promise because you just very might well get it.

And in a way, you know, Heavenly Father gave us just that. Heavenly Father gave us ideal families. Heavenly Father gave us an ideal spouse, right? I deal with my family. I deal with my spouse. I deal with my children. Or in my case, I deal with my in-laws. And in a way that meaning takes a life of its own, and we realize, my goodness, when we wanted so much the opportunity to have an ideal family -- well, Heavenly Father was giving us everything that we needed. We just didn’t realize how much work needed to go into building an ideal family.

And I always like to say to sisters and to brothers, you know, many times when some of you have the courage to come up to me -- and we love it when you come up to us and seek us out, and you say, you know, In Jin Nim, you guys are True Children and how is it being a True Child, building an ideal family and Father is so great, you know. But you know, the True Children, they went through a process of growth, and it’s been so difficult. How do you deal with all of that? I always say, well, I deal with everything like the way I deal with anything. And that is, one step at a time, each and every day. I start my morning thanking God. I end my day at the end of the day thanking God, and in between I try my best.

You know, it’s never an easy thing. In some ways Jesus Christ had the easy way because he didn’t have a spouse. He didn’t have to raise children. In a way I think if he were granted the ability or the opportunity to have a spouse and build a family, it would have looked no different than pretty much what the True Family had to go through, in that every child would have had to work through their difficulties and their life suffering and their different obstacles to become the kind of people that God originally intended them to be. And like your children and like my children, as much as we love them, they’ve got to make their own choices, right? So we as parents can only try our best, but they have to decide whether they’re going to be loyal to God or whether they’re going to live their life for God, and whether they’re going to build an ideal family.

I know that a lot of the first generation who’ve given up so much for the movement sometimes felt like, well, God, I sacrificed everything, I gave everything up. I thought we were going to have sinless children, it would be like planting a seed in a pot and all I needed to do was water and make sure that it got enough sunshine. But as any parent knows, children are a little bit more than a potted plant, and they need a little bit more love and care and attention. Yes, it’s wonderful that they’re born sinless, but that just means that we have to take care of them and we have to in a way manage them. We as a community need to protect them.

So when I’m going around the country nowadays, in a way sharing with the members, what I really want to stress is, hey, the best asset of our movement is our kids, and they’re not potted plants. They’re incredible human beings that are going to shake up the world when they truly reach their potential. Watch out, Michael Phelps. In last night’s introduction, one of the blessed children got up and said, you know, maybe gymnastics, maybe I want to win and say wonderful things about, you know, I did this for God and True Parents and for my family and for my movement.

Many times I’ve often dreamt, and my husband together, can you imagine if one of our own was that Michael Phelps, and was that person who won all those gold medals? And at that crucial time, the anthem, the national anthem of America comes up, and this young man, so accomplished, so dedicated, dedicates his victory to God and True Parents. We would win the world like this in an instant. And I’ve often thought, why not? Why can’t we as a movement produce the best, the future Olympic gold medalists, the future Nobel Prize winners, the future great Picassos, or Isaac Sterns of the world?

In a way we have everything we need, and instead of in a way being focused so much in trying to become big, you know, we’re always putting on these big events, and always inviting all these big-wigs, for a lot of money, why not build relationships so that in a way they want to come and be a part of our event? Why not build incredible families and communities, so instead of going after the politicians, they feel the need to come and talk to our congregations, talk to our communities and be a part of it. And in that process, make us, make the Unificationists an integral part of the political and the social process in America. Why can’t we be that? I think we can.

When I meet your children, when I meet our children, I am just so inspired because they represent the best of what can be. They’re beautiful, they’re intelligent, they love God, and they honor elders, which is something lacking in this country now. They care about people, like handicapped people, people who can’t take care of themselves. I don’t know how many times people -- I’ve heard stories about our second generation touching the lives of different people.

I’ve often talked about this STF person named Matthew who, by his sheer presentation and love of this one woman who was looking for UTS Father’s trail, that in a way he took care of her and loved her and not only showed her where Father’s trail was at UTS but took care of her in such a way with so much respect and honor that most older people in this country don’t get from young people, that she had to, she felt compelled to ask -- who are you people? And he said, do you remember those mass weddings of the ’80s? We’re a product of those mass weddings. Do you remember that man, Rev. Moon? He’s the one who put our parents together. And in that instant this woman’s life and her view of the movement was transformed, and that’s what I mean when I say natural witnessing.

In a way I feel that for such a long time, you know, our movement has always been initiating new witnessing campaigns, new witnessing initiatives, and in a way we’ve been sort of like the wind. You know the story about the wind and the sunshine, right, and both of them having a competition -- let’s see who can blow the coat off of that gentleman walking down there. The wind went first and the wind blew and the wind blew and tried to blow him down, tried to blow away the coat. But what did the man do? He grabbed onto the coat even tighter and fought against the wind.

In many ways, sometimes because we were so inspired by the Principle, we acted like the wind and we acted like I know the truth, I’m going to teach you something, so listen to me. And many times people kind of felt afraid, or many times people felt like, no thank you, no thank you. But in a way the beauty of natural witnessing and the beauty of raising children like Matthew and Sophia and so many others that inspire the people to ask, who are these kids, why are they so different?

And in a way, already they’re prepared to want to know why the children are different. And when the answer comes, they are different because these are the children of the mass weddings, these are the children that came into being because their parents were inspired by Rev. and Mrs. Moon, then a natural process takes place, a natural process of discovery, people wanting to learn more because the proof is in the pudding. They can see it. They’re not just hearing it, they’re not just imagining it. They’re seeing it in our children, in your children.

So in a way, if our movement can be more like the sunshine, radiating the warmth and the heart that True Parents are talking about all the time, in a way when these people come to our services, you know, we need to create an environment where they feel loved, they feel accepted, they feel cared for so that they want to come again. And when they do come and they meet your wife or your husband and they realize what a great relationship you have, and they meet your children, our children, and they realize how awesome they are, then in a way they will be inspired and they will be intrigued to learn more about the Principle.

I think if we can in a way take this approach instead of giving to people when they’re not ready, but holding a little bit back -- just like the way the book “The Secret” was such a phenomenon. Have you ever thought about why that book was such a phenomenon? It’s because of the title, secret. It’s intriguing. I have something but I’m holding it here so you have to come and read it. It’s kind of an invitation, but at the same time saying, take time to learn about it.

In a way sometimes I feel that taking that approach is a lot more effective than just kind of like the crash course mentality, let’s hit this campus -- all right, 20 CARP members barrage the campus and spread the word and teach the Principle. Because many times what we get is negative feedback -- we don’t want you, you’re not registered students, what are you doing on campus, why are you coming to brainwash our children?

As a new chairman of HSA, and as somebody who’s thinking about re-branding our image, because we are the world’s best-kept secret, in a way helping the world recognize how truly awesome we really are, we have to think about all the different ways that we interface with the larger community and the way we kind of interact with people I think can be something that we can work on. Maybe this approach of the sunshine as opposed to wind, maybe the approach of in a way living the Principle instead of teaching the Principle. And maybe the importance of giving our children dreams so that they can have something to aspire to, not just within our own community but within the greater community at large. Then in a way we’re not just thinking about ourselves but we’re thinking about how do we serve America, how do we serve the world.

When Father and Mother look at America and says that in a way America represents the elder son nation, and that America is crucial in the dispensation of our Heavenly Father, in a way I kind of understand it to mean that Heavenly Father has blessed this country with so much to prepare it to do great work for the world. When I was a freshman in college and just taking my first intro course in Political Science, and I remember the first day and I was an eager student, ready with my notes, ready to jot down everything that the professor had to say. And he came into class and the first question he asked was, what is power? And a lot of students had different definitions of what power is. But after listening to the whole classroom’s idea or definition of what power is, he defined it for us. He said power is the ability to influence.

In a way, when I think of America, God created America to be a superpower because America has the responsibility or the power to influence the world in the right way. You see, whatever America does, the world follows. You had Elvis Presley. Immediately in Japan you had Oriental Elvis Presleys. You have McDonald’s, Burger King immediately in Asia and even in Moscow. You have McDonald’s, the symbol of capitalism, in the center of the city. You have Starbucks in Moscow. You have Jay-Z immediately. The Russians listen to Jay-Z just as much as Americans, or Beyonce, or Isaac Stern, I mean, you name it. Anything American gets copied right away. There’s an incredible responsibility if you think about it, right?

And then the fashion of America, and right now America is going through a cult of celebrity. It’s almost as if for the young people God doesn’t exist any more. Their god becomes these celebrities. These celebrities become their god. You want to live like them, you want to dress like them, you want to look like them, you want to sing and dance like them.

So in a way, when my elder brother came to this country and he realized how important the power of the cult of celebrity was, he realized that he wanted to in a way create something that can harness the power of multi-media and entertainment and use it to influence the world, the young people in a good way. That’s why in a way he created the Manhattan Center. When the New Yorker and Manhattan Center were bought, Father and Mother said that these two buildings are the physical manifestation of True Parents in New York. So in a way, you know, the mother one, the Manhattan Center being more artistic, more beauty-oriented, and the New Yorker just being a very strong symbol of strength, it was the masculine and feminine at play.

And for me coming into this new role and working smack in the middle of midtown, remembering the kind of vision that my father had for those two buildings, as well as for America, and the vision that my brother had, I feel like there’s a tremendous amount of work to be done. But we have everything, in a way, prepared already by our True Parents and God, and the only thing we need to do is work on ourselves and work on our youth.

So part of my desire in wanting to show the promo is to inspire the young people that we’re not a tired movement. We are going to be a growing movement. We just need to remember how awesome we are. And I asked the first generation, those of you who’ve suffered so much and given up so much, in a way literally digging basements over the years in the hope of creating this incredible mansion for God, you guys were literally digging basements.

And I would say to the second generation, God is not asking you to dig the basements again that your parents have dug. What God is asking you to do is to be grateful to the first generation that have already laid the foundation for a beautiful home. The basement has already been dug. Now the second generation’s responsibility is to build a house that the first generation was waiting for. And that building, the house is going to take our effort and our dedication.

In doing this, the more we take care of ourselves trying to be externally excellent and internally excellent, in a way it’s our way of thanking the first generation for their sacrifice, saying, your sacrifice is not going to waste. In a way all those times when you’ve been tired, all those times when you’ve barely made it, thank God you made it because your children, our children are going to build an incredible house for God and for the world. And it’s just a matter of time.

So I feel that if we can truly kind of, you know, liberate ourselves from the difficulties of the past and kind of think of ourselves in a new way, think of ourselves as a movement of celebration, think of ourselves as a family where we can celebrate each other’s victories, listen to each other’s suffering, but be inspired through each other in what we can do. And I feel that in many ways, you know, we’ve just been so much concentrated on what we are not that many times we don’t see what we are. And what we are is wonderful, wonderful people. It’s God-loving people, God-loving families. It’s children who are aspiring to live a life for God. And that’s a rare phenomenon in the world now, you know.

When I think about what the outside world is like, for me a good litmus test is this sampling of a video that a friend of mine, sent to me. He said, you know, Tatiana, take a look at this. It was basically a video clip about a 22-year-old virgin, who just like you and me grew up on the stories of Cinderella and Snow White, you know, wanting to have this incredible happy ending story, wanting to find Prince Charming. But somehow in the course of her life, having gone through high school and college and, you know, seeing her friends go through different relationships, broken relationships and heartache, decided that maybe her purity didn’t really mean that much to her. But she thought, if it meant anything to anybody, why not put a capital value on it, market value.

So this young lady, having graduated from college, was thinking, okay, I can finance my graduate school program by auctioning off my virginity on the Internet. And the last update that I got from my son, he said, now her number is up to over $3 million. So a lot of the young people seeing that are thinking, oh, that’s a lot of money. Maybe I should give up my purity, and in a way auction it off. Then I’ll be set. A lot of young people are confused. When I see that, it’s really a litmus test of where America is right now.

So in a way, a lot of the first generation, you joined the movement because you found something wonderful in the Divine Principle and something beautiful in our True Parents. You found something called core values. You found something that gave you dignity as a human being, that you are God’s son and daughter, and that God destined for you to have an ideal family. There was purpose, there was meaning, there was dignity, there was honor in that. And a lot of you who joined 20 or 30 years ago were hippies-yippies, right?

I saw a picture of Rev. Phillip Schanker. Good Lord! He’s out to here and out to here, looks like a grizzly bear. And I’ve seen some pictures of Larry Moffitt when he was young. They look a lot like the way the young people look now. They were lost, they were looking for something. Many of them tried drugs, many of them tried free sex. Many of them tried everything that possibly one could imagine trying. But they never felt happy. They never felt valued as a human being because they didn’t know why they were put upon this earth.

