A Unified Spirit And A Unified Mind Centered On Our True Parents

In Jin Moon
October 3, 2010
Lovin' Life Ministries

On October 3rd, 2010, Rev. In Jin Moon spoke of her father and mother, the Rev. and Mrs. Sun Myung Moon, both having the attitude of a warrior in their mission as True Parents. Rev. Moon clarified that the a true warrior is somebody with a purpose, with determination, who dares to go where no one wants to go.

Rev. Moon shared about her experience as a student being persecuted with her siblings at school for being a "moonie". However, after signifying their purpose for going to school each day, they were able to get through the battlefield as warriors living to serve others.

Good morning, brothers and sisters. How is everyone this morning? Sounds like some people over there had their breakfast: You have a lot of power there!

I'm delighted to be with you again, on this lovely Sunday morning. Here at Headquarters we are getting ready for a great deal of festivity that is scheduled in Korea on October 10, when our True Parents will preside over the Holy Blessing ceremony. This blessing is a very important one in that it is taking place on October 10, 2010: 10–10–10. We will not see these numbers again for the next 1,000 years, so it has a providential significance.

Together with the great men and women working with me here at Headquarters in the Lovin' Life Ministry, we are trying our best to share the breaking news of what a remarkable time this is when we have our True Parents with us. For them to be presiding over the Holy Blessing on 10–10–10, I feel, is historically and providentially significant.

True Father comes as the one anointed by Jesus Christ himself, when my father was 16 years old, praying in the lonely hills of North Korea. Jesus asked my father to fulfill Jesus' mission, and Jesus told the story of how he was not supposed to die on the cross. In fact, he was supposed to live and find the beautiful woman who could be his wife; and the two together, symbolizing perfected Adam and Eve, were to stand in the position of the True Parents.

If for the first time in history Jesus could have stood in that position 2,000 years ago, we today as people of this world could, through Jesus Christ, be inheriting and substantiating the heavenly lineage through which we would understand God as our Heavenly Parent and we would understand the clear purpose of our lives: to create beautiful families and to leave something beautiful behind in the form of our children, eternal sons and daughters.

But, as you know, Jesus did not have that chance. He had to go the way of the cross, and history had to wait another 2,000 years before Jesus anointed my father, who took up the responsibility of perfecting himself as the True Father and finding his beautiful wife in 1960. With their marriage representing the Holy Marriage of the Lamb, these two together as the True Parents stand in the position to partake in building one family under God. True Parents are doing this not just by teaching people that they all are especially prepared eternal sons and daughters but by helping them graft onto the "original olive branch" offered by True Parents. Thereby, people become part of the divine lineage, marrying into the lineage of Heavenly Father and Mother, so we can call God our Heavenly Father and Mother.

So, having True Parents here with us is an incredible thing. They are here to help us become part of the worldwide family, and it's just in the nick of time, if you really think about it. Here we are, living in one of the superpowers of the world with vast arrays of technology available to us. We have so much power, but we don't quite know what to do with it. We have so much power, in fact, that we have the capacity to blow up our world many times over. We need our True Parents here to remind us that despite the differences in culture, race, economics, and tradition, we must come together as one family, and not just talk about being one family but actually graft onto, marry into, each other's families, into God's family.

That is why True Parents are so crucial to this world for the work of peace building. Only when you become part of one family do you realize how much we need each other, how much we have to love each other and support each other.

Thinking this morning about my father's life, I reflect again that he's lived over 90 years and is still going strong. He can out talk anybody. The last marathon was about 12 hours, and he still wanted to go on. Had it not been for the cute little grandchildren coming in with notes from my mother reminding Father how long he'd been speaking, I'm sure he would have talked far into the night and way into the morning.

When I think about this man, he is truly extraordinary in that ever since he was 16 years old, when he was anointed by Jesus Christ, he has approached his mission with the attitude of a warrior. When I say the word warrior, I'm not talking about somebody who's out there slaying people. When I think of a warrior, I think of somebody with a purpose, with determination, with a mission that he or she wants to fulfill. A warrior is somebody who dares to go where no one wants to go. The world is so busy being selfish and consumed with temptation, maybe in the form of what I call PMS -- Power, Money, and Sex. It's not just women that are PMS-ing all the time, but a great many of the world's fathers and brothers are also PMS-ing because they're constantly being tempted by power, knowledge, money, and sex.

Despite what my father had to struggle through and overcome, the incredible thing about him is that he dares to live a life of unselfishness in a world that is consumed by selfishness. One of the great teachers of the Baha'i religion talks about it -- how we are all consumed by the temptations of the flesh. The teacher reminds us that we are all simply like fingers on a hand, that we are a member of a body.

A great many religions and teachers have reminded humanity that we are part of something bigger than ourselves. We exist almost like fingers on a hand, but that hand belongs to our Heavenly Parent. When we hear teachings like this, and the words of my father, who dares to go where most people do not dare to go and to pledge himself to a life of ridicule, mistreatment, and abuse, we can recognize something worthy of the great warrior that I have come to know my father is.

Not only does Father approach his mission with a sense of purpose and fearlessness in wanting to right the wrongs, to go where nobody wants to go, and to live the kind of life that no one else wants to live, he also practices living for the sake of others because he ultimately wants to see the world become a place that God can call his and her home. My father longs for home, just like any warrior or soldier fighting a battle. The end goal in their fight is to bring the victory back home. There's a certain yearning for home.

That's what my father longs for and works hard for. He wants to come home. At the end of his life, he wants to create a world that God can come home to, a world that is loving and peaceful, where God's children can reside in love and prosperity. This is what he wants. This is the reason he has tirelessly fought over many obstacles, including six imprisonments.

I remember growing up in America in the 1970s. It was not a walk in the park. There was a great deal of fanfare initially, with mayors and governors giving my father keys to every city and state because they saw us as a movement of young men and women who were doing great things. But our movement became a victim of its own success. Hundreds of brothers and sisters were joining at every weekend workshop, and people started to wonder, why are they so successful? Why are they having such an effect on these young people?

Some of these young people were previously engaged in drugs and living hippie lifestyles; others were studying at the best universities. Why were people like that so inspired by this message of true love? It scared a lot of people, so we got the backlash. In the late 1970s my siblings and I had a tough time at school because of this. Attending school felt like going into enemy territory every day. On a battlefield, a soldier can roam around somewhat, but at school we had to meet the same people every day.

I was very close to my brother who was one year younger than I [Heung Jin Moon], and we often talked about how to tackle this conundrum in our lives. My brother was into fantasy novels, and he loved the image of the warrior–gladiator figure, a lonely, powerful man willing to take on the burdens of the world because he believed he had a mission to fulfill. This type of hero believed in a purpose that needed to be executed, and he was willing to go through any amount of suffering and misery to achieve what he wanted to do. My younger brother identified with these characters that he read about.

One evening I said, "Another week at school is starting tomorrow. How are we going to get through the week?" I suggested, "Why don't you and I decide to become warriors? Let's go to school knowing that we have a purpose -- we are there to learn, to absorb everything we possibly can so we can excel and be better prepared for college and our career, so we can be better prepared to give something back when we have professional expertise. We are there with a purpose."

Once we focused our minds on that, engaging fierce battle in different classrooms, we were ready because we knew why we were there. We were not there to get hurt, to be victimized, to be abused. Knowing we were in for a fight, we were going there because we had a purpose for going to school. We thought it was wonderful to see ourselves as warriors with a mission, going where nobody dared to go, entering the kind of environment that most teenagers would run away from, perhaps change schools or stay home and not deal with the problem. We had to glamorize ourselves a little, so we called ourselves warriors of true love. I know it sounds tacky, but back then it worked.

We were going to go into enemy territory, where no one wanted to go. Being called Moonies day in and day out felt like being shot with a machine gun. Moon is a beautiful name that belongs to my father, that we are proud to call our own, but the other students were using our own name to try to shoot us down. Sometimes it was so debilitating and wearing emotionally. How could we develop an emotional bulletproof vest and still walk down the hallways at school with pride and dignity, knowing we were there for a mission that we were going to carry through?

We told ourselves that we were going to go to school and dare to go where nobody else wanted to go; even knowing we were going to be called names and ridiculed, we still went ahead because we were the warriors of true love. When we got through these battles and past the land mines, we could come home at the end of the day having learned something. We weren't there just to be abused or mistreated or called names.

If we could have the strength in that environment to remember why we were there and learn something by focusing on our purpose and not listening to the static in the air, if we could not just learn and survive, but actually be the best students, get that award at the end of the year, write that winning essay for a college grant, if we could do that, we felt, that no matter how bad it was, at the end of the day we would be coming home, coming back to a place where we had love. We might not have had our parents, but we certainly had each other. We could regroup and re-energize ourselves, reminding ourselves one more time that we were warriors of true love and would go back the next day.

We told ourselves that the single most important thing about being a warrior was that we had to understand unity. We had to have a single purpose. We could not have dual purposes. When you're going into battle, you need to clearly know what you are going to do. If you are confused going into battle, you are not going to survive. We knew we needed a single, unified purpose in going through what was hell for us. We willingly and conscientiously went to school every day because we wanted to live our lives serving others. That was our single most driving and important philosophy. Behind that philosophy was the example of our True Parents.

We realized that the most important thing in that hostile environment, a difficult life for a good number of years, was to have clarity of vision, singularity in thought, and total unity with our parents and what they thought we needed to do so that we could become great people.

When I think back to my high school years and my younger brother, I remember how we supported each other to tackle life. Battlefields are not just physical. Because he was a boy, my brother was assaulted many times by people calling him Moonie and saying that he belonged to a weird cult. But he took on all that burden, all the emotional as well as physical battles, because he had a unified, singular understanding of why he was doing what he was doing. He realized he was an eternal son of God, with a personal destiny he had to fulfill.

Yes, we knew there would be difficulties and battlefields, but we also realized the key to overcoming these. It was to be totally unified in the spirit and love of our True Parents and in understanding that there has to be a sincere desire to live for the sake of others in order to help mature and grow ourselves into altruistic and loving people. We realized we could not deviate from being focused on our parents.

This singularity of vision is just as important for all of us today as it was for my brother and me many years ago. As our church grows and as we become a movement of not just First and Second Generation, but now third and fourth, and soon fifth generation, many things in our church are changing. My father is getting older. The children are growing up. We are faced with a situation in which there are lots of different representatives of our True Parents all around the world. In the First Generation, there are missionaries and leaders of our movement, but as the True Family comes to the forefront, we have many children involved. We as True Family know very clearly that the most important thing, as the hands belonging to a body, as a foot belonging to a body, as an elbow or a knee belonging to a body, is belonging to one body. The head of the family is the True Parents.

Therefore, we must absolutely be singular in our purpose or else the body cannot operate properly. Can you imagine if the brain signals to the hand, "Grab that piece of chocolate sitting on the table. With the thumb and index finger, bring it slowly to your mouth and take a bite without biting your thumb or index finger."

Now imagine if somewhere down the line that communication goes awry and somehow the hand picks up the chocolate and throws it at the husband sitting across the table from you, all while you're opening your mouth to savor the delectable treat. Not only are you going to upset your husband because you're a good shot and you got him squarely on the nose, but you're not going to be satisfied because you didn't get the chocolate.

Or what if your brain signals you, "Take the thumb and index finger, pick up the chocolate, slowly bring it to the mouth, and take a bite," but your hand understands that somehow as, "Grab the chocolate, smoosh the chocolate and bite your fist." It's not going to have the same effect, right?

Likewise, the True Children are like different parts of the body. We have to work, listening to one command, one brain. It's one brain with two hemispheres, the right and the left, our Father and Mother. They give us the signal and say, "It's time to reward yourself a little." It's time to take a bit of the chocolate. Enjoy."

When we unite with the signal from the brain, we can partake in something pleasurable to our senses. Biting into that rich milk chocolate that slowly melts in your mouth and coats your tongue, you feel gloriously happy. It's almost as if all the problems of your world disappear and then you can enjoy and feel satisfied in that bite.

Likewise, during this time of transition, when our church is going through growing pains, our True Parents, the two hemispheres of the brain, are still the center, taking care of the whole body, sending us truly courageous and right signals for us to unite with so we can accomplish the task at hand. The brain is telling the True Children, but also brothers and sisters in our movement, to be warriors of true love: "Live a life with a purpose. Live a life that dares to go where nobody wants to go."

We dare to live a life of unselfishness. We are not going to be caught PMS-ing all the time. We are going to try to create something beautiful out of this gift called life. We are going to find that special somebody and try to build an ideal family. When our Heavenly Parent blesses us with beautiful children, we are going to try our best to bring out the best in them, to inspire them to want to fulfill their unique personal destinies that are eternal, unchanging, and always there just waiting for them to make the decision to be that special eternal son or daughter of God.

The Good Book reminds us in I Corinthians 1:10 to be united, to be perfectly joined with no divisions amongst us. It asks us to be perfectly joined, same mind with same mind. The King James Version uses the words "same judgment." Different Bibles use the words "same purpose." We need to be perfectly joined having the same mind and same purpose in the way we carry out our belief system, in our understanding of why we are here and who we are, and in the way we live our lives so we can become that great son or daughter that all of us are meant to become.

One of the phrases Paulo Coelho coined in The Alchemist tickles me every now and then. He says, "To realize one's personal legend is really the only true obligation of any individual." He means that to realize the meaning of our life, we have to tap into why we're here and understand that each of us is a personal legend in the making, a precious child of God put upon this earth to do great things, not just for ourselves but to affect, influence, and empower those around us.

By lifting others through your good works and being the kind of good person you are, you live eternally in these people's memory. You become a legend in that you have touched these people's lives and perhaps have brought them closer to an understanding of the divine, or an understanding that we all share a common parent, our Heavenly Father and Mother.

Coelho encourages each of us to realize that every person was born with the precious gift of a personal legend. In The Alchemist he tells a tale of an Andalusian boy, Santiago, who goes in search of the great treasures near the pyramids. When Santiago doesn't find anything and comes back home, he realizes that basically the journey was really a process of getting to know who he is. In the midst of his travels, Santiago meets a sheep that encourages him to speak the language of enthusiasm, the language that everybody understands universally.

When Santiago wonders what this language of enthusiasm means, the sheep explains that it means speaking a language in which things are accomplished through love and peace. These are things that we as human beings can understand universally. The sheep is encouraging this boy in his lifelong pursuit to find the treasure which in the end Santiago realizes is himself: He's holding the treasure within his own hands. The sheep encourages Santiago to speak the language of love and peace, what the sheep calls the language of enthusiasm, meaning we need to be inspired.

Regardless of how difficult the emotional or psychological or physical battlefields might be, we need to speak the language of enthusiasm. We need to speak the language of love and peace. And we all must remember that we are divine sons and daughters with a personal legend that is just waiting to be discovered. By believing in ourselves, in how precious we are and recognizing how grateful we should be for this life we have been given, we come to realize and celebrate this opportunity in gratitude. Therefore, we want to make the most of our time here and to leave something truly beautiful behind.

When I think about the theme of warrior, of course my mind goes to my father and mother. But all of us sitting here are warriors of true love, too. Not that we're brandishing swords of any kind, but, yes, many times we're fighting a battle, our own emotional battles. In fact, many times we tend to be our worst enemies, right? We fight the battles of fear and loneliness.

I thought, how fitting that the battle of loneliness is a real battle of war. Many times, even when you are engaged in an attack on an enemy line with thousands of your fellow men and women, and you are feeling part of the multitude, at the same time every soldier very sharply feels a sense of being all alone. There can be an extreme sense of being incredibly alone while you're sitting in the throngs.

Every soldier has to battle a demon inside, to become a focused soldier who is ready for battle. But many times in life we are like that, too, in that we have our own emotional, psychological, and physical battles that we have to fight in order to be prepared to tackle each new day.

If we can understand that we are all in this together, we are human beings after all, and we share in the humanity of the different things that we experience, then we can know that we are truly not alone. But better than that, we have our True Parents here with us, guiding the way.

The Good Book [Isaiah 11:6] also says that when the lamb lies down with the lion, there will be 1,000 years of peace. In Christianity the lamb is frequently a representation of Jesus Christ, so the lamb can also represent Christianity. The lion symbolizes royalty, or the true lineage of God; lineage is what differentiates the royal from the non-royal. God wants humanity to be a part of his and her lineage. Therefore, the Good Book talks of when the lamb lies down with the lion.

When you say in biblical terms that somebody is lying down with another person, you're talking about marriage. So when Christianity can be married in the spirit of interfaith and receive this lion, or the royal lineage, represented in the figure of our True Parents and can play the correct role as John the Baptist to the world, then the world can experience 1,000 years of peace.

The fact that our True Parents are presiding over the Holy Blessing ceremony on 10–10–10 is significant in and of itself. I believe that it signals the next three years as the time for the opening of the floodgates when the world will finally come to realize why we need True Parents and why we must have a singular vision and understanding. By grafting onto the heavenly lineage through the Holy Blessing, we can become one family under God, seeing ourselves as brothers and sisters, as families, and loving men and women, just as we love, respect, and want to live in peace in our individual families.

This is not a time to be confused. The Bible says that when the true teacher comes, there will be a lot of static in the air. The static can come from far, or it can be very close. When Paul was addressing his congregation through the first letter to the Corinthians, he was writing the letter in 55 C.E., or Christian Era, in response to some of the pleas that his members were making to him because there was so much division. There were a great many missionaries representing Jesus Christ in Corinthians. The people were confused over whom to believe and follow.

