Way Of Life

Reverend Sun Myung Moon
February 16, 1973
Second International Training Session
Master Speaks

Each of you, as an individual, was born and raised in the love of your parents. You go through kindergarten, primary school, high school and the university, and eventually your view of life is broadened to a larger scope -- you want to see what the society is like and what the people around you are doing. You find yourself belonging to one of the many nations of the world. You will want your nation to prosper more than any other nation. You want to be successful, and become interested in the opposite sex. You want to have a sweetheart, and you desire to get married to that person and build a home of your own. You want to give birth to your children, and, in the parents position, you want to educate them as your parents have educated you. In order to raise your family you must have a job. To most people, success means to be able to make more money for the happiness of the family. In this way you grow old.

In the worldly sense, there are happy and unhappy people. Some are unhappy because they have no children and some are unhappy because their family is being broken. Still others are unhappy because they have been discharged from a high position or because of the bankruptcy of their company. Kings, presidents and other responsible officials in each nation feel unhappy when their country is defeated by other countries. We can well see that in the world there are people who are happy, but there are more people who are unhappy. There is no single man in the whole world who would want to have unhappiness or misery; every man would want happiness. However, everything is not within our reach. We cannot always do things as we would like. In the US people are seemingly happy, having an abundance of everything, but in their hearts there is usually unhappiness too. To a certain extent, the people of the US have been happy and blessed, but when one is falling in misery after having happiness, one feels even more miserable. Suppose a certain couple seem very happy. Inwardly, they may be very unhappy. In the home, especially, there is a breakdown. You may be successful in your worldly career, but that can become a failure in the next moment.

Then, what is happiness in the truest sense? In a word, happiness is what we enjoy when we have the things which other people do not possess. I am happy when I am enjoying a position higher than other people. Then what is that something which you have more than other people? If you are satisfied with what you are, with the position and everything else you have, then you can call yourself "happy". You are elevated, elated, you are happy when you can give to other people. By giving and taking with other people, you feel happy. On the other hand, if you cannot give out to others, they cannot receive, and they feel unhappy. You are happy when you can give things to other people, when you can share the position, wealth, knowledge, and everything you have that is virtuous, with other people.

If you can share love with each other, that makes you feel most happy. You ask yourself, "Can I be that kind of person? Can I ever be that kind of person?" You find yourself limited by your knowledge, your position, your authority, and many other things; but your desire and ambition have no limit. When you have limitless desire and a limited environment, how can you find the balance between those two? This is what gives all of us agony. Thus, we find there is only a small difference between the commoner and the prince or princess. Everyone wants to solve this problem.

Mankind cannot find anything as the key to the solution. That's why people look for the key to the solution in philosophy and religion. In philosophy you want to find the key outwardly, and in religion, you want to find it inwardly, or spiritually. In striving to do those things, people have developed a certain standard of meaning or standard of philosophy and religion, and we are now enjoying those things. In the external sense, in the philosophy of democracy, freedom-loving people have grown to a certain level in their cultural tradition. On the other hand, Communism is going strong against Democracy. Between the two ideologies, people are struggling to find the more righteous one. In the midst of struggle, the religious world is keeping the mainstream of thought, and they cannot be driven out by the opposing power.

The struggle between Democracy and Communism will end in two possible ways: either one of them will absorb the other, or both, exhausted, will diminish and perish, and a third will arise. We are now faced with such an age. Democracy and Communism have long struggled; they are both exhausted and they are talking of peaceful co-existence. They say that people are going to enjoy real freedom and peace and we will be settled in the peace they proclaim. If they fail in doing that, some philosophy will arise that will deny all the "isms" and ideologies that have existed. Then everything of the past must be denied. Their whole family, clan and nation -- everything will be denied. This is because the already established system of family, clan or nation and everything else has been tested and is a failure. So, we have to deny and tear down all those things and change the system. There will come out a people who will deny their culture and tradition and everything else which had been their leading thought.