That’s why when you came and you met True Parents and you heard the Divine Principle, and you realized how precious each and every one of you are, and how incredible it is for you to truly love somebody forever, and for somebody to love you forever. And how incredibly wonderful it is to raise an ideal family and sinless children. You guys were inspired. And in a way I feel like the world is coming back again to that time. It’s almost as if it’s a new retro-hippie, yippie movement that the young people are going through.

You can see many times in society the consciousness, where the consciousness is by looking at the fashion trends. You know, fashion trends are very good indicators of what people are kind of feeling or grabbing for in their subconscious. But when you see the ’60s fashions come back, or, for God’s sake, the green color, chartreuse that was so prevalent in the ’60s and everybody hated in the ’70s and ’80s come back full force in this new millennium, you realize that in a way it’s the cyclical thing coming back again. And again, this cult of celebrity creating so much confusion, with shows like Cribs on MTV, where everything is about money, money, money, women, women, women, sex, sex, sex -- that’s all. The young people are like, okay, if I have money, if I have women, if I can have all the sex in the world, then I’m set.

Well, you know what, young people? I work with those very people that have all the money in the world. I work with those people that have all the women and men in the world. And you know what? They’re not happy. They’re not happy. I don’t know how many times my shoulders have been the crying pad for a lot of very, very famous people. And not because I said anything but because they met my children, and they felt moved. They started asking me questions, how come your kids are so different? How come they’re so respectful? How come my niece is not like that? How come my nephew is not like that? And then naturally I can talk to them about my father, I can talk to them about incredible people like you, and incredible children like our kids. And they just start bursting into tears.

Many of them come from very difficult homes. Many of them were molested when they were young, incestuous relationships, or raped or beaten, really, really horrible stories that compel them to want to succeed so badly. But they never got rid of what happened because, you know, something like that happens to you, it scars you for life. And unless you find God and realize that you are God’s son and daughter and God has a purpose for you, then life becomes meaningless. And all the money in the world, all the women the world, you know, all the cars in the world is not going to make you happy. I see that day in and day out, working in New York City.

So I know that I met a lot of talented musicians yesterday, and quite a few talented ones here up on stage playing. I can’t wait to hear you guys next year. I’m sure you’ll be that much more phenomenal. But you know, it’s like if you really love something then don’t be satisfied with just being mediocre. If you really love something, be passionate about it. And all those people that have made it, it’s because they worked hard. You don’t just become a singer just because you’re talented. You have to be talented and work hard and try your best. I think if you can do that, and at the same time be internally excellent so that you can be like Beyonce, but absolutely love God, absolutely love True Parents and America, be proud that you’re representing America to the world, and in that way influence the young people -- I would say go for it. I would say absolutely. And I think a lot of you will.

With so many things that are happening, one Sunday morning is just not enough to share with you everything that’s going on. But I think the most visible phenomenon through which we recently witnessed God working in mysterious ways was really the election of an African-American president. When I started touring America, President Obama was still a dream. It was still an impossible dream that the civil rights leaders and people like Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, Dr. Lowery -- who I had the privilege of working with -- had dreamt about. So for a lot of Americans he represented a dream becoming a possibility. But now that possibility is a reality. In a way the civil rights have fulfilled its mission of electing an African-American to the White House.

So in a way this is an incredible time when I as a representative of the True Family can go back to the civil rights leaders and say, you know what? You can’t go into retirement. God still has plans for you. God works in mysterious ways, and in a way now you have to hand the baton of the civil rights movement on to a new generation of young people that’s going to change the world. And before you were fighting for racial equality, but now we’re fighting to create a peaceful world.

We’re fighting to create a world where at the end of my day I can close my eyes in peace and know that my children are going to be safe from suicide bombers, from school shootings, from people who want to hurt them just because they’re doing well. I need to know that as a mom, that I’m leaving behind a generation that espouses to be something greater than themselves.

We need to create in a way a new consciousness for the youth of America and for the world. And really help them recognize the importance of understanding that God is our heavenly parent, the importance of understanding that we are one family under God, which means as brothers and sisters we have to treat each other with respect, we have to learn from each other with greater understanding, and we have to love each other in a caring way that inspires us to unite more deeply and create a world that will be a better world than what we know.

In a way the young people, you know, they’re just really an incredible group. They love naming themselves. Young people have named themselves Generation X, Generation Y, Generation Z, and you know with the MTV phenomenon it’s the show-me-the money. They’re called the Millennials now. So why not encourage or inspire the young people to name themselves Generation Peace, so that they can own their own world instead of waiting for politicians to solve the problems, or instead of waiting for ministers to solve our problems, or instead of waiting for me to solve your problem. You, everyone of you sitting in that chair, can be that agent of change just like the way my father became an agent of change when he decided at the tender age of 16 that he’s going to live his life for the sake of God and for the world, and that he’s going to dedicate himself ceaselessly and endlessly and consistently to achieve the liberation of God, which we witnessed last weekend.

And as a daughter who has seen my father liberate so many things in the past -- spirit world and liberate ancestors and all these different things -- but for me the liberation of God as the King of Kings was the most profound one because, you know, when Father liberated God, he didn’t just liberate God as the King of Kings as a father, but he liberated God as the King of Kings as a heavenly parent. There were two thrones representing God, the male and the female.

And maybe because I’m a woman, I have a, you know, I have a profound experience whenever there is a feminine aspect that’s represented in religion. I know that, as somebody who has studied religion, religion has not really been kind to women because in a way Eve caused the fall and Eve has been blamed for everything. Until True Mother, through her endless difficulties and suffering, you know, until she truly became victorious and reclaimed the proper role of Eve, so many women in the name of religion have been slaughtered, abused, and misused.

So as a sister, somebody who understands the heartache that women have had to bear through centuries and thousands of years, you know, of being misunderstood, for me this is an incredible time of liberation. In a way, when I look out into the audience and I see American sisters and I remember, just as you remember in the ’70s and ’80s when Father was berating you, peh, peh, peh, you American women, you horrible women, and really challenging you and really asking, are you going to be beautiful, educated, capable for yourself or for God?

And I remember many American sisters literally turn into Niagara Falls with so much deep suffering that they’ve had to go through. But in a way it’s your suffering that allowed, that laid the groundwork for Mother’s victory. And it’s upon your suffering that I and your daughters and your granddaughters will take an active role in a life of faith. And for me, I think that’s tremendous.

So providence is moving very, very quickly. You know, Father predicted, October 26th, 1975, in Chicago that an African-American born of a white mother and a black father would become the president of the United States. Father predicted that the Berlin Wall will come down when he sent my elder brother, Hyo Jin oppa, to preach and beat the wall down, and basically say, "Gorbachev, we cannot have this division any more." And very, very soon thereafter the wall did come down. And my father knew that when he gave his daughters all difficult Russian names, he knew that we would be going to Moscow one day, and he knew, he foresaw his grandchildren going to Moscow one day. And he knew that by having Russian names that there would be an immediate heartistic connection between the Russian people and his family. And that came true as well.

And my father knew that when he put Fish-Eye together with his daughter, the oil and vinegar together, he would get a one-of-a-kind vinaigrette that’s going to bring a lot of joy to a lot of people. And I see that in my children.

So in a way, brothers and sisters, God is working amongst us. God is working with us. God is working in mysterious ways and we just need to open our eyes. That opening of the eyes starts with realizing how incredibly blessed all of us are to be living at the same time that our True Parents are living with us. Can you imagine 100, 200, 300 years from now, your future children will be thinking about you, saying, I wish I could have been where Sue great-grandmother was. I wish I could have been like John great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, to be walking and speaking and living and sharing and conversing at the same time as our True Parents.

And you know what? As strange as it may look to some outside people, you know, my Father coronating himself in preparation to coronate God, some people might think, ooh, that kind of looks spooky. But when you look at it from a historical context, it’s no more kooky than Charlemagne crowning himself. It’s a major historical moment that cannot be erased and that has incredible significance in many, many years to come.

So in a way, brothers and sisters, I feel like we have a lot of work to do, but I am so grateful that Father has entrusted America to me. I am just so grateful that in a way I have the chance to get to know your children, and in a way get to know you, the first generation. And I’m hoping that in a way I can help transition of the first to the second and second to the third as smoothly as possible. And I feel that if we can come together as a community and really shine our inner qualities, if you will, and build a house where we would be proud to have guests, then I think the natural witnessing is going to take a life of its own. And it’s just a matter of time before the world recognizes how incredibly special our True Parents are and how special all of you are.

So I’m hoping that all of you can join with me in raising up this new consciousness, of raising a new generation of peace, and truly allowing America to exercise its ability to influence, its rightful and its proper ability to influence the world in a profound and in a meaningful way, by making God the prominent feature, by making the family the prominent feature, by in a way making peace the prominent feature by standing against violence of any sort, from individual to the world.

So I hope that, brothers and sisters, you can have a great week and a great month and a great year. I hope I get to see you sooner than that, but this is truly an ohio gozai-mas, truly a good morning, and I hope that this spirit can stay with you for many, many weeks to come. So thank you very much. 

Personnel Changes

In Jin Moon
February 3, 2009

Family Federation for World Peace and Unification
4 West 43rd St. New York, New York 10036
(212) 997-0050 e-mail admin@familyfed.org North American Headquarters NA 1

NHQ20090203 No. 6

MEMORANDUM

To: Block Advisors, District Directors, State Directors, All Blessed Central Families and Members
From: Rev. In Jin Moon, Dr. Pyung Hwa Kim, Rev. Michael Jenkins
Date: February 3, 2009
RE: Personnel Changes

Dear Leaders,

On behalf of our Chairperson, Rev. In Jin Moon, we officially announce that Rev. Dong Mo Shin has been appointed by True Parents as the Regional President (Continental Director) of the South American Region and has completed his assignment as the National Director of KEA in America. This appointment is effective from January 20th.

True Parents appointed Rev. Ki Yeal Lee as the National Director of the Korean Evangelical Association and the Pastor of the New York KEA.

We sincerely congratulate you on your appointment. Rev. Lee’s appointment began on February 1st, 2009. We wish them all the best and pray for their success and victory in their new missions.

Sincerely,

Rev. In Jin Moon
Chairperson -- NA 1

Dr. Pyung Hwa Kim
Continental Director, NA 1

Dr. Michael Jenkins
President FFWPU, USA 

In Jin Moon's Monthly Journal #6

Rev. In Jin Moon and Civil Rights Legends Rally American Clergy in Newark

Rev. In Jin Moon and Civil Rights Legends Rally American Clergy in Newark

January 31, 2009

The stars were in alignment in Newark New Jersey at the American Clergy and Leadership (ACLC) Convocation Jan. 29-31, richly blessed as it was with a keynote speech from Family Federation for World Peace and Unification Chairwoman Rev. In Jin Moon, participation from civil-rights legends, Rev. Joseph Lowery and Rev. Walter Fauntroy, and lectures that moved some of those present to tears.

Rev. Moon, along with her husband and their two youngest sons, attended the ACLC dinner on Friday, January 30th. In her opening remarks she told the assembly that America’s mission is to influence the world in the right way and that the leaders of the Civil Rights movement did exactly that 40 years ago. Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, Jr. and the other champions of the civil rights movement inspired her, and Dr. King “taught me how to dream,” she said. Rev. Moon said she dreams of a day when our children will not have to live in fear of school shootings, suicide bombings and prejudice against Asian-Americans.

“Dr. Lowery, I as a woman look forward to inspiring a new generation of young people. I look forward to my children becoming a part of you [your movement]. I look forward to the day when one of my children will marry a Muslim or a Jew,” she said.

“I feel like God is working his mysterious magic today to make this an extraordinary year. God has been using Rev. Fauntroy and Rev. Lowery and the Council of Elders to raise up a new generation…There is no stopping us once God’s spirit gets moving, and you know what? It’s already moving.”

Archbishop George Augustus Stallings, co-president of the ACLC, opened the conference on January 29 with a visionary statement that explained the theme of the convocation, “That They All May Be One.”

"The American Clergy Leadership Conference stands in a central and vital position in assisting the new President of the United States in achieving his administration's message of hope, unity and change. True and lasting change will only come to America when we, as a nation, return to our founding principles and embrace them as if they were our own. Central to this endeavor is rebuilding the family and setting it as the cornerstone for the restoration of our communities and the renewal of our nation and the world. The ACLC can seize the power of the pulpit and constantly drive home the message of hope, unity and change that will inspire countless numbers of citizens to personally strive in their everyday pursuits to create a nation where we can all stand together and say: ‘We Are One!’," Stallings said.

The gathering of 115 ministers then heard insightful lectures on the Divine Principle and inspired preaching during the three-day conference which culminated with a bus ride into Manhattan so that all ministers could attend the deeply-affecting ceremony for Dr. Sun Myung Moon’s 90th birthday celebration and commemorative program. One minister remarked later: “The ceremony was the highest and most prestigious ceremony that I have ever attended. It was beautiful, it was smooth and on time, the most elegant expression of love.”

