Blessing and Ideal Family
by Reverend Sun Myung Moon

Chapter Seven
Part 5

THE EDUCATION OF CHILDREN

1. FAMILY EDUCATION

What is the content of truth? Even though the content of truth is so nice, we would not trade our parents, our spouse or our children for it. What is the utmost truth of all truth? It is a parent, a husband and a wife, and children. Nothing exceeds those. Then what is the core of truth? It is love. In such a principle, what is the utmost center of truth? What do you mean by saying that God is the essence of truth, goodness, love and life? If something is truth, within it must be included love and life.

The world cannot be formed without a family. If there's something wrong with the family, the nation will perish. Therefore, family education determines the future destiny of the entire nation. When there are many families living by the public law, the nation will flourish; when there are many families living with a private standard, the nation will perish.

Children should be one, centering upon parents. The miserable accident of Cain and Abel shouldn't be repeated. Brothers and sisters should be one by being dutiful children to their parents. You should be the good example and educate your children with this standard. Until now, parents have depended upon schools for their children's education, but from now on, parents should be the first to show the good example so that children will form new families following the tradition of their parents.

You should lead an exemplary public life, to show your children the tradition and to educate them to inherit it. Human beings are originally to be educated by their parents. They are not to receive education just from the school. Especially the inheritance of the tradition cannot be taught in school. Children should offer all the education that they receive in school to their parents.

What is the growth period? It is the period in which we discipline ourselves to be the ones who can receive perfect love. Then what should we do during this period? For the sake of God's pleasure, we should go when God goes and we should come when God comes. Originally, the only human beings were Adam and Eve, so their children learned from them automatically. Formal education was not supposed to be necessary. Children are to follow and to know what their parents do and know. They are to do what their parents like. If they dream of things and behave in ways outside of what their parents do, they will be subjugated under the fallen dominion. That is why God had to say, "Don't eat the fruit."

Children find the value of all existence through their parents. Whom do the children resemble when they grow up in a family? They resemble their parents. They are to follow their parents.

Parental love shouldn't be selfish. If parents prevent their son from going the rough way, he will become an incapable man without willpower or independent spirit in the future. To make an incompetent son is not the goal of parental love. Parents should deeply understand their son and support and encourage him in his chosen path.

It is definitely easy for parents to let their children sleep whenever they want and eat whatever they want. But true parents would want to show the better way of living for their children.

Children don't complain when their parents push them to study because they know it is for their sake. The heart of true parents is to pray for their children all night, shedding tears.

Parents should make their children regard them as their most intimate friends by reading fairy tales, telling them interesting stories of their life of faith, and discussing the future of the family in a constructive way. Parents are to direct their children's faith.

Parents should be able to respect their children; they are not to scold their children in a humiliating manner.

It is difficult to correct the bad habits of human beings. As a Korean proverb says, the habit formed when one is three continues until one is 80. Therefore, we are to form sound habits, especially during adolescence. In order to let children develop the right habits, a thorough education is absolutely necessary in the early period of life. The problem is how to correct the bad habits of the older generation. By using saws, knives and axes, we can recreate all shapes and varieties of wood into the standard sizes used for construction. Likewise, by the standard of the order of love, the twisted human habits can be corrected. A brick by itself is just a brick, but it can create a house or a building. Likewise, when we correct our bad habits and unite our habits with the way of God's original love, power is produced and we can enter the orbit of God's eternal love. Therefore, we are to correct our bad habits in our lifetime and go the right way in the life of faith.

In order to set firmly your children's faith, you should connect them strongly to the church before they reach twenty. If you don't let them set up their faith between middle school and the second year of high school, they will slide into the fallen society. This is based upon statistics from our church. It is a very serious problem.

Blessed children are to follow their parents absolutely until they are twenty. Therefore, if parents make mistakes, their children will do the same.

When a husband makes mistakes, his wife should hit him, and when a wife makes mistakes, her husband should hit her. They are to follow the example of God. By being hit, we gain a good resource to educate descendants. When our life improves due to being hit with a stick, the stick will be the textbook. The people who leave such a textbook to educate their descendants are outstanding beings.

The mistakes of parents are bequeathed to the children.

We are to prepare the family law: the standard of babies' education and the regulation of the family. Parents will have nothing to say when they are accused under the law.

Because mothers in the Unification Church know the heavenly law, they should give solid family education to their daughters.

Don't leave your children in the care of others. Perhaps a mother feels so weak that she has to give another person charge of her child, and that person may love her child as if it were her first son. Then this mother will have to support that person. You should know that rearing babies is for the sake of the nation and the world.

Father's babies should be raised by the members who have set up enough heartistic conditions.

2. TRUE EDUCATION OF CHILDREN

In order to educate children, parents first of all should be loyal to the providence. They should stay in the position to be respected by their children so that their children will be completely obedient to them. Otherwise, the children will not want to follow them.

If parents neglect directions from headquarters and yet order their children to live according to Principle, their children will laugh at them.

Everything parents do should encourage their children to go the right way of the Unification Church. Unless the parents are an example of living the principled life, they cannot educate their children to follow Principle.

I speak to you only what I first have practiced and established as a victorious foundation. If you cannot believe it, pray to God. You will see clearly if I am lying.

You should pray to God, "Please let my children follow what I do." First you establish the standard of behavior, then your children can stand in the same position. If you stand on that foundation, God will automatically lead your children in the same direction. Spirit world will accuse you of irresponsibility if you do not set the right direction for your children.

You should be able to educate your children to become like you.

I told Hyo Jin and In Jin, "Because your father and mother work for the nation and God's will, we cannot meet you often. So you should do the same as Father and Mother do." It is really sad for parents not to meet their children very often. Children always want to be with their parents.

Children should be filled with the thought that their parents work for God's providence in spite of all the suffering. Parents should be a good example so that the children are clear that their parents live for the sake of the whole, not for the sake of their own well-being. Children learn their parents' heart.

What should the parents do? They should teach children to love each other as their parents love each other and to love the nation as their parents love the nation. If you can teach that, no other education is needed.