Since all those things have been tested and have failed, some people want to feel as they please without any limitation. That group is what we call "hippy". They don't do any work. They are clad in rags and they put on their shirts inside out and half crooked. Women are dragged by men and children carried on the back of their women. They do just anything, thinking they are the guests of society. The people around them are helpless; they cannot correct the hippies and make them good. If the parents warn them against what they are, they protest against their parents and ask, "What do you have that is better than what we have." They protest to their parents and older generations: "What have you done for us? The society is corrupted and you are still advocating the tradition and culture you have built, but it is corrupted and decayed. What have you better than we have?" This group can build the foundation for another group to come to deny the world and the society. This happens to be the world situation today, and society cannot blame those people for protesting. Almost all of them are inclined to continue their way.

Our standard, of what our family, nation and community should be, is all broken down. So there is only darkness, and we have no idea what to do and how to judge things. We are faced with the ruin of our view of value. In the olden days we thought highly of love in the family and between opposite sexes, but now love has fallen far below the standard of what we have known. In the democratic world people are saying: "Well, he is just another man, and he is just the same as me." Everything of virtue has fallen. There is no set goal to show later generations. But we cannot abandon our human ambition and desire. Out of the two powers, shall we follow Democracy and the US which is a leading nation of the world, or shall we follow the Communist world and respect Soviet and other powers? Is there any religion which we can really follow in which we have not been disappointed? People have been disappointed by all of these. Democracy, Communism and even religion have failed the people. They feel that now everything has been tested and all have failed. In this way we have traveled on the way of life. Now, at this point, what should we do?

There is natural law ruling in human society. We cannot change our sexes. Men must remain men and women must remain women. Their missions and desires are different. But what do they have in common? They have the desire to enjoy something virtuous. However vast our human thought or the world may be, we must be set truly on one goal. We have got to find the ultimate goal which both male and female are headed for. If we can find that goal, we will be the happiest people. People may think that happiness is something that we only wish for, but which cannot be given. Who can give us happiness? Can our nation give us happiness? Can any ideology or "ism" give us happiness? We can only be scornful of past ideologies.

When you were in Holland, you felt so limited because that was such a small country and you dreamed of coming out of that country and aspired to come to the US. Now that you are here, you don't find so much difference from there. Even though we are given tremendous wealth here, even though your dreams have been realized here, you are not going to be contented; you want to go further. In the world, people are not contented with what they now enjoy. Their missions and desires are always far ahead of them. Isn't that true? That means that what we already have is not the ultimate happiness. There are limitations around us, and in those limitations we cannot really feel happiness. A boy may want to marry a girl and at this point that is the goal. After it is obtained, are they happy? No! They want to have something more. You have learned what the boy is and there is not much left there. Isn't that true? We can come to the conclusion that real happiness is something that we can enjoy forever.

So, what is the source of happiness? Can a man be the source of happiness? Can a man give happiness to us? We can safely come to the conclusion that if there be no God, we must create one. We must have God in our imagination. Even though we may be cheated, if we have that God in our imagination, and by serving Him we feel that we are given ultimate happiness by Him, then we will be happy. Because no human being can give us that. We have got to have God or life has no meaning. At this point, if we really recognize that -there is God, how happy we must be. We can turn the whole world upside down. If a group of people can really recognize God and work in the love of God and for the cause of God, society will feel a lot for that group, and watch it, and will be anxious to have the group be successful. From this viewpoint, we find ourselves in the Divine Principle movement, and we find that in the Unification Church we have that high ideology. We are having to put this into practice, and we are happy in carrying out our mission.