Ministers took notes as they listened with close attention to Divine Principle lectures by Rev. Levy Daugherty, Rev. Kevin McCarthy, and Bishop Jesse Edwards. Dr. Thomas Walsh, Secretary General of the Universal Peace Federation International explained the “Providential Significance of the Establishment of an Abel United Nations.” Rev. Michael Jenkins, a member of the Executive Committee of the ACLC, lectured on Rev. Dr. Sun Myung Moon’s 34 years of Dedication in the United States.” The 5:00 a.m. prayer services were punctuated by shouts of “Amen” and loud clapping as the clergy heard the spontaneous inspirations of several Pentecostal preachers, including Rev. D.C. Corson and Rev. Mark Abernathy, Several clergy recounted their moving testimonies regarding how they had encountered and joined the ACLC despite persecution from officials within their own communities.

Bishop Ki Hoon Kim, ACLC National Chairman, pronounced the convocation a great step forward in the ACLC’s mission and pledged to hold prayer breakfasts in every state every month in 2009. In closing remarks Saturday morning he commissioned the assembled clergy thus: “We must realize God’s dream -- building the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, where we live.” 

In Jin Moon's Monthly Journal #5

In Jin Moon's Monthly Journal #5

God and True Parents Really Cares About You

In Jin Moon

Jan. 11, 2009

Minneapolis, MN

I’m delighted to be here with you again. What am I supposed to say after an introduction like that? It leaves me quite speechless. But thank you, Rev. Jenkins.

This morning when I got up before Hoon Dok Hae and I had a little time to myself together with our heavenly parent, I was meditating on what can I say to these people, to these brothers and sisters. How can I convey to them how much God really cares about them and how much True Parents care about them? You know, I realized that as a daughter or as a member of the second generation, not only is it my honor and privilege to be representing my parents but it’s also an honor and privilege to be representing my generation of second generation, to say thank you to the first generation for so many years of sacrifice and so many years of absolute devotion to our True Parents and to our Unification Church. And at the same time I hope that as a member of the True Family I can share with this community how much True Parents really, really, really love America and love you.

I am incredibly blessed, I think, in some way, and given this incredible burden to represent America. There’s a lot of work to be done but I know that I have many, many good people working with me on a daily basis, as Rev. Jenkins mentioned, at headquarters. I am excited and inspired and looking forward to all the improvements that we will make in our community, but also looking forward to great new talent that will come from our fold and represent our community, truly the way it should be represented as something great, and something worthy of people’s respect.

Brothers and sisters, I hope that as we start off this New Year we can kind of take this moment to think about the incredible moment in history that we’re living in. You know, when I talk to my Christian minister friends or my fellow Christians all around the world, you know, one of the things that they always say to me is, gosh, I wonder what it would have been like to sit next to Jesus Christ. I wonder what it would have been like just to hear his voice. Or maybe to eat with him, maybe to dine with him. Or maybe to converse with him. I wonder what it would have been like.

I’ve often asked them, what would you do if your wish could come true? I’ve heard many, many Christians and Christian ministers say to me, I would give my right arm. I would give my left arm. I would give anything to be breathing and walking and living at the same time that Jesus Christ walked on earth.

Now brothers and sisters, fast forward 2,000 years, and here we have the first True Parents, who are the fulfillment of everything that Jesus Christ wished for, everything that Heavenly Father wished for Jesus Christ. He is the Second Coming, my father is the Second Coming, and he has found his true bride, our True Mother. And for the first time not only the masculine aspect of our Heavenly Parent but a feminine aspect of our Heavenly Parent is with us today. So how incredible it is for us as human beings to be living at a time when our True Parents are here on earth.

Can you imagine, you know, what the future would say about you? Gosh, I wish I could have been Rev. Jenkins. Gosh, I wish I could have been Dr. Peace Kim, you know. He spoke the same language, came from the same land as Korea. I wonder what it was like for him. I wonder what it was like for Rev. Jenkins. I wonder what it was like for Bishop Kim. I wonder what it was like for Jaga Gavin to not only be living at the same time as True Parents but to have literally been prepared by True Parents to grace this earth by putting his parents together. How incredible would that be?

So you know, for many of the first generation who’ve come this far, following our True Parents’ footsteps, I know that it has been many, many years since you joined, and I know that some of you are a bit grayer, maybe a bit tired, maybe a bit wider even, than when you first walked into a workshop. But I know that you are here because you really love True Parents. And I know that you joined, and you first said, yes to our Heavenly Father and True Parents because you experienced the spark of life. You knew you found something great. You knew you found something new. You knew you found something worth giving your life to, and that is building an ideal family, that is building an ideal home, you know, seeing the world as one united family under God. These are all incredible things.

You know, a lot of the first generation that I see in that audience today were literally backpacking across the country, right? Looking for something. Looking for something that would give meaning to your life, and you joined the Church and you heard the Principle and you were overcome with the Holy Spirit and you were moved to try to build this kingdom. You know, but nowadays the young people are backpacking on the Internet, looking for new religions on the Internet, looking for meaning on the Internet, and that’s why I felt that the most important thing that I need to be working on as the chairwoman of HSA is to really create a whole new presence on the Internet about how we really are as a community.

You know, something that respects you, something that’s worthy to kind of showcase everything that you’re about, something that shows the world that we’re a beautiful community that is thriving and growing. You know, we’re not some kind of this cultish group of people that are just following Rev. and Mrs. Moon because we’ve all been brainwashed, but we are educated, we are thinking, we are capable individuals, professional individuals that have chosen this lifestyle because it’s something good. It’s something worthwhile, and something that is worthy of the experience, the initial experience that you had when you first joined.

You know, even to this day I carry a small sheet of paper with me, and it is a drawing that I did when I first experienced the American Church. I came to this country when I was eight years old, and coming from a culture where everyone has black hair and black eyes, and coming to this new land, where you have blonde hair, blue eyes, green eyes, brown eyes, you know, red hair. It was just so beautiful to me, something so new. And to see all these fresh-faced young Americans, so excited about hearing the word of the True Parents, of hearing the words from my father. As a little girl, I said, oh my goodness, this is something really awesome. And then to kind of look into the audience and see your faces, as an eight-year-old girl, and realizing that each of you had this spark in your eyes.

I remember taking out a piece of paper and drawing a tiny smiley face with eyes and then next to it a sparkle. And for me throughout these years -- and I’ve lived in this country for over three decades -- that little rendering of a smiley face and a sparkle next to the eyes has always been kind of a constant reminder of what our American community was, how excited the young people were, how excited you were, and how excited I was as a young girl to be seeing that sparkle in your eyes.

I’ve often wondered, where did the sparkle go? Maybe it’s buried in dust somewhere on the bookshelf, and maybe this is the time when I, coming and approaching the HSA from a woman’s perspective can inspire all of us maybe to do a little bit of dusting, and to say, you know, you guys are like a beautiful, beautiful vase that has grown tired from neglect, maybe that have grown tired because we ourselves didn’t realize how beautiful we are. And it takes something new, it takes somebody new, maybe like a second generation, to come around and say, you are still beautiful and you deserve to be honored, and you deserve to be taken care of, and let me be the first one to dust off those layers of maybe tiredness, of maybe resentment even, and maybe misunderstanding. And then to help you say to yourself, look at what I’ve created. I have a beautiful family. I have second generation, I have sinless children that I can proudly claim as my own.

Even in my own life of faith, you know, I realized that following my True Parents’ way of lifestyle and trying to build an ideal family, I realized that without even thinking so much about what an incredible resource I have, I realized that every time I meet an outside person -- you know, it could be a colleague, it could be a fellow professional -- I realized that they’re always moved when they meet my family. And they always come up and ask me, you know, Tatiana, In Jin, your kids are really different. What is it about them that you did? Did you feed them some kind of a protein drink that we have yet to learn about? Are you feeding them some supra-nutritional stuff? How come they’re so happy? How come they’re so motivated? How come they’re just so comfortable in their own skin?

I say, well, you know, I’ve been following the teachings of Rev. Moon, you know, who happen to be my mom and dad. And my father was called by Jesus Christ to fulfill his mission, to build an ideal family, and basically I’m trying my best to follow the teachings of my father. Unbeknownst to me after all these years, I have five beautiful children, five healthy, beautiful children who love God and who love their grandparents and who honor and respect me every day of my life. I must say that it’s really thanks to our True Parents and to the Divine Principle that they are who they are.

In the course of my interactions with the outside world I realized that, gee, you know, I said to my husband, our children are our best witnessing tools. In a way that’s what I like to call natural witnessing. And when I went around the country and met with different second generation and heard their stories, the stories of Matthew on STF, and his encounter with this one lady who was looking to find Father’s trail near UTS and came upon Matthew and a couple of his friends and asked, where is this Father’s trail? Where can I find it?

Well, not only did Matthew help this lady find Father’s trail, but he did it in such a loving and in such a respectful way that this woman felt like I just had to ask, who are these people? How is it that Matthew is just a teenager, and American teenager but he is so different from the ones that I meet at malls, from the ones that are just hanging around with nothing to do? From ones who are making fun of the elderly people, poking fun. But here you have a group of young people that are respectful toward the elder generation, going out of their way to take care of them with two hands, not just one. Making sure that she’s well taken care of, not just physically but also spiritually. She was so moved. So she had to ask Matthew, who are you people? And Matthew said, well, we are the product of those mass weddings that you saw. And this lady said, mass weddings? Yes, mass weddings of Reverend Moon.

This lady just had to kind of step back and said, Reverend Moon and those mass weddings. You mean those Adolf Hitler type of -- you know, those mansei saying crazy bunch of people, mass wedding Rev. Moon? Brainwashed zombies mass wedding type of people? And Matthew said, yes, those were my parents.

And in that instant this woman realized, wow, Reverend Moon must be a good man if he was the one who blessed these parents, who produced children, young, proud, beautiful Americans like these. That’s natural witnessing at work.

And when people at the UN came across a CARP member, second generation CARP member like Sophia, and she went out of her way to not only make sure that the second generation had a great experience with the UN, but so much so in taking care of people, the supervisor of the whole committee was so inspired by this young, you know, bright and bushy-tailed young American lady that he had to ask, who are you people? And she said, well, do you remember those mass weddings? Do you remember a bunch of young people running around crusading for One Family, One Nation under God back then? Well, those were our parents and we are the product of those mass weddings and here we are. And she said that with so much warmth, a smile on her face, and with so much pride that the supervisor, again, had to kind of step back and say, wow. Rev. Moon must not be such a bad guy after all. And again, that’s the magic of natural witnessing taking place.

You know, brothers and sisters, for so many years we’ve spent so much time in terms of starting different initiatives, right? Different witnessing campaigns and different ways to reach out to people. But you know what? I found that in my own life of faith the most effective way to witness is to raise good families. The most effective way to witness is to substantiate what we’re teaching, what we’re trying to teach the people ourselves by living it, by raising great kids like Sophia and Matthew, by in a way allowing them to represent our faith, allowing them to be the living testament of who we’re all about.

In a way this time is a time in providential history when we should proudly showcase everything that we’re all about. You know, when I think about the olden days in our time in the wilderness, it was truly a time when we were like the wind. You know, we were blowing these people down with our words, with our teachings, you know, get them to the seminars, get them to the workshops, you know. We’re going to teach them the truth. We know the truth. But you know, there are a lot of people out there who also think that they know the truth too. And the young people are a lot smarter than, you know, than before.

They’re a lot more tech savvy in that they’re more familiar with the type of different religions that are available to them than maybe before. Maybe in the ’70s the Eastern religion, the influence of Eastern religion was a new phenomenon. Well, for the young people, they’ve been inundated with different types of Eastern religions over the years, you know. So they’re pretty well versed, and they’re pretty critical as well, too. So not only are they learning to, hoping to find the truth, but they’re hoping to see the truth. They want to see the truth.

So instead of the wind blowing people down with our desire to fervently teach the truth, how wonderful would it be if our community could be like a sunshine upon the world, if we can just start emanating the warmth from within and let the people naturally take off their coats, let the people naturally be drawn to us because we are a wonderful community. You know, you are, we are the world’s best kept secret. Let the people experience through this loving encounter with each and every one of your families, you know, the beautiful families that you’ve struggled to build over the years. And I know, as with most families, and mine too, it’s a work in progress. And I know that when I -- sometimes when I’m in a prayer conversation with our Heavenly Father, I have to laugh because Heavenly Father reminds me, well, all your life you wanted to build an ideal family, so isn’t that what you’re doing?

Sometimes, you know, being a mom and being a wife and being a daughter to our True Parents is not an easy thing. And building an ideal family, I thought, was something almost akin to buying a potted plant, you know, bringing a potted plant holder from the store, buying a package of seeds, you know, and putting the seeds, planting the seeds into this pot. And all I thought was I just have to give it water and sunshine and these children would miraculously grow into this incredible human beings, you know, incredible God-centered men and women. But if you’ve had children, moms and dads in the audience, you know that it takes a little bit more than just water and fresh sunshine, light, and air. It takes a lot of effort, you know.