At that time Paul was reminding people that we have to see ourselves as the body of Christ. This was Paul's attempt to convey clearly to his brothers and sisters in Corinth that they have to be united, that he was the representative of Jesus Christ, and that his members needed to be united in Jesus Christ but also through Paul's words.

What Paul was dealing with back then can be seen as analogous to some of the things taking place in our movement at this time. That's why we would all do well to learn from the mind-set that a warrior has in going to battle: the singularity of purpose and the willingness to do and go where nobody dares to go. We can apply this mind-set because we want to live a life in service, or in defense, or in safeguarding our family, nation, and world, knowing that one day we're going to be going home to the embrace of our Heavenly Parent.

We have to have a unified spirit and a unified mind centered on our True Parents. When our True Parents clearly teach us, giving us a great blessing by taking the guesswork out of what the future will look like -- when the brain clearly signals to the body how it must respond to the next signals coming from our True Parents' representative, the spiritual head of the family who is the youngest son -- then the body must follow. The body must listen, and the body must be united.

As we prepare ourselves to partake of this beautiful Holy Wedding ceremony, when the world can substantially become that one family under God, let us remember our True Parents. Let us remember the great warriors of true love, our True Father and True Mother. Let us follow their example, and let us be true vessels so that we can respond to the signals they're sending us -- the true signals that will guide us and propel us forward, empowering us to be great men and women of God.

Brothers and sisters, shine your beautiful light unto the world, know who you are, and go with pride and dignity because we are working for a better world. We're doing something wonderful that will leave a lasting imprint in the form of our beautiful children, who can stand as members of the Generation of Peace.

So God bless, and have a wonderful week.

Notes:

In Jin and Heung Jin Moon Interview

For a 1981 interview of In Jin and Heung Jin Moon visit http://www.tparents.org/Moon-Talks/InJinMoon/InJinMoon-811100.htm

1 Corinthians, chapter 1

1: Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and our brother Sos'thenes,

2: To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours:

3: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

4: I give thanks to God always for you because of the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus,

5: that in every way you were enriched in him with all speech and all knowledge --

6: even as the testimony to Christ was confirmed among you --

7: so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ;

8: who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

9: God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

10: I appeal to you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that there be no dissensions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment.

11: For it has been reported to me by Chlo'e's people that there is quarreling among you, my brethren.

12: What I mean is that each one of you says, "I belong to Paul," or "I belong to Apol'los," or "I belong to Cephas," or "I belong to Christ."

13: Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?

14: I am thankful that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Ga'ius;

15: lest any one should say that you were baptized in my name.

16: (I did baptize also the household of Steph'anas. Beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized any one else.)

17: For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.

18: For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

19: For it is written, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
and the cleverness of the clever I will thwart."

20: Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?

21: For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe.

22: For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom,

23: but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,

24: but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

25: For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

26: For consider your call, brethren; not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth;

27: but God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong,

28: God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are,

29: so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

30: He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption;

31: therefore, as it is written, "Let him who boasts, boast of the Lord."

Isaiah, chapter 11

1: There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots

2: And the Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him,
the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the spirit of counsel and might,
the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD.

3: And his delight shall be in the fear of the LORD.
He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
or decide by what his ears hear;

4: but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,
and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips he shall slay the wicked.

5: Righteousness shall be the girdle of his waist,
and faithfulness the girdle of his loins.

6: The wolf shall dwell with the lamb,
and the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
and the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
and a little child shall lead them.

7: The cow and the bear shall feed;
their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.

8: The sucking child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den.

9: They shall not hurt or destroy
in all my holy mountain;
for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD
as the waters cover the sea.

10: In that day the root of Jesse shall stand as an ensign to the peoples; him shall the nations seek, and his dwellings shall be glorious.

11: In that day the Lord will extend his hand yet a second time to recover the remnant which is left of his people, from Assyria, from Egypt, from Pathros, from Ethiopia, from Elam, from Shinar, from Hamath, and from the coastlands of the sea.

12: He will raise an ensign for the nations,
and will assemble the outcasts of Israel,
and gather the dispersed of Judah
from the four corners of the earth.

13: The jealousy of E'phraim shall depart,
and those who harass Judah shall be cut off;
E'phraim shall not be jealous of Judah,
and Judah shall not harass E'phraim.

14: But they shall swoop down upon the shoulder of the Philistines in
the west,
and together they shall plunder the people of the east.
They shall put forth their hand against Edom and Moab,
and the Ammonites shall obey them.

15: And the LORD will utterly destroy
the tongue of the sea of Egypt;
and will wave his hand over the River
with his scorching wind,
and smite it into seven channels
that men may cross dryshod.

16: And there will be a highway from Assyria
for the remnant which is left of his people,
as there was for Israel
when they came up from the land of Egypt. 

We can decide the kind of life we want to live

In Jin Moon
September 26, 2010
Lovin' Life Ministries

In the following sermon, Rev. In Jin Moon speaks of the message she gave to the attendees of the WFWP 18th National Assembly the day before, and the hope she has for these women to be agents of change. She also addresses the book written by Daniel Pink titled "Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future," which speaks about our world moving into a new way of thinking, which Mr. Pink calls the Conceptual Age.

Good morning, brothers and sisters. How is everyone this morning? This morning I'm feeling unusually well because last night we had the gala for the 18th National Assembly of the Women's Federation for World Peace. I was seated next to two lovely ladies: the former First Lady of Uruguay and Madame Patricia Lalonde, who is doing great humanitarian work in Afghanistan and Iran.

During the ballroom dancing portion of the event, when a young lady approached our table looking for a dance partner, these two distinguished ladies both looked at me and said, "We're not going out if you're not." So the three of us approached the dance floor and experienced serious aerobic training there. I felt that I had a great deal of circulation going. I thanked our Heavenly Parent this morning for giving me a refreshing, beautiful Sunday morning. And I thanked Madame Rompani for being my partner in some great aerobics last night.

For me as a woman, having experienced a life of religion and having grown under the umbrella of my mother, who we call True Mother, I came to realize once again how significant it is for the women of the world to gather together and celebrate sisterhood, motherhood, and the feminine in each of us.

Under the guidance of our True Mother, Women's Federation for World Peace has been a profound and important organization in that we're not here to step on our brothers who may have abused us and done us harm. It's in the hope that by reclaiming our dignity as women, as daughters of our eternal Heavenly Parent, and as eternal and divine beings, we can empower our brothers, sons, and fathers, to work together with us to usher in this new millennium and the world of peace that we so long for.

I realized when I gazed into the eyes of my sisters that every one of them is a great powerhouse. If all of these women could be mobilized and inspired, just as the great women of history such as Catherine Booth, mother of the Salvation Army, and Mother Teresa have transformed their world with the spirit and expression of true love, then I truly believe that this world of peace that we've dreamt about for so long is within our hands. It's within our hands and within the realm of our own responsibility to be agents of change and to make the world a better place, not just for our own families but for the larger family, one family under God.

When contemplating what I wanted to say to the delegation of women, I was thinking maybe we should stress this or that point. One afternoon I went for an outing to pick up a couple of items and while waiting in line overheard two Chinese American women in front of me. One of them was a mother talking about her son, and she seemed quite concerned in talking to the other woman, clearly someone who was close to her. While waiting in line she expressed how concerned she was when in her little boy's classroom each child was given the chance to talk about what their dreams were and what they wanted to become in their life.

In an elementary classroom -- perhaps second or third grade -- usually the boys want to be policemen or firemen, something with a great deal of adventure and drama, fighting the bad guys, taming the flames that are going to burn the house down, all those sorts of exciting things. Or they want to race cars. But this Chinese woman was concerned because when her son's turn came to talk about what he dreams about for the future, he got up and said, "I want to be a nurse." Why are you laughing? Maybe you are laughing precisely because of the same reason his mother had.

She said, "Why would my son want to be a nurse? Why not a doctor? Being a nurse is for women." Here are two women wanting their child to be greater than they are. You would think that if the opposite sex wants to enter into a profession primarily kept for women, they would think, "Unconventional thinking! Convention is the killer of progress, but here is my second-grade son being different, wanting to be a nurse, a profession seen as primarily for women."

The friend turned to the speaker and said, "Your boy is a little different. He's kind of feminine, and maybe nursing would be a good thing." I was standing behind them, wanting to say something, but I learned from my mother many years ago that sometimes it's good to keep silent. I heard her voice in the back of my mind, "Keep silent." As we made our way toward the cashier, this woman kept on saying, "Do you think I should send my son to a psychologist? Do you think it's normal?"

When I got back home, this conversation made me think. My father has declared the dawn of the Pacific Rim Era, that this is the age of women, that the new millennium must have a bit of the feminine. When he and my mother, together as true partners in their work, work together for world peace as the True Parents of humankind, what they are trying to share with the world is not just the beauty of the masculine that we experienced through the history of religion. Here for the first time we have the beauty, power, and magnificence of the feminine.

This concept of a man and a woman ushering in the new age is something quite profound, and quite liberating for me as a woman. When the religion editor of National Public Radio came to interview me, she asked, "A couple of hundred years from now, what do you think your father will be best remembered for?" I looked her in the eye and responded what I truly feel to the core of my being. I said, "Yes, he's going to be remembered as the True Parent, a man of peace, but for a great multitude he is and she is, together as the True Parents, going to be seen as the liberator of women."

Part of the reason why women have suffered so long is because the traditions of different religious backgrounds have yet to embrace the feminine as a vital and integral part of an active life in ministry because nobody could really understand what we should do with this Eve figure who tempted Adam away from his proper position, which caused a great deal of ill things in the world. Women have been blamed for a lot of things. Usually when two people are blamed, it's the woman who is blamed more. That has been the case.

But with the advent of the True Parents, we women have the dignity that we lost. Through our True Parents women can reclaim the rightful position as that divine and eternal daughter of our Heavenly Parent and therefore, grace the world with the beauty of the feminine, not just the masculine.

I came across a book written by Daniel Pink. I love his last name because pink happens to be my father's favorite color. (I find it quite extraordinary that a man with my father's stature can confidently stand in front of everybody and declare to the world, "Pink is my favorite color." I adore a man who has that courage.)

When I was at the bookstore looking for interesting reading, his last name caught my eye. The title of the book is A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future. He's writing about a new way of thinking, the new mind that will characterize this new age, which he calls the Conceptual Age. The 18th century was understood as predominantly agricultural, exemplified by farmers. The 19th century, the Industrial Age, predominantly represented by factory workers. Then in the 20th century we had the Information Age, or what he calls the age of knowledge workers.

Right now, he says, we're poised to enter the Conceptual Age, which will be exemplified by people who can best be described as creators or empathizers. In reading the book I was struck by some of the arguments he made. The age that we are coming out of is the Information Age, in which the profession that best exemplified that age would be computer programming. The Information Age very much stressed detailed, sequential, logical, analytical, systematic thinking. Therefore, it was very masculine in the sense of emphasizing numbers, the bottom line, and clarity. People operated almost like computers.

In this new age, the world, having gone through what he calls the crisis of the advent of automation and Asian workers flooding the workforce, has drastically transformed the way we see ourselves, the way we understand our professions. Because of the growth of the Asian market, where people can do things faster for a whole lot cheaper, a lot of the work formerly done in the economic superpowers of Germany and Japan is being outsourced.

You can't get ahead and be successful on the basis of your knowledge alone. In the Information Age there was a great deal of stress on being a doctor, lawyer, or businessman. Getting an MBA was seen as the thing to do to be successful. But because the Internet now makes available to anybody information that traditionally was in the sphere of only certain individuals, the way we understand our professions and go about doing things has been drastically altered.

Mr. Pink is warning America and the West to rethink the importance of our lives, even if we are business-minded people and only thinking about materialistic success, because the Asia market, outsourcing, automation, material accumulation, and the technology that makes everything accessible at our fingertips has led to "abundance."

He points to self-storage companies, a $17 billion business in the United States. People have accumulated so much that they don't know what to do with; they simply stash things in storage. He notes that because we have so much abundance, we spend an inordinate amount of money buying garbage bags.

This emerging paradigm shift in how we look at our lives, in how we envision being successful, matches our understanding that we're all divine beings, touched with the wonderful love of God, and extraordinary in our own right. Mr. Pink says that even if we don't want to undergo this paradigm shift, the crises we are experiencing in the age of abundance, automation, and Asia are propelling us into the Conceptual Age, best exemplified by creators or empathizers.

I think his ideas are right in line with what I believe in that one of the things I strive for at Lovin' Life is to raise up a generation of young people that truly understand they belong to one family because we all share a common Parent in Heaven. We also know that we're eternal sons and daughters and therefore have a purpose and personal destiny we need to fulfill. We need to be a group of young people who want to live for the sake of others. We want to be people who are compassionate, caring, caregivers -- empathetic people.

The point I always like to make is the need for both internal and external excellence. If you think about it, the Information Age stressed external excellence above and beyond. Now people are realizing that regardless of how successful, smart, and knowledgeable we are, we're not tapping into the great divine mind in each one of us if we do not tap into what is spiritual, emotional, and moving to all of us.

In discussing the characteristics of the Conceptual Age, Mr. Pink says that we're moving from function to design. For example, everybody knows what the function of a wastebasket is, but how should it be designed? Is it going to look nice? Will it be the color pink? Will it fit into the color scheme of the room?

In the Conceptual Age we'll move from simple arguments, like the way lawyers argue different points, to the importance of a compelling narrative, or what Mr. Pink calls a story. Regardless of the culture we come from, we all love a hero. When children are asked what they want to be, many times they answer, "A hero." To my ear, having been born in Korea and learning English later in life, I hear not "hero" but "here" and "row." Usually when you think about a hero you think about someone who became great by overcoming great obstacles or afflictions, working through them, and then transforming into a beautiful butterfly able to soar and become a great man or woman in history.

When I hear the word "hero," I think it's an invitation here and now for you to row. You've got to do a lot of hard rowing to get where you want to go. But the three main points Mr. Pink talks about are what he calls the departure; the initiation; and the return. It's interesting how these themes are found throughout the great works of literature regardless of which country you look at: In Homer's Odyssey, the story of King Arthur, and the Star Wars saga you see the same three themes.

By departure, Mr. Pink means the period just after the potential hero receives a calling, when the person commonly refuses and tries to overcome the initial surprise, or has to work through and become the courageous individual who accepts the calling and departs, crossing over the threshold into a new world where the second theme, the initiation, waits.

Initiation, according to Mr. Pink, means meeting face to face with afflictions, difficulties, or obstacles that must be overcome, and then, usually with the help of great mentors tapping into the rich reservoir of what is divine and being transformed, like a butterfly. During the third theme, return, the hero returns to the place of the calling, now representing two worlds that have been experienced and possessed -- the world that had been left behind and the newly discovered world.

In this conceptual age, what people are longing for is not just a simple argument of what we need to be. People want an understanding; they want to bite into a great story, an understanding of who we are in the larger picture. Unlike in the Information Age, when we were so focus driven, linear, sequential, and analytically minded, we are now looking toward a more symphonic way of thinking. Mr. Pink uses the orchestra as metaphor: Great individual instrumentalists -- oboist, violinist, and percussionist -- together become a whole new medium of music that people can experience, a symphonic work of art.

What people long for in this conceptual age is more of a big picture, something eternal, not fleeting and temporary such as what characterized the Information Age. The Conceptual Age also stresses the importance of empathy. Previously great importance was placed on logic. Logic reigned supreme in the Information Age, but in the Conceptual Age, empathy will reign supreme.

His definition of empathy is interesting. He says that empathy is not to be understood as sympathy, merely feeling sorry for somebody. Rather, it's the ability to feel with the person in question. It's the ability to understand the person next to you, and think and feel as if you were with that person, a part of that person. He very much sees that as something that will be prevalent in this coming age.

The Information Age, with its business suits, is characterized by Gordon Gekko of the movie Wall Street, where everything is so professional, cold, and hard-edged, with the bottom line and board room all so serious. But we are moving from incredible seriousness to the importance of play.

I've often thought that one of the most interesting companies we have is Google. When you visit their offices, of course, they have the typical office workers, but in the middle of a conference room is a basketball hoop, or beanbags for tossing, and different games will be available to play. There is an understanding that in order for humans to be creative, a sense of play and humor are very important. We all know how important humor is. I remind myself every morning about the importance of smiling, of laughing away the burdens and obstacles.

We are moving away from what we considered the most important things in the Information Age -- the accumulation of wealth, knowledge, power, and prestige -- to this new Conceptual Age, when accumulation is being replaced by a search for understanding and meaning. People are looking for the spirituality that will answer the void they felt in the Information Age. They want something warm, embracing. They want to experience care, to experience love.

When you follow Mr. Pink's line of reasoning, you realize that what he is saying in fine print is very much what my father has spoken about, that we've become so professional, so technologically advanced, so good at accumulating, that we forgot to look at what is truly important. That is our relationship with our Heavenly Parent, our families, and the other people in our lives.

When we concentrate on the need to be compassionate, we are, I believe, concentrating on the hallmark of the new millennium. We need to be raised up as and living as compassionate human beings who leave that as our legacy. In this light, we can realize how important it is to be able to empathize, to feel with other people.

Instead of our world being cold, fragmented, and isolated, where we act like rulers in measuring how important our positions are or how much we're earning vis-à-vis the other person, we should recognize that what is truly important is how we are. Are we internally excellent in our relationship with our Heavenly Parent? Are we internally excellent in our life of faith vis-à-vis the people in our families? Are we internally excellent in wanting to be good people for the people in our lives?

