Sun Myung Moon
April 1, 1978
World Mission Center
Translator - Sang Kil Han
Those who want to be faithfully religious find it difficult to overcome themselves because, like everyone else, they originally grew up feeling that everything centers on themselves. We are all surrounded by many circumstances which strongly influence us, and those who are not religious just take it for granted; they do not know about the fall, so they believe that it is only natural to be dominated by both the good and evil in their environment and they don't question it. Religious people, however, know that something went wrong early in history, and that as a result they face internal conflict about good and evil every day. As their spirits grow higher and higher, they realize how far man fell-from the same position as God down through the world level, family level, past the level of God's child to being a servant of Satan, where mankind could go no further down.
No one now finds himself in the place where God is, but in the realm which Satan controls. Satan is in control of the "self,,, the family and society, and even the world. We realize that right now God and His world are way beyond our reach and that to get there we have to thrust ourselves beyond the gravity of the fall. We realize that this world where we stay is the realm of the fall, and that it is surrounded by the spiritual realm which Satan dominates. Satan controls not only this physical world but even the lower part of spirit world. It is only in going beyond that realm that we can reach the spirit world which God dominates. God has control only in the highest realms.
To correct ourselves we have to be conscious that we are the offspring of the fall; only then can we one day conquer it. Every day is a process of overcoming ourselves and even overcoming the spirit world so that one day we can reach the realms of goodness in the spirit world. It is very difficult to be religious and observe all the necessary disciplines to some day reach that level.
We have to realize why we are doing many things which ordinary people would never imagine doing, like sacrificing ourselves to an extreme degree. We always have to be conscious not only of this world that happens to have fallen into Satan's dominion, but also of the fact that our job is always to overcome it. There are many layers oppressing the individual who tries to get out, layers which prevent his easy escape. Since God is on our side we can eventually overcome, of course, but once we do that, the evil spirit world will also try to come and oppress us. When we go beyond even that and overcome, then for the first time we can be connected with heaven, which is controlled by God.
Each person must vividly realize his need to change
It's a fact of history that to truly live the religious life is very, very difficult. Each person finds himself in the fallen realm with the blood of Satan flowing through his veins. Everyone has to be conscious of that, continually aware that Satan's influence touches everything we do and that we apt to do everything centering around our baser self. Just shrugging and admitting, "Maybe that is so," is not good enough. We have to clearly understand how this is the reality surrounding us. How we can change this bad blood into good is the problem facing us.
Let us see in further detail what the characteristics are of a man with fallen blood lineage. The one characteristic most easily discerned is that of ignoring the whole and trying to elevate oneself instead. This is not difficult to do because it was this very self-centeredness that motivated the fall. Thus we find that this is the most noticeable characteristic of a fallen man.
How deeply rooted is this self-centered nature? It is very deep because all the world surrounding us is composed that way and compels us in this direction. We can easily imagine how difficult it was under these circumstances to establish religion, through which mankind could continue advancing toward heaven. The satanic lineage has extended throughout history and there is nothing around us that is not connected to Satan. This is not a concept but the reality, and is the reason why many religious leaders appeared on earth to teach people and try to lead them away from this bad realm.
Putting aside the world for a moment, let's think about the self. Has anyone been successful at any time in history in overcoming himself, even just one small individual? We know there was no one like that except Jesus. God has never seen one individual reach perfection, although through 6,000 years He has invested all His energy into restoring one man into the original position of Adam. Just restoring one person has taken all this time, and at the same time he has been the only one thinking about saving the bigger things, or even just improving the world. So far most individuals have been struggling just to get themselves out of the fallen realm and haven't really had concern for what happens to others.
God realized that it would be impossibly difficult for each individual in a population, no matter how small, to overcome the fall in his own way. God thought that instead He would establish one model, and through becoming completely one with that model everyone could overcome himself and go beyond the realm of the fall.
When can we say that we are totally rid of satanic blood and call ourselves good? Which level do we have to reach before we can say that? We can say we are rid of the fallen blood when without exception we never think about ourselves and we live for the whole of mankind. We have to have a clear concept of what this is. It's very much like the situation of a man who would travel in space; he has to get beyond the earth's gravity just to get started. As long as he is still influenced by gravity, he will always come down again, no matter how high he goes. Once we get beyond the pull of fallen nature, there will be no force pulling us one way or the other and we can travel in the direction we know is right, eventually to be pulled by the gravity of goodness.
Why are we religious? We want to know how the man in the position of evil can come to the position of goodness. Many people have taught different ways to make a life of goodness and to completely change, but in essence they are all rather simple-to change from self-centeredness to always thinking first about God and others. That's the essential teaching of many religions, and even though we may not yet be in that selfless position, we can be called truly religious when we at least know the direction in which to go.