You should be able to counsel your children, saying, "You should be happy to see your parents living for God's will. Your parents are different from other parents. Other parents easily separate and divorce when they encounter a little difficulty, but your parents endure and love each other in the midst of difficulty. You should be grateful to God and always have hope, following the way of your parents. God's blessing will come down where you become one with your parents and where you are loyal to God's providence." Then your children will follow your example and inherit your tradition. Your offspring will flourish eternally if you practice this truth.

When teaching your children what to do, you should give them specifics, with the details of their course, instead of vaguely telling them to be great people.

The father is to be responsible as a father, the older brother is to be responsible as an older brother, and the older sister is to be responsible as an older sister. That is, you should distinguish the way for a true man and a true woman to go following the heavenly law, so that you may qualify as heavenly subjects.

The word "father" is a dreadful word. Without "truth" you cannot feed your children. You should feed your children with your achievement of blood and something good. When they eat something wrong, their parents should guide them into the right way, praying for their blessing in tears. Parents are not to be indebted to their children.

Heaven and earth should know the money that I use.

Even though parents cannot give children material benefit due to difficult living conditions, they should serve children with loving heart from their bone marrow. Then the children come to be indebted to their parents. That's why most sons of filial piety come from poor families. When the children endeavor hard not to be indebted to their parents, the parents will feel joy.

You are to follow heavenly law, embracing your children. You should never show tears to your children, even though your living condition becomes terribly difficult.

Father educated Mother not to show tears to the children. When rearing children, parents encounter many periods of suffering. Even though the tears of agony are about to burst, parents become joyful when their children try to comfort them in tears. If you cannot do that, you are unqualified to educate your children.

Your children should consider you greater than any king or queen in the world, and you should show your children how intimate you are with each other. Blessed families should set up such a tradition. You should implant into your children's bone marrow the tradition that they revere you more than anyone else in the world.

Worldly parents continuously fight in front of their children even though the children ask them to stop. You are supposed to be a good example of harmony to your children so that when they see careless secular-world parents, they feel that they have the world's greatest parents. You are to set up the heavenly family law by means of action, so that your children respect you from the bottom of their hearts. If you do this, your children will determine to follow in your footsteps.

How can we set up such a tradition? We can set up the tradition through Unification Thought. After knowing this, we should set up the family morality of being absolutely obedient to the standard of Unification Thought. When children experience this, they are naturally obedient.

3. TRUE EDUCATION OF PATRIOTISM

You should teach your children to be loyal subjects in front of God's will, for the sake of the heavenly nation. If your children cry for Korea, you should teach them that we don't have our nation yet and Korea is not our true nation. You should teach this while holding their hands, in tears, telling them that there's another nation that we must attend. You should be able to feel God's concern as closely as the breath of your babies in your bosom. In this tearful position, you are to educate your children. Then the width of your education will broaden.

When educating children, parents shouldn't just teach them to love their parents. Parents should explain to their children, "I'm the loyal subject who loves this nation, a patriot. I'm not the mother of a family first, but a patriotic mother, and a loyal father." In order to teach filial piety, parents should behave as children of filial piety themselves, in front of their children. Otherwise they will fall down like the leaves in the autumn.

A father should teach his son to be as dutiful as he is and to be as loyal as he is in spite of being driven into the comer by the struggles of human history. My goal in life is to bequeath this tradition to you.

I tell you: love thirty million people with the parental love that you've received. Then the foundation of hope to subjugate the nation will be extended. Isn't that a principled way of instructing people? You are not to be a mere compatriot of thirty million people; you are to be the parent of thirty million people. Be the sons and daughters who can be the parents of thirty million people.

When parents educate their children to love and sacrifice for the nation to the degree that they sacrifice for their children, the children will endeavor to become the patriots that their parents desire them to be. Whenever such children reflect on their parents, they will think of the thirty million people of the nation. They will study to serve their nation and, when their nation suffers misery, they will feel the same agony. But standing in such a position doesn't make them patriots. They should have a foundation substantially established in such a position. That foundation becomes the point which the people will adore eternally. Otherwise, life just passes by. It is a serious matter to consider.

A teacher who is seriously devoted to bequeath the right thought to his or her disciples in a school will advise them while holding their hands and shedding tears, with the deep care for the nation's destiny, so that they will be obedient to the nation, not to the teacher. The disciples who receive such teaching will accomplish the unfulfilled will of their teacher. When teachers are totally devoted to their disciples, to the point of offering their lives, and when parents are sincerely devoted to their children, regarding the nation and the world as more precious than themselves, the disciples and the children will be the pillars of the nation.

Have you professors lived for the sake of others? Teachers should have heart springing out of their bone marrow and should shed blood and tears for their disciples. They cannot help but shed tears when standing in front of the multitude who lost d e sense of looking for the original world. Myriad cells are trembling. Have you given a lecture shedding tears from a guilty conscience for the sake of the students and their descendants? Reverend Moon has walked the path of blood and tears for humankind. People thought of me as a notorious ringleader and they expected me to perish, but now those same people are asking me to be their leader anytime and open the doors of the east, west, south and north. They say that they don't need anything except Father. In such a place, the Kingdom of Heaven is to be restored. Such a philosophy hasn't existed until now.

What can we do to love the nation? Nobody educates regarding this matter. People think they love the nation by paying taxes. With this attitude, how can we learn to love the nation? Love for the nation should start from the family. Parents should teach their children to love the nation as they love their parents and their brothers and sisters. Then no other education is necessary. The children come to realize that, because they and their parents live in such a way, all American families and the president are to live in such a manner if they have a patriotic heart. Such a tradition should remain eternally, even though the U.S. State Department and Pentagon disappear.

By their unity centering upon the president through this tradition, the people can do everything. That is why we should educate our children to be loyal, risking their lives when the nation faces difficulties.

Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and the Israelites tried to restore what Adam failed to establish, but they failed. How can we restore their mistakes? Mothers shouldn't live for their own households. The reason to eat and to rear children is for the future of the nation.