When we ask ourselves these questions, we realize that all of us have to go through a process or road of self-discovery that allows us to be profound and deep human beings. The difficulties we deal with on a daily basis and tackle one by one are going to make us richer in emotional wealth, they are going to make us deeper in spiritual wealth, and they are going to make us feel more fulfilled as physical human beings.

Dr. Lauren Artress, an Episcopal priest, said something a while back that I like to remember. She said that we are not human beings on a spiritual path but rather spiritual beings on a human path. We need to understand that when Father teaches that the greatest purpose for each of us is to be born in love, to be raised in love, to live in love, and to leave a legacy of love, it means the path we are on as human beings is not going to be an easy one, but we must not forget that we are essentially spiritual beings, divine beings, on a human path.

As long as we remember that we are divine, eternal human beings on this human path, then no matter how difficult an episode or period might be, we realize that just as a caterpillar enters into a chrysalis before it is transformed into a beautiful butterfly that can soar to the heavens and enjoy the air, we too eventually will meet such a future awaiting us if we understand that we are spiritual beings.

I realize this point each day when I see the sun rise and the beauty of the day -- which does not always equate to blue skies. I love thunder and lightning. I love hailstorms. I love great gusts of wind just as much as I love sunny skies. I realize that everything we experience in life -- the good and the bad, the beautiful and the profane, the pretty and the ugly -- are all different dimensions of the divine that we experience so that we become better people in the process.

I truly believe, just as I shared with my sisters yesterday, that if we can decide to be that agent of change, that divine person who is going to harness the power of the Conceptual Age and take flight on the power of the spiritual and our own divinity, then we can each become the creator of our own destiny.

We can decide the kind of life we want to live, and we can create it. If we truly desire to live in a world of peace, we are the creators, the agents of change. What we decide today about stepping up to the plate and starting to live like a peaceful person will determine whether we will have a peaceful world at the end of our lives.

As a mother, having given birth to five children and being still in the process of raising them, the legacy that I wish to leave behind is the legacy of a wise mother. I shared with you many weeks ago that in my understanding a wise mother is somebody who serves the world with integrity, service, and excellence. I want to be that wise mother and leave my essence personified in the beauty of my children. I want them to be proud members of this Generation of Peace. I want them to be an expression of everything that I was about.

I think many fathers and mothers in the audience probably would agree with me that the greatest legacy any of us can leave behind is the beauty of our children. If we can concentrate on our families -- building ideal families as the cornerstone of the society, nation and world, becoming loving families seeking to empower and nurture each other to be greater than what we originally thought we could be, being a community that inspires each other, loves each other, and takes care of each other -- then this peaceful world is within our hands.

We need to live each day just as it says in Luke 1:44, [actually Like 1:47] "How I rejoice in my Lord, my God." We must rejoice and celebrate the gift of life. That's why here at Lovin' Life we aim to do just that. Have a wonderful Sunday and a beautiful week. Thank you.

Notes:

Luke, chapter 1

1: Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things which have been accomplished among us,

2: just as they were delivered to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word,

3: it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent The-oph'ilus,

4: that you may know the truth concerning the things of which you have been informed.

5: In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechari'ah, of the division of Abi'jah; and he had a wife of the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth.

6: And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.

7: But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were advanced in years.

8: Now while he was serving as priest before God when his division was on duty,

9: according to the custom of the priesthood, it fell to him by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense.

10: And the whole multitude of the people were praying outside at the hour of incense.

11: And there appeared to him an angel of the Lord standing on the right side of the altar of incense.

12: And Zechari'ah was troubled when he saw him, and fear fell upon him.

13: But the angel said to him, "Do not be afraid, Zechari'ah, for your prayer is heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John.

14: And you will have joy and gladness,
and many will rejoice at his birth;

15: for he will be great before the Lord,
and he shall drink no wine nor strong drink,
and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit,
even from his mother's womb.

16: And he will turn many of the sons of Israel to the Lord their God,

17: and he will go before him in the spirit and power of Eli'jah,
to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,
and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just,
to make ready for the Lord a people prepared."

18: And Zechari'ah said to the angel, "How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years."

19: And the angel answered him, "I am Gabriel, who stand in the presence of God; and I was sent to speak to you, and to bring you this good news.

20: And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things come to pass, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time."

21: And the people were waiting for Zechari'ah, and they wondered at his delay in the temple.

22: And when he came out, he could not speak to them, and they perceived that he had seen a vision in the temple; and he made signs to them and remained dumb.

23: And when his time of service was ended, he went to his home.

24: After these days his wife Elizabeth conceived, and for five months she hid herself, saying,

25: "Thus the Lord has done to me in the days when he looked on me, to take away my reproach among men."

26: In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth,

27: to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin's name was Mary.

28: And he came to her and said, "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you!"

29: But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be.

30: And the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.

31: And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.

32: He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High;
and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David,

33: and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever;
and of his kingdom there will be no end."

34: And Mary said to the angel, "How shall this be, since I have no husband?"

35: And the angel said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you,
and the power of the Most High will overshadow you;
therefore the child to be born will be called holy,
the Son of God.

36: And behold, your kinswoman Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren.

37: For with God nothing will be impossible."

38: And Mary said, "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word." And the angel departed from her.

39: In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a city of Judah,

40: and she entered the house of Zechari'ah and greeted Elizabeth.

41: And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit

42: and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!

43: And why is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?

44: For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leaped for joy.

45: And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her from the Lord."

46: And Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord,

47: and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,

48: for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden.
For behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed;

49: for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.

50: And his mercy is on those who fear him
from generation to generation.

51: He has shown strength with his arm,
he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts,

52: he has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted those of low degree;

53: he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent empty away.

54: He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,

55: as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his posterity for ever."

56: And Mary remained with her about three months, and returned to her home.

57: Now the time came for Elizabeth to be delivered, and she gave birth to a son.

58: And her neighbors and kinsfolk heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her.

59: And on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child; and they would have named him Zechari'ah after his father,

60: but his mother said, "Not so; he shall be called John."

61: And they said to her, "None of your kindred is called by this name."

62: And they made signs to his father, inquiring what he would have him called.

63: And he asked for a writing tablet, and wrote, "His name is John." And they all marveled.

64: And immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, blessing God.

65: And fear came on all their neighbors. And all these things were talked about through all the hill country of Judea;

66: and all who heard them laid them up in their hearts, saying, "What then will this child be?" For the hand of the Lord was with him.

67: And his father Zechari'ah was filled with the Holy Spirit, and prophesied, saying,

68: "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel,
for he has visited and redeemed his people,

69: and has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house of his servant David,

70: as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old,

71: that we should be saved from our enemies,
and from the hand of all who hate us;

72: to perform the mercy promised to our fathers,
and to remember his holy covenant,

73: the oath which he swore to our father Abraham,

74: to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies,

might serve him without fear,

75: in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our life.

76: And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High;
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways,

77: to give knowledge of salvation to his people
in the forgiveness of their sins,

78: through the tender mercy of our God,
when the day shall dawn upon us from on high

79: to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of
death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace."

80: And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness till the day of his manifestation to Israel.  

Notes on In Jin Moon's September 26, 2010 Sermon

Today's Readings

1. From the unreal lead me to the real, from darkness lead to the light, from death lead me to immortality.
Upanishads (Hinduism)

2. The sky blesses me, the earth blesses me. Up in the skies I cause to dance the spirits, on the earth, the people I cause to dance.
Cree Round Dance Song,
Native American Religion

3. Love has the power to create the whole. Each of us was born as an essential being of the entire universe receiving all the love in the universe. The highest purpose of life is to be born through love, be raised in love, live by love and to leave a legacy of love when we die. Nothing can be of greater value for a person than to live out his natural life within his own family as a life of love that is the center of the universe.
Sun Myung Moon 9/21/1978

4. In Jin Moon welcomed everyone. She felt unusually well because of her experience last night at the gala for the 18th annual celebration of the WFWP. She was sitting next to the former first lady of Uruguay and humanitarian Patricia Lalonde (helping women in Afghanistan and Iran) and when they were invited to dance, the two of them looked at In Jin Nim and told her they weren't dancing if she wasn't. So the three of them went to the dance floor and experienced serious aerobic training and blood circulation. (I was there -- and In Jin Nim really knows how to dance!) And so when she got up this morning she thanked our H Parent for making it such a beautiful Sunday morning.

5. For In Jin Moon, as a woman, having experienced a life of religion, having grown under the umbrella of her mother, whom we call True Mother, she came to realize how significant it is for the woman of the world to gather together and truly celebrate their sisterhood and motherhood and celebrate the feminine in each and every one of us. Under the guidance of our True Mother WFWP has become an extremely profound and important organization. WFWP is not here to step on the brothers who have abused them and done them harm, but it is in the hope that women can reclaim their dignity as women and as daughters of our eternal Heavenly Parent, and in recognizing we are eternal and divine beings ourselves, we need to work together with our brothers, our sons, and fathers and truly empower them to work together with the women to usher in this new millennium, the world of peace we so long for.

6. In Jin Moon realized when she gazed into the eyes of her sisters that we have a great powerhouse in each and every one of them. She realized if each and every one of these women could be mobilized and inspired, just as the great woman of history like Clare Booth, mother the Salvation Army, and Mother Theresa whom we all love and admire, woman like these who have transformed their world with their spirit and with their expression of true love -- then In Jin Moon truly believes that this world of peace we have dreamed of for so long is within our hands. It is within the realm of our own responsibility to be that agent of change and to make the world a better place not just for our own families but for the larger family, one family under God.

7. As In Jin Moon was contemplating what she wanted to say to this delegation of women -- she went out shopping for a few items and while she was waiting in line there were two Chinese-American woman in front of her whom she overheard. One of them was concerned about her son. She was expressing to her friend that she had gone to her son's classroom when the children were sharing about their dreams in life, what they wanted to become. Usually little boys express their ambition to be a policeman or a fireman fighting fires or a car racer but this Chinese woman's son when he got up to speak said that he dreamed of becoming a nurse. (Everyone laughed) In Jin Moon asked why we were laughing. Maybe for the same reason this woman expressed "Why would my son want to be a nurse? Why not a doctor?" Being a nurse is for women.

8. Here were two women, wanting their children to have a better life, to be greater than they. You would think that the mother would be proud of her son for having unconventional thinking. Conventional thinking is the killer of progress. Here is her son, being different by wanting to be a nurse, a profession that has been seen primarily just for woman. The woman's friend then responded to her saying, "your son does look a little different, he's kind of feminine and maybe being a nurse might be a good thing."

9. In Jin Moon wanted to say something to them, but she remembered her mother's advice, "Sometimes it's good to keep silent" and so she did. She then heard the woman say "should I send my son to a psychologist?"

10. This made In Jin Moon think. Her father has declared the dawn of the Pacific Rim Era, this is the age of woman, and so the new millennium must have a bit of the feminine. When her father and mother together, as True Parents in their work, work together for world peace as the True Parents of mankind, what her father and mother are trying to share with the world is not just the beauty of the masculine that we've experienced through the history of religion, But here, for the first time we have the beauty, power, and magnificence of the feminine. The concept of a man and a woman ushering in the new age is quite profound and for In Jin Moon quite liberating as a woman.

11. When the religion editor came to interview In Jin Moon for National Public Radio she asked In Jin Moon, a few hundred years from now, in the future, what do you think your father will be most remembered for? In Jin Moon looked her in the eye and responded with what she truly felt to the core of her being, "Yes he'll be remembered as the True Parents, as a man of peace, but for a great multitude he and she together as the True Parents will be seen as the liberators of woman."

12. Part of the reason why women have suffered so long is because of the traditions of different religious backgrounds that have yet to embrace the feminine as a vital and integral part in an active life in ministry. Because no one could understand -- what are we going to do with this woman, this Eve figure who tempted Adam away from his proper position, who was the temptress, the cause of a great deal of ill, of not such good things in the world?

13. Women have been blamed for a lot of things. Usually when two people are blamed the blame goes to the woman, but with the advent of the True Parents women have the dignity that they lost. Through our True Parents woman can reclaim the rightful position as that divine and eternal daughter of our Heavenly Parent and therefore grace the world with the beauty of the feminine, not just the masculine.

14. In Jin Moon came across a book by Daniel Pink. In Jin Moon. loves the fact that pink is her father's favorite color. She finds it quite extraordinary that a man with the standing and stature of true father confidently stands in front of the world and declares that pink is his favorite color. She adores a man who has that courage.

15. And so Daniel Pink's last name caught In Jin Moon eye. The book was titled The Whole New Mind. He talks about a new way of thinking, the whole new mind -- which is going to characterize the new age, which he calls the "conceptual age". He talks about how in the 18th century we were understood as an agricultural age exemplified by the farmers and in the 19th century it was the industrial age represented by factory workers and then in the 20th century we went through the information age, what he calls the age of the knowledge worker.

16. He is saying that we are now poised to enter the conceptual age. He is saying that this age is exemplified by people who could best be described as creators or as empathizers.

17. As she read this book she was struck by some of the arguments Mr. Pink was making. He says that in this conceptual age it will be characterized by six essential senses. The age we are coming out of to enter this conceptual age has been the information age. In the information age the best representatives were people who were computer programmers. It was an age that emphasized detailed, logical, analytical, and systematic type of thinking. Therefore it was very masculine in that there was a great deal of emphasis on numbers, the bottom line, and on clarity.

18. People operated almost like a computer. But he says in this new age, the world having gone through the crisis, the advent of automation and Asia. The concept of Asian workers coming into play has transformed the way we see our selves and understand what our profession is all about. So he is saying because of the growth of the Asian market in which people can do things faster and cheaper, a lot of the work that is done in the superpowers is being outsourced. You can't just get ahead and be successful based on your knowledge alone.

19. In the information age there was a lot of stress on being that lawyer, that businessmen, getting your MBA, seen as the top of the ladder thing to do -- To be a successful individual. But because of the information age and the Internet, where information that was only available to certain individuals became available to everyone, this has drastically altered the way we understand our professions and the way we go about doing things. And so, Dr. Pink is very much thinking or warning the American and Western hemisphere to rethink what the importance of our life is. Even if we are business minded people only thinking of material success, because of this Asian market, the ability to outsource, and the new technology -- these have all made things so easy and so accessible and because of all this materialistic wealth and accumulation has led to this thing called abundance.

20. Mr. Pink goes on to say that one of the most interesting things about the American economy is the development of self storage. People have so much junk, they've accumulated so much they don't know what to do with it and so they put it into self storage. Self storage companies have become a $17 billion industry. And he notes how in such great abundance we have become a country that spends an inordinate amount of money buying garbage bags.

21. There is this need to have a paradigm shift in how we are thinking or looking at our lives and how to become successful human beings. And because we are all divine human beings touched by the love of God, we are extraordinary in our own right, but Mr. Pink is saying, even if we don't want to be, due to the crisis we are experiencing in the information age -- abundance Asia and automation it is compelling humankind into this new age, the conceptual age that is best exemplified by creators or empathizers.

22. In Jin Moon thought, "Mr. Pink, love your last name, and you are right in line with what I believe." One of the things that In Jin Moon strives for at Lovin' Life is to raise up a generation of peace, a generation of young people that truly understand they belong to one family, because we all share the common Parent up in heaven and we also know we are eternal sons and daughters and therefore We have a purpose and a personal destiny that we need to fulfill, that we need to be young people who want to live for the sake of others. And that we want to be compassionate, caring people, caregiver type of people and empathizing type of people.

23. The last point In Jin Moon always makes is the need for internal excellence as well as external excellence, because if you think about the information age, it has stressed so much the external excellence, above and beyond, so what people are realizing is that, regardless of how successful, how smart, or how knowledgeable we are -- we are not really tapping into this great divine mind that exists in each and every one of us if we do not tap into what is spiritual, emotional, and moving to all of us.

24. When Dr. Pink goes on to discuss the six characteristics of the conceptual age. He talks about how we are moving from the function of something, such as a wastebasket and everyone knows what that is, to, in the conceptual age, the actual design of the wastebasket. We all know what it is, but is it going to look nice? Will it be the color pink and will it fit into the color scheme of the room?

25. He talks about how in the conceptual age we'll move from simple arguments such as lawyers do to the importance of the narrative, what he calls the story. He talks about how, regardless of what culture we come from we all love the hero. Whenever In Jin Moon hears the word hero, everyone wants to be a hero, but to In Jin Moon's ear, having been born in Korea, when she hears hero she hears "here" and "row."

26. Usually when you think about a hero you think of someone who becomes great by overcoming great obstacles or afflictions and having worked through it somehow, is transformed into this beautiful butterfly and is able to soar as a great man or woman in the story.

27. He talks about how there are three main themes when you are thinking about a hero. For In Jin Moon hero is an invitation here and now, to row, and you have to do a lot of hard rowing to get to where you want to go. But there are three main points that Mr. Pink talks about, 1) the departure, 2) the initiation and 3) the return.

28. It is interesting how these three themes run throughout all the great works of literature. It doesn't matter what country you come from. In Homer's Odyssey, in the story of King Arthur, in the Star Wars movie saga, you see the same three themes running throughout.

29. What he means by departure is, once the hero has this calling usually, there is a period in which the hero refuses and tries to overcome the initial surprise or has to work through and become that courageous individual who accepts his calling and actually departs or crosses over the threshold into this new world where he meets number 2, the initiation

30. By initiation he means meeting face-to-face with afflictions or difficulties or obstacles that he has to overcome and, with the help, usually of great mentors, the hero realizes that he has this divine gift within him or within her and comes to tap into his rich reservoir of what is divine in him or in her and is transformed like a butterfly. And then he returns to where he came from, by representing the two worlds that he has come to experience and possess -- the world that he left and the world he has come to know.

