221. The Path of Life for All Humankind, Part 1

I am deeply grateful that you have taken the time from your busy schedules to help make today's gathering such a success. Our theme for today is “The Path of Life for All Humankind.”

Today the world is lost in great confusion and cries out in agony. We face endless conflict as individuals, in our families, in our nations and in the world. As individuals, we are confronted with inner turmoil between our mind and body. Families are affected by the moral decadence of young people and the breakdown of family-centered traditions. Historical rivalries lead to distrust and even war among our nations, fanning the embers of uncertainty and hopelessness in the world. The solution to all these problems lies in developing an ideal love relationship with God.

God's purpose for creating human beings

Throughout history, humankind has sought to answer the basic question: Why are we born? Some have concluded that they were born for the sake of their country. Others have decided that they were born for the sake of their parents. Still others believe they were born for their own sake. People of faith believe they are born for the sake of God.

Yet it is not enough to say that God created the universe for the sole benefit of human beings or even for God's own benefit. The creation of humankind involved the cooperation of many beings and elements. Although each had its own inherent purpose, they worked together to initiate the creative process. God's purpose in creating, the angels' purpose in assisting, nature's purpose in providing the materials, and even the human purpose for being created are all consistent. There is a common purpose that is pleasing to God, to the angels, to the rest of creation and to human beings themselves.

This shared purpose is something that, the longer it is possessed, the greater the happiness and joy it provides. It is something that, once we possess it, we would never let it go. It cannot be external in nature. It is something internal and invisible. Things like knowledge, money and power are merely collateral conditions that are needed in people's lives. We are not born into the world for the purpose of possessing them. Such external things may exist in a reciprocal relationship with humankind only temporarily, not eternally.

God has no need for money. If Almighty God ever needed money, He could create as much as He desired. Also, we know that God is the root of all knowledge, since He created the universe through certain principles and laws. Furthermore, the Creator is the origin of power, so God has no need to seek power. 

What, then, is this common content or purpose? It is something we cannot arrive at through human effort alone. This is because human effort cannot control the fundamental origin of life. This content is something that directs the motivation, course and even final destination of each person's life.

From this perspective, this common content can only be true love. Human beings are born in love and are destined to go the path of love. People even die for love. This shows that love is more valuable than life itself. Moreover, we see that love precedes life. That is why people willingly offer even their lives for the sake of love.

Love is eternal. If we look at novels, poems and other works of literature, we see how authors set unchanging and eternal love as the ideal. Clearly, human beings are not satisfied with momentary or finite love. Our desire is for love that is eternal.

Love has the power to disarm God completely. Even God is vulnerable to love. Almighty God cannot resist breaking into a big smile when smelling the fragrance of love from human beings. God enjoys love stories, too. Yet, how much more pleasing it is when love is actually practiced!

Each organ in our body was created for the sake of love. For example, the eyes were obviously created for the purpose of sight. To see what? The eyes were created specifically to look for love, which is the common theme among all beings. The nose was made to smell, specifically to smell the fragrance of love. Similarly, our ears were created to hear the sounds of love. Among all the sounds we hear, the one sound that we never get tired of hearing is the sound of someone saying, "I love you.” This is as true for senior citizens as it is for young people.

Love is the only power that can bring all beings into a state of mutual attraction. Here, love refers to true love, which every being in the entire universe welcomes. True love is the type of love that is publicly endorsed by God, the angelic world, things of creation and all people. If we were to cover the entire universe with a blanket of love, no being would want to crawl out from under that blanket. From this perspective, it is clear that the creation of the universe and life itself originated from true love.

True love is the reason God created the universe

When human beings reach the state of consciousness in which they are able to love the universe, all the doors of the universe open to them. For example, I am just a tiny being occupying this space right here. However, centered on love, I can have a reciprocal relationship with a being of any size or magnitude. Let us say that God is an extremely large being. Then, by the power of love, I can rise to a position reciprocal to that of the Absolute God. This is possible because love is an attribute of God.

Thus, a person who recognizes and keeps God's covenant of love can enjoy freedom anywhere in the universe. A person who is intoxicated with God's love can examine a single grain of sand for a thousand years without ever being bored. Such a person will see light radiating from his or her own hand. When lying alone at night, a person feels as if he or she is lying on a golden bed and radiating golden light. This may sound unbelievable, yet it is true. If you reach this state, you can stand on a hilltop and feel that all creation is cheering to welcome you. Have you ever experienced this? The thought that we are born into a universe of love not only gives us a feeling of infinite happiness, it also makes us want to proclaim to the world, "Hey, look at me!" God was working in the laboratory and made the most ideal, most sensational discovery: That discovery is each one of us.