Who is the patriot of a nation? It is not the person who eats well and commands. The people who keep the honor of the nation are the patriots. Such people would want to hide their miserable living condition, never eating their poor meal in front of foreigners, in order to maintain the nation's honor. We shouldn't behave lightly, jealous of one another, forgetting the honor of the nation. People who endeavor to present their nation in a more beautiful and valuable manner are patriots. The descendants of such people will also be patriots.

The feeling of joy at giving birth to a son is not the end. Parents should be concerned about how to rear him as a man of value. Parents who love their son with such a concern are the ones who know the heavenly law. If parents are just happy to give birth to a son without such concern, the starting point for the son's life is wrong. Parents should concern themselves with rearing him to be a person who is useful to the nation. If parents begin his upbringing based upon this concern, they will set the condition to begin the son's life for the sake of nation. This is very important matter.

Teach your children, "Become the people who can pray for the nation and the world instead of praying for your own children." The reason that God blessed you by giving you children is not only for your will but for God's will. When people give birth to a child through making special conditions for heaven, God will send the child as the savior of the nation.Therefore, if such parents don'- educate their child to serve the nation, God will take the child away.

People cannot become patriots in one night. They receive education from their ancestors. They should experience the piercing bond of education to the bone marrow from their parents, and they should determine the purpose of their lives centering upon this education. Patriots themselves cannot be the cause or motive of their being patriotic. They definitely received an education from their ancestors, or certain stimulating inspiration from the depth of their conscience, which became the motivation of their being patriotic. When their whole life is motivated to fulfill the purpose of the initial inspiration, they finally appear as patriots.

4. EDUCATION TO LIVE FOR THE WORLD

Religion is the summit teaching. God's summit teaching is to educate and to love humankind. There's nothing other than that. Therefore, true parents are to teach their children something with which the whole world and God are happy.

It is not a problem to sacrifice the family for the sake of the world and God. Father went to North Korea abandoning his son. First of all, love the world and God! God's will is to save the world. The family centering upon God's will shouldn't exist for itself. The family is to live for the sake of the world. This is our way of tradition. The fact that we have to be taught to love God is sad. It is because of the fall. It is mortifying that we have to educate our children to believe in God and to protect the church. Originally, we do not have to be taught such facts. God would always dwell in our hearts and directly lead us. Your own parents don't have to be introduced to you; likewise originally there was no need to introduce God.

Morality teaches us parental love, conjugal love and children's love. Have you thought about for whom you have to love your parents? For whom do you have to love your spouse and your children?

Human beings lost the main character who is responsible for love. God talks about infinite love. He says that the thing which will remain until the final moment is love. That love is the love of God. You should know the purpose of love. Because of whom do you love? We love because of God. We must love for the sake of God. If you love for yourself, it is no secret where you will be assigned to go after death.

When feeding your baby milk, you feel the baby is very cute. Because of whom do you feel this cuteness? You should cherish your baby as the substitute for heaven and earth. You are to love your child for the sake of the world and God. The fortune of heavenly law is moving to embrace the cosmos, transcending the world, according to God's love. If you love your children, who are born of such great fortune, just for the sake of your own well- being, you will not be accepted at all. When suckling babies, mothers should have the piercing heart to embrace them as representing heaven and earth.

Do you want to receive the Blessing? Do you want eternal life? In order to receive the Blessing and eternal life, you should be a public person. Don't love your children as yours when you educate them. You should love them as sacrificial children for the whole of humankind. When feeding babies milk, mothers are to feel as if they are the representative mothers of all humankind and they are to consider their babies as representing humankind. Parents shouldn't just cherish their own children, but they are to treat others' children as theirs. The babies fed and raised by such public-hearted mothers will be great figures. Among the descendants of such mothers will be born the great figure who has the ability to liberate the world. This is the formula.

When educating children, parents have to think how to rear their children. Who can successfully accomplish the mission for God's providence? They should think the same way when they nurse their babies.

All parents teach their children to become great figures for the nation. But now is the time when we are approaching the world level. Now is the time to teach children to be worldwide figures. Do you educate accordingly? You are supposed to. Live together with the world! Because Father knows how you feel, I have to tell you this conclusion.

Father didn't perish even in the time of disruption, so I will educate you to live together with the world. This is important. What has history been seeking? It has sought the time the world could live together. You are also to go, fight, endeavor, teach and die centering upon that time. Even if you finally die in that effort, you will be resurrected anew.

For what does goodness move? It doesn't move for myself. We are to eat for the sake of the cosmos, not just for ourselves. To get married is also for the will. Our goal should be the world. All our experiences also should be centered on the world. Such people don't look interesting, but they are very interesting people. When overcoming the 70 or 80 years of life on earth, we are to see eternity; but most human beings are not aware of that. If we know how to enter the eternal world, we will possess eternity.

Many people are running after money. For what do they earn money? They answer that they make money for their children. Then what will their children do? They are to live for the nation and the world, not just for their own survival. Otherwise their tribe will perish or will be subsumed by other tribes.

All of us are surrounded by an evil environment. We don't need an education in order to go the evil way. Anybody can go that way without receiving any education in that field. History started with an evil action, so we automatically go the evil way. That's why the purpose of education is to make people discern the good from evil by means of conscience centering upon morality.

Upon what is an education centered? Even though people have been educated centering upon the good -- the conscience -- how many people have led a life which matched the standard of their education? Anybody can get a high grade in doing evil without education.

The conscience always tells us to be good in an evil environment. The mind always stimulates and advises us to be good. But have you listened to what your mind tells you? When we think of such matter, we lament all the time -- today, tomorrow, during the heyday of youth, the time of middle age, the time of old age. Our life ends with lament over not having become what our conscience desired. In other words, it finishes in evil. That is the inevitable conclusion. Because human beings were born from evil, they struggle in evil and pass away in evil. That has been the typical life course of human beings.

What is the relationship between you and the providence? You were born for the purpose of the whole. You were born in the middle of the providential history; that is, you were born as a public being. You should be grateful to your parents that you were born in the midst of the providence. Therefore, you are to live for your descendants, the world and the universe. Without knowing, your parents gave birth to and reared the children who represent the whole universe. Likewise you are to give birth to and rear your children according to the public way of thinking.