31. What Mr. Pink is saying, is that in this conceptual age, what people are longing for is not just a simple argument -- why we need to be what we need to be, but they want an understanding, they want to bite into a greater story, understanding of who we are in the context of the larger picture.

32. He goes on to talk about how unlike the information age in which we were so focused and detail driven, so linear, so sequential and analytically minded, we are looking more towards a symphonic way of thinking. What he means by that is, like an orchestra your great violinists, your oboe players, your percussion -- as a whole it becomes a whole new medium of music that people can experience. It's a symphonic work of art.

33. He is saying that what people long for in this conceptual age is more the bigger picture, something larger than life, something eternal, something that is not fleeting and temporary such as what characterized the information age.

34. He says what the conceptual age is looking towards is the importance of empathy. Before there was such predominance and importance placed on logic. Logic reigned supreme in the information age but in the conceptual age he anticipates it will be empathy that reigns supreme. He defines empathy, it is not just sympathy feeling sorry for somebody, but it is the ability to feel with the person in question. It is the ability to understand the person in front of you are next to you and think and feel as if you are with them or a part of them. He sees this as something that will be extremely important in this new age.

35. He goes on to talk about how the information age, with their business suits and characterized by Gordon Gekko of Wall Street, everyone is so professional, so hard edged, so cold, everything is the bottom line, so serious, the boardroom is incredibly serious, but he is saying in this new age we are moving from this incredible seriousness to the importance of play.

36. In Jin Moon has often thought one of the more interesting companies is Google. They have your typical office and office workers but they also have a room where they have games -- a basketball hoop or bean bags on the floor and different games for people to play. There is this understanding, in order for a human being to be engaged in the process of creativity a sense of play and humor and games are incredibly important. We all know how important humor is in our lives. In Jin Moon reminds herself every morning of the importance of smiling and laughing, laughing away the burdens and obstacles in your path.

37. Then he talks about how we are moving from what we considered the most important thing in the information age -- accumulation of wealth and knowledge and power and prestige -- to the new conceptual age where accumulation is being replaced by the search for understanding and meaning. People are looking for that spirituality that is going to answer the void that they felt in the information age. They want something more, something that is embracing. They want to experience care, they want to experience love.

38. When you read Mr. Pink's book and you follow his line of reasoning you realize that what he is saying in fine print is what her father has spoken about. We have become so professional we become so technologically advanced so good at everything so good at accumulating but we forgot to look at what is truly important and that is our relationship with our heavenly parent in heaven and our relationship with our families and our relationship with the people in our lives.

39. When we concentrate on this word compassionate and In Jin Moon believes it is going to be the hallmark of this new age, this new millennium. We need to be raised up, we need to be living and we need to leave a legacy as a compassionate human being. And we realize how important it is to be able to empathize or to "feel with" other people.

40. Instead of our world being cold, fragmented and isolated and a bunch of us acting like "rulers" measuring how important our positions are or how much we are making compared to the other person, what is truly important is how we are. Are we internally excellent in our relationship with our heavenly parent? Are we internally excellent and a life of faith in relation to the different people in our family? Are we internally excellent and wanting to be good people to the people in our lives?

41. When we ask ourselves these questions we realize that we all have a process, a road of self-discovery, but it is a road that allows us to be incredibly profound, deep human beings. The difficulties that we deal with on a daily basis, that we tackle one by one is something that is going to make us richer in terms of our emotional wealth, deeper in terms of our spiritual wealth, and is going to make us feel more fulfilled as physical human beings.

42. There is a great woman, an Episcopal priest, Dr. Lauren Artress, who said something that In Jin Moon likes to remind herself from time to time, "We are not human beings on a spiritual path, but we are spiritual beings on a human path."

43. We need to understand that when Father teaches that the greatest purpose of each and every one of us is to be born in love, be raised in love, to live in love and to leave a legacy of love, then we realize that this path that we are on as a human being is not going to be an easy one. But we must not forget that we are essentially spiritual beings, that we are divine beings on this human path. As long as we remember we are divine eternal beings on this human path, then no matter how difficult the process, or episode, or a period might be, we realize that, just as the caterpillar enters into chrysalis it is transformed into this beautiful butterfly that can soar into the heavens and enjoy the air -- we realize that's the kind of future that awaits us if we understand that we are spiritual beings.

44. In Jin Moon realizes every day she wakes up and sees the sunrise and the beauty of the day (and the beauty of the day is not always equated with blue skies for her. She loves lightning and thunder, hailstorms, and great gusts of wind just as much as she loves sunny skies) that everything we experience in life, the good and the bad, the beautiful and the profane, the ugly and the pretty -- are all different dimensions of the divine that we experience so that we can become better people in the process.

45. She truly believes, just as she shared yesterday with her sisters, if we can decide to be that agent of change, decide to be that person, that divine person, that is going to harness the power of what Mr. Pink calls the conceptual age and truly take flight on the power of the spiritual and enjoin our own divinity, that we can become our own creators of our own destiny. We can decide the kind of a life, we can create the kind of life we want to live.

46. If we truly desire and want to live in a world of peace, well, we are the creators we are that agent of change, and depending on whether we decide today to step up to the plate and start living like a peaceful person, will determine whether we will have a peaceful world at the end of our lives.

47. As a mother having given birth to five children, and still in the process of raising five children, the legacy she would want to leave behind is a legacy of a wise mother. Many weeks ago she shared with us her understanding of what a WISE mother is. It's someone who serves the world with integrity, service, and excellence. She wants to do that, and be that wise mother and leave her essence personified in the beauty of her children. She wants them to be proud members of this generation peace. She wants them to be an expression of everything that she was about. She thinks that everyone in the audience who is a father or mother would agree that the greatest legacy anyone of us could leave behind is the beauty of our children.

48. If we can concentrate on our families, if we can truly build ideal families as a cornerstone for the society, nation, and world, if we can become that loving family that seeks to empower and nurture each other to be greater than what we originally thought we could be, if we could be that kind of community that inspires each other, that truly loves each other, that truly takes care of each other, because we understand ourselves to be part of this one family, then this world, this peaceful world is within our hands.

49. We need to live each day as it says in the good book, Luke 1:46-47, "How I rejoice in my Lord, my God." We must rejoice and celebrate this gift of life and that is why, here at Lovin' Life we aim to do just that.

50. Have a wonderful Sunday and a beautiful week. Thank you! 

"Human Rights and Women's Dignity"

In Jin Moon
September 25, 2010
WFWP 18th National Assembly

Thank you, and good morning. Welcome to the 18th National Assembly of the Women's Federation for World Peace, talking, discussing, and pondering about the dignity of women. It's truly my honor to be with all of you here this morning.

Last night I arrived from Las Vegas after spending a couple of days with my parents, who had just arrived from Korea. On the flight back I was seated next to a very interesting person, and we started talking about the Women's Federation event that I would be attending. This person asked me, "Nowadays we have a lot of different women's organizations doing a lot of great work. But tell me if you can do something about creating ideal men for all of us." (Laughter)

I said, "I'd be very happy and honored to do my part in inspiring the delegates that will be attending the conference to work together to create a lot of ideal men all around the world." I went on to tell this person, "You know, God did promise all of us women ideal men, and he told us that he placed these special ideal men in four corners of the world. Unfortunately the women found out that the world was round. So the adventure and the treasure hunt continues."

I was thinking about creating an ideal world, having and experiencing ideal men, and becoming divine and worthy women, mothers and sisters. How do we reclaim dignity? I was thinking about the word dignity, which comes from the Latin dignus, meaning "worth." We don't have to look far, but if we peruse different books written about the great women of history, or the history of women in the context of religious life, we realize that these women had to fight very hard to reclaim their dignity.

When I think about my own life as a daughter of the man we call Reverend Moon and about my own journey of self-discovery as a woman who sees herself as a divine being with a divine purpose and as someone who wishes, hopes, and aspires to be that compassionate leader that we all know we are, then I find myself meditating on the word dignity.

Many great women have come before us -- like Catherine Booth, mother of the Salvation Army, or Rosa Parks, who ignited the spirit of the civil rights movement, made great strides in the name of civil rights, and gave women of color a sense of dignity and worth in this great country of America. When we think about these women, we realize that to reclaim their dignity and worth, they had to dig in a soil that was not fertile but rather was unkind and quite hostile to them. Nevertheless, they worked and gave it their best; they gave their lives to reclaim their dignity.

But if we think about where our true dignity comes from, we must realize that regardless of what kind of cultural, racial, or economic background we come from, true dignity comes from God, our Heavenly Parent. The understanding of who we are as a worthy mother and a sister comes from understanding that God is our common Heavenly Parent and we stand as eternal daughters of God.

If we can agree that our true worth or dignity comes from God, then we can realize as women how important the concept of True Parents is. My father teaches what we must do in order to restore the difficulties of human history, or the human Fall, for which women have been accused of a lot of bad things and have been called the "whore" and the "temptress who led Adam astray." This understanding that women were the instigators of something that was horrible has been in the minds of men and women alike throughout history.

The great thing about the concept of True Parents is that through understanding ourselves as the children of God, our Heavenly Parent, we come to realize our own worth. If my father can overcome his individual difficulties and in the position of perfected Adam welcome a wonderful woman in the position of perfected Eve and stand together with her as the True Parents of humankind, they can restore and indemnify all that has gone awry in history, including the misconceptions women have had to bear for centuries.

In the understanding that men and women are divine beings and eternal sons and daughters of God who come together in the beautiful Holy Blessing, we realize that women no longer need to be bound by the concept of being the one who led Adam astray. Instead, the woman becomes the Eve that makes Adam complete in the beautiful package called the True Parents.

When we look at the ills of society, we see the hatred, hurt, and suffering caused by so much misunderstanding. Many have said that we need to make sure that women are not educated, that women are controlled, and that women stay in their proper place. Women have been seen almost like a radioactive substance that, left on its own, can do a lot of damage. But if we can understand women as divine beings who were meant to be beautiful partners to a representative person like True Father in the context of True Parents, then we realize that women are an integral part of something that makes the world beautiful.

When my father and mother go around the world teaching and sharing the message of true love and sharing about the importance of building beautiful families as the cornerstone of the society, nation, and world, it is clear that women have a very important role to play. We must have a voice, a presence in different areas of life, not just in the context of a family but in the context of a society, and in politics, religion, and economics as well. Women have been especially prepared to usher in the new millennium. We are the ones who have the responsibility of helping our brothers and fathers to be compassionate fathers, brothers, and leaders who can work together with us to bring about a world of peace.

Catherine and William Booth founders of the Salvation Army

When we meditate on the concept of peace, we need to realize that if we're going to build an ideal world free from violence and hatred, we have to start with ourselves. We have to decide to be the agent of change like Catherine Booth or Rosa Parks. We have to realize that it's within our power to raise the Generation of Peace.

Rosa and Raymond Parks Civil Rights Heros

What is the Generation of Peace? I make it very simple for my children to see how I understand peace -- by taking the word and seeing it as an acronym. P stands for Heavenly Parent. We need to have an understanding that God is our Heavenly Parent. No matter how different we are, no matter where we come from, we come from the same original source.

Then we need to understand when we look at the letter E that we are Eternal sons and daughters of God; we are divine beings with a rich reservoir of true love that we need to share with the world. As eternal sons and daughters, we were born with a purpose. We were born to fulfill the special personal destiny that each of us has, men and women, male and female alike.

Looking at the letter A, we realize that we have a duty and responsibility to live our lives Altruistically, meaning living for the sake of others -- not because we're seeking our own individual salvation, but just because we want to be good people: We want to love; we want to inspire; and we want to empower each other to be the best that we can be.

When we look at the letter C, we understand that the next millennium, if it's going to be a millennium of peace, has got to be something different. We've seen world wars, we've seen hate that resulted in something as horrific as 9/11 on the shores of New York City. We've seen the suicide bombers, and we've seen children shoot each other and their teachers to death in their schoolrooms. The next millennium has to have leaders who understand the meaning of Compassion.

Our modernized world has become so efficient and technologically advanced that the understanding of our own dignity as an eternal son or daughter has not progressed in line with the progress of technology. Here we are, faced with technology that has brought us the Internet, Hollywood, and, for my children, video games. In the process we lost something that is very important to all of us as human beings. We forgot our spirituality. We forgot to pay attention to our emotional needs as well as our physical needs.

In this era of compassionate leadership, we must understand the importance of being kind in this cold, fragmented world. Just last Saturday there was an incident at Harvard University in which a young man decided to take his own life on the steps of Memorial Church. He was not a student at Harvard, but he wanted to shoot himself to shock his generation and particularly the students at Harvard.

Why did he choose Harvard? He understood it as the center of intellectual activity in America. He wanted to shock the people who are going to be future leaders, to tell them that something is amiss in our society's understanding of the true worth and dignity of human beings. He shot himself in broad daylight, in front of a lot of students busily moving from one class to another, and he had prepared a manifesto of 1,905 pages, what he called a treatise, on why he did what he did.

When you think about why someone would do such a thing, why someone would need to shock his nation and the world by killing himself, it's not so different from suicide bombers who do the same thing, blowing themselves up to shock the world because they want to make a statement. When you get to the basis of their thinking, it's a cry for help, a cry out to a world that needs to be more compassionate.

That's why we as women and as mothers have a duty and responsibility to help make that happen. We need to create a world where our children feel safe and valued, where they not only understand their dignity as human beings but also have a purpose in front of them when they think about and live their lives, fulfilling their personal destiny. We as women are the nurturers, the guides, the ones who empower and give our children the confidence to succeed.

Even in our title there is the word peace. It's the responsibility of those of us here to raise a generation whose members understand their worth, a generation whose purpose in life is not to shock the world by killing themselves but to become true sons and daughters who create beautiful families that are cornerstones of society and help build a beautiful nation and world. That is why women are necessary. We need to be in positions of power, as leaders in religion, politics, and economy. We need to show the world that it can be nurtured, guided, and empowered through compassionate leadership.

When we look at the last letter, E, we see that in our effort and heart as mothers we want to raise children who are Excellent not only externally, but also internally, children who are not just fantastic doctors, lawyers, and scholars, but also fantastic men and women who will become fantastic fathers and mothers and fantastic grandfathers and grandmothers. Then we can rest assured that in the future children will be brought up in good hands and will carry on in understanding that the world as one family under God.

I feel that the 18th conference, stressing the dignity of women, is an incredibly profound one. As someone who has been busy visiting Capitol Hill, seeing congressmen, congresswomen, and senators, highlighting the faith breaking taking place in Japan, I feel that we as women cannot waste another day.

Just last week I heard that another member of our faith was kidnapped, forcibly abducted, and subjected to faith breaking. For the last three decades, our church has witnessed the kidnapping of more than 4,300 of our brothers and sisters -- the majority of them over 21 years of age, old enough to choose how they want to worship God and live their life of faith.

In meeting many of them, I came to understand that, particularly for many of the women, it's not just faith breaking that is taking place. Our sisters are not just being emotionally abused; they're also being physically and sexually abused. These women and their dignity are being lost in the process. As somebody who understands not just my own worth and dignity as coming from God, I see their honor and dignity as coming from God as well.

As the international Women's Federation for World Peace, we cannot stand still while these women are being abused and denied their right to exercise freedom of religion. These Asian women have been silent for too long, not wanting to discuss the horrific things they've had to endure. We have to give them a voice to the world. I seek your help, including international help, to exert the right kind of pressure on the Japanese ambassador and the Japanese government so we can put an end to this faith breaking in Japan.

We have seen the recent chain of events surrounding the trial of a poor Iranian woman who was found to be having an adulterous relationship and the possibility of her being stoned to death. The president of Iran is in the process of changing his story because of all the international pressure and the international inquiries being made. Perhaps the woman did something wrong, but where is the man? Why is the man not being sentenced to be stoned to death?

If men and women everywhere are eternal sons and daughters, shouldn't we as loving mothers and fathers want to allow this woman a chance to redeem herself, to find herself as a woman of dignity? Shouldn't we as the Women's Federation for World Peace make a statement saying, "Enough killing; enough violence." We must protect each other. We must stand with each other. We must do the right thing and help our sisters and brothers in need.

So I ask all of you to please talk about these issues. Please share with the pertinent parties what is going on in Japan, and what our Unificationist brothers and sisters have had to bear for the last three decades. We have seen many great men and women before us. We have seen extraordinary Japanese women change their world for the better.

If each of us seated here this morning decides today to be that agent of change, can we not create a better world, sisters? Can we not inspire our children to be that Generation of Peace? Can we not guarantee our children and our grandchildren a safer world? I think we can. This is the starting point because we have to start talking about it. We have to start discussing it and together decide to do something about it.

I am truly honored that all of you have invited me to come and speak as one sister to another. We can make this world into that peaceful world that we all want if we decide today to work together. I think we all will, and I think we all can. So God bless, and thank you.

Notes:

Man Dies After Shooting Himself in Harvard Yard
Elias J. Groll and Naveen N. Srivatsa, Crimson Staff Writers
September 20, 2010

A bouquet of flowers lies on the top step of Memorial Church, marking the spot where a man fatally shot himself on Saturday morning.

A man who appeared to be unaffiliated with Harvard University died Saturday after fatally shooting himself on the top step of Memorial Church.

The Harvard University and Cambridge Police Departments, responding to a call about the shooting, discovered a body with a self-inflicted gunshot wound lying outside Memorial Church, according to a HUPD community advisory.

The incident took place around 10:50 a.m. on Saturday, according to CPD spokesman Daniel M. Riviello.

