Pyeong Hwa Gyeong: Episode 184
Pyeong Hwa Gyeong: A Selection of True Parents’ Speeches
Book 4: The True Family Movement
Speech 14: True Families: Gateway to Heaven, pg 650-653
Chapter 1: The Family is the Central Model for the Kingdom of Heaven
Section 5: Bringing together the love of three generations
Section 6: A training ground of the heart
Section 5. Bringing together the love of three generations
The family is able to encompass past history, the present era and the future. The ultimate point that God has sought for six thousand years is the family that is connected through true love and united in true love.
Everything that exists comes under the dominion of true love. We would not want to cut ourselves off from a relationship of love that is absolutely true. The original mission given to Adam and Eve at the time of creation was to establish such a family.
God did not want Adam and Eve to remain merely an individual man and an individual woman. He looked forward to the family they would form through their union. This is God’s primary purpose in creating men and women. It is only when we establish true families, and when we live with a sense of fulfillment within true families centered on God’s love, that we will be able to enter the kingdom of heaven without any problem. This is the only way we can transcend this world.
To form the family realm of love you must be absolute. The grandparents must be able to represent the past, the husband and wife must be able to represent the present, and the children must be able to represent the future. When we truly love people from each age group we allow God, through us, to relate to all of humankind. With this kind of love, husband and wife and children, having become as one body, are able to represent the cosmos; they may hold up their love as an example for others to follow and tell their descendants to follow their path. The place where they can make such statements, both to themselves and to others, the place where the heart of heaven is communicated, is the homeland of the heart that will be remembered by all of heaven and earth.
What has God been seeking all this time? He has not been seeking a subject partner, but rather an ideal object partner. God has been looking for those who resemble Him and possess the inner and outer aspects of the world that He created. What is the starting point that leads to such a result? It is the family. Nothing represents the cosmos better than the family. To be one with our parents is to bring the past and present together. We love the past by loving our parents; we love the present by loving our husband or wife; and we love the future by loving our children. Thus we experience the love of three generations. The core unit where these three kinds of love are concentrated is the family.
Then where does life in the kingdom of heaven begin? It is in the family. It does not unfold in some other place. The kingdom of heaven is nothing more than a three-dimensional expansion of the family; it does not exist separately from the family. So when you embrace your husband or wife, you ought to think of this as creating the union of all men and all women in the world. Only in this way can families set the condition for having loved all humanity. This is the path you need to follow in your lives. To love your parents is to connect past history with the present era; it is to pave a road that will let God come to you.
This is the reason why you must love your parents. To love your parents is to connect everything in the past to yourself as an inhabitant of the present, thus bringing together the past and the present so that they become one. Also, loving your own children is to connect the present reality with the future. Unification Thought is the philosophy that extols such love and teaches how it can be practiced throughout eternity.
Section 6. A training ground of the heart
We cannot live separately from the heart. Even if you were the president of a country or possessed all the authority in the world, you could not live without a place to express the joy in your heart. The desires of your heart would not be fulfilled through the people under your command, through your ministers of government, or through your followers. Only in your family could you experience such fulfillment. When you return to your family, you and your spouse feel joy through each other and through your children. You ought to be proud of this. This joy can be experienced only directly, not secondhand.
The same is true for God. Even if He were to restore the whole world, without a family He could not feel joy. So we must have families.
In the family, parents are at the center. In educational institutions that represent society, teachers have to be at the center. Your parents raised you from the time you were breastfeeding and helped you develop physically and emotionally. What is school, then? It is a place where you are trained for your future life in society. If the family is the training ground of the emotions, then school is the place where you can practice and train for your future life in society.
However, society is not the ultimate end. It all comes back to the nation, and the nation has a leader. Why is it that people want to see the president of a nation and to be near him? Once people have learned all they can in the family and then in society, they have a desire to go on to the next level.
The president represents the fruit of the third stage, following the stages of formation and growth. Once a seed is planted, it begins a cyclical process by dividing. Later it comes together again to produce a flower and bear fruit. In the same way, schools need to raise people up who will become important pillars of society, talented people who are needed by the nation.
What is the purpose of our studies in school? It is training. The school is a place for learning and experimenting. During training you are not in the actual situation. It is a preparation stage. Be sure to prepare well.
What is the family? It is the place in which to train the heart. You train your heart with love at the center. In school you learn to relate to others with affection, as you would your own siblings. In the nation, too, you can then relate to others with affection. The education you receive from your parents will be important for you in school and in the nation.
Parents have to pass on everything having to do with the heart to their children. They need to create a foundation of heart for their children, and teach their children to live as they have lived, giving specific guidance on how to live in the family, in society and in the nation.
A family is not necessarily good just because it has a nice house in an affluent neighborhood. Conversely, even if a family may live in a humble house in a poor neighborhood, it will be a good family if it provides peace and love to all its members. In this family, parents and children will have a relationship of heart that urges them to live for each other. This family will be the original homeland of our dreams. It will be the source of our motivation in all that we do in life. This means it will be the basis for determining our happiness in life.
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