It is human desire to meet the one man who will save us and give us new birth. This one man is the Messiah. Because he is completely different from all others, we can be absolutely sure that every hour and 365 days a year he does not live for himself but for the sake of God, the whole world and all things. If he is confident to live that way then we may say that he qualifies as the Messiah. How can you distinguish Jesus from anyone else and say with confidence that he is the Messiah who came to save the world? By knowing this standard, we are sure from what he taught and from what he did in his life that he was the Messiah.
Jesus sometimes taught in a seemingly contradictory way. At one time he said, "He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it." What kind of statement is that? It's not just 90 degrees different from all others, but 180 degrees different. We have come to understand that in order to change our satanic blood we must change completely, not just a little. In order to do that there is no other way except for our fallen selves to die; then our original selves will live. Changing 179 degrees is not good enough because in moving at that angle we will eventually arrive back at the same place we started from. If we go away 180 degrees from the starting point, however, there is no way to go but in the opposite direction.
Sometimes temptations and trials are difficult, but what is the best way to overcome them? Immediately to say, "I have to forget about myself." That is a very effective way to go directly to God. It may be easy to say, but how impossible it is to do! When Jesus was crucified, even the people who opposed him knew it was totally wrong, but still he prayed that they would be forgiven since they didn't understand. How is it possible to feel that way? What do you suppose Jesus was thinking when he was crucified? Did he feel sorry for himself because he was dying? Certainly not. Even as the blood was dripping out of his body, he thought about how the blood he shed represented all mankind who would have to shed their satanic blood. Many people before and since Jesus have shed blood, but how different those deaths were in this crucial point. Jesus shed his blood for the sake of mankind, as the representative of mankind.
If one man is this good, is there any compatible place for him to live on earth? Can he find even a small area to live in? Certainly there was not such a place for Jesus; even religious people at the time were thinking about how they would prosper one day and have great influence on the world. They were centered on their own religion and never thought about the entire world, so there was no place that was adequate for someone like Jesus.
The truly religious person has more pride in God than in his religion
Jesus was indignant and used strong language, calling the Jewish leaders a brood of vipers. He was justified in saying that because they were just thinking about themselves and their own denominations. It was the same kind of thinking as Satan's, for they shared the same blood. To be truly religious, the Jews should have been thinking about the world and God and not so much about their own religion; they should have had a stronger love for God and mankind and all things. If all of you are not that way but think about yourself and your own denomination more than the world, then certainly you are a brood of vipers. That's why Jesus spoke to the Jews the way he did.
At that time the religious person had more pride in himself and his religion than in God and all people and things. The Jewish people of 2,000 years ago could not get rid of this way of thinking. As long as anyone continues to think in this way, they are not religious in the true sense, and furthermore, as long as this continues their nation and people will never improve beyond where they are now. This is a historic fact. This is true not just for one faith but of every faith; any who think selfishly are not qualified to be called religious people.
What about the Unification Church? Are we truly a religious entity, or just another social group? You may think we are religious, but do other people agree? We have to have a clear idea of the difference between a true religion and a false religion. The simple criterion is the fact that the true religion exists for God and His love and for all mankind, whereas all religions that do not are false. It's as simple as that. Truly religious people are willing to sacrifice even their own denomination for the love of God and mankind.
The Unification Church is willing to sacrifice itself for the sake of God and His love. When I think that the Unification Church is the highest level of religion, then I think of how to throw even that away for the sake of all mankind and God and His love. You can imagine that Reverend Moon, the same man who is trying to sacrifice not only the individual but the whole Church, does not lead an easy life. If one of our members is involved in an accident and dies, then the blame all comes back to me. The thinking is that if I had not come and started the Unification Church then maybe that person wouldn't have died. Do you realize that this is what goes on?
No other church has its congregation get up at 4 a.m., and actually none of you likes that, but we are trying to subdue our physical bodies because great improvement results. We do all these things in order to pull ourselves away from satanic dominion. Do you think God likes most the man with the comfortable, dignified way of life? No, instead He likes the man who wears himself out running here and there to pull himself out of the evil dominion because that is the way Satan can be eliminated from the world.
You know the kinds of traits that Satan relates to. The person who tries to avoid working hard, who tries to get the best food and who praises himself has traits that are very common in the satanic world. Can you say you have completely freed yourself from satanic bonds, or are you still struggling with them?
When you marry, you actually marry for the sake of your spouse, and for that reason you don't care much about what he looks like. Self-centeredness demands many things of marriage. In one of our marriages the husband may be outstanding but the wife be very plain, and people may denounce me for suggesting such a match. But even though the couple may seem imbalanced, with one seeming to be inferior to the other, if they are happy and respect each other then it will be a principled marriage. Maybe some of you think I am trying to indoctrinate you, but what I have said is true and it is in accord with God's principle.
A man must be capable of marrying with the idea that he exists for his wife, no matter how difficult the circumstances become. This is the only way that he will he able to make his marriage successful and thus be able to enter heaven. How can you as an individual truly love another person in the original way unless you can totally give up yourself for him? And without doing this, how can you love God and mankind? Ideals will just be wishful thinking until I you can do this. Doesn't that stand to reason? I have always challenged myself in this way: Can I love that person on behalf of God and mankind?