At that time, a tour group posing for a photo was standing on the steps of Memorial Church facing Tercentenary Theatre. When the man shot himself, the people on the steps took off running across the grass, according to Jorge A. Araya Amador ’14, who was walking by Emerson Hall at the time.

Just after 11 a.m., at least 10 officers had responded, marking off sections of the eastern half of Harvard Yard with police tape.

Cambridge Fire and Rescue pronounced the individual dead on the scene. HUPD and the Middlesex District Attorney’s office declined to provide the man’s name.

Katherine C. Mentzinger ’14, who saw the tourists from her friend’s window, said that the members of the tour group who had been near the scene of the incident were taken aside to be questioned by police. Many of the individuals were crying, she said.

“From my friend’s window, I could see him in a pool of blood,” Mentzinger said.

Thayer resident Nathaniel J. Miller ’14 said that people in his dorm were “shaken a little bit, but no one [was] too hysterical.”

The incident occurred during Yom Kippur services in Memorial Church. Service attendees who exited the church at around 12:30 p.m. said that they had not heard anything about the shooting that had occurred just a few feet outside.

Two police officers entered the church toward the beginning of services, but there was no sense of alarm or panic, said Lindsay K. Berger, a Harvard Kennedy School student who was in Memorial Church observing the holiday. Several attendees were informed of the news by Crimson reporters inquiring about the incident.

College administrators—including Dean of the College Evelynn M. Hammonds, Dean of Student Life Suzy M. Nelson, and Secretary of the Administrative Board John “Jay” L. Ellison—were on the scene throughout much of the day.

At first, police closed off only the grassy area of the yard, allowing bystanders to walk along the pathways near University Hall, Widener Library, and Sever Hall. But as the day progressed, the perimeter grew until several gates on Mass. Ave. and Quincy St. were closed and the entirety of Tercentenary Theatre was cordoned off with yellow tape.

While police stood watch over the body in Tercentenary Theatre, tour groups and pedestrians continued to pass through the other side of Harvard Yard as usual.

At some point in the afternoon, authorities removed the body, and a man with a yellow cleaning cart showed up to clean off the granite.

By 3:45 p.m., the police tape had been taken down, and tourists resumed posing and taking photographs in front of Memorial Church. A damp spot remained near the area where the man had fallen.

Sometime between Saturday and Sunday afternoon, a single bouquet of red and orange roses was placed where the body had lain. A sealed letter lay next to the bouquet with the words “To my friend” written in neat cursive on the front.

What he left behind: A 1,905-page suicide note
Author described nihilistic outlook
David Abel
Boston Globe Staff
September 27, 2010

Mitchell Heisman spent years crafting his message.

In the end, no one really knows what led Mitchell Heisman, an erudite, wry, handsome 35-year-old, to walk into Harvard Yard on the holiest day in his faith and fire one shot from a silver revolver into his right temple, on the top step of Memorial Church, where hundreds gathered to observe the Jewish Day of Atonement.

But if the 1,905-page suicide note he left is to be believed — a work he spent five years honing and that his family and others received in a posthumous e-mail after his suicide last Saturday morning on Yom Kippur — Heisman took his life as part of a philosophical exploration he called “an experiment in nihilism.’’

At the end of his note, a dense, scholarly work with 1,433 footnotes, a 20-page bibliography, and more than 1,700 references to God and 200 references to the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, Heisman sums up his experiment:

“Every word, every thought, and every emotion come back to one core problem: life is meaningless,’’ he wrote. “The experiment in nihilism is to seek out and expose every illusion and every myth, wherever it may lead, no matter what, even if it kills us.’’

Over the years, as he became more immersed in his work, often laboring over it 12 hours a day, Heisman shared bits with friends and family but never elaborated on the extent of his nihilism — his hardened view that life is vapid and nonsensical, that values are pretense, that the “unreasoned conviction in the rightness of life over death is like a god or a mass delusion.’’

He told them he was working on a history of the Norman conquest of England, cloistered in a cramped apartment he shared in Somerville. They knew the clean-shaven young man from suburban New Jersey, who always called his elderly godmother on her birthday and once donated $200 to Harvard Hillel for sponsoring services at Memorial Church, to be intensely committed to his work.

Neither his mother, sister, nor the roommates from whom he sought forgiveness in the hours before he died had any idea he was about to kill himself. They and others have been groping for answers to why he did it and in such a public way, on such a holy day.

“He was very cordial, very charming, you would never know that something was wrong,’’ said Lonni Heisman, his mother. He frequently told her he loved her, and had recently visited to help her prepare for a move. “I’m still in shock and I can’t understand how he could have hid this,’’ she said. “He had everything going for him. He was in perfect health. He was handsome, smart, a good person. I’ll never understand it.’’

She said he was a gregarious child who grew introverted after his father, an engineer, died of a heart attack when Mitchell was 12 years old. As he got older, he became increasingly bookish and went on to study psychology at the University at Albany in New York, where he seemed shy to friends and spent much of his time reading.

After college, Heisman worked at bookstores, including the Strand in Manhattan, enabling him to amass a library of thousands of books. About five years ago, he moved to Somerville to focus on writing and be near major university libraries.

He led a Spartan existence, subsisting on microwave meals, chicken wings, and energy bars, and surviving mainly on money left to him after his father’s death. He was tall, with dark eyes, and dated when he needed a break from his solitude, rarely having trouble attracting women. But he broke off the relationships quickly, saying he was too busy writing a book.

To help him concentrate, Heisman often listened to a constant loop of Bach’s “Well-Tempered Clavier,’’ which he felt synthesized the mind’s competing strains of emotion and reason, went to a gym daily, and took Ritalin, which his mother thinks may have induced depression and led to his suicide.

One of his longtime roommates, David Barnes, described Heisman as quiet and considerate, never angry. He engaged in conversation by asking questions; when he spoke he often gave deliberate, lengthy responses. “He could get intense talking about his book,’’ Barnes said. “There was definitely a lot of emotion pent up in this project.’’

Barnes and relatives said Heisman bought the gun, a .38-caliber pistol, three years ago, though they don’t know where, and they believe he had only one purpose for it: to commit suicide when he finished his book.

“He wasn’t going anywhere dangerous; he wasn’t paranoid; he wasn’t worried about anyone hurting him or breaking in,’’ Barnes said. “I couldn’t imagine him buying a gun for any other reason.’’

A month ago, as he began wrapping up his writing, he asked Barnes if he would be a witness to the signing of his will. Barnes thought it was because he cared so much about his book and wanted to ensure it would be taken care of in case something happened.

Two days before his suicide, Heisman seemed elated. He told his roommates he had finished the book. He spent the next day at the post office, buying stamps and preparing packages for friends and family, with the book on CDs.

On the morning of Yom Kippur, Heisman showered, shaved, and ate a breakfast of chicken fingers and lentils, some of which he left on the kitchen counter, something he rarely did. He put on a white tuxedo, with white shoes, a white tie, and white socks, and donned a ill-fitting trench coat, perhaps to hide the gun.Continued...

At about 10 a.m., a half-hour or so before he would commit suicide in front of a group touring Harvard, Heisman walked into Barnes’s room. He told him the white clothing was a Jewish tradition, even though he rarely practiced his religion and had given up on the concept of God. Appearing to be in a buoyant mood, he explained the significance of Yom Kippur.

“He said he wanted me to know that if he ever did anything to offend me, he apologized and hoped that I would forgive him,’’ Barnes said.

In his book, which he titled “Suicide Note’’ and scheduled to send to hundreds of people as an e-mail attachment about five hours after his death, Heisman produced an extraordinarily lengthy treatise on why life was not worth living.

With chapter titles such as “Philosophy, Cosmology, Singularity, New Jersey’’ and “How to Breed a God,’’ and citing more than a hundred authors from futurist Ray Kurzweil to the biologist E.O. Wilson, Heisman explains how his views took shape.

“The death of my father marked the beginning, or perhaps the acceleration, of a kind of moral collapse, because the total materialization of the world from matter to humans to literal subjective experience went hand in hand with a nihilistic inability to believe in the worth of any goal,’’ he wrote.

He saw his emotions as nothing more than a product of biology, as soulless as the workings of a machine, making them in essence an illusion.

“If life is truly meaningless and there is no rational basis for choosing among fundamental alternatives, then all choices are equal and there is no fundamental ground for choosing life over death,’’ he concluded.

The darkness of his views has been too much for his friends and family, many of whom have yet to read his suicide note.

“It makes me sad and angry that he didn’t care for any facet of life other than the book,’’ Barnes said.

As his sister, Laurel Heisman, spent last week sifting through what remains of his things — a poster in German, a well-made bed, piles of books in a small room shrouded with a dark curtain — she said she received a separate, posthumous note from him asking that she preserve a website he created to publish his book, a burden she has agreed to bear.

“I love you,’’ he wrote to her.

She wishes she could have made him see more of the beauty of life, and how we create our own value and give our own meaning to life. She might have taken him up a mountain or held him more closely.

“He just told us the safe things, because he knew we would have tried to stop him,’’ she said. “It’s really hard. It’s not like someone who was really depressed because they lost a lover. His whole ideology was wrapped in this concept of nihilism. I wish we could have made him see things differently.’’ 

Hermon: We Live Our Lives Embodying The Truth Within Us

n Jin Moon
September 19, 2010
Lovin' Life Ministries

Good morning, brothers and sisters. How is everyone this Sunday? I am delighted to see all of you.

I am so happy to hear that our True Parents will be coming to America once again. As a wonderful family representing America, how shall we receive our True Parents? With love and a great heart of attendance and devotion, right?

I was able to talk to my parents and tell them of all the wonderful things taking place here and the progress the Second Generation is making. Our True Parents are delighted to see these changes. I think they can feel your heart and excitement. So I truly want to thank you for your inspired devotion and continued attendance to our True Parents.

This morning when I got up I thought about what I could share on this beautiful Sunday morning to prepare our hearts to spend the precious minutes we have with our True Parents in the fullest way. I was meditating on the word sincerity, which comes from the Latin sinceres, meaning "pure." When we meditate on the word pure, we think of something that's unadulterated, something that is not corrupted and not deceitful. Webster's dictionary defines sincerity for us as truthfulness, as something honest and genuine.

When we understand ourselves to be the children of our Heavenly Parent, we think about how we can go about living a life as an eternal son and daughter. What should an eternal son and daughter be like when we apply the principles in our lives? How should it look?

I very much feel that when we are attempting to live our lives as eternal, special, precious, prepared sons and daughters of God, the way we show our gratitude and heart of attendance is through sincerity. Many times my father has talked about the importance of being connected to God. In my sharing and sermons -- or "hermons" -- with my brothers and sisters, I like to talk about the example of a light bulb. In this beautiful hall we have many light bulbs that illuminate this gathering. The way you get this overwhelming, overpowering light is having it connected to a light source.

Human beings are like light bulbs. If we are connected to the divine source of energy -- or the divine source of true love -- we can illuminate beauty, love, and the power of God. But if we are not connected to God and to this power source, then we live empty lives, in darkness.

If we are like light bulbs, wanting to express the divinity within us by allowing the power of true love to flow through our bodies so we can be the source of a beautiful light unto the world, what is sincerity in this context? If God is the source of energy through which we can emit our own divine light into the world, the application of sincerity in our lives is almost like the cord connecting the light bulb to the power source. It's the cord that is pure, truthful, honest, and genuine. It's the cord that is unadulterated and allows the natural and free flow of God's energy through our bodies so we can truly live as divine and inspired beings.

Shintoism teaches in the words of Takatomi Senge that sincerity is the singular virtue that binds the divine and humanity. It's this sincerity or genuineness, this truthfulness or honesty that binds man to the divine. It's the willingness to be true to oneself that allows humankind to be connected to the divine source and allows him and herself to emit this beautiful light within.

When we refer back to the Good Book and look at Scripture, Titus 1:15, it says,

"To those who are pure, all things are pure. But to those who are corrupted and are not believers, nothing is pure."

This scripture reminds us of the importance of seeing good in other people. When we want to live our lives practicing sincerity, the scripture reminds us, one of the first things we need to do is to see the good in other people.

When you've had children -- and I have my ongoing saga with motherhood -- you've learned that kids are so pure and innocent that to them the whole world is wondrous. Everybody is a good person, and everybody is full of love because children have yet to experience the pain or difficulty and obstacles in life. They are bright-eyed, full of innocence and wonder.

I think this scripture is reminding us that, just like children, we need to maintain this sense of purity and goodness, wanting to see the good in others. As children grow up and become "corrupted" in experiencing the not-so-wonderful things, as well as wonderful things, they become tainted -- they become sarcastic, thinking negative thoughts and looking at people negatively.

When I was a high school student a long, long time ago, I experienced that the people who tended to make fun the most of other people at school were the most insecure people. Because they wanted to mask their own insecurity, they had to inflict pain on other people, just to make themselves feel less insecure. Because they felt somehow corrupted and unhappy, they could no longer have goodwill for others. This desire to tear somebody down just because you are unhappy, to say negative things about other people and not be able to see the good in them because you are miserable, and to poke fun and make the other person miserable just continues. These insecure people are not able to be honest about why they feel and do what they are doing.

People like Mother Teresa and Mahatma Gandhi, who want to see men and women of the world as children of God, who want to see the good, to see everyone's divinity -- such people see the divinity because they are pure in their own hearts, because they have made themselves pure through patience, diligence, and a consistent life of faith. Because they are pure, they see all things as pure. They believe that people can be pure; they see the divine in each and every one of us.

When you contemplate the beautiful hearts of people like Mother Teresa, who gave up a middle-class home to live with the untouchables of India, to feed and clothe them, to take care of them, you realize she was seeing the golden nugget, the purity, the divinity that each man, woman, and child has. Regardless of how dirty the slums of India might be, of how tattered the clothing of these people might be, regardless of whether or not these people were considered untouchables, Mother Theresa saw only the good -- what was genuine and honest in those people. She realized they were children of God, and it was her honor to take care of them and to see the good in them.

When I read about people like Mother Teresa and Mahatma Gandhi, it makes me realize that our modern-day world is so fragmented and that people are becoming so cold as to be almost mechanical in their functions. There's so little chance to savor and relish times with each other. When our society is so cold and people are miserable and isolated, what this world needs is people who can see again the good in others, pure-hearted people who can see the purity in others.

Regardless of how ugly our world might be, we must not look at others as corrupted human beings, seeing only the impure or ugly things. We have to transcend our own existence, our own situations, to want to live that life of sincerity first by seeing the beauty and good in other people.

Shintoism goes on in the divine injunction, saying that sincerity, or matoko, means the mind of kami, or the mind of God. When we contemplate this thought, my mind goes back to a speech my father gave in November 1978, when he talked about the importance of speaking with our mind, our innermost self. When I hear my father talk about the importance of speaking with the mind, it makes me think of what Shintoism teaches -- that sincerity is the mind of kami.

We have to think and speak with our mind as if we are speaking like God: with the parental heart of God; with the heart that empowers, not takes away; with a power that inspires, not enervates; and with a heart that nurtures, not destroys. If we are to live as sincere men and women, wanting to be truthful, honest, and genuine with each other -- and Shintoism urges one to think of sincerity as the mind of kami -- then we need to even go beyond seeing the good in others. If we really approach each other through the mind of God and we speak through the mind of God, we need to consider how he would speak to his children. Would God be sitting on a high throne, pointing out all the things we're doing wrong? Would God be sitting on a throne as a parent and be gossiping about his children? Would God be sitting on a throne, only pointing out how we fall short?

If we are to truly live our lives and speak with the mind of God, our innermost self, as my father, Rev. Sun Myung Moon has taught, we will heed his words as he goes on to say that if we are sympathetic to others, then we can live with and become one with God, and the truth of the universe will be revealed to us.

What does he mean when he says, "If we can be sympathetic to others"? You can show sympathy in many different ways. One of the most effective ways is by listening. Another way might be giving an embrace. But sometimes the most effective way of showing your sympathy for somebody is to speak a kind word or two.

My father is urging us that if we want to live a life of sincerity and we want to speak with the mind of God, we will articulate or speak about what is good in others. One of the most difficult things about working at Headquarters is that we have a lot of departments and different types of people. Whenever you get a group of people together, it's a cause for celebration, a cause for an inspired state of being. But many times it's an invitation to gossip, to tear people down, or to say negative things about other people.

If we really want to live a life as eternal sons and daughters of God, if we want to practice sincerity in our lives, then we need to think about gossiping. When the senior pastor of Saddleback Church welcomes new members to the church, he gives a brief introductory talk welcoming everyone, inviting them to become members. But one of the first things he requires of everyone who wants to become part of his community, a part of his family, is that he asks everyone please to not gossip.

Why does a senior pastor like Rick Warren make that a requirement? Because gossiping is not constructive. It does not empower, it does not inspire, and it does not nurture. No parents in their right mind would sit back and gossip about their children. No loving parents would want to tear their children apart. No loving brothers and sisters would want to tear each other apart.

Just as Rick Warren of the Saddleback Church in California has decided it is a requirement of membership that we should not gossip, shouldn't we as a movement do better? If we are here to really celebrate this breaking news of our True Parents, shouldn't we be articulating things that are empowering, positive, and uplifting, so that through our words we can inspire each other and ignite the excitement that our True Parents are here with us?

Why is it so exciting that our True Parents are here with us? For the first time we have a man and a woman sharing the breaking news with us, showing us that we belong to the same Parent and should not be fighting each other to the point of killing each other, as we have so sadly witnessed on 9/11. We have to overcome our differences. We have to overcome the barriers that divide us by concentrating on the fact that we belong to one common Parent and that we are all brothers and sisters, regardless of where we come from or whatever our economic status, race, and religious background might be.