Great mothers teach their babies to endure any kind of difficulties in order to be righteous figures who can move the world. That's because they realize that righteousness never perishes.

Father's mother was not public. She didn't want her son to suffer. She didn't care about her son's will and ideals; she rather worried about her son's physical torture. When Father was caught by the North Korean communists and was imprisoned in their jail, she came to see Father several times; her only concern was the physical pain that Father was going through.

Father's mother wanted him to abandon the public way of life and to live with his physical parents comfortably. That's why Father had to abandon his physical parents. When I arrived in Pyongyand (from Hung Nam prison) and spent 40 days, I didn't visit my home even though it was quite close to Pyongyang. If I had visited my home on my way as a refugee, my physical family could have been liberated. But because they would have obstructed Father's accomplishment of God's will, I didn't meet them at that time.

My parents and the brothers and sisters who remained in the hometown must have been killed by the communists. The communists never tolerate the family members of a so-called reactionary, but immediately massacre them. During the "1.4 Retreat," Father took refuge with the church members from Pyongyang and a disciple from Hung Nam prison, leaving his physical family in their hometown.

Father can abandon his physical family when they are against Father's public mission; but even though the Korean government opposed Father and sent me to the prison, Father cannot abandon the nation. This nation and the people persecute and oppose Father because they don't know Father's will and ideal. Therefore, even though they persecute me, I have to love them and teach them.

God's will is not centered upon the physical blood lineage, and it is not for us to love our own family. If we live for ourselves, we cannot save the world. In order to save the present world, we have to offer our loving children as the sacrifice. This is God's providence.

The people who can offer their children to God for the future world can draw the victorious foundation of the future into the present time. Abraham offered his son for the future world. He loved his son more than anything in the present or in the future, but because his love for humankind was greater than his love for his son, he could offer his son to God.

God dwells in such a heart. By this, entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven is determined. What sort of person can go to the Kingdom of Heaven? Selfish people cannot go there. Only people who sacrifice them selves, abandoning all their personal belongings, can go to the Kingdom of Heaven.

Then who can completely occupy God's love? They are the subjective individuals who can sacrifice their children as well as their bodies to save and love humankind.

In the providence of restoration, God never hit His enemies. He has been leading the providence by hitting the most beloved figures, who were the closest to Him. God has developed the providence in this way. This development finally aims for the Kingdom of Heaven.

The Unification Church talks about "cosmos-ism." Then what is "cosmos- ism"? It is to live together with heaven and earth. You may respond, "It sounds good but it cannot be actualized." It sounds like a dream, doesn't it?

The Unification Church pursues a world one step higher than the conventional churches. The conventional churches are linear whereas the Unification Church is spherical. Then which is greater? The Unification concept is greater. "Cosmos-ism" is greater. The Unification Church claims to live together with the cosmos. Therefore, the Unification Church has to complete the mission of three ages. We are to liberate the spirits in the spirit world, the living people in this sinful world and the descendants to come. The Unification Church came, holding the authority to liberate the three ages.

For what are you responsible? You are responsible for the spirit world, the present world, and the descendants. This is the way of restoration and of destiny that Unificationists must shoulder.

5. FAITH AND STUDY

To lead a religious life is to drink the milk of life as a baby sucks the mother's milk. When a baby is hungry, it cries for milk; likewise, when your heart is thirsty, you should visit the church and listen to the words of life.

The mother who truly loves her baby doesn't only nurse the baby, but she disciplines the baby and teaches it to do what it doesn't like to do. Parental heart is to train the child to be strong enough not to fall. Likewise human beings need to be disciplined to restore what they lost in the beginning of history God and the universe. If religion had taught human beings to go over the fence of evil, resurrection would have happened.

If God truly loves human beings and leads all the religions, and if He really wants human beings to be resurrected through the religions, persecution and opposition are inevitable; they are the discipline. Therefore, unless you gain victory in the midst of the severe persecution from the individual, family, nation and world, you cannot be resurrected.

The education of faith is more important than secular education. Father's thought is centered upon the will but your thought is individualistic. Originality develops when you believe and act.

The schools of the society don't teach "marriage" even though it is a very significant matter. A man doesn't know of a woman and a woman doesn't know of a man; but today's education doesn't give much weight to the problem. We lack education concerning problems which arise after getting married. How to create a happy married life and how to educate children are not being taken care of. The problem of science and mathematics gets more attention and density of focus. This is one of the malformed phenomena.

In order for your present being to develop into a future being, you shouldn't be habitualized. All the blessed families from the 36 Couples to the 6,000 Couples became secularized. Because they became habitualized into the secular customs, problems occur. All the parents think, "We should let our children go to the good universities. Studying leads to success. In order to send them to school, we should make money and they will finally be successful." Father doesn't think so. To know Principle thoroughly is more important than to study. In order to be successful, you should know Principle clearly. The standard of success depends on how much you love your nation and God.

God didn't create human beings so that they could collect all knowledge. To understand the ideal of creation is not to gain knowledge. In other words, understanding the ideal of creation is not determined by the amount of knowledge that you have collected in your brain.

The ideal of creation is not established by knowledge, power or money. It is established only by love. Parents who teach that the only measure of success is knowledge or studying are making a serious mistake.

Some of you may be boastful because you went to a first-rank university and make a lot of money. That is stupid. The knowledge that you learn in school is important, but more important is love. You can gain knowledge in several days or years, but you cannot have love overnight. Love is absolute and eternal, so you cannot master it even in your whole lifetime. You cannot get the graduation certificate of love, even though you study 30 or 40 years. You can become professor or receive a doctorate after studying a field of secular knowledge for a certain period, but you cannot be a professor or gain a doctorate in love even if you study for 1,000 years, because the field of love is limitless and eternal.

Love never produces the feeling of repugnance or disgust. It produces the feeling of the utmost joy and gratitude.