Are we going to pursue the way of happiness or of sacrifice? Realizing we are in the fallen world, we can safely say it is better to go the way of struggle and sacrifice than of happiness. This is not to be our thinking for just a short while; if you adopt this thinking 24 hours a day for as long as you live, then without question you have become truly worthy of international marriage.
There is no discrimination in this way of thinking; there is only absolute equality, no matter what color you are. Whoever discriminates will perish, and if God exists then He will see to it that such thinking will never shape the rest of the world. Proof of this is not difficult. Many civilizations have reached great heights, yet finally declined, because once they became self-centered and tried to dominate other civilizations, God helped them decline. How can America be an exception? It has struggled for goodness, and because it was close to God's ideal God helped it to prosper. Now it has reached the peak of civilization, but if it becomes arrogant and indifferent and ceases to improve itself or to be truly religious, how can it continue to survive? God will help it to decline just as He helped it to prosper.
How can we say that God wants to help a nation or to warn or to strike a nation? One sure sign is when its children, the most precious possession of any society, begin to be degraded; then it is obvious that God is warning the nation. In America, the young people who were just starting to blossom like flowers have turned to drugs and free sex, causing much pain to their parents.
Look at the young people in the Unification Church. They are different from the prevailing standard in America and lead exemplary lives. I do not teach you to live for my sake or even for the Unification Church, but rather for the sake of this nation and God's love and the world. Why do I do that? Even if you lose yourself and the Unification Church is destroyed as indemnity, still the love of God will remain. This is the basic formula. If the Church fits into this formula, it will continue to prosper. If it goes against this principle, however, then even the Unification Church will have to decline.
Your credo is to overcome yourself
This is how I evaluate our leaders: Is a certain person going to be arrogant or indifferent to other people and think of his own position more than anything else? Centering on anything except God has no place. A leader may be unyielding and uncompromising, but if he is centered only on God then it may be permissible. In this way I am very much down to earth and democratic. To eliminate the satanic blood in our bodies we must go in the opposite direction, the non-self-centered way.
If you compromise even one degree out of the 180 then eventually your path will deviate from the correct direction and the further you go the further from God you will be. While working and also while resting we must think about the final target of love, which is the world. If you are in a community then when your family rests you must be conscious of the community you are working for before you sleep. Satan will claim whatever you develop self-centeredly and take it away. Even if externally you are successful, nothing will remain.
What can you say at this moment; are you the kind of person whom Satan can claim or God? Your credo is to overcome yourself. As long as you still have satanic blood you have some relationship with Satan and whatever you do will eventually go to him. All religions teach one thing in common: "Whatever I especially like, I shouldn't do." Up until now no one has had a clear idea of why this should be so, even though they believed it. To become liberated from satanic blood each person must start with himself. Is everyone sitting here liberated from Satan? You have to keep striving all the time, every moment, because it is very difficult to maintain a straight line. Typically, everyone goes first one way and then another. That is permissible, but at least keep on going forward. As long as you keep going in one general direction you will be able to walk relatively straight. Man's actions are largely an accumulation of habit, so be in the habit of going in the right direction. If you really try your best to live like that then one day you will find yourself completely changed. The more you do it the happier you will become because God will be with you more and more. You may think I am different from you but that is not so. I have experienced even more intensely than you the very things you feel now.
I keep very late hours, staying up until 2 or 3 o'clock conferring with Church leaders, and then I go upstairs. Do I just take off my clothes and go to bed? No, I sit in a chair, thinking about the people who left, praying. Sometimes Mother comes to shake me, saying, "Why don't you get undressed and go to bed?" You may wonder how I can live like that, but I feel better that way than if I have all the sleep I want. When I sleep longer than usual, after waking up I feel sorry that I slept. You may think I am unbeatable and invincible, someone whom no one can compete with, but that is not so. I am the same as each of you.
I am a strong, unyielding man. I am so sensitive about right or wrong, justice or injustice, that it's almost like uncontrollable fire. When I see many unjust things directed at me or at someone else, I want to just wipe it all out. But I control myself because God, who is the same way, is controlling Himself.
If you are in a desperate situation then God can help, but unless you reach this point He cannot help. You must remember this. When I see the leaders of our Church come to conferences wearing nice clothes I sometimes worry, "What if God plunged you down to the bottom to see how you would respond. Would you make it?" God does that, sometimes lifting you up high and dropping you down to the deepest valley. If you are still grateful and keep going straight then He will lift you up again and He will never drop you down any more.
The same standard applies to the blessing. Many people assume that when a man and woman reach a certain age they are entitled to marry, but as a matter of principle I ask in my mind, "Have you already loved the world more than yourself that you can sit in front of me asking to be blessed?" Have you loved the world completely? Or have you not thought so much about the world, but come anyway, thinking only about yourself and your family? In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve should have loved the world and all things first and then been blessed. That's the point of view of the Principle; it's not something you can rationalize or compromise.