We are created in a position reciprocal to God's love. Therefore, any act of self-destruction is the greatest of sins. Conversely, loving and protecting oneself are acts of great goodness. That is why suicide, the act of self-destruction, is such a momentous violation of heart. Suicide contributes to breakdown of the universe.

A person might be imprisoned and tortured to the point of vomiting blood. In that moment, if he or she feels God's love, that suffering becomes a key that opens the door to God's embrace with a love that penetrates to the marrow of his or her bones. A person who perceives his or her suffering in such a way is even able to face death with happiness. 

By this example, we see that anyone who lives within the power of true love is a person of great strength. Even if someone were to offer this person a country or the world, he or she would not be swayed. Even Satan would be forced to surrender before such a person. Such an individual, called by God to represent all humankind centering on this cosmic love, would be the Messiah. Jesus came as that representative. We can never find this universal love without going through the Messiah. It is reasonable to say that all people on earth will have to follow the Messiah. Jesus said, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me” (John 14:6). The meaning of this would be clearer if the word “love” were added: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life, and the love; no one comes to the Father, but by me.”

The Divine Principle of the Unification Church teaches that energy is produced when a subject partner and object partner become one. In a family, parents hold the position of the subject partner and children hold the position of object partner. Once they have a reciprocal relationship of love, they become one entity, a true family. This entity then becomes a new object partner that can unite with a larger subject partner. With God as the subject partner, the parent-child union becomes one with God. We can also say that when a perfect subject-object partnership is formed with God, centering on the ideal of love, God and humankind can exist in total oneness. When the realm of love between God and humanity becomes a reality, the light of love will shine throughout the universe, as bright and constant as the sun.

In this way, each of us is a person in whom the lives of both parents are brought together as one, and is also a partner in our parents' love. We are one with their love and one with their ideals, including happiness and peace. For a parent, the joy of worldly success is nothing compared to the joy of reuniting with a lost child. This shows that the child embodies the highest ideals of the parents.

Each of us is connected to our parents' life, love and ideals, and no one can sever these connections. Even God cannot sever them, nor can the universe. In fact, all the forces of the universe work together to safeguard these connections. This is because the parents are the cause and the children are the result. The parents and children are one, centering on love. Cause and effect become one and form the substantial realm of love. This is a principle of the universe. For this reason, wherever the child goes, the mother and father will follow. Even in the spirit world, your parents will always want to be with you. In the original ideal, therefore, it is unnatural for a person to dislike being accompanied by his or her parents. Such behavior tears the universe apart. When a person doesn't like to go with his or her parents, it means that he or she is already moving away from the Principle and toward the Fall.

Thus, acts of filial piety, such as loving and caring for our parents as we would ourselves, are the most precious things. That is why there is a saying, "Good fortune comes to a harmonious family." On the other hand, divorce cuts through family harmony like a knife. The law of the universe does not allow such an act. Parents who disobey this law find themselves longing for the good fortune of having a harmonious family.

We have three sets of parents

Each person comes into the world through three sets of parents. The first parent is the material world. Elements from the world of matter combine to form each person as the center of the material world and as a complex material being. Thus, it can be said that these physical elements themselves are the ancestors who gave us birth. At the same time, the material world is an extension of us. The universe is created so that matter can settle only in the ideal of love. It is only in the ideal of love that all cells can live in tranquility. However, this tranquility is destroyed whenever a person becomes angry.

Our second set of parents is our natural parents. By giving birth to us, our parents gave us a particular form, and to this extent they are the masters of our lives. However, no matter how hard they may try, our parents cannot be the masters of our love. The master of love is God. In this context, God exists so that love can expand into the entire universe and be made eternal. Because God is the subject partner of love, God becomes the Parent centering on love. God is our third Parent, so we have three sets of parents.

Human life can be divided into three periods: life in the womb of about ten months, a physical life of about a hundred years, and life in the spirit world that lasts for eternity. If we look at our own face, we also see three stages: the mouth, the nose and the eyes. These reflect the three periods of our lives. The mouth symbolizes the period in the womb, which is a world of material. The nose symbolizes the period on earth, which is the world of humanity. The eyes symbolize the period in heaven, which is the spirit world.