Our mind can grow infinitely by heart but it cannot grow infinitely by knowledge. The heart of love embraces the universe and still there's more space remaining, so once you cultivate the great original site of love, even God wants to take a nap there. We cannot comprehend God by knowledge, so we should realize the greatness of the heart of the Unification Church.

When you study for yourself, you will quickly feel sleepy; but when you think the survival of thirty million people depends on the one page or one sentence that you are dealing with, you will never get tired. Study with seriousness so intense that you feel that the retention of one vocabulary word will save the thirty million people and the loss of one word will doom the same number of people. Don't say that your memory is lacking! You never forget what happened in an extremely serious moment, do you? Study at the risk of your life. You can feel the pulse of your heart when you are serious. In such serious moments, you even forget things that you were determined to do.

Because your mind is scattered, you cannot remember. If you hit on a brilliant way to survive when on the verge of death, will you remember it or not? When you study, invest your life in page after page. Once I started seriously questioning a certain passage in the Bible, I would endeavor even for three years to solve the mystery of it. Until I shouted, "Eureka!" I would push myself to penetrate the root of the problem.

In order to be a great person, you should make all the excellent teachings of the prominent teachers your possession. Otherwise, you cannot be a great personage. Being a Ph.D. holder is not enough; you are to absorb all the systems of knowledge of the world's prominent scholars and digest them as a factor of your life by comprehending the overall value of them. Then finally you are to appear as the new figure of knowledge by adding your originality to the existing system. That is the way to be the world-class scholar and the world-class philosopher. The same method applies if you want to pioneer "goodness."

In order to develop and accomplish a certain purpose, you need stimulation. In order to accomplish the complete purpose, complete determination is needed, and you must pass through a time period. In order to complete the time period, a power of propulsion is needed. The driving force is produced by periodic stimulation. Stimulation is necessary for development.

The blessed families, especially the elder blessed families centering upon the 36 Couples, seem to ask Father for help with their children's schooling. I doubt there's anything wrong with them, and of course there are many reasons for what they ask. But when parents get deeply involved with their children's schooling, they will encounter obstacles in going the way of God's will. Parents are supposed to give a general direction to the children and then let them solve the detailed problems by themselves. Father was a self supporting student. Tigers let their cubs experience severe trials and harsh discipline in order to rear them to be the kings of the mountain by developing their wild nature. Iron gets stronger by heating. This is an important lesson in educating children.

To live is to compete. We cannot develop without competition. The lack of competition makes us miserable. In order to win in a competition, we need capability. To be competent, we need a preparatory period to establish a foundation. Jesus came after the preparation period of the Old Testament era. The returning Lord comes after the preparation period of the New Testament era.

To prepare is to study as a student. Especially adolescents should prepare, while carrying big dreams. You are the ones who will be responsible for the Unification Church, so you need to be prepared most of all. By preparing ideologically, you can conquer the mental world. Then you are to act utilizing your prepared capabilities. In other words, you should win the victory in the competition. It is the Principle that the weak ones are absorbed by the strong ones. Day and night you should never cease your endeavors to actualize your ideal with confidence. The purpose of this workshop is for preparation.

Between 1974 and 1976, while Father faced the most severe opposition in the United States, I established the theological seminary and prepared for the unity of American churches by rallying theologians. That's why the religious coalition is possible now. Father prepared extensively in the fields of economy, culture and media as well. Among these, economic independence is the most important preparation. A leader should have the power of persuasion as well. Father has gone the way of preparation throughout his whole lifetime. From age 27, my life was one of struggle for the providence, and from age 40, I have been actualizing the ideal of the providence.

Thus far Father hasn't allowed the second generation to enter graduate school because they had to love God, the nation and their tribes and families first.

Love is the criterion by which our international activities are measured with respect to God's will. Corinthians Chapter 13 also says that among faith, hope and love, love is the greatest.

Where do you think you can utilize the knowledge that you've gained? How much can you utilize for the providence the knowledge that you've gained through the study of law and economics at a university? They are not really useful for going through God's will. When Japan lost their national strength and economic power through the Second World War, what happened? Their knowledge of economics was not useful at all when the nation was devastated.

There's something that we need in order to proceed in the providence. Those who study theology, squeezing heir heads there is a problem in your way of thinking. Your way of thinking is extremely wrong. Do you think Father will follow the economic theories that you've learned in the school? Or do you think I will refer to the politics that you've studied? Father doesn't . even want to smell such things.

Entering graduate school is presently forbidden. You are not to go to graduate school unless Father's children do so. It is not because Father's children cannot go there, but it is a heavenly law.

When a bud sprouts, the branches and the leaves are to come out. When a bud stretches high, the tree can grow normally. If a tree has more side branches than buds, it becomes a useless shrub. That is natural law.

You should be the sons and daughters who can inherit the tradition first. After Father's children enter the university or graduate school, you may follow them. You have to encourage Hyo Jin Nim to study quickly. Now Hyo Jin cannot straighten out his trembling mind because the Unification Church and its members didn't fulfill their responsibility.

Your parents have been tied down to your education, praying for only your well-being. What about Father? Have I been bound to the education of my own children? Father has been investing all of his power in you, in humankind and in God. So there has been no time for me to be concerned with their education. But your parents after Blessing concentrated on your family and your education; they have committed a terrible sin in front of Father and God. That's why you are collectively responsible for it.

You must have a special concern for other true brothers and true sisters as well, and you must be cooperative with them. That is the way of principle.

All religions, especially Buddhism and Catholicism, until now have exalted the commandment not to marry. It is not that they don't desire marriage. The providential revelation not to get married was sent. Likewise, it is not that Father doesn't want to send you to school; the providence of this age is not yet for you to go to school.

When Father mentions father and son, as in "father-son relationship" he means the original father and the original son (daughter). Without the original father and the original son, the nation cannot be established. Humankind seeks a peaceful world. Such a world cannot be established through the culture for which the present advanced nations are striving. It is to be established through the True Parents. Even though the True Parents clothe themselves in dirty rags or emerge completely exhausted from a bottomless hollow, human beings are to learn God's heart centering upon them.