In this world no one questions whether their habits are approved by God
The title of my message is, "I Proclaim That I Know." The first thing you must proclaim to the world that you know is that you must be liberated from the blood of Satan. Secondly, you have to be liberated from the satanic world. How? By doing the reverse of what the world does.
In America most everyone is trying to make money for himself alone, and then at best, for America. No one wants to make money first for the country and then for themselves. Are all the couples in the world thinking first about the world, the nation, and then about their own families, or don't they care so much about anything except themselves and their children? I really work hard to raise funds, but even after that I don't own anything personally. You also work hard; if you worked that hard in society you would be given almost a million-dollar salary, but you don't own anything either.
I owe money, but probably you don't. As if it were not enough to work hard and raise funds, I even owe money for the sake of the goals of the world. That's the way it has always been. God cannot help but assist in this situation. One thing I am sure of is the matter of principle, and it is one rule which never fails. Worldly people think I proceed in an unplanned way and they don't understand how I can accomplish what I do. But if I always act in harmony with the Principle then God always helps. Many people were dubious in the beginning about everything I undertook, but every time it proved successful. God intervenes and helps.
Many religions and denominations don't understand this principle, and they are pained to find that we are always successful. Because they find themselves slipping backward they really hope that the Unification Church will fail, but their hope is all in vain. Another thing the world doesn't understand is E how all you young people can stay in the Unification really You work hard but instead of receiving comfort you only get driven out to do more. People may try to commiserate with you by saying that I am really bad, but then you turn around like a wounded lion and defend me, saying that I am not a cruel man. They think you suffer because of me, but I you defend me.
Recently the mass transit workers and newspaper workers have been talking about going out on strike. Actually I do not support striking, but if they are mostly interested in demanding increased wages, then let them go ahead. We know what it is like to be loved by God or to be in the love of God. It is the ultimate happiness. We must really know the value of this experience. It's not good enough to just feel good; we must know the full value of the love we are being given.
Our university students have twice as much difficulty as other students. It is difficult enough for regular students to keep up with their school work, and our members also have to study hard to get good grades, but then at home they can't even rest because they have to go out and witness. Even so, the more difficult life is, the more valuable it is.
We have to be liberated from the world of Satan, and to do that we should not be conscious only of our own nationality. We must belong to God first and then to America, not the other way around. If someone abruptly asks you your nationality then you have to automatically be able to answer that you belong to God's country. It is not Korea or Japan or any other country that we are proud of. First we have to know that we belong to God, and expel from our minds any feeling of favor or bias toward a particular country. Be liberated from that and belong to God's country, and after that you may belong to something else.
God has always been leading history, and if a good civilization reaches the peak, it is because God was helping it. Do not be proud of how many languages you speak unless you are able to speak the language of God's country. You have to think that you need to learn the language which God uses. From now on we must be able to recognize and learn the mother tongue. How could we be proud of speaking English if it isn't the language God uses? The possibility is great that He won't use English.
No matter how good the clothes you wear are, you are only wearing Western clothes temporarily unless God ultimately approves them. Historically, the people wearing Western clothes have done more evil than anyone else. You are not certain if you can be proud of wearing them because you don't yet know what God thinks about them. You can't yet be proud of a good suit or shoes; maybe it will be better to go barefoot.
I was astounded at how many lines of cosmetics for women there are in this country, especially how there are over 100 kinds of lipstick. How would God view lipstick? It is highly questionable. There are many things that men are so conditioned to accepting that they take it all for granted as being natural, but all these things are connected with Satan, who brought the fall
What is the main diet of the heavenly country? No one questions it now, but eventually they will get around to it. This applies to schools as well; schools are doing good things sometimes, but Satan's lineage is still connected to them. Can we confidently say that all the strange songs and dances nowadays belong to God? It is not likely. Do you want anything to do with them? In the future maybe the expression of highest happiness will be sitting perfectly still!
We must always be conscious of both the big things and little things we have been doing. Could you ruthlessly cut all of them away? This applies to daily things. You are in the habit of going home to be with your family at Christmas time, but that is a habit you must think about also. What does God think about Christmas at this time? Many people commit unbearable sins at Christmas; it is an insult to someone born on that day, so what is the meaning of the day? You must surmount history and circumstances and customs; the old ways no longer make any sense and we cannot approve of them. We cannot do something unless we make sure that God approves it.
I have felt your struggles myself one hundred times over
Everyone who wants to live a truly religious life to reach heaven must be liberated from all these environmental snags. Can you be uncompromising when you find yourself lonesome and isolated? This is why you find laments in the Bible concerning loneliness and being without friends. It's a complex situation, though, for even if you are isolated and feeling alone in the world, you know that everyone in the world must follow you rather than you following them. The multitude will have to follow you, even though you are completely isolated and alone at the present.