We are all children of God. We can lift ourselves up by articulating goodness and positivity, and by celebrating here at Lovin' Life all that makes human beings beautiful as children in the eyes of God.

When I think about speaking with the mind of God, with our innermost self, I sense all of us being invited to have the heart that a wise old mother would have after having gone through the years of childbirth and raising children. One of the most difficult things I've ever had to do, and still continue to do, is to be a mother. We wish all the great things for our children. We want them to be happy, to experience success, love, and everything that's beautiful. We want them to be great human beings.

A mother gazing upon her children really wants to say to them, "You may experience moments of doubt when you feel desperate, but I will be here with you every step of the way. I will be here cheering you on, telling you that you can become great. I will be the one telling you that you are awesome; I will be articulating what God wants to say to you, that you are an awesome and precious creation of our Heavenly Parent."

When we think about the reading from Taoism that I shared earlier, it's really an invitation for us to embody this truth within us. Not only should we see good in others, not only should we speak good of others. One of the first things newborns learn to do is to gaze upon their world. A little further on, children learn to speak and they start expressing themselves. But the ultimate goal of every human being is to embody this truth within ourselves.

Taoism teaches that truth means purity and sincerity to the highest degree. And it is only with purity and sincerity that we have the capacity or ability to truly move others. If we realize that we are eternal sons and daughters with divine power as a rich reservoir of true love that we can tap into in order to become conduits of the universal energy of God, which allows us to embody his essence and become divine, then we can become a truth body ourselves.

It's almost like gazing upon True Father, who is such a complete man in that he is truth personified. This is a man with purity of spirit and utmost sincerity living a heart of attendance, devotion, and love in service to his Heavenly Parent. Ever since he was anointed by Jesus Christ to fulfill Jesus' mission at the tender age of 16, this man has never wavered, despite going through the trials, tribulations, and difficulties of six imprisonments and even surviving the Hungnam concentration camp in North Korea for almost three years. This man has never, ever wavered. The purity of his spirit directed to his mission in service to God and humanity, despite being maligned, persecuted, and hated, is so great that this man never gave up.

There is something ultimately beautiful in that. There's a sense of nobility in two people who personify two truth bodies, a man and woman who are so pure and sincere with their convictions and commitments that just by being true to him and herself, they can move multitudes to want to be great like him and like her, like our True Father and True Mother.

When our Father and Mother successfully established the position of True Parents, standing as the perfected Adam and Eve, perfected as two truth bodies personified, being pure and sincere in their utmost convictions and their devotion to our Heavenly Parent, they were not declaring themselves and sharing with the world that they are True Parents just to lord it over us. In fact, just like the True Parents that they are, they, with the heart of a parent, are inviting all of us to become great true parents ourselves, to become wonderful men and women who can come together in holy matrimony through this wonderful Blessing and have a chance to raise a beautiful, inspired family, what we call the ideal family.

I'd be the first one to say when we strive toward the goal of accomplishing an ideal family; it's not always a walk in the park. An ideal family means we're going to have to deal with a lot of things that come from being in a family. Sometimes nothing is more painful than the relationships in the family because those relationships mean so much to us. Nothing is more painful than the disunity that you might feel with a sibling because you care for and love that sibling of yours. Nothing is more painful than to feel you don't have a wonderful relationship with your father and mother because they mean so much to you.

But if we can concentrate on changing ourselves to become truth bodies, like light bulbs, practicing sincerity so the core connecting us to the divine is unadulterated and free from corrupt, dirty ways of thinking, and if we can be pure in our hearts, then we are inviting an incredible sense of gratitude into our lives.

When we live our lives embodying the truth within us, it's an invitation to live a life practicing a heart of attendance. When I talk about the heart of attendance, what I mean is to exercise the heart of love and devotion by thinking about the other person before ourselves. In thinking about the other person, instead of trying to change the other person, we actually decide to change ourselves. And when we decide to change ourselves, we realize that things naturally fall into place.

When you start exercising sincerity by looking inward and thinking about how you can be a good person, you then can realize that you have started looking at other people with pure thoughts. You're looking at other people's purity because you want to be pure and you're working on the purity of your thoughts. You want to see the good in other people because you want to see the good in yourself. You want to see the divinity in other people because you want to tap into that divinity yourself.

I don't know anybody in this world who likes to stand in front of a mirror and disparage themselves. Please point me to a person who likes to start the day looking in the mirror, saying how awful you are. Can you imagine saying to yourself in the morning as you're looking in the mirror, "You are so awful. You are worthless. Why can't you ever do anything right?" If we start our life out that way, we're not going to have a good day. If we start our life out that way, we're not going to appreciate the profound relationships that we have right before our eyes.

In Islam there is a saying, "Every man, woman, and child should live every day, every hour, every minute as if gazing into the face of God." Islam teaches that we may not actually see the very face of the divine, or God, but God certainly sees us.

If we are living and gazing into God's eyes, God's face, in our daily lives, then it invites us to see the good in others, to speak well of others, and to embody the truth, to become that pure and sincere human being that we all are.

We need to take away the armor of the world that we have become accustomed to. As the years go on, we put on more and more layers until we have totally insulated ourselves from our emotions, from our ability to empathize with another person. We need to put this professional armor away, put away the armor that protects us because we are so afraid of another person seeing the real us, because we don't feel like we're good enough or we don't feel worthy enough.

Let's have the courage to put away the layers. Let's live every day looking into the face of God and realizing there's nothing to hide because although God sees everything -- our fears and our insecurities -- and God sees and feels our apprehensions and shortcomings, God in return gives us consistent empowerment, nurturing, and love. It is in tapping into this divine source of energy and love that we can become great ourselves.

On days when we feel naked, homeless, and hungry, it might be a good time to check whether we are truly plugged in to the rich divine source of true love, or God. Perhaps we are feeling naked, homeless, and hungry because we haven't connected ourselves to this power source; we forgot to turn our light on.

When we are feeling worthless, it's important to realize that each life is a gift. The fact that we're living and that we're breathing in 20,000 liters of air every day is a miracle. We are living and breathing miracles, and we are here not to live meaningless lives, like dust in the wind. We are here with a purpose: to be loved and to love. We are here to move and be moved by each other.

As Taoism teaches, if we are not plugged in to the truth of who we really are in the essence of our divine being, our purity and sincerity, then we will not be able to move others; we will not be able to move and be moved by the people in our lives. We will not be able to love and be loved by people in our lives. So we need to be grateful for each other. We need to be grateful that we have this incredible opportunity to do something right, an opportunity to make the world right with God.

At the turn of this millennium, we have a responsibility to raise up a new Generation of Peace, a generation of young people who are going to see themselves as eternal sons and daughters belonging to one God, who are going to recognize that the value or meaning of their lives is not in living a selfish existence to satisfy whatever hunger they might feel but actually in living for the sake of others -- not because they seek individual salvation, but just because they want to be good people.

We need to raise up a generation of young people that sees more than what the Millennials, or the "show me the money" generation, sees. We need to raise a generation that practices compassion, is kind to each other, truly loves each other, and embraces beyond barriers, boundaries, and divisions to live and substantiate One Family Under God -- all while being compassionate human beings working on themselves to be internally and externally excellent.

If we can do that, brothers and sisters, if we can raise up an inspired generation calling themselves, claiming themselves, and owning for themselves the name Generation Peace, then the world will be in good hands. Then the world will be in the hands of young, inspired men and women who understand that right now in our modern age we have the capacity to destroy ourselves and our world, but we also have the capacity to love and to create. We have the capacity to think, and beyond that not just imagining how to substantiate a world of peace, but first and foremost understanding ourselves as belonging to one family of God.

Brothers and sisters, I hope that on this beautiful Sunday morning you can think about the word sincerity and realize that we all are such beautiful masterpieces of God. Nobody can really compare themselves to your own special nature. God doesn't look at you and compare you to somebody else. God looks at you and loves you just the way you are. And what God wants is to see all his children achieve and substantiate their personal destinies, just the way we as parents want that for our children. This is exactly what our Heavenly Father wants when he gazes into our eyes.

Brothers and sisters, please go on living as if you are gazing into the face of God. Always remember that no matter where you are, God is always there, God is always watching, and God is always praying and loving you every step of the way.

God bless, and thank you.

Notes:

Titus, chapter 1

1: Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to further the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth which accords with godliness,

2: in hope of eternal life which God, who never lies, promised ages ago

3: and at the proper time manifested in his word through the preaching with which I have been entrusted by command of God our Savior;

4: To Titus, my true child in a common faith: Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior.

5: This is why I left you in Crete, that you might amend what was defective, and appoint elders in every town as I directed you,

6: if any man is blameless, the husband of one wife, and his children are believers and not open to the charge of being profligate or insubordinate.

7: For a bishop, as God's steward, must be blameless; he must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain,

8: but hospitable, a lover of goodness, master of himself, upright, holy, and self-controlled;

9: he must hold firm to the sure word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to confute those who contradict it.

10: For there are many insubordinate men, empty talkers and deceivers, especially the circumcision party;

11: they must be silenced, since they are upsetting whole families by teaching for base gain what they have no right to teach.

12: One of themselves, a prophet of their own, said, "Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons."

13: This testimony is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith,

14: instead of giving heed to Jewish myths or to commands of men who reject the truth.

15: To the pure all things are pure, but to the corrupt and unbelieving nothing is pure; their very minds and consciences are corrupted.

16: They profess to know God, but they deny him by their deeds; they are detestable, disobedient, unfit for any good deed.

Titus, chapter 2

1: But as for you, teach what befits sound doctrine.

2: Bid the older men be temperate, serious, sensible, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness.

3: Bid the older women likewise to be reverent in behavior, not to be slanderers or slaves to drink; they are to teach what is good,

4: and so train the young women to love their husbands and children,

5: to be sensible, chaste, domestic, kind, and submissive to their husbands, that the word of God may not be discredited.

6: Likewise urge the younger men to control themselves.

7: Show yourself in all respects a model of good deeds, and in your teaching show integrity, gravity,

8: and sound speech that cannot be censured, so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say of us.

9: Bid slaves to be submissive to their masters and to give satisfaction in every respect; they are not to be refractory,

10: nor to pilfer, but to show entire and true fidelity, so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior.

11: For the grace of God has appeared for the salvation of all men,

12: training us to renounce irreligion and worldly passions, and to live sober, upright, and godly lives in this world,

13: awaiting our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ,

14: who gave himself for us to redeem us from all iniquity and to purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good deeds.

15: Declare these things; exhort and reprove with all authority. Let no one disregard you.

Sun Myung Moon's November 1978 speeches about the importance of speaking with our mind.

The Completion Period For the Dispensation (November 12, 1978)

Mainstream Of the Dispensation Of God [Part 1] (November 19, 1978)

Mainstream Of the Dispensation Of God [Part 2] (November 19, 1978)

How To Gain Spiritual Help (November 27, 1978)

How To Gain Spiritual Help (Unofficial Notes November 27, 1978) 

Let's Send Team USA To Wongu Peace Cup In Seoul!

In Jin Moon
September 15 2010

This year the Unificationist Olympic Games will take place in Seoul, Korea on Oct. 11-12. True Parents are calling this event the Wongu Peace Cup Games. Wongu means Round Ball, and as a ball turns, the world turns, from evil to good. True Parents want team USA to shine this year!

True Father said it this way:

"Within one second, the cosmos could change from the Era before the Coming of Heaven to the Era after the Coming of Heaven. It could likewise change from the Era above Heaven to the Era below Heaven, or from the Era in front of Heaven to the Era behind Heaven. These changes can be represented by the motion of a round ball. In Korean I coined the word won-gu, meaning "round ball," for the title of the Won-gu Peace Cup. Although you may not realize it, the cosmos changed as a result of the Won-gu Peace Cup Cain-Abel Cosmic Tournament."

Our National President, Rev. In Jin Moon, is urging all of our communities to take ownership for sending their athletes to the Peace Cup Games. Each athlete is soliciting donations from sponsors nearby. Together we will make history: please give generously when your athlete calls upon you! 

Loneliness

In Jin Moon
September 5, 2010
Lovin' Life Ministries

Good morning, brothers and sisters. How is everyone this morning? Happy Labor Day weekend. I'm delighted to be with you once again. I woke up this morning thanking our Heavenly Parent for a beautiful Sunday morning.

Today was interesting for me. I got up, prepared myself, made my way to the kitchen, and made a pot of tea. I just grabbed one of the cereal boxes that I have in the cabinet and sat down for a bit of a treat. Most of the time, I'm so busy I just grab something without looking at it and then run out the door. But today there was a beautiful picture on the cereal box, and it caught my eye. I turned the box around, and it was one of my children's favorite cereals, called Banana Nut Crunch. When I read what was on the back, I started giggling.

The box had a picture of a banana, the main ingredient. The company said in its advertisement, "We should all aspire to live like bananas." I thought, "Great statement. Why?" Then it says, "Because bananas are on permanent vacation in exotic places or lush tropical forests." It went on to say, "Bananas have it made because they grow under the canopy of other trees so they have the perfect blend of sunlight and shade." I thought, "Hmm, a lovely holiday sounds like a fine thing every once in a while."

The Asians who were born and raised in America and speak perfect English sometimes call themselves bananas because they're yellow on the outside but white on the inside. Or sometimes we're called Twinkies because we're yellow on the outside and white and creamy on the inside. I thought, "This banana thing has a lot of different connotations for me this morning." As one of the bananas here, standing at the pulpit, I find myself thinking, "Isn't it everyone's desire to be on a permanent vacation with our Heavenly Parent?"

As Confucius said, "There are many roads in life, but the destination is the same," By this he meant that regardless of what kind of family we're born into, what kind of career we might follow, or what kind of life we live, sooner or later we end up in the same place. Hopefully it's within the embrace of our Heavenly Parent in heaven.

That leads me to a lovely conversation I had with a young lady. One of the advantages of being a senior pastor here at Lovin' Life is that I get to meet a lot of young people. They truly inspire me in so many ways to really invest myself in my work so that I can better support these fine treasures of young men and women that I see in our community.

I remember a conversation with one young lady who came up to me at one of the meetings I had with a group of Second Generation. She said, "I always wanted to ask you a question." I said, "You're more than free to ask anything you like." She told me a little about her family, her parents, her relationship with her siblings, and some of her difficulties at school.

She said, "My friends and I were talking about this. We seem to be going through feelings of extreme loneliness." She mentioned that it always comes right before school starts, the way Labor Day weekend signals the end of summer and the beginning of school. It's around this time that young people feel really lonely. First they're struck with the fear of seeing new faces at school, new teachers, and being in a familiar and yet different environment because now they're a grade older.

She and her girlfriends were talking about this, and she asked, "Were you ever lonely?" I looked into her lovely face and asked her, "Is the sky blue? Absolutely. What you are going through is exactly what every one of us goes through." When we're adolescents, this loneliness hits us and we feel like no one understands us, God doesn't understand us, our parents don't understand us, our siblings don't understand us, all the people that we dearly care about don't understand us. Then we start to feel a weight of negativity and loneliness, and it can be crushing for many young people.

This girl was feeling this crushing weight of loneliness, and she was reaching out, asking me, "Do you ever feel like the sky is crushing down on you? What do you do?"

I shared with her a simple formula that works for me. I hope it can work for you as well. Growing up in a public family like mine, I learned to expect that my parents were rarely at home, and even when they were at home they were with other people, not our family members. So 24-7 they were always on the job. We had various people supposedly taking care of us, but when a lot of people are taking care of you, that basically means nobody is taking care of you and you're left alone a lot. When you cannot speak to your parents, you don't know who to go to. You feel incredibly isolated, like you are set on a huge, darkened stage with only a spotlight on you. Everybody can see you, but you can't see anybody. You belong to everybody, but you can't touch or see or feel anybody because it's simply dark. Many times that's how young people feel, and certainly many times that's how I felt, too.

Usually when I had a problem to work through, I would seek my mother's guidance whenever I could find an opening. One day I was terribly sad and depressed. I was living with my younger sister, whom I love dearly, but at that time I felt that this person I loved so much didn't understand me. Even though I was living in the same room with her, I felt incredibly alone.

I asked, "Omanim, I'm feeling really, really horrible today." She said, "Why are you horrible?" I said, "I'm feeling really lonely. I know I don't have much time with you, but I wanted to ask if you ever felt lonely." She turned to me and said, "Of course I've felt lonely." I said, "You did? But you're always with Father. How can you be lonely?" She replied, "Because your father is a public person, even when I'm with him I can feel lonely."

As a little girl I was really intrigued by that. I asked, "What can I do when I feel this crushing weight of loneliness?" What she told me has proven to be a wonderful nugget of wisdom. Even now when I feel the crushing weight of loneliness, her words come to mind, comfort my heart, and encourage me to go on and do greater things. She said, "In Jin, so many people spend their life trying to run away from loneliness. Young people like you need to be careful." A lot of the teenagers in America, such fine, prepared young men and women of God, are trying to do everything to run away from loneliness. They want to bury their loneliness by doing drugs, to drown it by drinking, or to hide it by going to parties and having endless relationships. Young people are always on the run from loneliness.

She said, "The first step in overcoming loneliness is to welcome it." I didn't quite understand when she said this, but she continued, "One of these days you're going to be a mother and you're going to experience motherhood." She said, "The loneliest point a woman can go through is right before birth, in the midst of incredible pain when your body feels like its being pulled in half. No one can really help you. But once you go through that, then you experience the most beautiful thing -- holding a baby in your arms. She said, "Loneliness is a wonderful thing if you can welcome it. God in heaven wanted to experience what it felt like to be a parent. He was lonely, and he wanted to experience loving relationships; that's why he created children."