To the unborn child, the aquatic world of its mother's womb is a world of total freedom. Interestingly, although it is constrained within the confines of the womb, the fetus feels completely free. In the womb it can't stretch its legs, and it relies on an umbilical cord to breathe and receive nutrients for survival. Its nose and mouth are both useless in that world. Nevertheless, to the baby, the world in the womb is one of complete freedom.

Would a baby in the womb say, "I can't wait until I get out into the world, where I can eat all kinds of delicious things!" when it was time to be born? No. The opposite is the case. It would say, "Oh, no! I don't want to leave!" However, even if the baby doesn't want to leave its mother's womb, when the time comes it has no choice. As the amniotic fluid flows out, the baby follows soon thereafter. This is what happens in a normal birth. As soon as the baby is born, it begins to cry. At the same time, it starts to breathe through its nose and becomes linked to the second world, the world of air.

As the baby leaves the womb to enter the world of air, the umbilical cord is discarded along with the amniotic sac and everything it needed in the world of the womb. With the destruction of these things, the baby is born into the bosom of its new mother, the planet Earth. Once born, the baby begins to eat with its mouth and breathe through its nose. The food we eat on earth nourishes our physical body, but it does not contain the essential element of life. This life element is nothing other than love. Thus, while we are in this world, we also need to breathe the air of love. We need to inhale this air of love from our mother and father.

A newborn baby automatically searches for its mother's breast, following the vibrations of her love. Whether she is beautiful or ugly does not matter to the baby. The only thing that matters is that she is its mother. It is a sacred scene manifested in limitless variety. We are born in love, and we grow by receiving love. Each of us is the substantial fruit of our parents' love. The nature of our parents' love is made visible in us. Parents love their children because their children are the fruit of their love. Boundless love can multiply from this fruit. In this way, we are linked to the love of the individual, family, tribe, nation, world, universe, and ultimately to the essential love of God.

We are the fruit of our parents' love

Once we are born, our parents take responsibility to see that we become good human beings during our life on earth. Our parents act on behalf of the world, the nation and the family to teach and provide for us. We receive material things and education from our parents so that we may become complete as individuals. Based on this, we then become linked to a horizontal foundation of love, which is marriage.

Parents take responsibility for us until we marry. After marriage, we inherit the love shared by our mother and father. When we marry and start rearing our own children, we begin to understand how much our parents loved us and thus come to inherit parental love. In this way, a person becomes capable of receiving and giving love completely. This is how each of us matures as a complete man or woman.

We are born and mature in the vertical love of our parents, and later we engage in horizontal love. This is the only way we can find the integrated realm of love. Heaven and earth together form a spherical world, covering all the dimensions of top and bottom, left and right, and front and back. When the vertical and horizontal love relationships are linked, they interact, revolve, integrate and finally emerge as a single center of harmony. Once the vertical love of heaven and earth is firmly established as the axis internally and externally, the need for horizontal love arises. This takes place during adolescence.

During adolescence, even the sight of an autumn leaf blowing along the ground can seem inspiring. Girls who used to be so reserved when they were younger suddenly start doing things to their hair, putting on makeup and trying on all sorts of clothes and accessories. Their interests expand as well. These are horizontal phenomena of love.

So we are travelers on the path of life. The most important thing on this path is to experience and embody vertical and horizontal love. We need to build a family centering on the love of true parents, true husbands and wives, true brothers and sisters, and true sons and daughters. Next, we need to expand ourselves horizontally, multiplying into families in all directions. When these families, linking the horizontal and vertical, manifest themselves as true families connected to the levels of the tribe, society, nation and world, this world, interlinked by true love, will be the kingdom of heaven.

When a husband and wife love each other, their relationship symbolizes the planting of God. Parents represent God's original position, and the husband and wife embody different aspects of God. Also, each child is like a small God. Since God is the original entity of true love, when the various members of the family link themselves to true love, they become one body with God. Parents are the living embodiment of God, and the children represent God as well. Thus, three generations stand in the position of God, centering on true love.

This is why all members of the family—parents, husbands and wives, and children—need true love. A family formed based on true love in this way is the foundation for the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of heaven will be established when we create the foundation of true love. This is the formula. The family is the center of the entire physical universe. People today do not realize that their family represents their country, world and universe. They do not know that their family is the center. Breaking apart a family is an act of aggression against the country, world and universe. Because a perfect family is the foundation for a perfect universe, a person who loves the universe as he or she loves the family can travel freely everywhere. God, as the Parent of the entire universe, is in the central position of love.