The second generation of the blessed families should inherit the proper education and the heartistic tradition to qualify as heavenly subjects. Therefore, Father is preparing the educational system for the second generation. You should establish schools and curricula for all ages from kindergarten to university. The second generation of foreign countries also should come to Korea to receive the same education.

Centering upon the second generation, a new chapter of Unification culture will open. It is to be structured according to the heartistic tradition of the True Parents in form and content, and it also includes education for acquiring knowledge and technique. Without your realizing, the way of worldwide restoration through indemnity has opened, and all the necessary standards are established.

You should discover the root of true love. The family which can make the bud of that root sprout on earth is the family which will control the world. When love blossoms from that family, the culture of the human ancestors will emerge. The language that family uses will be the international language. The other languages used now will be useless.

As long as you are to be a child, you might as well be born of one parent in a loving society and learn your parent's language. Then you are to go through the nation to the new world. From there the culture centering upon love will develop. It will be the universal culture, and the other cultures will go through that culture. That culture will represent the world.

6. LOVE IS NOT LEARNED BY EDUCATION

Do parents have to go to school in order to learn how to love their children? People know love without learning it. Man and woman didn't learn how to make a baby. People don't study how the meeting of two strangers turns into the creation of a husband and a wife, much less how to create a family out of such a bond. Love is not taught nor is to be learned through school. It is not a subject for the experimental method in order to prove how it works. There have been no schools to teach love and there will be no schools to teach it in the future.

If you cannot give birth to children, you will never understand parental love. Even though you study parental love for thousands of years, you cannot understand it. But right after the birth of a child, you will know it instantly.

The human baby looks for its mother's milk and the animal baby also looks for its mother's milk. It is a natural behavior, because the power of love works there. It doesn't have to do with education or discipline.

True love is not to be inculcated by education, but is to be established naturally, because it is the heavenly law. It is a tragic result of the fall that we cannot see sincere love in human society nowadays, and we are relegated to learn true love through education and discipline.

Parental love doesn't measure how pretty or ugly the child is, and a child's respect and love toward its parents doesn't depend upon the parents' external appearance. Is there any son who denies his mother because she looks ugly? There are no parents who reject their children because they look ugly. If there are such parents and children, they are beasts born human by mistake, not human beings.

What kind of person was Jesus? From where did his reasoning come? He didn't say, "Behave well and you'll to go to the Kingdom of Heaven." Rather, he said, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." Jesus didn't tell us to learn but to follow. Christians come to resemble Jesus by following him.

Did you have to learn that you must have love in your family? Does a father teach children the way of love? Does a mother push children to desire love? From whom did the parents learn to love children? From whom do a bride and a bridegroom learn how to love? It is mysterious that we do certain things well without learning.

You all know the existence of air, don't you? Every day you breathe air in and out, but you seldom think about it. Everybody receives the sunlight, but have you greeted the sun with the grateful heart? Have you learned how to do that?

What about drinking water? Were you taught to drink water? Nobody learned it. We didn't "learn" the most precious things.

Let's think about the precious sunlight. If the sun doesn't show up for two days, what will happen on earth? If the air goes on strike for fifteen minutes, what will happen on earth? Then we will accomplish world unity so easily. We wouldn't need the title of the Unification Church. It would be very simple to accomplish world unity in ten minutes.

Did you learn to breathe air or drink water? We are to know the way automatically. All the precious things in the world are like that. If God exists, He will be much more precious than those. How can human beings know Him? Originally, we get to know Him without learning.

7. THE PATH OF LIFE CENTERING UPON LOVE

Which is first, life or love? Love precedes life. Without the flow of love, existence has no value.

Who am l? What is the origin of "I"? "I" originated from parents. Why am I precious? Because I participated in my parents' love. And there I participated in the universe.

We should know why we were born. We were not born out of knowledge or authority. Because of love we were born and we were born of love.

Then why is love so great? Because it is the origin of life. You were born in the midst of parents' love. You were not born out of counting money or out of singing songs of knowledge. Our life was initiated by love, so we have to conclude it with love. That's why we need children. When a husband and a wife in oneness have the object called "children," they are perfect.

Human beings cannot exist without love. The existence called "I" lives on the foundation of love.

The origin of all things also is God's love. Because the existence of all things started on the foundation of love, it is undeniable that the existence of the center of the created world -- the human being -- started from love.

Since human beings start their life from love and become mature by love, they cannot survive without love.

When we think about the origin of life, we soon encounter the ques- tion, "Is life first or love first?" So far we haven't distinguished the answer clearly. Love precedes life. Because the next-born should adjust to the firstborn, it is natural to sacrifice life for love. This concept should be settled definitively. Then the answer to the question of how to lead a true life follows automatically. Since life originates from love, we can conclude that life should live and die for love. First, we are to look for the love that the macro-cosmos welcomes. Second, we are to be born out of "the love of the macro- cosmos" which can be acknowledged by God, the angelic world, all things and our parents. Third, we are to live and die in the midst of "the love of the macro-cosmos." That is the purpose of life.

Human beings are not born out of their own will or hope. Then, are we born of the hope of our parents? No, we aren't. We are born of God's hope. In other words, we were born of parental love, which is the substitute for God. "I" was born as a new life form out of parental love representing God. It is "I" who was born as the central existence of the whole universe receiving all the universal love.

The utmost purpose of life is to be born of love, to be raised up by love, to live by love, and to leave love to the next generations. The most valuable job is to fulfill the order (command of love -- the center of the universe.

In maintaining life, human beings who live for themselves cannot protect the "domain of the objects." God created the creature for the sake of His objects. The happiest way of life is to give love which endows equal value and equal ownership to the objects (or subjects). The path of life is to find the way to inherit the universe, which God desires to bequeath.

Every existence definitely moves. This is a fundamental law of existence. This law of movement applies not only to living things but also to non-living things. The nature of the movement is orderly and principled. This is because the order and the principle cannot exist without a certain predetermined purpose. Therefore, every existence moves by order and principle centering on a very certain purpose.