So when Heavenly Father says to me, you know, be careful what you ask for because you just might get it -- well, I had always hoped for an international blessing and I had always hoped to marry maybe an American. And I got what I wanted. You know, my husband is the only -- the first and the oldest male blessed child born to our community, but he’s also the first American blessed child born to our community. So in a way God did answer my prayers, unbeknownst to me. I was hoping that I would have this incredible ideal family, and in a way sometimes when things between spouses become difficult, you know, there were moments in my life when I said to Heavenly Father, where is this ideal family? And a voice came back to me, saying, well, it is an ideal family. I deal with my family. I deal with my husband. I deal with my children on a daily basis. And in a way Heavenly Father did give me an I-deal family.

And I have to be grateful because God is teaching me in all these mysterious ways of how to be an ideal person. I deal with myself every day, and every day is a new day. And every day when I wake up I make a list of all the things that I would like to accomplish that day, and at the end of the day if I’ve accomplished them, if I’ve held firmly to my commitment, and I thank Heavenly Father for allowing me to deal. I deal with myself.

As I’m dealing with my family, as I’m sure all of you are, I realize that every obstacle or every suffering that Heavenly Father puts in our path is really just an opportunity to grow, and opportunity to deepen our understanding of who we are, an opportunity to deepen our faith each and every day, and for it to be tested and for it to be strengthened. So I always encourage my children, you know, when we’ve had a tough day, let us be grateful because this tough day is helping us or giving us an opportunity to become a stronger family, a stronger building block of this incredible community that we’re building. At the same time I always encourage my children, just as I encourage the second generation of our community, to really be in a position to honor their parents and honor the sacrifices that have gone before.

You know, a lot of the second generation have come up to me and said, you know, In Jin Nim, I really have a hard time looking up to my parents. I said, why? Why is that? They say to me, you know, my world is telling me that the only thing that matters is power, knowledge and money, but these are the things that my parents gave up. And even to this day I would have to say my parents are financial losers. They don’t have much to show for it, and I don’t know if I want to follow in their footsteps, living a life of faith where I’m literally struggling with myself to put bread on the table.

I said, thank you, first of all, for your honesty and for entrusting in me to share your thoughts. I feel really honored that you would speak to me about this. But may I say one thing, and that is, you know, you kind of have to understand the first generation as somebody who joined the Unification Church because they wanted to build an incredible house of God on earth, God’s kingdom on earth. And the first generation, their mission primarily was building the foundation. Their primary mission was like preparing the basement.

If you want to build a tall building, you have to dig just as deep. And in a way the first generation were busy digging, preparing to build this incredible monument, incredible testament to God and our faith. But if we want to build 20 stories, you’ve got to dig 20 stories. And the first generation’s, in a way, life path or a life of sacrifice, or a life of devotion was like building a foundation in order to build a house. They were so deeply entrenched, digging away, that many times the second generation, or maybe even the first generation themselves said, what are we doing? What are we doing just shoveling dirt every day? What are we doing?

But Father and mother asked you, continue, please continue, we’re going to build something wonderful. And on pure faith you kept on digging and you kept on shoveling that dirt. Maybe not realizing how deep, how deep you’ve dug. And then the second generation, maybe not realizing what the parents were doing, but the second generation’s mission really, or a life of faith is to realize and to acknowledge the sacrifice of their parents, in a way thank them for the foundation that they have laid, for everything that they have done, so that we can stand upon the shoulders of the first generation’s sacrifice and start building something really wonderful, to start harvesting all that has been prepared.

Part of the reason why I share the promo DVD about the Manhattan Center with the second generation is to kind of show them. Manhattan Center is just one example of the foundation that your parents, together with my parents, have laid in preparation for your leadership. We have many, many, many different organizations. My father and mother have touched every aspect of life. Just about a month ago I came from a meeting with True World Foods, that my father founded more than 20 years ago. It has grown into a company that’s worth over half a billion dollars.

This is the group that literally feeds all the sushi lovers of America. Think about it. In a way, our community has touched the American people one way or another. And for those who love sushi and for those who have a strong craving for Asian food, my father’s work is already in their body. We’ve physically given them sustenance. Now how wonderful would it be if the second generation of our community can be re-invigorated and re-inspired about how much of a foundation is waiting for them, so that based on the first generation’s physical sustenance of taking care of the American people, why not introduce them to the spiritual sustenance that’s just waiting for them, waiting for you, the second generation, to reach out and touch the American people.

So when I think about this country -- and when my father says that America has been chosen, it’s a God-chosen country, you know, I think of it in many, many different ways. But one way to kind of understand how incredibly powerful, how incredibly providential America is, is to kind of remind myself of my first day in class as an eager Political Science major at college. I remember I had this wonderful professor. His first topic, introduction to political science 101 was the definition of power. And he said to this class of very, very intelligent group, he said, you know, power means the ability to influence.

I’ve often thought about that in my own life of faith. And when I think about America, and when I think about as a God-chosen country, and I think about why God has blessed this country with so many resources and so much opportunity -- in a way God prepared this country because it was prepared to exercise the power, the ability to influence the world. You have Elvis Presley, you have -- and then in Japan you have Elvis Presley wannabe’s, right. The music, the Levi jeans -- who in the world hasn’t heard about Levis jeans?

Who in the world hasn’t heard about McDonald’s, Kentucky Fried Chicken? Even when I went to Moscow in the year 2000 they had McDonald’s there, and a couple of years later when I visited they had Starbucks there. They very much love Microsoft and Bill Gates. All these things that came from America, that is literally influencing the world, influencing our children -- can you imagine if America became truly a country of God and started influencing the world with an incredible message of true love, with an incredible message and hope for one family under God?

I know that a lot of the first generation that joined the Church, you joined because you experienced hope for the first time in your life. Many of you came from broken homes, right? And many of you wanted to create this incredibly loving family. You wanted to find a way to have a loving relationship with your spouse. And in a way the Divine Principle gave you hope that you can have that, blessed by God, and you can have incredible children, sinless children. You had hope in your eyes, you had hope in your heart.

And again, can you imagine if America, as the elder son nation, representing the Second Israel, can truly proclaim to the world how incredibly profound it is to say, yes, you can have hope once again; you can have hope in the brotherhood of man, in the fact that yes, we can love each other. Not just co-exist, not just tolerate, but truly love. I often say to blessed couples, can you imagine if your husband -- I can’t imagine my husband turning to me and saying, "In Jin, I love you so much, I love you with all my heart, I want to co-exist with you for the rest of my life."

If he were to say that to me, I would say, "huh? Come again? Honey, try that again. Co-exist with me?" Of if he were to say to me, In Jin, "I love you so much, I just tolerate you every day." Maybe sometimes he does feel like saying that. But if he were to say that to me, it wouldn’t be as inspiring to me as if he were to say, "In Jin, I love you with all my heart and I want to understand you with all my heart, and I want to love you for the rest of my life." It’s really quite different, isn’t it?

When I see stickers that young people put on their bumpers, that say “Co-exist,” with different religious symbols, I said, no, we’ve got to be able to do better than that. So True Parents are saying, yes, we can do better than that. We need to love, we need to take care of each other. Not just put up with each other, co-exist or tolerate. And so if we’re going to be teaching this to the people of the world, what about our community within?

Are we just simply going to co-exist with our Japanese brothers and sisters, our Korean brothers and sisters? Are we just simply going to tolerate the American brothers and sisters? Or are we really going to love each other, just as our True Parents have taught us? Are we really going to care about each other and support each other and not judge each other every day, but to see what words of encouragement we can say to each other every day, so that we can help each other to become better people? Because there is a strength in a community, a strength in numbers, and we should be celebrating it each and every day.

I have to say that every day for me is a day of challenge, and at the same time it’s a day of celebration, when I can see my children every day, and see many hard-working members every day. Their enthusiasm touches me and makes me want to be a better person. When I work with the members, as well as non members, and I have the added responsibility of running the Manhattan Center, I work with these people that are almost like gods for the young people of today. America is undergoing this cult of celebrity, where the movie stars and singers and top entertainers are becoming like gods. They dictate how you should live. They dictate what kind of people you should date. They dictate what kind of music you should be listening to.

I have a couple of friends who are producers of television programs aired on cable nets like MTV and VH1 and I’ve gotten to meet all the different CEOs of different entertainment groups. These are people who literally have it all. They have everything. But they’re always looking for something here, always something empty here. (pointing to her heart.)

And so when I see that young people are looking at these people, hungry to copy their lifestyle and use that as something to aspire to, I would have to say, young people, but these people that you’re looking up to, these people are the ones that are asking me, how come your kids are different? How can I raise my children so that they will respect me when they grow up? How can I raise them so they’re not going to throw curses at me? How can I help them grow up so that they can be a child that thinks about something greater than just themselves? So we’ve had quite a few conversations like this with some of my professional contacts and friends.

This one friend of mine sent me a video clip from CNN and he said, Tatiana, I just wanted to get your feedback on this, so take a look and e-mail me and call me back. When I opened up what he sent me, it was a CNN interview with this young lady, young American lady who had graduated from college, done extremely, extremely well, was looking toward graduate program, and found herself in this situation where she had everything prepared academically, but in terms of the finances she didn’t have enough money to go to graduate school.

Having been inundated with kind of like the cult of celebrity and this understanding that right now she’s part of the millennials, or show-me-the-money generation, she thought, well, hmm, I don’t have money, I want to go to graduate school, I have an incredibly great resume from my college days. What do I do? So this young lady came up with this novel solution and she decided, why not use the Internet to auction off my virginity to the highest bidder? This girl thought, well, yes, when the interviewer was asking her different questions like, why would you do such a thing? Don’t you believe in love, don’t you believe in marriage or something like this? She’s like, oh yes, yes, I, just like all the young little girls in America grew up with fairy tale stories of Cinderella, Snow White, waiting for that knight in shining armor to come and save me and to live happily ever after, amen.

But then she said, in the course of growing up, going through elementary school, then middle school, the kids start kind of experimenting with the opposite sex, and then going to high school where they’re not just experimenting but they’re living it. And then having gone through four years of college, where she literally saw bed-hopping going on in the dorms every day, she basically said, you know what? It seems like my generation doesn’t value what I held on for so long. But if it can solicit a decent price on the Internet, it’s the only thing I have to sell, and it’s the only thing that might give me something to work with in terms of going to a graduate program.

When I saw that clip I called my friend right back and said, good God, how is it that this girl has given up on love? How is it that this girl has given up on the prospect of having a loving family? She’s literally starting to sell her body for money, and she’s giving it a logical twist or an intellectual understanding to herself by saying, well, it just makes sense. I said, well, you know, maybe you should re-think about some of the programming that you’ve done over the years. Because now this person has 14 and 16-year-old daughters. He’s been generating these types of programs for the youth of America. But as a father he’s ultra-protective of his own daughters. He has to come to terms with, ooh, what have I done? Was I really thinking about how these programs are going to affect my daughter when I produce these things? Or was I just thinking about the bonus I was going to get at the end of the year because it was a hit show?

So we had this conversation. We started talking about my father. He started asking me questions about my father and about some of our beliefs. I was saying, you know, what is missing in the millennial show-me-the-money generation are the core values, core God-centered values or moral values that made the founding of America so great. In a way America needs to reclaim its spiritual heritage in order to continue to become great. The spiritual heritage is like the backbone, and everything else is like the flesh. But for the last couple of decades America has been kind of moving around like an amoeba. It has lost its spiritual backbone, lost its vertebrae. And it’s looking. The young people are looking.

The wonderful thing about our community is not just in that do we have a physical representation of God in the masculine and the physical form in the form of True Parents, but we have this wonderful culture of an international community. You have the beautiful aspect of the Eastern culture such as honoring the elder, such as physical manifestation of honoring somebody by basically bowing. And instead of it looking kind of geekish, or kind of weird, if the American people can be informed that this is truly a loving gesture, not something that’s demeaning or degrading. In fact, there’s nothing more beautiful than a spouse who bows to each other before they go to bed because they understand the sanctity of the relationship, they understand the sanctity of what they’re about to partake on a daily basis.

There’s nothing more beautiful than that, a man bowing to his wife, honoring his wife. Not smacking and hitting and abusing, but honoring and respecting that woman. And the same, a wife honoring, bowing to the husband, not hen-pecking, not telling him how horrible he is and how much complaint. But honoring on a daily basis. There’s something beautiful in that. That’s kind of like the groundwork in order for the couples to have even a more enriching experience as husband and wife.

The fact that the children honor the parents, the fact that a younger brother calls the older brother hyung, or the fact that a young brother calls an older sister nuna, and the older brother loving the younger brother respectfully. There’s beauty in that.