Are you going to expand your territory to preserve yourself, or are you going to retreat and be pushed around? Do you feel that the world's ways are so insurmountable that all you can do is sit down and do nothing? Please understand that if you feel that way then I have felt it a hundred times stronger than you or anyone else. I have been met by opposition on the national scale, even without good reason. You have to experience that. People don't understand why you should be different from them and so they oppose you.
The peak of opposition on the worldwide scale came in 1976; in other words, two years ago there was more opposition than now. Did I retreat then, or stand firmly? Opposition came first from individuals, then families, and then even the nation. All over the world I confronted everything at the same time. The communists and Christian churches got together to oppose me, along with families who formed their own negative groups. Was there any category which didn't participate in denouncing me?
I never wavered and thought that they were right. At the peak of this all-out opposition I stood firm and told them that they would decline if they continued. I told Americans that I came here as a doctor and a firefighter. They have been living nicely for the last 200 years, but now an Oriental man is here telling them that they need a doctor. It is understandable that they don't feel good about me. Americans don't think Orientals have anything to say to them worth hearing. If the doctor knows that his patient has cancer but the patient says, "Don't tell me," then what good will it do? The patient should be asking instead "Is there any way I can overcome it?" Let the people try to help themselves if they want.
Would America prosper or further deteriorate if everyone in America did the same as Unification Church members? How can any great change happen in America if only 10,000 people know God's will clearly but the rest don't? Are we going to stop here because we are few out of many, or now that we are clear on the matter of Principle are we going to push forward and influence the rest of the nation in a good way? We must know that the pattern we establish here will eventually pull up the root of evil. We really have to let the nation know that its way of thinking, which has been acceptable for so long, is wrong.
Are you recognized by society? You started at the rock bottom and gradually God has been raising your standards, but you do not yet stand completely above the present level of society. You can't keep a distance from people with a critical attitude; you have to meet everyone so that they can evaluate for themselves who is right and who is wrong. Go along and bother them and show them what is wrong and right by your personal example. In thirty minutes of talking seriously to them you will be able to convince them that the strange stories they have been hearing about the Unification Church are wrong.
All over the world people are following the same pattern of saying that the Unification Church is bad but Moonies are good. They are not convinced of our values by me personally, but as you go around and teach them they are convinced that Moonies are good. You should go unceasingly to every corner of Manhattan and teach them, in order to save the city and themselves. Later you are going to be proud of how much persecution you received as a Unification Church member. In the future our opponents will be interrogated about why they persecuted the Moonies, on what grounds and with what right.
Is God a God of love or ruthlessness? To a person who knows Principle God is surely all love, but to the person who does not know Principle the same happenings that we see as an act of love may seem merciless. It would be very difficult for everyone to go separately through the individual, family and national levels of restoration, all the way up to spirit world, so God has chosen one unfaltering example who is standing upright through all opposition; everything belongs to him if he wins. Centering c on him, God is collecting everyone else and is pushing them forward mercilessly. This has been c God's strategy.
The reason why God mercilessly drives us out is to ensure that everything is completed at the same time, so that once the problem is solved He can win over everything at one time. Once a religion comes which is opposed, not just locally, but by the whole world and even the spirit world, it should be regarded as a sign of the last days, the time when everyone can overcome all levels of problems at one time. The secret of easily liberating mankind on the world level lies here.
Whether or not there is much opposition, you have to have the confidence to not let that opposition bother you. When Satan opposes you and you are undecided, then he will attack more and more, but if you don't even bat an eye, he won't bother you any more because he knows you can't be moved. Satan is wise in this respect. After Satan makes efforts for a long time but still meets with opposition from you, he will realize that you are getting stronger and stronger because of his opposition instead of weaker.
If people had not opposed me so much I would never have become as famous as I am now. When the blacks and Spanish people see that all the white people oppose me they will come to my side. Even the children of the white people who oppose me will come to my side, saying that their parents are wrong; they will think that if so many people are criticizing me then I must be right. That is God's way of judging people.
Is this just my thinking, or is it the way things have actually been going? Is the Unification Church expanding or on the decline? Even though the expansion is not visible, we know that the Unification Church must be growing much faster than we think. Now you people can walk right into the Christian churches and demand to know why they oppose Reverend Moon. The older people oppose the young people of the Unification Church but the youth are leaving those very churches and many of them are coming to our side. The young people who used to belong to other churches see the older people still there criticizing the Unification Church, and they clearly distinguish who is right and who is wrong. We will walk into established churches and ask the congregations to compare us with our critics and determine who is right. One thing that we are thankful for is that they themselves are tired and don't have so much power any more to oppose us.
Did you know that the Barrytown students are visiting 120 different churches in the area? You will do the same thing; first you will visit people in their homes and then go to their churches and explain to the congregations what we are. Why should we do that? We must be liberated from persecution from the churches before we can go out to the world level. No matter how long this takes, it is still the shortest way. We will strengthen the churches and once they become healthy they can grow to the world level of doing God's work. By saving the Christian churches, we are saving God's tedious, inch-by-inch buildup of Christianity over the last 2,000 years. We are not going to lose it but recover it, and by doing so save God's dignity. Then God will be recognized as a God of success in Christianity.