People of the world go to school and get married, and they seek position and status; but they are not satisfied. Here in the Unification Movement we know God is above, leading us and working through us. So everything we do is very meaningful and what we say and what we do is of higher dimension than what others are saying and doing. People in this world are doing things that have limited scope, but we are doing things without limitation. We have a super existence above us: God, our Father. So we do everything in accordance with His will. We eat for the great task, which He would have us do. We do and say things and act out things in accordance with God's will -- that is our standard. We marry and we want to win the family, nation and everything -- this is all in accordance with God's will. Do you understand? We marry because we want to go closer to God. We do certain things because we want to go near Him. We want to restore the family, the nation and the whole world because we know that by winning the larger things back to God, we can come closer to God. We want to go to such a meeting point with God that we can attack Him and win Him for ourselves.

In the external world, the ideologies of Democracy and Communism have been struggling for so long. They are both so exhausted the people don't know which one they belong to. But in this world of higher dimension, people are not going to be exhausted, and the more we struggle the more valuable the achievement. In the love of God we will enjoy everlasting happiness. So, it is only too natural for us to reach the conclusion that in the Divine Principle movement we can attain the goal of human happiness in a higher dimension, so that it will last forever. It is not just imaginary that we, Unified Family members, all recognize God and that since hearing about God in the family we are the strongest people and the happiest ones. We know only too well that God is love and we will enjoy God's love in doing everything. In going through education and enjoying high positions and wealth, we know how to give back to God and we can enjoy things that have been given by God, our Father. Compared with people in the world, we are the happiest; we are far better off than those people of the world. That's what makes us happy. We said that when some people possess more things than other people, they feel happy. But since we possess more things and things of greater value, than other people, we are happy.

In giving, too, we are not narrow minded, we are not limiting ourselves by drawing small circles around us. We are generous people; we want to give out things not only to family members, but to friends, and neighbors and to the society around us. We want to give out not only things, but our whole being to the last man in the whole world -- to reach the other end of the world. There is no limitation between East and West in our fight. In the past and even still today it is thought that Western people are more advanced than Eastern people. It is thought that Eastern people are more primitive and Negro people are underdeveloped, etc. They still think that kind of thing in the world, but there is no barrier like that in our ideology. Nations which have long been enemies can come together in our movement and love each other. We can enjoy things among ourselves, sharing with each other what we have cherished. Since there is no barrier whatsoever, there are no enemies whatsoever, we can safely say that we are the happiest people. In human society some people want to possess more than other people and they want to invade ownership and they want to possess more people, more land, etc. That's what makes people fight each other. But here, there is no such thing. If you want to possess things with self-centered thought, you are liable to be ruined.

Here in the Unified Family we say that everything belongs to God. Only God owns everything. All that we have belongs to God. We feel that we have to return everything first to God and then be given what we need. In that way, we exchange what we have with God's love. That's more than ordinary commercial transactions. We promise more and we give out more than all that we have, and we receive God's love. We want to return to God everything we have, and in return we want to receive God's love -- which is more than anything else. Then, we want to share that love with others. Husband and wife are proud of the love between them. The man is not proud because of the build of his body, and the female is not proud because of her femininity, but they are both proud of there being love between them. The family, as a unit, cannot be proud of its wealth or position. It can only be proud of the love of God abiding within the family. Neighbors, relatives and friends will be envious if they really enjoy the love of God in their family. The couple says to God: "I will return everything to you -- what we have is yours: our family, our children, our nation and everything is yours. In return we want to have your love. In your love of the family, we will love the family and in your love of your nation we will love the nation and in your love of the nation and people of the world we are ready to love the nation and the people of the whole world." What we are going to do next is to return the whole cosmos, the whole spirit world, to God and receive God's love so vast as to cover the whole continent. What we are doing here is for the sake of God. We eat for God's cause, we work, we do things, we say things -- we do everything for God's sake and for God's love. Later on this will give us ultimate happiness.