Of course we have the Western aspect, the importance of conversation, the importance of camaraderie, the importance of enjoying horizontal relationships, not just the vertical but the horizontal. So that in a family setting not only are the children respectful toward the parents, but sometimes the parents can let their guard down and have incredible fun with the family and talk with the family, which in a strictly Asian culture just doesn’t exist.

In a strictly Asian culture, many husbands and wives never talk to each other. In fact, in my travels across America I came across a Japanese sister who said to me, In Jin Nim, your message about love is so wonderful. Then she was kind of like looking at me with these doe-like eyes, and her husband was sitting right next to her, so I said to the husband, did you tell your wife that you love her? This wife just started crying. The husband said to me, in Japan we don’t express, we don’t verbalize I love you. Of course she knows I love her, but we don’t say it.

I said to this gentleman, you’re from Japan. My father’s from Korea. Korea’s the Adam country, right? There are a lot of people who don’t tell their wives, I love you, there too. But I’ve never met a Korean man who says, I love you, to his wife more than my father. So wouldn’t it be wonderful if you could just say, I love you, to your wife? I saw this man literally struggling. Like after years and years of not verbalizing, maybe feeling but not verbalizing, I -- I -- I -- eh -- eh -- love -- you. It was just such an effort.

But when this brother was able to convey for the first time in their marital relationship -- and they’ve been married for decades -- not just feel but articulate, communicate. This poor wife, she was -- she turned into Niagara Falls. Then he turned into Niagara Falls. It was just one of those things where he’s such a wonderful person, but coming from that culture it’s so difficult to overcome the cultural barrier and to turn to his heavenly daughter, heavenly wife, and say, I love you.

That’s the beauty of our community. When I was going to Divinity school, many people said to me, Rev. Moon, yes, he’s a great evangelical leader and a great regional phenomenon. I’ve often said, no, no, my father’s not a regional phenomenon. He’s a worldwide phenomenon and he’s a worldwide leader because this man, you cannot call a Korean man -- not only does he express to his wife he loves her, he acts on it on stage all the time. He’s constantly kissing my mother. Sometimes Mother has to say, Abba, not now. But constantly trying to pick her up in public. I thought, how wonderful it is to see some public displays of emotion here. From a Korean man. And we’re not talking a 20-year-old. We’re talking he’s almost 90. It’s a totally different generation. Can you imagine a man from his generation being this communicative with his wife, acting upon the feelings that he has for his wife? You cannot call him a Korean man. He is quite a universal man. And a very much progressive thinker.

When I see how he has raised Mother and how truly incredible Mother is for going the course to restore the position of fallen Eve, to reclaim the true position of Eve, the true position of women in our world, and for her to be standing as the true Eve, or the true Mother -- as a daughter there’s nothing more inspiring than that. I’m sure the American sisters in the church have felt like me. Back in the olden days I remember Father used to berate the American sisters, right? You American sisters, peh, peh, peh. Quite a bit of chastisement has been done to the poor American sisters, and I remember watching my father give the Americans a hard time. Thinking, oh, my goodness. And me and my sisters, Ye Jin and Un Jin, we’d be writing notes to each other, they’re getting it real bad today.

At the same time, because we were girls, we were women, we felt everything that you were feeling. And back in those days I had wonderful things called brothers. You know brothers can be quite mischievous and quite cruel, right, when they’re young. They would poke pencils at our butts saying, see, see, women are nothing. Women are object. Bad women. Bad women. And we would literally be sitting there, God, are you watching this? Can you please help us?

But Father, once he started, he would go on. It’s like a bulldozer. Once he starts rolling, he rolled all the American sisters down before he finished. We grew up watching this. I as a daughter often kind of heard the Divine Principle lectures and subject and object and creating an ideal family, and vertical and horizontal, and then kind of look at my parents and saw my father as this charismatic evangelical preacher and leader, and a teacher. And my mom just being silent for so many years.

And I remember reading the Martha and Mary story in the Bible. In a way the history of religion has not been a kind one to women, and many times that story of Martha and Mary has been used to silence women in the church, to silence women in a life of faith. When I was kind of reading that passage, the way I understood it as a girl and as a woman and as a mother was that Mary and Martha, they are preparing the arrival of Jesus to visit in their home. Martha being the frantic one, wants to be sure that everything is prepared well. I can almost visualize the East Garden setting of that particular story, of maybe Martha is Mrs. Dr. Kim, frantically preparing, kitchen sisters, do this, do that, do this, do that. Making sure the water is here, making sure the tablecloth is pristine.

Then Jesus is sitting down, True Father is sitting down, getting ready to address the audience. Then Mary quietly sitting by his side, wanting to listen. And I’ve often kind of visualized resentment of maybe Martha toward Mary, saying -- maybe in her heart, or maybe even verbalizing or articulating, Mary, what are you doing sitting there? Can’t you see I’m busy? Why don’t you help me? What a spoiled child. Maybe this is how Martha felt. Or maybe Martha felt like, why isn’t Mary helping me? It’s so important to take care of Jesus in a correct way. Why doesn’t she get up and help me? Then I’ve often visualized Mary, thinking, I can’t believe I’m in the presence of Jesus Christ. I don’t want to miss a thing. I want to hear every word.

When I look at that picture and see it in the modern day visualized version of Father and East Garden context, I realize that in a way that story is not a story about why a woman should be silent in a life of religion, but it’s really a story about how the heart of attendance is. In a way I very much understood the story of Martha and Mary as something that was profound in that regardless of how many preparations need to take place, the most important thing is to attend Jesus Christ, is to attend our True Parents, and to give our heart. And in a way, when that story was being told, it was to teach us that yes, frantic preparations are wonderful, but what is more important is to come and spend time with our True Parents, spend time and attend True Parents.

I kind of kept my own understanding of the Martha and Mary story in my heart, and over the years I’ve kind of seen True Mother’s course unfold. All those years of True Mother never, never complaining, always uniting, and always being there for Father and Mother, and finally restoring the position of Eve to a position where women can take an active role in the life of faith. It’s an incredibly inspiring thing for me not just as a woman but as a student of religion. It’s an incredible time for us as a faith community.

So I feel like the ability for me to take this position as the chairman of HSA is really because of all those American sisters, you know, who’ve gone before me, who in a way received, who sacrificed. And by going through that berating, prepared the way for True Mother’s victory, and prepared a way to give me an opportunity to do something wonderful for this country. And I think we can. (Applause)

And when I think about why my father gave the American ladies such a tough time, you know, I would have to ask myself the same question. As somebody who has taught college students and high school students, I would have to say, well, as a teacher, when you’re standing in front of a classroom, you tend to be harder on the students that are academically gifted. You tend to challenge them more. You tend to push them more. And I firmly believe that in a way when Father came to America and was giving the American sisters a real tough time, it’s because he saw within you the power to change the world, the ability to influence. He saw within you an educated bunch of young American sisters, very capable, very articulate, very enthusiastic. And so in a way Father was challenging the American sisters -- are you going to be educated, professional, articulate for God? Or for yourself?

I think that’s the reason why my father was so hard on them. I think that’s also the reason why, you know, my parents are just so hard on their own children too. But you know, God works in mysterious ways. Through suffering comes depth and wisdom and new determination. And I know for a fact that because Father was so hard on women, now I have the ability or the opportunity to tickle my father a little bit by telling him, Dad, did you know that I’m really an American woman now?

I came as a resident alien to this country. I was an alien for many, many years, but I just recently became an American citizen, actually last year. So for me to kind of finally become an American citizen and then, you know, very, very soon after that for my father -- to be in this role, I thought I just had to remind my father about all that berating that he did for American sisters, and to say, well, I’m that American sister too, Father. He had a hearty laugh. And he said exactly what I said. It’s because those American sisters were really talented and really prepared. That’s what Father said.

Now I have the added pleasure of not just meeting you again, together with wonderful American brothers too, but I also get to meet your children, and wow, they’re really a great bunch. They have just so much talent. So as a mother coming to this position, I really want to try my best to not only make the Internet a wonderful place for our children to visit, and to find out more and more about their faith and maybe to hear some of your stories, but also to create an educational track for the blessed children so that the American community that has literally been living in the wilderness, going from one event to another, not really being allowed to settle down, to concentrate on our families -- this can be a time when we can do just that. We kind of need to build within. We need to be strong within if we’re going to do any outreach and invite people to our homes, right?

If you have a guest coming over, what do you do? You’ve got to clean up shop, right? You have to make sure your house is in order. You have to make sure it’s clean. You have to make sure it’s prepared, it’s presented well. Well, likewise, before we invite new members or new people to come and hear the truth, our house needs to be in order. It needs to be clean. It needs to be organized. It needs to be dusted so that bright, gleaming spirit that all of you have can shine once again. Just like the beautiful sun, start attracting. Instead of pulling teeth, start attracting people to the beauty of our community.

So I feel like when Father declared the beginning of the Pacific Rim era, and the important role that the women must play, I feel like this is an invitation for the American sisters to come and work together again and to help our brothers, to raise up our brothers, to raise up our families so that they can truly be great examples for the world. I’m hoping that, just as we’ve experienced the most incredible election process in the history of America, electing an African-American to be our next president. I often tell the different districts I go to that the impossibility has become a possibility; and not just a possibility but a reality.

When Martin Luther King was shouting out his “I Have a Dream” speech, I’m sure he was hoping for some day for an African-American president to take the White House. I don’t think he knew it would happen this soon. In fact, one of my dearest friends is an African-American actress. She’s won numerous awards and she’s done incredible things in her career. I remember her sitting next to me. We were at a fund-raiser that Rev. Jenkins briefly mentioned at the Manhattan Center. This was a fund-raiser for the Democratic Party, for Obama. It was actually hailed as the concert of the decade. You had Billy Joel there, you had Bruce Springsteen, you had John Legend, and you had a new up and coming star, her name is Indira. And basically it was $25,000 per seat.

The Hammerstein, the bigger venue at the Manhattan Center, houses 2,400 people, so you can do the math. They raised quite a chunk of change for the Democratic Party, and after that I had a chance to go backstage. It was actually my friend who brought the event to me at the Manhattan Center.. So he’s the one that brought Obama to the Manhattan Center.

Before I went to see Obama on the 16th, I was together with our True Parents in Hawaii, and I asked my father, a friend of mine has brought the Obama fund raising campaign to Manhattan Center and I will be going there to personally greet him, thank you for coming, and to convey whatever you would like me to convey to him. What would you like me to say to Obama?

My father said to me, remind Obama of the spiritual heritage of America and remember where he comes from. And if he remembers God and if he can unite with the work that our Father is doing, then together they can do incredible things for America. So after the event -- it was actually at the event when my actress friend was literally crying. She was Niagara Falls on my right arm here. She said, I just can’t believe, I just can’t believe, in all my years I’m taking part in this process. It’s just so incredible to me. She said, I just cannot believe that a black man is running for the presidency of the United States. She was just weeping the whole time because she was so moved.

So I brought her together with me backstage and approached Obama and his wife Michelle, thanked them for coming to the Manhattan Center and conveyed what Father wanted me to convey. As a representative of my father, I gave my father’s blessing to him by shaking his hand. I asked him to please remember God and your spiritual heritage. Several weeks later he was elected president. So in a way I feel in some way Father blessed Obama to take on this role.

Then I went and also visited Dr. Lowery, who’s a dear friend of mine that I got to know through my work with Religious Freedom Coalition when I was 18 years old, we locked arm in arm and we marched all the way down through Lafayette Park. For some reason he and I kind of had this heartistic connection, and he’s the one who always said to me, you know In Jin, God works in mysterious ways. I always kind of remember the way he spoke, G-o-o-o-o-o-d, holding it a little while longer, works in mysterious ways. That was kind of always ringing in the back of my mind when I was thinking about different things in the course of my life. When I saw Obama being elected, I thought, God works in mysterious ways.

I was able to reconnect with Dr. Lowery after many, many years. He has kind of been a little bit heartsick about our community because sometimes he felt that maybe our community was too extreme right-wing, and maybe they didn’t treat the African-American community very well. I know that even some of the members, when I talk about the Obama phenomenon, they said to me, but he’s a Democrat! I replied, absolutely. But you know, God works through Democrats too, not just Republicans. And it was Father that said we have to start a new movement, called Headwing movement, and he said that many, many years ago.

When I look at Obama, I’m not just looking at him as a Democratic president but I’m looking at him as somebody who has been prepared by God to do incredible work if he can somehow connect with our True Parents and with our community. And I think he can and I think he will. It was Dr. Lowery who was instrumental in anointing Barack Obama towards this race for the White House. Without Dr. Lowery, President-elect Obama would not be president-elect now. President-elect Obama asked Dr. Lowery to give the benediction at the inauguration. So I feel like in a way the jigsaw puzzles are all coming together in one way or another.