Now we are liberated from the family level of persecution because kidnapping has been ruled to be wrong. Soon the Christian church will come to realize that Moonies are not bad after all, but are only doing successfully the same thing they have been trying to do all these centuries.
When we can win the understanding of Christianity we will be liberated on the world level because Christianity is that powerful. If all Christians could unite, communism would not stand a chance and world liberation would take place all at once. The Christian church has the key for us to be liberated, and in order to win that recognition we have to approach the Christians and teach them what their beliefs are all about.
New York is the best battleground for the Unification Church
You might wonder what I have been doing, but now you understand why I have been reaching out to the academic world. Theologians are being enlightened by what I have shown them through Barrytown, and now they know who is right and what we are all about. There is no room for misjudgment intellectually, but in practice we have to prove this in one city, namely New York. This is why I proclaimed New York as the front line. Once we succeed in New York, no other city, no matter how big, will be any problem; they will just follow the pattern here.
What does the sound "yoke" mean in English? Oak tree. New York is an old oak now and we are going to make a New Oak out of it. Oak wood is very hard and a club made of oak is very strong. If you hit the world with it the world will just be flung up high like a baseball. No matter how big a ship is, if enough people go over to one side of it will start to lean. When there are many problems and many people to rock it, the old oak will sink and new oak will float up. You have to think in that way.
When we try to get on the boat, others will try to get off. Since everywhere they go they meet Unification Church members and feel they don't want to see you anymore, they pack up and go somewhere else. As the less privileged classes move into the inner city the wealthy people move to the suburbs; likewise, when the Unification Church is seen everywhere working so hard around New York City, the white people will want to leave. A new New York will be born when the old one moves away. Wherever you go you meet Moonies speaking on the streets, and on color TVs that are playing the Divine Principle cassettes. If New Yorkers leave because they don't like it, the city will come alive anyway. There will be many vacancies and people from Europe will move into New York.
Don't think that by doing this you are going to liberate the world. Instead, you must realize that you are the one who will be liberated. If you think you are saving them and they oppose you, then you won't find so much meaning in doing this. But if when everyone is opposing you, you say, "I have to meet all this opposition because I need to be liberated," then you won't mind it so much because it is for your own benefit. In the future Unification Church members will be striving to win this recognition and liberation from the churches and the world.
Not only are people on earth fighting this war, but also those in the spirit world. They must join in all around us; you must have confidence in that. People from every country live in this city and as we go home-by-home and church-by-church to liberate the world, we are going to be liberated ourselves. There's no city like New York in the world where in one limited area all the people of the world are represented. Clearly God has saved this city for the last days so that the Unification Church members could fight in this arena to liberate and to be liberated. New York holds the key to that.
What does "Hudson River" remind you of? "Hot sun" river. "River" rhymes with "revival"; "hot sun revival". Once you come into contact with the hot sun you immediately feel it. Are you a hot sun? Of Satan or God? New York is now "old yoke", so by three stages it has to become New new new York york york. Since this building's name was "New Yorker," which means one who belongs to New York, I feel good about the name. We will lead all the New Yorkers, and those who live in New York will lead all their neighbors.
Do you live in the New Yorker because there are convenient bathrooms? No, you live there so that you can become hot suns and restore all New Yorkers. Why do we eat every day? We are not like those who eat because they are accustomed to it, and we don't sleep like those who assume they must have a certain amount of rest. All is for the sake of New Yorkers. The country needs me for this reason-to recover New York.
Out of all America, I chose to settle down in New York because all the elements of the world are here in a small area. When New York is convinced and sees the light, the entire world will see it at the same time. Of course, it has to be difficult; the whole world cannot be influenced easily. All the complications of the world center here, but once you straighten them out here, the impact will go around the entire world in no time at all.
You are going to receive recognition from this city and be liberated, and on that foundation will begin the liberation of the entire world. After this accomplishment is achieved in New York no more fighting will be needed because of the influence the world will receive. I believe that this is the last and best battleground of the Unification Church, and once liberation takes place here it will easily spread out to the world. Are you going to work with your own hands and win victory for yourself here?
Because of you, New York will be liberated and God will win and all the world will obtain victory thereafter. New York has an old financial problem which no one has any solution for, but if New York adopted the Unification Church way of living it would be solved in no time at all. Since New York employees got a raise in pay, other people will also claim they need a pay raise. How can the city ever manage? Radio City Music Hall could close very soon because its owners have run out of money. When I heard the news I sighed and thought, "Go ahead and close." If Radio City Music Hall has to close, then very soon City Hall will follow.
"Koch" in Korean has the same pronunciation as "magpie," while "Carter" means "pro and con." Some say Carter is right and others say he is wrong, and he even-says both himself. Who can become the host or master of New York? You as the masters of religion are the masters of New York, and as such you have to work around the clock to make sure that New York will live.