If you really think about it, all the things that prepare us to be great people involve hours of loneliness. To become classical pianists, my children spent hours alone in the piano room, just them and the instrument, honing their skills, working on the very thing that would make them incredible musicians in the future. It's during these times of loneliness that they can immerse themselves, knowing that loneliness is not a permanent state of being but is actually a sign of a work in progress.

If we can take a bird's-eye view and see ourselves in the context of providential history, in the context of our personal destinies that we are all meant to fulfill, we realize that these phases and episodes of loneliness that we go through are actually preparation for us to get moving. Loneliness provokes us. It makes us want to do something about it. It gets us to think about things we've never thought about. It gets us to do things that we've never done. At the same time, if we can understand loneliness as a time of preparation and welcome it as such, then we can be grateful for a lonely feeling.

My mother said, "Many times young people will not search and look for God if they've never experienced loneliness. Sometimes people come to find and rest their hearts in the embrace of our Heavenly Parent only because they're incredibly lonely." They have to fill this incredible void with something eternal, something profound, something divine, and that is what leads them to God."

Early in my youth she urged me, "Try to welcome loneliness. Don't always try to run away. See it as one of those steps that you need to go through in order to get to the next level. Take each day one step at a time. You'll realize that if you do these simple exercises of prayer, singing, and rest, they can help you overcome the crushing burden of loneliness."

She encouraged me to pray. Why pray? When you grow up in a family of 14 siblings, like me, you cannot write a journal without somebody reading it out loud publicly. You cannot scribble your thoughts without someone finding it and saying, "Look what she's writing about!" We got no satisfaction when we gazed upon a blank canvas of a page, which was so inviting. Having my diary raided over and over again by a good many of my siblings, I learned that the best way to really articulate my thoughts was through prayer. In a way you are welcoming God, our Heavenly Parent into your life by inviting God to have a conversation with you.

When you start talking to God, it is not as if you're talking to somebody sitting up there on a throne, but it is as you would like to talk to your parents. Even though I grew up without my parents being there many times, I realized that I had an eternal parent, an eternal set of ears that was always there to listen to me and comfort me. I could talk for hours about what I was feeling, how angry I might have been, how sad I might have been, how lonely I might have been. But at the same time, the feeling that there was somebody hearing me out was an incredibly comforting one.

Even to this day, whenever I get the urge to write in a diary, I usually break out instead into a conversation with my Heavenly Parent. It's almost like having a dear, dear friend who follows you everywhere. You can have this conversation anywhere. It does not have to be scheduled. It can be five minutes, or 30 minutes, or a couple of hours, maybe late at night.

I realized the importance of articulating. When we are adolescents going through the tough times in our lives and we feel like nobody understands us, the first thing we tend to do is clam up, like an oyster. We take away the power of speech, and we don't want to talk to anybody. What ends up happening is, because we are divine beings and there's an endless, percolating true love that wants to come out and be expressed, if we suddenly deny ourselves the beauty of articulating our thoughts, sooner or later we're going to burst like a volcano.

Thus, speaking out, talking, and articulating what they are going through can help young people through their episodes of loneliness. By talking to God, knowing that Heavenly Parent is always listening, even if our parents, our best friends, and even our siblings might not be there for us, we know that we always have God.

My mother has a beautiful voice; often when I visit in her room she's humming or singing. One of the most beautiful things I saw my mother do was respond to something that had happened earlier in the day. I think she was terribly hurt. She was crying when I went in to greet her, but she was singing at the same time. Watching my mother sob -- really crying -- but at the same time singing, was something I'll never forget.

I gave her a big hug and asked, "Mother, why are you crying? Why are you crying and singing?" She answered, "When you sing, you're vibrating, and when my body is vibrating and I can feel, then my sadness, my difficulty, my suffering lessens with every note that I sing." She said, "You might think your mother is funny, but next time you are really sad or really lonely, try singing…Or humming."

One of her favorite songs is, "Sing, sing a song. Sing out loud, sing out strong." The Little Angels sing it all the time. "Sing of good things, not bad. Sing of happy, not sad." Right? These very simple words in a simple children's song carry a very valuable lesson for adults as well. Many times when we are so burdened by loneliness, misery, and suffering, we literally turn into bundles of wax and forget to stand. We forget that we are divine beings, that we are awesome sons and daughters of God. We forget to be joyful.

Sometimes when we are engulfed in a miserable state of being, a simple song like, "Sing, Sing a Song," or one of our favorite melodies can invite the beauty of the universal language back into our hearts, minds, and environment. It's amazing how a simple tune can change the way you feel. It's a nice reminder to "sing of good things, not bad. Sing of happy, not sad." As juvenile as it may seem, it somehow makes you feel better.

My mother also talked about the importance of rest when you're trying to overcome a difficulty or loneliness. I learned the importance of rest when I started going to piano lessons with two of my kids. One of the first things the Russian piano teacher taught them, before they started to play and before she put them on six months of intense scale training, was breathing. That reminded me that we're breathing in 20,000 liters of air every day, but we don't realize it. In this piano lesson, she said, "We're going to breathe in, and we're going to breathe out. We're going to breathe in, and we're going to breathe out."

She took my two kids through breathing exercises, saying, "You need to get in tune with the universe. You need to get in tune with your body, which is part of your instrument. You need to understand the importance of breathing in and breathing out." She went on to express that music is a living thing, a living language of love. As with most language, it needs to breathe.

If you hear music, no matter how great it is, without breaths, without punctuation, without silence, sooner or later it's going to turn into water torture. You're not going to be able to enjoy it at all. It's the wonderful rests in the music, or a taste of silence in the course of a song, that makes the next part of the sound more delicious so you can relish it more.

My mother emphasized the importance of rest, learning how to breathe. I think a lot of mothers in the audience know what it's like when we get married and have to take care of our husbands and kids, and our days are scheduled from morning to night. We are always busy: Prepare breakfast, prepare lunchboxes, take the kids to school, pick them up, bring them home, make sure they get to activities on time -- art, music, sports, whatever it might be -- do the grocery shopping, pick up the cleaning, make dinner, make sure they do their homework, take a bath, and get to bed. It just goes on and on.

Many times the mothers, myself included, forget to breathe. We feel almost like Joan of Arc, heroines struggling against the storms of our family. We can easily feel that our husbands and our children don't understand us. We can become incredibly lonely because we put ourselves up to be supermom, flying here, there, everywhere, not realizing that we have to breathe as human beings. In order to become effective moms, there has to be a time when we act, but there also has to be a time when we rest. There has to be a time when we give, but there also has to be a time when we receive.

I've found myself often in a state of chaos, feeling incredibly lonely, feeling I had to hold up the whole world in my hands. I literally was being crushed alive under the weight of everything I had to do, not realizing that perhaps if I took five minutes for myself, if I gave myself 30 minutes to go for a walk, or if I took a couple of hours at the King Spa Sauna -- which is becoming a real hot spot for our movement -- then back home I could be the rejuvenated and embracing mom that we all know we are.

Loneliness is not something that only young people suffer in adolescence. It's something the First Generation, moms and dads, grandfathers and grandmothers go through, too. But we need to understand that it's a work in progress, not a permanent state of being, and it's something that can be worked on. It's through episodes of loneliness that those who are artists can write a wonderful song, do a wonderful painting, or write wonderful poetry.

First Peter 5:10 says, "You will suffer for a little while." God doesn't say you will suffer for all of eternity or your whole life. God is saying, "You will suffer for a little while," meaning that these periods of loneliness are episodes, different phases that we go through, but it's not a permanent state of being. It goes on to say, "You will suffer for a little while, but He will restore, He will support, and He will strengthen you, and place you on a firm foundation."

God is being very frank with us here. Yes, you will suffer for a little while, but God will be there every step of the way. Just as a mother watching a baby learning how to walk stands back and lets the baby try over and over again, knowing the baby will fall repeatedly, we know it's a process that the baby has to go through so in the end he or she can learn how to walk. The baby might cry, the baby might fall, but a loving mother will be there to reassure, encourage, and support as she allows the child to go through the process for a little while.

When we feel lonely, it does not mean that God, our Heavenly Parent, has deserted us. In fact, He is watching us very much, wishing us well and supporting us from the sidelines, saying, "You can do it. Reach out for me, Child. Look for me, Child. Talk to me, Child. Sing to me, Child. Rest a little and work with me." This is what God is saying.

We as human beings and as sons and daughters of God desire this ultimate holiday with our God in heaven. We long for these moments of wonderful holidays when we can take time off and be with nature or our loved ones and friends. It's interesting that the word holiday comes from "holy day." A holy day is a day of rest, a day when we remind ourselves to breathe in, to breathe out. It's a day we remind ourselves that silence is just as beautiful as sounds that we hear.

God is speaking to us in many different ways. God speaks to us not just through happiness and celebration but through times of loneliness and difficulty. He speaks to us through our victories and through our trials and tribulations. Through it all, while we experience all these different feelings, God is with us each and every step of the way.

No matter where we are in life -- as Confucius said, "There are many roads in life." I'm sure the young people who are nervous about going back to school don't want to be different or lonely or isolated or scared. But Mother is advising us to welcome the fear, welcome the loneliness, and welcome the possible pain. By experiencing it and overcoming it, we can grow wider and taller and deeper as people.

Somebody who's known only happiness can never really fully understand the heart of God. Someone who has experienced only misery can never fully understand the heart of God. You have to understand God by canvassing all the different colors of the rainbow, all the different emotions that we human beings all feel.

I myself have felt loneliness. So will you. I myself have felt loneliness. So will our kids. But let's help our kids understand that loneliness is not a permanent state of being, that it might be the catalyst through which they reach out to God, the catalyst through which they become incredible writers, artists, musicians, and thinkers, and the catalyst to create them as human beings who are excellent internally and externally. Recognizing loneliness in this way, we can realize that life in all its multitude is truly a gift. It doesn't matter where we are in life right now, we must concentrate on what Confucius taught: that all roads and all destinations are the same, that we will go ultimately back into the embrace of our Heavenly Parent.

So the ultimate question we must be asking ourselves is, "What are we going to leave behind?" The wonderful Legacy of Peace tour was so profound in that it addressed the question, "What are we going to leave behind?" As human beings, the most beautiful things we can leave behind are children. It is through our children that we live forever.

For centuries men and women alike have sought the fountain of youth, the key to living forever. But living forever is actually the eternal. The divine is already within each one of us, and we will and we do live forever through our children.

It is our duty to raise up this beautiful generation of peace that understands that they belong to one family. As my father declared to all of us on God's Day, 1987, "I see all religions as belonging to one family." My father has gone on throughout his lifetime to teach that all races belong to one family. No one is better than the other. We're all brothers and sisters. And no one culture or tradition is better than the other. We must learn from each other.

It's exciting for me as the senior pastor to be reminded -- when my children come back from their colleges and their friends visit them at Lovin' Life -- of the things that are said over and over again about our movement: "Your church is the most beautiful church I've been to. The people are so beautiful, inside and out. I've never seen such beautiful people excited about God, and especially the young people."

In our movement we have the beauty of East and West, the beauty of horizontal and vertical. Anybody who comes to see our community can feel it. We must not be jaded because we see our community up close and personal. We must not be like the area directly under the lamp that tends to be the darkest. Many times I think we don't realize how blessed and precious we are. But if we can take a look at ourselves from the vantage point of my kids' friends, or friends of our kids, we cannot help but feel that our movement is phenomenal. The fact that ours is the most successful, powerful, and influential movement in the time of the founder's own life is unbelievable. That is an achievement in and of itself.

Brothers and sisters, let's put our movement and the history of our church into context. Jesus Christ changed the world in less than three years of public ministry. He has given new life and a new understanding of love to millions of people around the world. Our movement is just getting started. Father is still with us. We have celebrated already the 50th anniversary of our movement. We have 50 years' worth of good works and good love to share with the rest of the world.

If Jesus could change the world with less than three years' ministry, think about what our True Parents will do with more than 50 years of ministry.

Brothers and sisters, let's put ourselves in the context of history and realize what a phenomenal family we are and what a phenomenal movement we are. And we will be the ones to usher in the next millennium. On that note, God bless you. Thank you.

Notes:

Confucianism. I Ching, Appended Remarks 2.5

Confucius said... "In the world there are many different roads but the destination is the same. There are a hundred deliberations but the result is one."
World Scripture, A Comparative Anthology Of Sacred Texts - Editor, Andrew Wilson

Sing
Words and Music by Joe Raposo

Sing, sing a song
Sing out loud
Sing out strong
Sing of good things not bad
Sing of happy not sad.

Sing, sing a song
Make it simple to last
Your whole life long
Don't worry that it's not
Good enough for anyone
Else to hear
Just sing, sing a song.

Sing, sing a song
Let the world sing along
Sing of love there could be
Sing for you and for me.

Sing, sing a song
Make it simple to last
Your whole life long
Don't worry that it's not
Good enough for anyone
Else to hear
Just sing, sing a song.

1 Peter, chapter 5

1: So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ as well as a partaker in the glory that is to be revealed.

2: Tend the flock of God that is your charge, not by constraint but willingly, not for shameful gain but eagerly,

3: not as domineering over those in your charge but being examples to the flock.

4: And when the chief Shepherd is manifested you will obtain the unfading crown of glory.

5: Likewise you that are younger be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble."

6: Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that in due time he may exalt you.

7: Cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares about you.

8: Be sober, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking some one to devour.

9: Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brotherhood throughout the world.

10: And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish, and strengthen you.

11: To him be the dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

12: By Silva'nus, a faithful brother as I regard him, I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God; stand fast in it.

13: She who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings; and so does my son Mark.

14: Greet one another with the kiss of love. Peace to all of you that are in Christ.  

Leaders, Serve The People You Are Leading

In Jin Moon
August 29, 2010
Lovin' Life Ministries

Good morning, brothers and sisters. How is everyone this morning? We missed you last weekend, but it's so good to be back home in this good ol' US of A. We just got back yesterday and were able to spend about a week with our brothers and sisters in South America. We visited Paraguay, Uruguay, and also Argentina. We shared with them our True Parents' love and a little bit of our spirit here at Lovin' Life Ministries.

The people down there were so warm and so passionate about their love for our True Parents. Just as we had a general assembly in Brazil the last time I went down there, where the vote was unanimous for our True Parents, the same thing happened in Paraguay as well. Again we had a general assembly because there was a great deal of pressure from different parts of our movement that wanted to take the assets that belong to our movement and our True Parents away, under the name of different companies. The members spoke, and their voices were heard. They stood firm that the church assets should remain in the possession of the church. So it was a great victory for our movement and for our True Parents. And again, I thank the brothers and sisters in South America for being courageous, for doing the right thing, and for letting the worldwide movement know that South America stands with True Parents.

When I went to Paraguay, I was joking with some of the brothers and sisters there that the name "Paraguay" is quite interesting to a Korean ear because it sounds like "para-guay," like "para-po-ah-ra," which is what grandparents would say to a grandchild when you want to say, "Please take a look at this." When I first heard Paraguay, I thought it sounded like "Look at this" country, which can be the guide for other countries of South America.

It's interesting that Paraguay is the country where Roman Catholicism took root many years ago. It was from Paraguay that Catholicism started to grow and influence the surrounding countries. In many respects Paraguay is like the birthplace of Catholicism in South America. When I met the governor, vice president, congresswomen, and the great senators they have there, I shared with them the breaking news that our True Parents are here: The Lord of the Second Advent, the messiah that we have been waiting for, is here.

I told the vice president, "Many times Paraguay is referred to as the corazon [Spanish for "heart"] of South America. So if Paraguay can graft onto the original olive branch, to our True Parents, and work in unity to bring the good news, the breaking news, and share it with the rest of South America, then God's fortune and blessing can be given to this great country."

When I met the vice president, we had a pretty large delegation. Though he's familiar with the good work of our True Parents through CAUSA and various other organizations, and he's heard about our belief system here and there, I think he's never heard that our True Parents are the messiah. I think a lot of people in the room felt a little afraid, "Is In Jin Nim going a bit too far? Will the vice president leave the room or start acting nervous?" But I began telling him the story of this extraordinary 16-year-old boy who met Jesus Christ on Easter Sunday in the hills of North Korea and from then on never wavered through all the different trials and tribulations he's had to endure, the six prison sentences and all the misunderstanding and persecution he had to carry in his lifetime -- he has always been consistent, dedicated, and loyal to our Heavenly Parent.

When I shared this news with him, Vice President Franco just sat in his chair with his eyes fixed on my face, and he listened for over 15 minutes. At the end he thanked me so much for coming and sharing with him how precious our True Parents are, why they are necessary to Paraguay, and why Paraguay has a special mission because it sits on the special spiritual heritage of Catholicism. I had explained to him that his country has the responsibility of tapping into the new message, the revolution of love that our True Parents are bringing, and of working together to re-inspire, to reinvigorate, and to empower the young men and women of Paraguay to be excellent people.

He thanked me profusely and said, "Not only am I honored to meet the daughter of Reverend Moon, but I believe I've just met a prophet." So I jokingly said to him, "Prophets are sent to provoke and to make you feel uncomfortable, maybe make you so angry that you would throw me out of your office. But you've been gentlemanly and kind, so perhaps I was not doing my job." We gave each other a hug, and I walked out.

