REVEREND SUN MYUNG MOON
SPEAKS ON

The Kingdom of Heaven:
Who Will Enter It,
and How Will They Get There?

Closing Banquet Address
The 7^th World Culture and Sports Festival
January 29, 2001
The New York Hilton, New York, New York

Honorable former and present heads of state, distinguished religious leaders, and representatives of world leaders.

I sincerely acknowledge the hard work you have invested to make this Seventh World Culture and Sports Festival shine ever more brightly.

I am also grateful that you have shown appreciation for my work and vision, and that you have promised to give constant support for it in the coming days. In return, I would like to give you world leaders a precious gift in words this evening. I speak from the truth found through immense suffering on a journey begun in my youth. This journey has brought me to the boundless world of Heaven. Tonight I will speak about the principles of the spirit world that we enter after death, a world no one can ignore. I would also like to introduce some aspects of life in the Kingdom of Heaven, the realm everyone desperately wants to enter.

As a result of the Fall, the first human ancestors could not wed each other with God’s blessing. They fell while they were still growing up, by disobeying God and committing adultery with Satan. Satan became an adulterer, and our problem lies in the fact that they inherited Satan’s blood lineage.

According to the principles of creation, man is to enter the Kingdom of Heaven after he lives the life of the Kingdom of God on Earth. We live the Kingdom life on Earth through establishing the unity of mind and body, the unity of husband and wife and the unity of children. By inheriting God’s lineage, we were supposed to connect this directly to the spirit world. How?

The very moment a true bridegroom makes love with his true bride for the first time is the moment that the perfection of husband and wife is achieved. The palace of love on Earth, that is the center of Heaven and Earth, begins in that first moment of making love. Through this love, the original palace of love is created for the first time. The life and blood lineage of humankind begin from that point of love. From the same point, a nation is born. The veritable Kingdom of God in Heaven and on Earth too begins with the opening of that door of first love.

When a man and a woman become one through love and create children, they substantiate the invisible God in visible form. Love is the power that can combine and commingle blood. Then what is the axis for this mixing of blood? It is the place in which the love organs of husband and wife meet and make the first love. That is a power station, the very plant for the generation of the power of true love, the power of true life, the power of true lineage, the power for the Kingdom of God on Earth through the true family, and the power for the Kingdom of God in Heaven. Thus, the wedding of Adam and Eve, who were in the position of God’s substantial object partners, would have been God’s wedding. They would have brought God’s liberation and freedom, and God Himself would have sung and danced.

Knowing this should fill us with awe and terror over the holiness of the first love. When the first love is corrupted, we destroy the palace of love, the palace of life, the palace of lineage and everything that was to have blossomed forth. This is the dreadful reality of the Fall. Through it we lost the Kingdom of God in Heaven and on Earth. Heaven and Earth turned into Hell. Throughout history, man’s love organ has symbolized the worst of slander and curses, because it destroyed Heaven and Earth. God’s ideal of love was to have settled perfectly beginning at the place of first love, through the marriage of the man’s love organ and the woman’s love organ. That point, centering on man-woman love, establishes the perfected object partner of God. That point is the nucleus of the universe. If the axis connecting God with the love organs of man and woman is broken, the entire universe shatters.

Since the marriage of man and woman is the original spring of love, it becomes the original palace of love, the original palace of life and the original palace of lineage. Our longing for freedom and happiness springs from there. What’s more, all individuals, families, tribes and peoples originate there. The foundation for peace and the Kingdom of God in Heaven and on Earth take root in love. Through the union the love organs, man and woman are blended completely. This love relationship produces the fruit of good or of evil. We must comprehend the infinite value of our love organs. The way of Heaven teaches us that whether we are a man or a woman, we must never misuse them.

Incited by Satan’s false love, Adam and Eve committed adultery and became a false couple. As false parents they formed a false family and transmitted sin to their children. The providence of salvation is a providence of restoration. We have to root out that very mistake of misusing love and restore true love. Through God’s true love, the restored Adam should take the true parents’ position and engraft humankind to himself. A man and woman perfected through true love shall establish a true family with God’s blessing.