By liberating the world, you also can be liberated
All human affairs can be reduced to simple terms: You come and go and eat and sleep and are happy or unhappy. Is anything left out? We come and go to do God's work. We eat and sleep in order to do God's work. How can we be happy and unhappy? When we do God's work well we feel happy, and when things don't go so well we feel unhappy. There are six kinds of human affairs then-come and go, eat and sleep, being happy and unhappy. All phases of man's living are included in these. After you eat you go out and then you come back and sleep. While you are out you are either happy or unhappy. If you find a good person when you go out then you are fruitful and are happy; if you meet opposition and your work is not so fruitful that day then you are unhappy. Man's affairs are not complicated really. We sleep and eat here in the New Yorker, and come and go from the New Yorker. If you are happy and unhappy you all bring it back here. For whom? For God.
If Unification Church members were asked, "Do you want to be liberated by New York?" what would the answer be? New York represents all countries, and being liberated on the level of this city is the same as being liberated by the world. This is the crux of what we are doing. All of mankind needs to be liberated, including ourselves.
If we have 3,000 members playing in brass bands all over the city, people will be curious and want to know what the noise is. They will be told that it is the Moonies parading, calling New Yorkers out to listen to them. Will they hide, or look and listen just out of curiosity? When they open the door and a nice parade goes by, would the people cheer or toss the paraders out? The number of band members is small compared to the world, but they are doing a world-sized job. What will happen to the world in the next 1,000 or even 10,000 years if we leave it alone to turn by itself?
Today is April 1, and that means that one quarter of this year is gone. I told you in January that 1978 is a very important year, and now that one fourth of it has passed, do you also want the remaining three fourths to pass as quickly? Do you feel that you have less and less time in this year? Soon there will be much rain, so when are we going to work hard? March, April and May are the best months for fighting and working hard.
The media has been doing senseless things in the past, but now the newspaper staffs may strike and the News World will be the only paper still in operation. News World will go on no matter what. The News World staff works the hardest and longest for the least amount of pay, and they should be the first ones to demonstrate. Why don't they? Because it is not money that they are after. Everyone else lives for themselves, and the more money they have, the more they want. You are different. Everyone else is proud of themselves on ordinary days, but we are proud on emergency days.
Most people experience a false sense of peace here in this nation and are not even afraid of the communists because they don't know what they are all about, but Unification Church members feel jittery about stopping communism before it develops too far. We are different. In the months of April and May, are we going to our best? For whom? For God, and for you to win your condition to be liberated. Wherever you go and work, restoration of the world takes place. If you are liberated in an individual way and if you live contrary to your past habits then you are liberated from the world and New York. Now the lower realms of spirit world will also let go of you rather easily, even though in the past it was impossible to shake loose from the spirit world.
New York is the key to the liberation of everything, including yourself, God and the world. Each person should be intensely aware that he is in the arena of an unprecedented historic fight, and that no time in the future will be like this one. This is the time to restore the foundation of four positions and April is the fourth month. The media workers are planning to start their demonstration in April, and that is a sign that in the same month we must enlarge our advance on the world.
We are making a new resolution, representing the past, the present and the future, that we are going to fight this one war and win the victory. God will be right behind us as soon as we practice our new way of living. Let us pledge to heaven with both hands.
Home churches
We will undertake home churches in numerous homes in each of your areas. Centering around the home churches we will branch out after June 1. For one person to start a home church is too difficult, so three people will get together for two months and after that each individual will have his own home church if he has worked hard in preparation. Beginning in August and September of this year I will let you go to your own areas and stay there. You are making the foundation now to live in your own home church after this year.
If you go out, you have to bring back at least one member as your replacement to live in the New Yorker as you have been doing. Here in the New Yorker we will train them in witnessing and in every good way. We can certainly accommodate more than 5,000 members at the New Yorker. If you work hard with dedication all throughout this year, then by June of next Year we will have 5,000 home churches and New York will come into the realm of liberation. We are going to carry this out and make sure the plan is fulfilled.
From September 1 on, you must try very hard to establish your own church, your own base where you will live. Shall we do this or forget about it? It is best that we do it. There is no way we can not do it. Whoever feels that they can't or won't do it, raise your hands and be dismissed from the beginning. Is everyone going to do this? If you carry this out with all of your might, good results will definitely come.
In the meantime I will be busy preparing a 20-hour video tape which you can use to give workshops by yourself. Every day you will be listening to the tape with the people and no matter how dull you think you may be, like a bean curd head, once you listen to it five or ten times you will be inspired yourself. After hearing Mr. Salonen giving the lectures you will know them by heart and you will be able to speak in unison with him and even anticipate his gestures. You don't have to lecture yourself at first, but after awhile you won't even have to play the video tape; after awhile you will be able to give the lectures on your own.