Father is utilizing different races, different mediums, to just all kind of come together, to fit that jigsaw puzzle into almost like a platform where True Parents can finally be recognized as the peacemakers of the world. So in a way I feel that we have the Generation X-ers, we have the Ys, the Z’s, and now this generation is calling themselves the millennials, or show-me-the-money generation. Don’t you think the young people can do a step better than show-me-the-money generation?

In a way the young people of today should be a generation of peace. They should be the ones saying, you know, look, the greatest threat to our existence is war of religions, or terrorism. It has already affected -- left its footprint, or fingerprint, in New York City, of all places, 9/11, right? And I watched that horror unfold from my husband’s office building, and I saw these people literally diving to their deaths.

The amount of hatred that must have been in the minds of these people that could do something like this, in the name of religion, in the name of Allah, it just cannot be. And we as young people, instead of just waiting for our politicians to change the world for us, instead of just waiting for our ministers to come together and change the world for us, why not change the world ourselves? It only took one man, one boy who was 16 -- and my son here, Truxton, just turned 16 this morning. My father was his age when Jesus appeared to him and my father finally said, yes, I will do it. It was his age.

From then on this man has never wavered, and this one man, this one boy has changed the world. He has changed each and every one of our lives. So can you imagine, all the young people in this audience -- 16, 14, 15, doesn’t matter how young -- but the change takes place here. But once you change your mind, you can change the world. Once you change yourself, you can change the world. Just like the way my father did.

In a way this is the time when we should call our children not just to sit idle and complain, or to just think about the cult of celebrity, but really get them to start thinking about how do we really accomplish this world of peace? How do we stop people from killing each other? How do we stop people from turning into suicide bombers and blowing other people up? How do we teach people about the sanctity of life, that life is precious? We are a divine representation on earth, and it’s our privilege and honor to live it. How do we show these young people?

I think the answer is in the back of the book. We have our True Parents here with us, they are living and breathing and walking with us. When my father says that he’s going to ascend to heaven in 2013, I’m just hoping and praying that 2013 will be his physical retirement and that he can finally rest, and that the second generation can go forward. But if 2013 is the day that he leaves us, it’s not very many days left. So you know, I feel like the time or the moment when we can proudly proclaim to our future generations, to our posterity, that I lived and walked with Father and Mother is not forever. So this is a precious time, incredibly precious time.

Honor your parents, second generation, and first generation, please encourage the second generation to find their passions, to be not just spiritually excellent but physically excellent. And physically excellent also means not just having great careers but also being proud of who we are.

I know you tired mothers, sometimes it’s really difficult to get in that shower and look good for your children, but please do so because then you can give them a good hug and ship them off in grand style that you deserve. And the mothers, who’ve kind of been, you know, tired and maybe upset at the husband and maybe kind of used food as a comfort. A couple of the American sisters literally kind of joked to me, yeah, a lot of us kind of popped up like this after getting married.

I said, yes, the most wonderful thing about the blessing is that it’s forever, but the worst thing about the blessing is it’s forever and that you take your spouse for granted, and that you stop caring about how you look for each other. Not just internally but also externally. If you truly love someone, you want to honor them, but not just how you are here, but also how you look. You want to smell good for each other.

You want to look attractive to each other. And you want to exercise together so you can be healthy together. Instead of every woman going through what I call the frozen Pillsbury dough-boy effect -- you know those lovely biscuits that we love to serve at dinner along with our lovely entrees, the biscuits that you twist open and it goes pop, right? A lot of sisters have gone that course, literally popped. Over the course of the last couple of decades God, our Heavenly Parent, has experience a lot of popping noises, and it wasn’t popcorn.

This is -- before you attract guests into the home, this is a time when we should think about how we are internally, but also externally, and how we can honor each other on Sunday morning by coming prepared. Not just here, but also externally, wanting to look good for each other because we care, because we want to love.

I think if we can start doing just that, we’re going to be an awesome community because you, we are the best content. We just have to package it in a way that people can understand that you guys and we are the best gift that the world is waiting for.

Please have a lovely Sunday, please have a lovely month. Thank you so much for taking care of us here with your warm hospitality. I look forward to seeing you again, and God bless you. 

39. In Jin Moon speaks to the Pacific Northwest District Families (December 7, 2008)

December 7, 2008
Calvary Lutheran Church
Seattle, Washington

Good morning, brothers and sisters. There was a whole lot of energy from that section over there! Thank you. I’m always quite speechless after George’s introduction. I hope that I can live up to all that he has said. But truly this morning, to be able to spend this time with you in Seattle is really a gift from God to me. If there is anything I can do in allowing God to speak through me, that would be to, in a way, share with all of you how much God loves you, and how much our True Parents truly love you in America.

When I came in to Seattle yesterday from a long, long flight from New York City, your district leader here, Larry, mentioned to me some wonderful things about Seattle. I realized that Seattle is the birthplace of Microsoft, and Starbucks coffee, which I’m an avid client of. (Laughter) My husband knows [that fact] very well. Also this is where the Boeing Company has its plant. So, in a way, when my father decided to bring his children over so that we can become American, so that we can learn the American culture and we can learn the language and speak English as if it’s our mother tongue, so that we can really be in a position to love the American people, one of the first places that we landed was Seattle.

I feel like just as Seattle represented for the True Family a brand new beginning, in a way Seattle represented for the world many brand-new beginnings. I cannot imagine my life without Microsoft, and I cannot start my day without Starbucks. And we wouldn’t be quite as effective as a family, as a True Family if we didn’t have the Boeing company to thank. So I feel truly blessed in so many ways to be here with you this morning.

You know, as I’ve been kind of traveling around the country getting to know all the brothers and sisters, it’s kind of an opportunity for me to do a fact-finding tour of everything that has gone on before, what does our membership look like, what does the congregation look like, what kind of ongoing programs do they have. It’s been an incredible experience for me to come face-to-face with all the first generation that have given so much to the movement. But more rewarding than that is truly meeting your children, the second generation, and getting to put a name to a face, and to hear about some of the things that they would like to do with their lives, their aspirations, their goals. Many of them are in the process of discovering who they are or finding their identities, but it’s always such a treat to hear it from the mouths of the young people who will be our future.

Standing at this podium, I feel that my biggest responsibility is to approach my new mission from a mother’s perspective. True Father hearkened in the time of the Pacific Rim Era and talked about how this is a time for the women to take on leadership, to really bring a world of peace for our world and for our children. Being a student of religion, for me it’s an incredibly awesome proclamation. As you know, the 6,000 biblical years of history has not been very kind to women. I know that because of the Fall, the process of restoring Eve’s position to that of a proper position, of what a true Eve should have been, took many thousands of years and many heartaches and sacrifices. Truly it’s in the personage of True Mother and her constant devotion and dedication and sacrifice in playing the role of the true bride and becoming the True Mother that I have this opportunity to assume the role that I’m doing now.

As a student of religion approaching our faith from an academic point of view, and having the opportunity to compare and contrast our faith with different religions of the world, this has been an incredibly eye-opening time for me. Especially the fact that we can say clearly that the proper woman’s role has been restored, thanks to our True Mother and thanks to so many American sisters who’ve hung in there all these years.

I mention American sisters because my father, in many of his sermons in the 70s and 80s, used to berate American women. Do you remember? He used to say, “American women, peh, peh, peh.” My sisters and I would be sitting together saying, “Oh, that sister’s getting it real bad.” Our hearts would really go out to the poor American sisters. At that time my brothers were young too, quite mischievous. Any opportunity to poke at their sisters was a fun time for them. I remember when my father was going at it, our brothers would poke us and say, “Did you hear that, In Jin? Women, women, bad, bad. Women, mistake, mistake. It’s all your fault.” We sisters felt like, “Is there a God at this moment?”

It’s interesting how God works in mysterious ways because those brothers that gave me and my sisters such a tough time for being a girl and for being a woman are the biggest promoters of what I’m doing right now. Many times at the end of the day I turn to my husband and say, “I never thought I’d see the day when my brothers would fully support me and my sisters and want to have an active role in our life of faith. Here they are, urging us on.” It’s so wonderful to have your whole family behind you.

Whenever I meet with members, I come as a representative of my family, but truly my family is standing here with me. Not only do we have the first True Parents in history, but we have the first True Family coming forward. Growing up was really difficult, being abandoned by our parents because they spent all their time with you, loving you up. We had to kind of go our own course, find our own way. But when I see Hyun Jin as the co-chairman of UPF trying his best, with all the Global Peace Festivals ongoing worldwide, and when I see Kook Jin, who has single-handedly stopped the financial bleeding in Korea through his restructuring, and right now we’re poised for incredible growth for the first time in our movement’s history in Korea. He single-handedly did that. Then I have my younger sister Sun Jin, who together with her husband is overseeing Happy World in Japan. She’s running a travel agency, Seil Travel.

Then I have my younger brother, that I still to this day fondly call Lovey. When he was born, he was so cute. I still remember my mom and I going shopping and she was so proud because these people we had met would just come up and say, “So cute!” Omonim would be just beaming. From the moment he was born, he was Lovey because he was so lovable and such a happy baby. For him to take up this new mission as the head of World Mission Department, in a way, becoming the spiritual head of our movement, the youngest one, is incredibly profound for me.

When I call my younger brother, who’s actually my boss as the spiritual head of the World Mission Department, I call and say, “Lovey, it’s In Jin nuna checking in. America reporting in.” I chuckle and he chuckles. It’s such a feeling that my family is working together with me. It’s so wonderful to have a younger brother that you can talk to. He very much is supporting me. He says, “You go, girl! You go, woman!” This is kind of, like, a new beginning for our movement, it’s like a new phase.

When I came to America as an 8-year-old, coming from a culture where everyone had black hair and black eyes, and then suddenly coming to Seattle, seeing many brothers and sisters welcoming us at Belvedere and East Garden, I saw golden hair for the first time, and brown hair. And red hair for the first time -- I thought that was incredibly intriguing. On top of that, curly hair, African-American hair. I remember thinking, I guess this is the worldwide family my father has been talking about.

When I looked into the eyes of these young, energetic, excited brothers and sisters -- which is basically you a couple of decades ago -- I saw this spark, I literally saw a gleam in their eyes. I remember saying to Un Jin, who’s my younger sister, I said, “I can understand the sparks coming from the sisters’ side, but I don’t get it from the brothers’ side. As far as I can see, they ain’t wearing no eye shadow.” But the brothers’ side had that sparkle. I drew a little picture for myself when I was 8; it’s not a fantastic picture. It’s basically a circle with two tiny circles with a sparkle going off the corner of one eye. I’ve kept that piece of paper all throughout the years, and it’s a reminder to me about how excited the young Americans were about finding God and about meeting True Parents, to think that the Second Coming is walking along with us, brothers and sisters, right? How many hundreds of years have gone by since Jesus Christ, when the world has not experienced God’s son and daughter?

Messiah is almost a scary word, but Messiah basically means a savior. To have a true parent that is going to show us the proper way to live, the proper way to honor each other, the proper way to love each other, and the proper way to raise our children, and they’re going to do it in our lifetime -- how exciting is that? That is unbelievably exciting.

Some of you sitting in the audience, when you go to college and study religion you’re going to realize that this is an incredible time, an extraordinary time, and the providence is moving so quickly. So many things are happening. We just came off the last round of elections, and it was incredibly energizing and inspiring, not just for America but for the whole world. America finally has a president-elect who is an African-American. I spent a great deal of time with Dr. Lowery, getting to know the civil rights movement, on behalf of Coalition for Religious Freedom when I was 18 years old. I remember meeting Dr. Lowery and his saying to me, “In Jin, God works in mysterious ways.” He would talk to me about the dream that Martin Luther King had of one day having an African-American in the office of president. Dr. Lowery wasn’t sure it would happen in his lifetime, but it certainly would be wonderful.

Yes, he’s representing the Democratic Party, and many people have come up to me and said, In Jin Nim, but he’s a Democrat. I say, “Yes, I know. But did you know that God works with both the Democrats and the Republicans?” That’s why our True Father initiated the Headwing movement many years ago because there are some components of Democratic Party principles that are wonderful, like the equality of women. There are some aspects of the Republican movement that are wonderful as well, some of the conservative values that reflect the Christian values of this country. So Father was saying, “Let’s pick the best of both parties and create a God-centered movement called Headwing.”

When I told my father that in the course of the last four months of running Manhattan Center and restructuring and reorganizing it, and finding really, truly that it is a diamond in the rough and all it needed was a nice woman’s touch and a bit of dusting off, I said to Father that, “There’s incredible things that we can do with media and entertainment.” Hyo Jin oppa was right in saying that media and entertainment are incredibly important. It’s something that we as a movement need to harness so that we can effectuate powerful change throughout the world.

I often say to the young people, “Do you realize that your older brother was an incredible visionary?” He was a passionate man, and many times passions are misunderstood because passions can be extreme. But he was passionate in his vision that music and art and culture can change people’s lives, and he saw how much of an impact it had on his own life. So he was saying to my parents and to all of us, imagine what we can do for the young people of the world if we harness the power of culture, of media and entertainment, and use it to promote God, family values, wonderful things, and use it as an opportunity to celebrate all things, all spectrums of life that make us human.