Man is to build an ideal family and perfect his spirit self while living on Earth. We then enter Heaven in the spirit world. Our original hometown is the Kingdom of God in Heaven, where our spirit lives in God’s love for eternity. The Fall closed our spiritual senses. This is why we do not know about our spirit self or about Heaven in the spirit world. Unlike animals, we possess a spirit self. We should know about the world of Heaven that we inevitably will enter. The family is the school, the training center in which we can perfect our heart. Family life guides us to master ourselves for the sake of sharing love with others. Thus, the family is the base upon which we can build the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of Heaven is where we are intoxicated in the service of God as our King and Master. We can enter there, but only as families.

The ultimate ideal of all living beings is to become the object partner of God’s true love and live with God. To ascend to a higher place in Heaven, live as God lives, investing your life for the sake of others. The one who sacrifices himself for the sake of his family, his family for the sake of his tribe, his tribe for his nation, his nation for the world, the world for Heaven and Earth, and Heaven and Earth for the sake of God, is the closest one to God. He or she will stand as the object partner of God’s true love. God, the Creator of the universe, has been sacrificing Himself for the sake of the universe more than anyone. Thus, to encounter Him and live with Him, we need training through a true love life, a life lived for the sake of others. Although God is the King of knowledge, the King of power and the King of wealth, He does not ask us to bring Him those things. God is waiting for the one who lives for the sake others in the spirit of true love here on Earth!

Distinguished world leaders!

Many people rattle off words about God’s absoluteness, omnipotence and glory. Nonetheless, through my lifelong search for truth, I have found that to be way off the mark. God lost His loving children as a result of the first ancestors’ Fall. If your children are imprisoned, can you live in glory? God’s heart is in the deepest pain. What’s more, God had to give Satan the beautiful creation that He made for His children. From the moment He lost His object partner of love, the God of true love became the God of loneliness. God was never in the position to exercise His power as the Lord of the universe. God never had the chance to display His authority as the Creator of all things. Meanwhile, fallen people often boast of themselves for nothing. Even though He is the owner of all that has breath, God was never able to reveal His pride. Being the author of the principles that guide the universe, how can God move freely in the fallen world, the world of non-principle? Humankind, living with all degrees of distrust and disobedience, even ignore God and mock God as non-existent and dead. God has endured this long history in a heart of agony. Truly, His waiting has seemed endless.

This tragedy transpired because Adam and Eve fell while they were growing up, and became false parents. Out of profound respect for their freedom and responsibility, God did not intervene directly to rectify their mistake. For that reason, we find in history that the Lord has appeared as the second Adam and the third Adam, in order to indemnify the mistake of the first Adam and perfect the ideal of true parentship. In this way, everything should be restored. Until then, God waits anxiously. This is the real story behind history: it was a providence of restoration to liberate God’s aching heart.

I have done my absolute best to fulfill the mission of True Parents. I paid no attention whatsoever to my welfare or status. To build a church was not even my goal. I had but one goal: to walk all the way to liberate God’s heart from pain and help Him realize His wish. In other words, I have invested myself totally to set God free from agony, to establish Him as the Lord of the universe, and to set the foundation for humankind to serve Him as the King of the cosmos.

Do you think that this task is easy? I had to make Satan surrender both in Heaven and on Earth. I had to tear down all the walls and even bring Hell to an end. We cannot liberate God’s heart through true love unless we prepare all people on Earth and in the spirit world to receive God’s blessing in freedom. Satan has to recognize this work officially, and it has to accord with the law of the universe. Satan has enjoyed his ruling power over nations in this world. Therefore, we are challenged to set conditions through victories that transcend nations and the world itself.

Dear world leaders!

This is a day to rejoice. I have set these conditions and on the 13^th day of January this year, I held the coronation ceremony for the Kingship of God in Korea. That was the greatest day of celebration in all human history. We liberated God’s heart for the first time. He could start His new history based on the might and power of true love. This is the dawn of the new age, in which humankind in Heaven and on Earth can attend the liberated God in gratitude. From now we will easily witness the living God and often notice helping hands from the spirit world.

I urge you to study about the spirit world with greater eagerness and to receive the God-centered blessing so that you can build a true family. I also encourage you to prepare for your eternal life through living unselfishly. The time has come that people who work hard will feel the hand of Heavenly fortune, with which the limited power of human beings cannot compare. Those who live the life of a filial child, a patriot, a saint and a divine son or daughter before the living God, with a humble and self-effacing attitude, are the most fortunate. At the advent of the era of God’s Kingship, I pray that you will promote God’s Kingship. May we work in partnership to build the world of heart and culture transcending nations.

May God’s Blessing be with you always!