To live and to act is not something meaningless. It has a clear purpose. The purpose is to realize the world of love. Human beings exist to actualize love with the purpose to accomplish love. Since the purpose of human life is the actualization of true love, human value is also determined by true love. Isn't it wonderful?

What is the origin of human existence? It is love. Then what is the purpose of it? It is to complete the ideal of love. Because human existence originates from love, the purpose of it is to establish the foundation of love and to extend it, and finally to complete it. In order to do that, a man and a woman in relative positions should be one centering upon love and should be able to relate their oneness to "front and rear," "left and right," and "up and down."

Even though we conform to the absolute existence and establish the absolute purpose, everything is useless if there is no joy. Living should be joyful. We make a living for a purpose. When we accomplish the purpose, there must be something new beyond the existence itself.

What is it? What is the most precious thing for a man and a woman? It is love. When you accomplish a purpose, there comes happiness and new development. Love is the only component of that happiness which can be related to the new development. No matter how well you accomplish the purpose, if the process is not under the dominion of love, you will be dissatisfied and seek after some other purpose. The limitations imposed by purpose cannot overrule love.

For what do you live? To eat, to work, or for nothing? Human beings live to love. How beautiful an answer it is! Originally, human life is to be born as the fruit of love, to live in love, and to return to the eternal love of God.

A life lived for love is a productive, fruitful life, and a life lacking love, or not knowing love, is a consumptive, destructive life. The original attitude of life for God, man and the universe is to live for love.

Life comes from love. Human life is to be born of love, to receive love from parents, to meet a spouse in love, and to die in love. Therefore, sadness or suffering originally were not supposed to be a part of life.

Human beings shouldn't forget that when they were embryos in the mother's womb, they not only received physical nutrients but also love. Likewise, human beings in this physical world are not only supplied with materialistic nutrients, but also with the essential factor of life -- the love of God.

The fundamental place in the universe is the place where parental love, conjugal love and children's love are united. This is the place where the whole universe concentrates and toward which all the cells of the universe are directed. All the gods of the spirit world also concentrate on this place and they are to protect this place so that it not be invaded by anybody. Therefore, to be protected, you need the form called "the four position foundation."

All plants absorb sunlight as a positive element; likewise, love is the positive element for human beings. Our hope is to establish the Kingdom of Heaven on earth and the Kingdom of Heaven in the spirit world, where human beings can live together with love eternally.

Human beings are born of love and grow by receiving love in the growth period. When they grow to a certain level, parental love is not enough to sustain continued growth. So they start extending horizontal love centering upon fraternal love and tribal love. That is to say, human beings are to grow receiving all the different types of love in the universe. Especially in adolescence they pursue the love of the other sex, and by loving the other the center of love.

A man and a woman exist for love. My way is the way of love. We live to gain love, to keep love and to establish the loving environment. Women apply makeup and massage their faces because of love. Wanting something or working is for love. We endure suffering in order to gain precious love.

From the time of birth, we receive parental love, and as long as we survive we continuously love regardless of whether we are in childhood, youth or adulthood. After growing up, horizontal, conjugal love takes place for everybody.

What is marriage? It is entering a school where men learn what they don't know about women and women learn what they don't know about men. When the grade is "A+", a husband and wife are happy. In order to learn to love the world, we give birth to children. Without children, we cannot be connected to the future. Children are given as the educational resource for us to be related to the future. To be dutiful to one's ancestors is to receive an education from the spirit world.

All of these are connected centering upon love. Grandparents, a husband and wife, and children are all related centering upon one love. Like the blood vessels of the human body, we can go up to the ancestors through thousands of generations and go down to our distant descendants through love. Everything is conquered by this. The utmost happiness is to become the slave of love and the servant of love.

Who has the greatest authority in this world? The conclusion is drawn that the person who has gone through the way of servant more than anybody else is the one with the greatest authority. This is God's philosophy, Reverend Moon's philosophy and our members' philosophy.

I have much experience of spirit world; it is the place covered with the ingredients of love. The earth is covered with air but love is the atmosphere of the spirit world. We breathe in air and breathe out carbon dioxide on earth, but we are to live by breathing love in the spirit world. We are not to give and take centering upon secular human love in the spirit world. We only give and take true love there.

Why do you get married? In order to experience parental love, conjugal love and children's love. Then why do we need those? The spirit world is surrounded by the air of such love. We have to form a family in order to gain the discipline to keep the beat with the spirit world.

If you go to spirit world lacking the feeling of true love, you will not be able to keep the beat. You will be like someone who doesn't have a nose to smell the air of love.

How can we express God's love? It is like a warm spring when the white clouds are floating up in the sky, the air is shimmering, bugs and ants crawl from place to place, a willow bud beside the brook starts sprouting, frogs sing a song of spring, and everywhere bees and butterflies are flying. We can eternally feel joy by being intoxicated in such an environment. The feeling that we perceive from our ideal spouse is like a flower garden where butterflies and bees are flying all about. Don't you feel good just imagining it?

When meeting a welcomed person, we shake hands. When you shake hands with your friend, saying, "Nice to see you again," don't you feel good? When you are really welcoming a friend, you squeeze the friend's hands strongly, right? If you shake hands in deep love, you never want to release them.

Sisters! Do you feel good or bad when your husband loves you? When you are loved, there is nothing for you to feel jealous about. Sisters feel good when their husband squeezes their hands, even if his hand is as ugly as the front foot of a cow. While watching a movie, they want to pick up such a hand.

Love is eternal. Love is one, not two. In love, a man and a woman completely stick to each other. That is God's love. Can we be one with such love? Think about it. We all are to become one.

God's dwelling place is filled with love. Once we start giving, we want to give more and more, and once we receive, we want to return thousands of times more. Is such a place the Kingdom of Heaven or hell? (The Kingdom of Heaven.) Due to the everlasting cycle of giving and receiving, we come to feel an explosive stimulation. We feel so stimulated that it seems like all our cells are about to burst. God's love is like that.