It doesn’t mean that the music is always going to be hallelujah music. It might be profound music, or it might be music that brings us to tears, or writing that expresses human desire and anguish and longing. These are all the things that make us human beings and, in a way, make us beautiful. That’s what Hyo Jin oppa wanted to do.

I often say to the young people in our movement, “We really have to be grateful for our elder brother and for his passion because he made rock ‘n roll okay in our movement.” For those of you who enjoy wearing blue jeans, it was Hyo Jin oppa who pioneered the way to make sure that blue jeans were included in the heavenly culture. I feel like in America as the second Israel, symbolizing the eldest son, it’s incredibly important for me to know that whatever I am doing, I am fulfilling, in a way, my older brother’s mission as the eldest son. I feel that holding my inauguration at the Manhattan Center was an important thing, and it’s truly a tribute to my brother and to everything he has done up until now. Whatever I can do is truly standing on his foundation, on his shoulders, if you will.

I often like to think of the second generation in that same way. I know many of the first generation have sacrificed your lives, your education, your careers to follow this vision of creating one family under God, right? I know there have been many heartaches and tears along the way, as well as much laughter. But you’ve been faithfully following True Parents year after year. As a member of the True Family, [I can testify that] we are truly grateful for your sacrifice. The first generation, you had this vision of building this incredible dream, this incredible house, if you will, and the first generation’s duty was literally was paving, or digging out, the foundation on which the house will be built. As you know, the higher you want the building to be, the deeper the foundation has to be. So, I think a lot of the first generation were so immersed in all the digging and all the different events, and all the different campaigns that were going on, you were just digging for dear life. And many of you have asked yourselves, “What am I doing this for? Why I am doing this? Why am I sacrificing? I don’t see a building going up. But, in a way, what you were doing was paving the way, in a way, laying the foundation of an incredible house that the second generation, your children, is going to build.

So, if we can realize, if the second generation can realize, a tremendous debt, or a tremendous sense of honor in being able to stand on top of the foundation that has gone before, so that we with a grateful heart can harvest in all your suffering, and all those years that you’ve dedicated for God. And through our sheer effort, and through our determination, to live as a God-centered son and daughter every day of our lives, and not just be externally excellent but internally excellent, meaning, not only is our spiritual faith like a backbone of who we are, but, in a way, the external accomplishments we do will flesh out who we are as human beings so we can become whole persons, so we can become a whole movement.

Just as the first generation sacrificed everything that was external to find their true center, to find their true relationship with God, then the second generation needs to build on top of that. We need to flesh out the incredible bone structure that your parents have given us, and become these incredible creative beings that reflect God in every sector of our lives.

I feel that the second generation really need to honor our parents. I, as a member of this second generation coming from the True Family, really urge the second generation to respect their parents and all their suffering. I say this with such tremendous love because I was touring different districts and spent some time in Boston. Afterward I made sure to shake everyone’s hand and I met a Japanese couple who have a couple of kids. A 15-year-old boy was coming down the line who obviously was not too thrilled to be there. His parents were dragging him along. I said, “Hi, how are you, what’s your name?” He told me. I said, “That’s a wonderful name. What does it mean?” And he told me. I said, “Where are you in your education?” He was in high school. I asked him, “What are your life goals? What would you like to be?” He looked at me and said, “Like father like son. My father’s a loser so I’m going to be a loser.” I said, “Young man, I don’t know how you talk to your parents, but this is no way to talk about your parents in front of me. Please don’t say things like that about your parents. You need to know that your parents are not losers. They are heroes.”

The reason this boy said that his parents were losers was that they had very little to show for it. No financial safety. Literally putting food on the table every day was a struggle. So the child, watching his parents, basically said, “No, I don’t want this for me. They haven’t made anything of their lives, so why should I?”

Afterward my husband and I talked about this. It’s really high time that we as a movement learn to respect each other, and that goes both ways. Not just first to second generation, but second to first generation. I feel that there has to be a constant reminder when it comes to our children that our sacrifice doesn’t equate to being losers. We might not have the external money or the house or the cars to show for it, but truly you guys are heroes in that the internal excellence that you have shown over the years, the internal loyalty and devotion that you have shown over the years, those things are priceless, and those are the qualities that make somebody a hero.

I told this gentleman, “You are only 15. You have a lot to live for. So if you truly feel that your parents are financially not well off and you don’t respect them and you don’t want to dream because your parents don’t inspire you to dream, then shouldn’t you take charge of your life? Shouldn’t you be the agent of change? You’re sitting smack in the middle of the land of opportunity that people from other nations are literally smuggling themselves in to come and start a new life.” I told him, “You may think that your parents haven’t given you anything, but the fact that they brought you here and you’re an American citizen, that’s more than what the majority of the world has. You’re starting out pretty well. Now that you know you’re standing smack in the middle of the land of opportunity, what are you going to do about it? Are you going to complain and say, look at the sins of the first generation and think how awful they were, therefore I have the right to be awful myself? Doesn’t that kind of turn you into a hypocrite? If you think that somebody’s awful, shouldn’t you be wonderful? If you think somebody’s a loser, shouldn’t you be awesome? There is nothing preventing you from being wonderful and awesome, other than yourself. So if you decide to be that agent of change, and you put your head to the books and get good grades, the sky’s the limit.”

Obama came from a single parent home, with few prospects. As an African-American, the thought of becoming the president of the United States was an impossibility. When Martin Luther King gave his speech, I Have a Dream, back then it was an impossibility for an African-American to be the president of the United States. But not only did that impossibility become a possibility, it’s become a reality.

When I look at the blessed children wherever I go, I’m thinking, if Obama can become the president of the United States, shouldn’t this 15-year-old boy, if he decides to be that agent of change, couldn’t he become the president of the United States? And by his decision to live his life for a purpose other than to be negative, to complain, if he decides that he’s going to be grateful for the life that he’s been given, thinking, “I’m healthy, I’m an American, I have access to an educational system that if I utilize it to my advantage can basically propel me to any level of society” -- couldn’t he become the president of the United States?

And I am a firm believer in that boy being able to fulfill his dreams. I’m a firm believer in our children becoming the future Michael Phelps. When I watched the Beijing Olympics with my children, there was this incredible moment at the awards ceremony, and there he is looking almost like a rap star with all these gold medals, and then the national anthem comes on. I thought to myself: How incredibly wonderful would it be if one of our blessed children -- maybe they’re super-talented in athletics, so instead of thinking regional, just being good in my community and getting into a decent college, why not think global or world? Why not think about representing America as a great athlete to the world?

Can you imagine if one of our children is standing there at the awards ceremony, looking bling-bling with all those gold medals around their neck, and when the national anthem comes up that child is thanking God, thanking True Parents, thanking mom and dad, thanking America -- can you imagine what can happen in that instant? It’s incredible what can be accomplished in an instant.

When I really look at America now in this new mission, I say to my husband, America is a super-power, an incredibly powerful nation. In my introductory political science course the professor stood at the podium, just like I’m doing now, and defined what power means. The professor defined power to mean the ability to influence. When I heard that, I thought to myself, America has been so blessed and so prepared by God because America has that responsibility to exercise its power in the right way, meaning whatever America does, the world follows, right? When you had the Beatles and Elvis, Japan soon followed suit. When America introduced Levis blue jeans, the whole world took notice. Right now we’re living through the cult of celebrity, where celebrities have literally become god-like.

I often wondered why the Dalai Lama is so accepted in the Western world, when our True Parents have done more, have introduced a more beautiful image of what God is because we have male and female manifested in True Parents. Why is the Dalai Lama so revered? I ask people on the street what they think about him, and they reply that he’s a wonderful religious holy man. I say, “Do you know what he believes in?” They have no idea. But they respect the Dalai Lama because their celebrities revere him, people that they feel are god-like. For young people seeing people like Richard Gere, people like Uma Thurman, whose father is actually a professor of Tibetan Buddhism at Columbia University, constantly surrounding the Dalai Lama make him look hip, look pertinent. On top of that, they represent a cause, right?

I was thinking that part of Hyo Jin oppa’s message in wanting to turn the entertainment industry around is because he wanted to harness the entertainment world for the sake of our True Parents. Can you imagine if at the next gathering maybe Beyonce or Busta Rhymes came? I don’t know what music you’re into. I had no idea who Busta Rhymes was or listened to rap music until I got to the Manhattan Center. If all these people were with True Parents, in an instant that would re-brand the whole image of Unification Church, right?

A lot of the work that Hyo Jin oppa wanted to do is something that I would like to continue. I feel that if we can turn America around into a country that can really recognize our True Parents as the peacemakers of the world, as the father and mother who are inviting all the major religions to come together as children and to worship God in fellowship, if we can help Americans realize that there is something wonderful in wanting to build families, that there is something wonderful in living for the sake of others.

Whenever I tell my friends that one of our strong beliefs is we want to live for the sake of others, many times they ask me, “What does that mean?” I share with them, as I share with brothers and sisters when I go around the country, that living for the sake of others starts with living. You have to live before you can serve. I spent so many years going through the formula course, witnessing and fundraising and feeling like I have to give, give, give. I literally found myself at a moment in my life where I felt I had given so much that I had nothing left to give. Then I realized I was no good to myself, and I was no good to my husband, to my family. That’s when I realized that living for the sake of others does not mean that you cease to be who you are. God made each and every one of us unique. When I meet the blessed children, I say, “You are uniquely gifted, uniquely talented because you are uniquely blessed. Literally our True Parents invited your parents to join in holy matrimony and create this family that resulted in you beautiful young kids.”

I feel that many of the first generation literally, instead of living for the sake of others, have been dying for the sake of others. And I myself went through that, where I was dying for the sake of others. I wasn’t really living or thriving or prospering. When I look around different districts, some of you have been dying for the sake of others, for the sake of your mission, for your spouse, for your children, and for the sake of your leader. But I think this is a time when we can really take another look at what living for the sake of others means, to realize that living for the sake of others starts with breathing, with walking, with living, with loving. And in that process of self-discovery and becoming a healthy individual you can truly serve others.

If the second generation ends up doing exactly what the first generation was doing, which was literally digging out the basement, and if every generation is merely digging and not building, then the beautiful house that inspired you to have that spark when you first heard the Principle and joined, will never be realized.

In our efforts to concentrate on the spiritual, the internal, we’ve neglected the outer and the external. But I feel that external needs to be a good manifestation of what we are inside. I feel we are the world’s best content, and you guys are the most beautiful people in the world. Now we just have to help the world see how incredible and how beautiful each and every one of you is.

As the CEO of Manhattan Center, I spend a lot of time thinking about marketing, about branding, how do we position ourselves in such a way that we become naturally attractive? I’ve been going around the country introducing this concept of natural witnessing. Over the years we’ve had many, many witnessing initiatives under different leaders, and we’ve tried the old methods many times. I remember in those early days we had literally 200 or 300 people coming every weekend wanting to hear the Principle.

We’re still using that same method of witnessing, but we’re not seeing that result. If you ask yourself why, the answer is that the world has changed. When you joined, you were literally backpacking around the country to find meaning in your life. Well, the young people of today are backpacking on the Internet. It’s a little different from how you used to be. The kids have a whole new vocabulary all their own. Internet is like the highway for them.

One of the things I’ve been working on with my talented team members is to “clean up” our presence on the Internet. So instead of having all the negative things come up when you Google Sun Myung Moon, we need to barrage the Internet with positive material so people will see the positive and they can make their own choice as to what they think Rev. Moon is really about. They will be an informed audience. That’s what we would like to do.

But in the meantime I’ve been encouraging brothers and sisters that this is really a time where we as a movement need to get re-excited about coming to church and seeing our neighbor. We need to feel good about looking wonderful for our children. Especially in the West Coast area I met some members who are so caught in the 1960s. God bless them, they’re beautiful people, but they still look like you could literally cut them out and place them in the 60s and they’ll fit right in. I’ve often encouraged brothers and sisters to bring their “look” up to date. How you look is an expression of what you are inside. All of us here are ambassadors for True Parents and for God. You become a walking witness for what our movement is all about.

The most beautiful thing about our movement is the Blessing, right? To have an eternal partner who will love and honor you, be faithful to you. I like to say to my friends and children, the worst mistake in the Blessing is taking each other for granted. What do I mean by that? Taking each other for granted and thinking that no matter how smelly, how dirty I might be, my spouse has to be there for me eternally. We women laugh at ourselves when we talk about the Western sisters phenomenon, where after they get Blessed, they gain weight. I call it the Pillsbury doughboy biscuit effect. Somehow there is a beautiful container of buttermilk biscuits, but the minute they go through the Blessing, it’s like opening the package and the dough bursts out, poof. It’s almost like, since my spouse can’t go anywhere, it really doesn’t matter how I look, how big I become, because he has to be there with me eternally.