Because we were not strong, the many bad things the New York Times has said about us had a strong effect in the public mind, but once this plan is effectively put into action the New York Times will have nothing to say that will be effective. You all have trinities in your areas, don't you? Three of you must get together after this and talk about plans. You will start out together initially and then spread out.
You can send a cassette tape to your parents and they will surely listen to it because they are always anxious to know what you are doing. Once they know that what their sons and daughters stand for is absolutely good and better than what other people are doing, then they will begin to defend you and have other people listen to the cassette as well, to evaluate it for themselves.
I will outfit vans and make mobile teams, assigning one team to five states. This team will visit your parents and give them lectures. You would do well to write your parents about what will be coming so that they can prepare. When that van comes to your neighborhood then all your relatives and neighbors will come in order to evaluate what you are doing. They will be especially interested in the movie about the 1800 couples. That was the world's greatest mass wedding. Not only parents but brothers and sisters of marrying age want to know about that wedding. All this will certainly bring a good response and then your own home can become a home church.
If your parents are sensitive to religious understanding then they will start a home church themselves, and if they are interested you can send more materials to them. You can show regular movies of good quality as well as Church movies. We will get permission to tape the performances of famous artists-piano concerts, ballets and orchestras- which contribute to the public interest and we can show that along with our Church tapes.
When your parents become interested in having their own home church you will be able to show them how to do it because by then you will have experience. I always told you that you must restore your own clan. Everything grows in three stages. The formation stage will be your staying here in the World Mission Center. The growth stage will be your own home church, and then perfection stage will be going back to your homes to start home churches there. This is how your home church work is directly connected to yourself personally.
This is not just talk; it will definitely happen and it is not far away. On the first of June next year I will chase you back to your homes, with your tape recorders and video tape machines. If your parents are interested in having a home church before then, I will send an itinerary worker to help them out. Your family will not only have something to show the neighbors about what you are doing, but also films of the mass wedding and the Yankee Stadium and Washington Monument Rallies, as well as regular movies and films of great performances. You may ask what will happen if all of you leave New York, but by then you will have brought strong members who will replace you. Our ultimate goal is to restore our own homes. So far, your parents have been hiding the fact that you are Moonies from their friends, but now they will begin to boast about how you stood up against opposition. In no time at all they will be boasting about you.
I think that if you are going back home you may as well not go by yourselves but as brides and grooms, so I will give a blessing at that time. If you are not going to your home then you don't have to make effort, but if you want to go then you must do a good job here. If you don't listen to me then people from Europe will be brought to do the job in your place. Without doubt someone will do it, so don't think that it won't happen if you don't do it. Whoever wins the victory can then return to their homeland like a victorious Jacob. You want to go back home, but only victoriously, right?
This morning's title is, "I Proclaim That I Know." First you will be in New York Church, then you will establish a home church, and then you will go to your home town. You have two months to prepare, and then plan to go to your home churches and not stay any longer in the New Yorker. You must quickly send back a person to replace you. We will have much activity after that, parading through the city, holding rallies, even doing night activities to oppose evil things. New York will become the city of the Unification Church. Shall we do it or not?
So far what you have been doing is laying a general foundation. Now the people know about us and know that we are going to stay in one place for some time. You will prepare in the next year and two months to go back to your own homes, but each person must have a clear plan and carry it out. Heaven will help us. If for special reasons you cannot go to your own homes then bring your brothers and sisters here for a visit and send them back home in your place. There are no exceptions, not even for News World staff or Headquarters staff members. You must make a plan. By the time you accomplish all of that, America will probably not need you any more and then you will go out to the world. Who will support you financially when you do that? Your family and relatives will have confidence enough in what you are doing that they will help you. Then the people of the world will know which family supports its missionaries the best, and it will become a tradition handed down in world history.
By the time you go out to the world there will be nothing in your way, and you will harvest as much and as fast as you work. Eventually you will have to teach everyone, and how can that be done if not by you? You have to know exactly what is necessary and go through each step. Then you will know how I went and you can teach the same things to your followers. This is why you must do this mission now. There is no way to avoid it. Set a good example now and work your hardest. Once you establish a pattern here, your followers will pick it up later and carry on themselves, probably doing better than you!
This is a day of real hope. This is the first day of April and you will make a new resolution. Mobilize all of your faculties and your four major sense organs and become hot suns bringing revival. When you are physically tired and disheartened you can go watch the hot sun and talk to it, declaring, "I am going to learn from you."
We will do that, not lingering, but swiftly moving. Are your five senses really open now? If you cannot even do as little as this then you will have to give up your religious life, and it won't be necessary for me to trust you or New York. I will chase you out even if you can't do it. Whether you are handsome or beautiful, capable or not simply doesn't matter. If you clearly understand the objective and God's situation then you can do it because it is to help you as well. You don't have to have special knowledge or great accomplishments. If you can't dedicate your heart to the task, what else can you do?
Let us stand up and make one resolution, pledging to God that we will do it. "We are now launching an all-out attack on New York starting April 1." Let us pray.