As we were getting into the car, one of his assistants ran out and said, "Please do not leave." I was thinking, "Oh, boy." Some of the leaders were thinking, "In Jin Nim went too far this time." I waited in the car, and the assistant came back, saying, "The vice president has a gift for you." He gave me a beautiful gift that's a typical Paraguayan delicate doily, like a patchwork of lace. He gave it in gratitude to me, but really to True Parents.

Many times in our movement we're afraid to speak the truth, to share the breaking news. But there are lots of people who want to listen to the breaking news; there are a lot of people who are prepared. The message we bring is a good one, a message of hope. Just as this breaking news was a message of hope for the Paraguayan political leaders and for our brothers and sisters there, so, too, it was a message of hope when we shared with the Uruguayan members and dignitaries, including the former first lady whom I had the opportunity to dine with. These are people who are prepared to hear the news.

The former first lady said to me, "For the first time I finally understand what you mean. I finally get it. I've often thought about my role in life, but with the understanding of True Parents as the first man and woman working together in this beautiful partnership to create a family and to be the paradigm of true love for the world, I find immense pleasure and liberation in knowing that I'm a woman. I realize I have equal divine value."

When we went to Argentina and I met with the director of the Teatro de Colon, the biggest theater in Buenos Aires, the same thing occurred. The message is the same. The breaking news is the same. It really doesn't matter whether I'm talking to an artist, a minister, the president or vice president. The message is the same. When I deliver the message, the response is the same.

We have such good news; it's like a wonderful secret we are able to enjoy in the privacy of our own homes, and maybe we feel uncomfortable to share the good news or think we are not prepared. When I ask them what is the image of the Unification movement out there, some of my friends say, "Some people say it's great, that you've done a lot of great work, created great organizations that live to serve the world and promote peace. That's all wonderful. But many people think you guys are always hiding things, withholding. Sometimes at your workshop we hear things like, 'You're not ready for that.'" Sometimes the feeling that they get is, why are they not getting the full story, if it's so good and if it's so truthful?

In my experience, yes, I would like to think of myself as a lady, but when it comes to how I think, I'm rather blunt, and perhaps a little too much to the point for some people to bear. But I would rather be blunt and in your face about my opinions than for other people to look at me as if I'm withholding something.

The same thing happened when I went to Argentina. The Minister of Culture was absolutely taken by this news. He said to me, "What can I do to work with you? How can we build bridges between North and South America? How can we build bridges between the different countries of the world and the different types of projects you're working on? I want to get involved."

I gave him a couple of ideas that we can pursue and look at. But the message of our True Parents being the True Parents of humankind is very clear. He said, "We really do need a good model of a good father and mother. It's a beautiful thing." People are inspired. When I mentioned that my daughter came along to experience South America and also to give something back by teaching ballroom dance classes to young people, I said, "My daughter is a great fan of Latin dancing. She's a great fan of salsa and tango."

Then he got up from his seat and said, "I have the best gift." I replied, "Are you going to enroll me in a tango class?" He said, "No, but I have a fantastic DVD set, one for every day of the week. These are the best performers and artists of Argentina -- the best tango dancers, the best singers. I would like your daughter to appreciate Argentine culture." I thanked him profusely. Before I left, I asked, "When are you going to teach me how to tango?" He replied, "Let's go tonight." I said, "I have a speech to give tonight. Will you be in America soon?" He mentioned that he's coming to New York a couple of months from now. He said, "When I visit you at the Manhattan Center, I'm going to teach you how to tango."

Later during the evening I shared with various dignitaries, "Argentina is a very special place. In America, we have the White House. In Korea, we have the Blue House. But in Argentina, you have the Pink House. Did you know that pink is my father's favorite color because it is the color of love? The fact that the president's house is pink -- is that somebody upstairs hinting a thing or two? Perhaps Argentina can be the place where the revolution of love can take hold, so that the first blush of true love can be experienced by young Argentine men and women. With the good work that you're doing through different cultural expressions you are allowing the Argentinians to take part in, perhaps we can encourage everyone to experience this love of the divine, to tap into our own divinity because we are divine beings ourselves."

When I shared with the different dignitaries the breaking news that our True Parents are here, they responded in the same way. I heard that in the audience in Uruguay and Argentina were many of the friends of our movement who had actually walked out on my father when he came to teach them that he is the messiah and True Parents, that he is the Lord of the Second Advent. But this time around I saw everybody listening so attentively and carefully. I realized the power of the John the Baptist. In a way I became John the Baptist, testifying about my father, so people could accept 100 percent and open up their hearts.

In the past we put that responsibility on True Father himself; we turned him into a self-proclaiming messiah. That's a very difficult thing for people to accept. But if every one of us can be a John the Baptist figure testifying to the beauty of our True Parents, then we realize that people are ready to listen.

I've challenged the members in South America, "Don't you want South America to be the place where the revolution of true love is percolating, where so much noise is being made by young men and women of God who want to do great things, who want to see the world as one family, that our True Parents will hear about it, that they will be excited about it and want to visit your country?" Of course, they said "Yes."

I said, "We in North America are working really hard. If we can work together with you, and I can support you, and you can also support me in North America, and we can really work in unity to bring the two Americas together, to unite the Cain and Abel of these two hemispheres, then great fortune can be harvested and great fortune will be experienced.

I challenged everyone in the audience, "Think for a moment -- even if you don't think the True Parents are who they are claiming to be, even if there's any ounce of a doubt in your mind perhaps because you've heard a lot of things and feel a lot of things when you think about these two people -- think that there may be a 0.001 percent chance that they actually are telling us the truth. They actually might be the True Parents, the prince and princess of peace that many Eastern philosophies have talked about, that will appear in the next millennium, or even may have been predicted by Nostradamus, for that matter. If there is any inkling of a possibility, and if that possibility is actually the truth, then are we not the luckiest people alive?"

My father gave a speech, "The Future of Christianity" (in God's Will and the World, p. 210), in which he stated that Jesus did not come to die. In fact, if Jesus came to die, then there would have been no need to prepare the people for the coming of the messiah. God would have not had to prepare the people and would have sent his son into the persecution of nonbelievers. Then Jesus Christ would have died a whole lot quicker, if that was the main purpose. If Jesus was meant to die, why did God have to prepare the people?

God spent an inordinate amount of time preparing for the messiah, laying the foundation for the messiah, preparing the people of Israel for the messiah, because Jesus was not supposed to die. He was supposed to live, to find his beautiful wife, and to build an ideal family. When we think about that time, maybe the people then were just like us. Maybe some were fervent believers and their lives were changed by Jesus' teachings. But perhaps many were ignorant, or blind, or had only an inkling that he might be someone special. Perhaps they experienced a chill up their spine or intuitively felt that he was someone special, but they didn't have the courage to own up to those feelings. And because they did nothing, then Jesus died.

Fast forward 2,000 years. Here we not only have Jesus Christ come again, but we have the perfected Eve standing next to him. Together as the True Parents they are here to usher in the new millennium of peace. Some amongst us look upon them and want to dedicate everything they have for our Father and Mother. Some people have never heard the breaking news. Then there are some who are blind, who refuse to see. They might feel that the True Parents are here, but they refuse to open their eyes and see them as the Lord of the Second Advent.

I asked the audience, if there is the minutest possibility that they are who they say they are, what are we going to do about it? How are we going to decide? How are we going to live our lives? Are we going to jump in and work together with them because this is the very man that Nostradamus prophesied hundreds of years ago?

Nostradamus could not have made it more simple. When you read the quatrains about the prince of peace who will come, it could not be more clear than to say, somewhere in his name will be Diana's moon. There will be a literal moon in his name. He went on to say that this man will be represented by a rose and by the color red. Of course everybody knows that the color of our Unification Church symbol is red. For those of us who are not familiar, it rather resembles a rose, does it not?

Nostradamus went on to say that this man will carry the rod of Hermes. Hermes is the god of commerce and finance. It's interesting to me that even though my father is a man of God, many people want to label him as a businessman. He's famous for businesses he's built and raised up over the years. He's seen as someone who wields this rod of Hermes.

Nostradamus said that this man will have something to do with the crane. This point baffled many authors who interpret Nostradamus' prophecies, but anyone who understands that the True Parents are a man as well as a woman, then you have to look not only at Father but also at the woman standing next to him. Her name means "heavenly crane." Many times our church symbol is surrounded, almost like a parenthesis, by two heavenly golden cranes. Again, Nostradamus was making it very clear for us.

He said further that at the end of time there will be birds traveling through the air like a rocket, uttering the words, "Now, now." I envision Nostradamus looking into his copper bowl of water, seeing images of airplanes, which did not exist hundreds of years ago. It is our True Parents flying to different parts of the world, saying, "Now is the time of the breaking news. Now is the time we must decide to live as one family under God because if we don't, we certainly have the technological power to destroy ourselves many times over."

It becomes a necessity for us to seek a way to unite with something that is larger than life, something that is eternal, something that is not temporary and fleeting. We need to latch onto this concept of the eternal, of a Heavenly Parent, and to realize that we are His and Her children, that we have a duty to see the whole world as one family.

I went to Paraguay not as just a messenger of my father; I went there as a sister meeting my Paraguayan family. I went to Uruguay meeting my Uruguayan family, and I went to Argentina meeting my Argentine family, men and women alike. I encouraged them and said, "Mr. Vice President, next time you get a phone call saying, "Mi hermano," then you know that I am calling, because I am your sister calling you. You are my brother and you'd better answer my call."

When I see the beauty of the people around these countries and see how much potential True Parents established there -- one of our tracts of land there is the size of South Carolina -- I can see how much these countries have been prepared by our True Parents for the sake of the world. We can utilize these huge assets to perhaps feed the world, to take care of the world, perhaps to discover different medicines.

My father is always thinking about the world, thinking beyond individual salvation. When I first did my listening tour, I shared with brothers and sisters that there are two words in English that we must not forget. It may not be grammatically correct, but it can be a fantastic reminder of why we need to live for the sake of others. I like to share with my children that we should not live for the sake of others because we seek our own salvation. We've done that.

I ask myself, if I've worked so hard and sacrificed so much, bent over backward because I want to live a life of faith for my own salvation, then what good is it if the rest of the world is suffering? Why would I want to sit up in heaven if my brothers and sisters in the world are suffering? If the whole world is immersed in tears and heartache, for me to be sitting in heaven would be a very lonely eternity.

Our True Parents are saying, "Don't just think about individual salvation. We have to want to be good people, just because." Our desire to be good people is not contingent on us wanting to be saved individually. In other words, we want to be good daughters and sons, good wives and husbands, good mothers and fathers, not because we want to sit up in heaven all by our lonesome but just because we want to be good people. Let's practice this philosophy of living for others just because, not because God is going to give us a candy for a job well done, but just because we get a thrill and fulfillment in taking care of somebody else. The beauty of our movement lies in the fact that we are here because we want to save, we want to help, we want to liberate whole world.

It's larger than us. It's larger than our own family. It's larger than our own society. It's larger than our nation. We want to save the whole world. The message that our True Parents bring is incredibly profound and powerful.

When I think back to Jesus 2,000 years ago, as it says in John 1:11, people did not realize who he was. It says, "He came to his own and the people receiveth him not."

What about our True Parents? They have come, and what are we, the people, going to do? Are we not going to receive our True Parents? Or what about those who are born into this movement? What about the ones especially tapped and prepared? We've been thrown buckets and buckets of diamonds, but we do not understand what the value of these diamonds are. Perhaps we're seeing them as cut glass and don't realize that we have been thrown diamonds.

What are we as the Second Generation going to do? Our True Parents have come back home, and we don't know who they are? Do we not see who they are? Can we not feel what they are?

This is an important time to be thinking about where our faith lies and where we lie in terms of our decision to either own up to who we are as Second and Third Generation or not. This is not a time to be sitting on the fence, checking out the lukewarm waters on both sides. This is a time to decide to be that agent of change. This is a time to decide to do right. This is a time to unite with the centrality of our True Parents and to really inherit what they want us to be. If they say that the youngest son is the spiritual head of the family, so it shall be.

The Bible goes on to also tell the leaders of our world to not send our True Parents the way of the crucifixion, as did the rulers of Jesus' time. In I Corinthians 2:8, "None of the rulers of this age knew who he was, for if they had, the Lord would not go the way of crucifixion." The Bible clearly says that Jesus did not come to die. It was the ignorance and the blindness of the nonbelievers that caused Jesus to go the way of the cross.

I've often chuckled to myself when I read this passage because it says none of the rulers knew that he was Jesus Christ, the son of God. What is a ruler in mathematics? It's a long thing that has numbers and calibration, right? You can measure things. I've often thought if the rulers, people in position of leadership, spent less time measuring their own positions, measuring their own power, measuring their own ability to influence but concentrated on the important things, perhaps measuring their own relationship with their God, our Heavenly Parent, measuring their work in service to the people, then perhaps the rulers' eyes might have been opened. They might have heard the breaking news.

It's a great reminder for those of us in a position of power to not become like the calibrated rulers we use in mathematics. The position of leadership is not a position to do whatever you want. It's to serve the people you are leading. If you truly understand that, then you realize that if we are in the position of leaders and serving our True Parents, who represent the original olive branch through which we are grafted into the heavenly lineage and become part of one family under God, then it's our duty to serve our people by absolutely uniting with the will and the desire of our True Parents. That desire is very clear.

The power of true love is very clear. Once you give the people an opportunity to exercise their power to be that voice of strength, courage, and truth, in an atmosphere like the general assembly -- both in Brazil and in Paraguay -- you cannot be there and not be moved. This is a very difficult thing for some people. But when the people own up to understanding that this is what True Parents want -- we should keep God's treasure in God's hands, we should keep God's assets in God's hands -- then it's a wonderful feeling of victory when the vote is unanimous.

Brothers and sisters, as our church grows into the next millennium, as our children become young adults and become couples on their own and raise families of their own, let us remember where all this started. None of the Second Generation would be here without our True Parents. The majority of the First Generation would not be here without our True Parents. They are the ones who gave us life. They are the ones through whom we experienced true love, true life, and true lineage. They deserve our loyalty.

Brothers and sisters, don't let our True Parents down. Be courageous. Do the right thing, just because they are the ones who have given us spiritual life, and they are the ones who will guide us through all of eternity. Be vigilant, be constant, and be dedicated to our True Parents because we have so much to thank them for and we should be eternally grateful.

On that note, have a wonderful Sunday, and God bless you.

Notes:

John, chapter 1

1: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

2: He was in the beginning with God;

3: all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

4: In him was life, and the life was the light of men.

5: The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

6: There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.

7: He came for testimony, to bear witness to the light, that all might believe through him.

8: He was not the light, but came to bear witness to the light.

9: The true light that enlightens every man was coming into the world.

10: He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world knew him not.

11: He came to his own home, and his own people received him not.

12: But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God;

13: who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

14: And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father.

15: (John bore witness to him, and cried, "This was he of whom I said, `He who comes after me ranks before me, for he was before me.'")

16: And from his fulness have we all received, grace upon grace.

17: For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

18: No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known.

19: And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, "Who are you?"

20: He confessed, he did not deny, but confessed, "I am not the Christ."

21: And they asked him, "What then? Are you Elijah?" He said, "I am not." "Are you the prophet?" And he answered, "No."

22: They said to him then, "Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?"

23: He said, "I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, `Make straight the way of the Lord,' as the prophet Isaiah said."

24: Now they had been sent from the Pharisees.

25: They asked him, "Then why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?"

26: John answered them, "I baptize with water; but among you stands one whom you do not know,

27: even he who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie."

28: This took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing.

29: The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!

30: This is he of whom I said, `After me comes a man who ranks before me, for he was before me.'

31: I myself did not know him; but for this I came baptizing with water, that he might be revealed to Israel."

32: And John bore witness, "I saw the Spirit descend as a dove from heaven, and it remained on him.

33: I myself did not know him; but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, `He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.'

34: And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God."

35: The next day again John was standing with two of his disciples;

36: and he looked at Jesus as he walked, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God!"

37: The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus.

38: Jesus turned, and saw them following, and said to them, "What do you seek?" And they said to him, "Rabbi" (which means Teacher), "where are you staying?"

39: He said to them, "Come and see." They came and saw where he was staying; and they stayed with him that day, for it was about the tenth hour.

40: One of the two who heard John speak, and followed him, was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother.

41: He first found his brother Simon, and said to him, "We have found the Messiah" (which means Christ).

42: He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him, and said, "So you are Simon the son of John? You shall be called Cephas" (which means Peter).

43: The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. And he found Philip and said to him, "Follow me."

44: Now Philip was from Beth-sa'ida, the city of Andrew and Peter.

45: Philip found Nathan'a-el, and said to him, "We have found him of whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."

46: Nathan'a-el said to him, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see."

47: Jesus saw Nathan'a-el coming to him, and said of him, "Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!"

48: Nathan'a-el said to him, "How do you know me?" Jesus answered him, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you."

49: Nathan'a-el answered him, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!"

50: Jesus answered him, "Because I said to you, I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe? You shall see greater things than these."

51: And he said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man."

1 Corinthians, chapter 2

1: When I came to you, brethren, I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God in lofty words or wisdom.

2: For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

3: And I was with you in weakness and in much fear and trembling;

4: and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power,

5: that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.

6: Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away.

7: But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glorification.

8: None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

9: But, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
nor the heart of man conceived,
what God has prepared for those who love him,"

10: God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.

11: For what person knows a man's thoughts except the spirit of the man which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.

12: Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is from God, that we might understand the gifts bestowed on us by God.

13: And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who possess the Spirit.

14: The unspiritual man does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

15: The spiritual man judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one.

16: "For who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.