I met one sister, who was telling me negative things about her husband, but she ended her tirade by saying, but he has nowhere to go. He’s a Blessed Couple. Where can he go? I said to her, “The world is a bigger place than you think.” Now that True Parents have opened up the Blessing, in many instances you can bring your own spouse. It compels all of us to remain at our best, not just spiritually but also how we look for one another. If you go through the biscuit effect, how would your husband feel? What would your children think? I’ve met some blessed children who say, “I’m embarrassed when my parents pick me up at school.” I asked them, “Why is that?” This child said, “My dad looks like he hasn’t bought pants for the last 20 years. My mom has so much dandruff that I just don’t want my friends to see my mom. I don’t want them to know that she’s my mom.” I said, “That must be really painful for you.” She said, “Yes, it has been, and I don’t know how to say to them in a nice way that’s not going to hurt them.”

I asked, “Have you made any attempt to remedy the situation?” She said, “I just don’t know what to do except tell them not to pick me up at school.” I said, “That might not be the best approach.” I said, “Have you ever heard of TJ Maxx or Marshalls? They have fabulous sales going on. You don’t need much money to help your parents look good. If you are embarrassed at how your parents look, maybe you can put in extra hours to make some money and give them a coupon, and say, ‘Today is your birthday, or Christmas, or a church holiday’ -- and we have a lot of church holidays to choose from now! So no excuses, parents, and kids. Tell them, mom and dad, this is something that I want to do for you because you’ve given me life, you’ve given me so much meaning, purpose.”

I told this one girl, “Please don’t tell your parents that they’re an embarrassment to you, but please tell them, I want you to look good because you’re an ambassador of True Parents.” She got excited, and she realized that she can be an agent of change, that she can make that foundation to honor her parents and take them to TJ Maxx for a fabulous sale, and have fun going with them to try on clothes, checking the personal care products that are available. It really depends on how we view ourselves.

Of course the parental heart is to do whatever they can to love and support the second generation. That’s the beginning of a beautiful relationship. That can start now, this hour, or tomorrow, but it depends on whether we are going to decide to be that agent of change. I would like us to be known for having incredible children. Already that’s taking place. In my own experience, my natural witnessing, if you will, my kids are the best witnessing tools I’ve had over the years. I have people literally asking me, “Why are your kids so different? They respect adults, which is so rare nowadays.” These questions automatically lead to telling about who we are and what we believe in. That’s natural witnessing, which is more like the sunshine instead of the wind.

We’ve gone through a phase where we were blowing people down with the Divine Principle -- we have the truth, you need to listen, go to the workshop. Somewhere along the line we’ve kind of forgotten that not only is it important to teach, but it’s important to live. Once you start living, you become the natural witnesser for who you’re representing.

I’ve met some of your children along my journey, and one in particular is named Matthew, who I met at UTS when STF was having a workshop there. He told me the story of walking outside UTS with his friends and meeting a lady who was looking for Father’s trail. Not only did he show her where the trail was, but he took such good care of this elderly woman that she felt compelled to ask, “Who are you people? What organization do you belong to? You guys are so different. You went out of your way to take care of me.” Matthew proceeded to tell her about how his parents participated in one of the mass weddings. Her eyes got big and she said, “I had no idea. Then Rev. Moon must be a good man.”

That’s the power of natural witnessing. Our children, by inheriting this philosophy of living for the sake of others, actually practicing it in their daily lives and making people so inspired about who they are, other people are realizing that True Parents are good people. That’s just one example.

I met another sister who works with CARP. She is in charge of putting together activities for second generation related to the Abel UN. The supervisor at the event came up to her and said, “Sophia, who are you people? You guys are so different. There’s something unique about you. What is it?” She also answered, “Do you remember those mass weddings? Our parents were in one of those weddings.” This person also responded, “Rev. Moon must be a good man.” That’s the power of natural witnessing.

We’ve been blowing people down with our faith, and wondering why some of them cling to their coats a little tighter, not wanting to listen. I thought, “How wonderful would it be if we can be more like the sun, if we by the way we live our lives, our natural witnessing, naturally attract people to want to be part of our congregation?” Instead of preaching, maybe we should do a little bit more living. Instead of trying to save the world, maybe we should care a little more for our children, who need us very, very much.

As a child of this movement, who grew up literally without a parent, I feel it’s my job to encourage all parents to really invest in the future, invest in your children because they are our greatest asset. There is no limit to what they can do if we can truly inspire them with this vision of external excellence and internal excellence. Let’s give them the vision of the impossibility becoming a possibility and then becoming a reality like Obama. Let’s remind our children that the things they take for granted, like being able to sit anywhere on the school bus, was because of a certain individual named Rosa Parks, a quiet African-American woman who basically said, “I’m not going to give up my seat on this bus because that’s not right.” This little lady sparked the civil rights movement that changed America, and impacted the world.

These individuals effectively moved the hearts of young people all over the world. Why can’t we do that with our own community? Why can’t we raise up a generation of young people that basically say, “I’m tired of becoming a Gen X-er, I don’t want to be a Gen Y, I don’t want to be a millennial -- which is basically the “show me the money” generation.” The shows on MTV like “Cribs” which literally follow stars around, showing their girlfriends and cars and money flowing everywhere -- young people are inundated with that. I’ve often felt that young people are losing a sense of what is truly valuable and meaningful in life. That’s why True Parents are so incredibly important.

Most recently a friend of mine sent me a video clip from a CNN interview with a 22-year-old college graduate who was looking at getting a masters degree, but finding herself without enough money to fund her dream. The interviewer was asking her, “How did you come to the decision to auction your virginity on the Internet to the highest bidder?” She replied, “When I was a little girl, of course I was inspired by stories of Cinderella and Snow White and Prince Charming, and I was inspired by romantic love, finding that special someone. But having gone through school, seeing my friends basically bed-hopping throughout college, I asked myself, ‘Why am I holding onto my purity when my society is telling me it’s worthless?’” She came to this decision, thinking that if her purity didn’t mean anything to society, maybe she could put a monetary value on it and see if some people want to buy it. Then at least she’s getting something back and would be able to fund her masters program.

When my friend sent me this clip, he asked what I thought. I said, “It’s awful! This young lady feels the only thing she has left to offer is a dollar sign placed on her virginity. If that is not a litmus test of where America is at, I don’t know what is.”

I know that many young Blessed Children, going through their own course in life, have decided to go the high road, but some have decided to go the long and winding road. I would like to say to anybody in this audience that regardless of where you are in your life, fundamentally it is your life and fundamentally you have the right to decide what kind of person you are going to be. But from God and True Parents’ point of view, no matter what you do, once a Blessed Child, you’re always a Blessed Child -- meaning whether you go the straight and narrow or go the long and winding, you will soon find yourself coming back to your faith, to your family, realizing how incredibly important this community is to you.

Just as this young lady was struggling with the issue of “What is purity? Is it worth anything? Can I put a monetary value on it? Can I have the highest bidder,” maybe some of you might be wondering, “Is my purity worth it? Is it worth waiting for a special somebody?” I would have to say, “Absolutely.” I have three kids in college now who’ve seen the college scene. I have encouraged them to see what’s going on, and then come back and tell me whether their grandpa has a good message or not. They’ve all said to me, “Mom, now that I’m going to college I realize how necessary our True Parents are, how necessary the message of true love really is, the importance of moral values, of saving ourselves for that special someone so that we don’t present ourselves as a used Pokemon card, a used gift, if you will. Just as we want something brand-new on our birthday, why should we not have something brand-new and wonderful on our Blessing day?” There is beauty in that.

Instead of thinking of kyung-bae as some strange Eastern cultural gesture, if you understand it as an expression of love, of respect, of honoring your parents, honoring your elders, or honoring your spouse, next time before going to bed please trying doing kyung-bae to your spouse in a very slow, thoughtful, prayerful way. You will realize that your relationship will be that much more profound and meaningful because you’re respecting this person that God has given to you.

I feel that the message our True Parents gave to us is so important and so crucial to America because it’s really a message about everyone’s right to dream. Father is helping each and every individual to dream, to find that special someone who has similar values, to be married to somebody where you’re not questioning his faithfulness every day. Can you imagine being in a relationship where you question your spouse about this every day? What kind of a life is that? But how wonderful it is to be Blessed to someone with shared values, who knows the importance of fidelity.

“Absolute sex” is the literal translation of the Korean phrase, but in my experience with non-members most people understand this the wrong way. What Father is saying is that one is absolutely faithful. A better translation would be “absolute fidelity.” Practicing fidelity, trust, communication -- these are the things that make a wonderful relationship between a husband and wife, and between children and parents, so that each family becomes a team. A sports team has different positions and roles. A family is like a team, each with their strengths and weaknesses. But let’s come together and say we’re going to be a great team, a great building block for this incredible house that our True Parents and God want to see manifested on earth. We as a movement can concentrate on building our own teams and seeing ourselves as building blocks that will create this incredible community. Then I think we can truly build something awesome.

In light of all these young people trying to figure out who they are, and with all the things that have gone on in America, like 9/11, where the wars of religion have truly taken away so many lives in the name of God, we really need to come together as a worldwide family to say, “There is one God, He is our Heavenly Parent, and we’re all family, all brothers and sisters. Doesn’t matter what religion you are. We believe in the one God, we believe in the same parent.” Concentrate on the common denominators that unite us.

A lot of wonderful things are happening in the short months I’ve been at Manhattan Center and HSA, but the providence is moving very quickly. A book called “The Tipping Point” describes moments in history where something has been building up and up and finally lets loose and changes the world. I feel that our movement is approaching that tipping point. All the sacrifices and all the things that you’ve given up in order to build this kingdom are helping the second generation move toward that tipping point.

When I meet with CEOs and celebrities, they’re all searching, and they love the concept of being in one family, the concept of owning a generation that calls themselves Generation Peace, a group of young men and women who basically say, “We will absolutely oppose violence. We believe in one family under God, and we believe our Heavenly Father is our heavenly parent.” These are the common denominators that unite us all, and this is something that runs through not just our movement but all the families and nations of the world. That’s part of the reason why I gave all of the Blessed Children a wristband to remind themselves that they belong to a new generation, a wonderful generation where instead of waiting for politicians to solve our problems, for religious leaders to stop the wars, that we can be agents of change. It’s going to start with ourselves and with our families becoming great teams. By doing it one family at a time, taking the small steps that are necessary for building this incredible house of God, there is an endless amount of possibilities and opportunities for this world.

For those of you American second generation who felt that you had no place in the church because there was a misunderstanding of what True Family is all about, and the importance of Korean, and importance of Korea being the chosen nation -- I love to quote Young Oon Kim wherever I go. One of the most beautiful things she expounded on while she was here with us is that being chosen means you are chosen to serve. If you are Korean and you truly feel you represent the chosen nation, then we are chosen to serve our brothers and sisters so much so that they become greater than us.

I know that many American Blessed Children have suffered because there’s like a pecking order in our movement, which says that Koreans have the deepest heart, are the most profound, come from Father’s country. Next there are the Japanese, and the Westerners are many times at the bottom of the totem pole. But I am here to encourage you and empower you, to say that America has an incredible providential responsibility and you are the future. You, as this new movement of young people who are going to re-brand yourselves as a Generation of Peace, you are going to help usher in a new age, where the whole world can recognize that our True Parents are the eternal Peace King and the Second Coming walking with us each and every day.

Father often says that he is going to retire in 2013, and that retirement means ascension. My brothers and I are praying every day that we will have our True Parents with us a little bit longer. But how wonderful would it be if in their lifetime the world can recognize them as the peacemakers that they so deserve to be? With the providence moving so quickly, this is not a time to be complaining about ourselves, or looking at the glass as half empty. Everything depends on how we view ourselves.

The first generation are not losers. They are heroes. The second generation are not kids without identities. They are beautiful sons and daughters of God who are going to do incredible things for the world, representing America to the world and exercising the power to influence the world to follow and honor God in the correct way. Thereby we will see America fulfilling its providential duty, becoming the great country that our True Parents always believed it to be.

With that I wish all of you a wonderful Sunday, a wonderful week, a wonderful month. Those of you who have been plodding along, I encourage you to plod a little bit more. Those of you with children, please talk to them, take care of them, invest in them, and remind them how awesome they really are.

I’m here as a member of my family to really thank the membership, who have been struggling and trying their best throughout the years. It’s the time of harvest, brothers and sisters. Instead of letting all the good produce go to waste, let’s harvest it, the greatest asset of our community which is our Blessed Children. Let’s reclaim our Blessed Children, get them inspired about everything that True Parents are, and everything that our movement has to offer, and in that process change the world. Thank you very much. 

38. In Jin Nim's Monthly Journal No. 4 December (December 2008 - Pdf)

In Jin Nim's Monthly Journal No. 4 December (December 2008 - Pdf)