In love, your trials and your struggles are not painful. Suppose there is a girl who wants to marry a very handsome man, a righteous man. She would sit up the whole night embroidering something which would please her future husband. She would not feel fatigued or exhausted sitting up day and night doing this. When you work for the love of God, you cannot be made to feel exhausted. Therefore, we have to toil and labor -- we are not unhappy, but we are happy to do it. This is the key to love. This is the secret to possess love. The more you labor for the person you love, the more love you will receive from him.

There is a vast difference between the way of life of worldly people and the way of life of our people in this group. Our standard of life and our view of value is so much higher that when we look back to the days of our past, we think we were horrible and we would never want to have that perspective again. You may not like this because Master is talking frankly, but isn't it really true about each of you? We have changed a lot and now we can think of ourselves as being great. Until a few years ago, before we joined our movement, our way of thinking was so small like this. We would quarrel over small things with our brothers and sisters and neighbors and friends which we would now discard like trash. Now we are here thinking of things of higher dimensions. We will do anything for God's cause and we will do things willingly at the cost of our lives.

You are here for the great task to be carried out. But here in the US the people are not calling out. You have to knock at the door and people are still sleeping and drowsy from slumber and you have to wake them up and get them to work for the great cause. That is your mission. People can be reluctant to receive your message and they will even repel you. But afterwards, when they are really awakened to the fact that they are brought into the movement where there are things of vast dimension, they will be very grateful to you. When you knock at the doors of those people, you will have brought to them the love of God. Even though you have left their house, they will have been touched and moved by what you have said. Later on, they will come to you in utter gratitude and they will want to return love to you. You must be aware of the fact that this is our great task and you must carry out your mission in thankfulness to God. In the face of persecution by other people, if you are calm and collected, they will think you are strange; but you are great.

Love is something that you want to keep to yourself as a secret. The secret between you and God will make you great. In planting the love of God in other people you are sharing your love with them and your love, rather than being diminished, will be multiplied. You will be proud of what you have made. The path of life under the Unified Family is different from the ones other people are treading. You can be proud of our way of life -- people will be attracted to us and people will be converted into our movement, because it is the path of love. We can say that in this way we are finding and enjoying the love of God. Only by giving can we receive. So, we want to give out our whole being. We want to give out our family, our clan, our nation and our whole world to God. In return He will give us such love that can cover the whole world and the whole cosmos. We are rich; and we are the happiest people. Then, are you going to be really generous givers? (Yes!) In giving to the people don't ever dream of receiving something directly from them. But let them return what they have received, to God. You are returning everything to God through those people, so God will be sure to return something to you. That something is His love which is more than anything else in the whole world. In that way you will be a great business man -- having made a profit from what you have invested in the love of God. You will receive things of more value than those you have given out. Through the love of God you will be in the position of God's son and daughter. Would you want to be that? (Yes.)

Now that you have learned the way to go in life, the more you labor for the love of God, the more you can receive love from Him in abundance. Are you happy or unhappy people when you want to give out things for the love of God? We have nothing to be afraid of. When you are on the sea and are shipwrecked, if you know that you have been doing things for the sake of God, you are not afraid of the shipwreck, because you know that God will keep and protect you. Even though you were attacked by a fierce tiger, you should not be afraid, because your soul will be saved in God's love. If you are sacrificed in carrying out your mission because of your love of God, you will be a martyr who will long be remembered in the history of the providence of God. There is no comparison between what you are doing and what the martyrs after Jesus did. In the Roman Empire when Christians were persecuted and martyred, they did that for the sake of the spiritual kingdom they thought they would enjoy when they died. With that thinking they wanted to go to the heavenly kingdom of God -- by being martyred.

But in this world we are going through all difficulties and hardships and persecutions in order to build the kingdom of God on this planet while we are still alive. Even though we may have to be martyred here, we are doing it for the love of God. We will have greater reward; we are doing greater things than those people. In the outer world too, they are at best the citizens in the heavenly kingdom of God, but up there we are going to be the sons of God -- the children of God. Knowing this, you must carry out your mission with gratitude and you must return joy to God.