Once you experience such love, you never want anything else. Opium is nothing in comparison with such love. Liquor cannot compete with love. People get intoxicated by drinking, but originally we are supposed to live intoxicated by love.

If you know that point clearly, you will not feel it difficult to carry any cross of love. It is a pride and glory to make conditions again and again for your beloved one.

All kinds of accidents happen when a man and woman are in love. But if you taste God's true love . . . nothing can be compared with it. If people taste God's love, nothing can conquer them. There should be such an absolute dominion of liberation. The only problem is how to find this out.

The people who had a deep experience of love with their parents, brothers and sisters, spouse and children can enjoy complete freedom in the spirit world. They can go wherever they want to go without any limitation. On the contrary, narrow minded people who don't have any loving experience will be isolated, with no freedom at all in the spirit world.

Love between parent and child is vertical. Love between husband and wife is horizontal. Love of brothers and sisters turns around an orbit. Therefore, when we experience these three kinds of love on earth, we will be able to move vertically, horizontally and spherically in the spirit world.

For example, people who didn't taste parental love because of their parents' early deaths will be very miserable in the spirit world, since they lack an important part of life. The same applies to those who are lacking in conjugal love, children's love or the fraternal love between brothers and sisters.

What sort of place is the hometown? It is the place where my heart is lifted up completely, spherically, in the four directions. What is heart? It is something by which to tie things up with love. The original home is the place where we are bound to parents, bound left and right in the bond of husband and wife, and bound downward to children and relatives. It is the place where every existence is tied to every other in spherical love. Because human beings consider happiness centering upon love the cardinal point and the most precious thing, they inevitably miss their hometown.

Why does a human being have an eternal life? Why does everyone seek for eternal life? Because God is an absolute and eternal subject, we have to be absolute and eternal in order to be His objects. When we stand in such a position, "up" is "down" and God is us. When we become one with God in love, He can even enter our pocket.

Human beings stay in the maternal womb for a certain period of time, then they live on earth, and finally they come to face death. Therefore, when getting older, we develop the fear of death. That's because we don't have faith in life after death.

Human beings stay in the mother's womb for ten months. Little fetuses have a life of limitation. All they can do in the mother's womb is stretch the fingers in and out, open and close the mouth, or kick a little bit while receiving nutrients through the umbilical cord. They probably think that they are in the free world. After nine months, they move into this physical world -- the human society. From here we imagine we had such a restrained life in the womb, even though we don't remember it clearly.

Human beings on earth live within the womb of the universe for around 100 years. As the fetuses don't know the world outside the mother's womb, people living in the physical world are ignorant of the world after death. They just have a vague impression about it. But the existence of the world after death is definitely evident. It exists just beyond our five physical senses. So, we have to overcome ignorance and doubt through our faith in religion.

The mind of people regardless of time period (past, present or future) longs for same thing: the human mind always seeks for the happy world of the mind. It seeks after the ideal spouse of the mind, the ideal family of the mind and the ideal world of the mind.

You were born from your parents. The more fundamental fact is that you were born from God. He just borrowed your mother's womb. You are to look for true parents through the "universal parents" and the physical parents. Your physical parents are temporary parents. Therefore, the moment of death is a joyful time to meet your true parents. The true love of the true parents dwells in the spirit world. That's called the Kingdom of Heaven in the spirit world.

That place is composed of love and is filled with parental love. Love has the principle of service and sacrifice. In order to pass there, you have to love the universe and humankind. Physical life is the place to discipline yourself to practice such love. Now you know the essence of the universe, so you must draw the conclusion that you will surely return to God when you go to the spirit world after passing the test of love on earth.

Even all things will bless the people who lead a life of love. Flowers want to blossom in their yards and birds want to sing songs in their garden. That's because such people know the value of all things and truly love them as well.

In the spirit world, you are to be paid back according to what you did on earth. The door to the Kingdom of Heaven will be open to you because of the Blessing that you received from Father. But to proceed, the spirit world must pull you through the orbit of heart. So you cannot proceed unless your heart is in harmony with the spirit world. At the time of entering the spirit world, you will have to traverse hills of judgment.

Why do we live? Do you live in order to be a president of a certain company, or to eat and sleep? If you live in order to survive, where will you go after it is all over? Where do you go after eating? Do you go to school or to your company? Where do you go? We are to go looking in response to the antennae of love. What is American-style love? According to a recent California survey, 90% of people there have an experience with divorce. What kind of love is that?

Why is jewelry valuable? Gold or diamonds are valuable because they are unchanging. What is the most precious thing in the world? It is true love, not jewelry.

True love is unchanging. Is there any objection? American young people need parents in order to find unchanging love.

Even after breaking up with a spouse, parental love never changes. The mother's true love is to sacrifice for the children even after her husband's death. By doing so, her true love toward her husband remains. When the mother abandons her children after her husbands' death and lives for her self, her love toward both husband and children disappears. Even though her husband dies, a mother who lives for the sake of her children can find the love of the whole. Such a mother keeps true parental love, the true wifely love, and the true love of children. Through the couple's children, the husband's love can be inherited. The son of such a mother will want to live for his mother several times more than before, in order to fill the gap created by his father's absence. There exists the deep vertical love much more precious than conjugal love. The same applies in the case of a wife's death.

This fundamental order, which is eternally harmonious, exists in the midst of unchanging love.

A husband and wife in true love don't boast about themselves to each other; instead, they praise each other's good points. Such a couple truly leads a life of love. All kinds of sounds will be heard in the place of such love, even the sound of electricity in an electrical cord. How noisy will be the thunder of love? People who have been sleeping for 1,000 years will wake up right away. They will not be surprised by the sound; instead they will dance in joy as soon as they wake up. They will dance automatically with. out anybody's request or command.

Concluding in one word, everything exists for true love. This is the most logical, universal and ideal conclusion. Myriads of men and women exist for true love. Sisters should think the following: "Women like me in past history have never received true love, so my mission is to restore it. I look like this in order to meet one man who can restore through indemnity the past history. If I become successful in fulfilling my mission, I'll be the greatest woman in the history of restoration and the most precious woman for a man."