Pyeong Hwa Gyeong: Episode 96
Pyeong Hwa Gyeong: A Selection of True Parents’ Speeches
Book 2: God’s Homeland and the Peace Kingdom
Speech 15: The Value and Significance of the Family Pledge, pg 324-329
God’s ideal is the formation of a great cosmic family
The fourth verse of the Family Pledge is, “Our family, the owner of Cheon Il Guk, pledges to build the universal family encompassing heaven and earth, which is God’s ideal of creation, and perfect the world of freedom, peace, unity, and happiness, by centering on true love.”
God’s ideal is that the world becomes one family or household under God. If everyone who recites the Family Pledge actualizes the four great realms of heart and three great kingships, they will not remain separate families; rather, they will become one great family under God. To establish one family under God is what it means “to build the universal family encompassing heaven and earth, which is God’s ideal of creation.”
To give you an example from nature, when there is a low-pressure system with a deficiency of air, air from a neighboring high-pressure system flows in and fills it up. Similarly, water in a high place will automatically flow down to fill up a low place. Balance, to become level, is the ideal.
In the world today, there are advanced nations and developing nations. In the advanced nations, people have an abundance of things and end up discarding leftovers, whereas people in developing nations lack many things, especially food. Many even starve to death. Twenty million people die of starvation each year. Do you think that is God’s desire? When advanced nations do not give out of their abundance to developing nations, they block the universe’s natural system of giving and receiving.
If this continues, the advanced nations will not be able to avoid divine punishment. Heaven will not let this go unnoticed. Already signs of judgment are appearing in various places. One sign is the prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases; another is drug and alcohol abuse. Others are free sex and homosexuality. They are madness; the human race can go no lower. God detests such behavior the most; Satan, on the other hand, praises such behavior the most.
I have been leading projects to save the tens of thousands of people who are dying of starvation and malnutrition each day in the developing nations. I am calling the people of advanced nations such as the United States, who live in a consumer paradise, to willingly go without in order to restore balance. Despite all the disorder of the human race, the natural world is constantly trying to maintain balance.
When we pledge to “build the universal family… and perfect the world of freedom, peace, unity, and happiness,” the word “freedom” does not just refer to the freedom of the individual. It refers to the freedom of all people as one family under God. The same goes for the words “peace,” “unity,” and “happiness.” “Happiness” refers to a world where all people live happily. That is why we need to develop movements in villages, towns, and cities throughout the world. As they build wealth, we need to inculcate their people with the ethical norm to share it with others.
Ladies and gentlemen, a world of one universal family is a world filled with families who have received the marriage Blessing. When you go to the spirit world, you will find people living together from everywhere on the planet. There, all five colors of the human race are intermingled. Yet, who among those people has truly prepared themselves to live the family ideal that can unite the past, present, and future? If you prepare yourselves in that way, you will become central leaders in the spirit world. That is why you must train for this while you are on earth.
The basis of that training is mind-body unity. There are many people in this world who betray their conscience and act according to their body’s desires. They hoard money, commit fraud, come up with schemes and defame others. However, the money accumulated in this way will eventually come back around to strike them, like a rod of judgment.
Likewise, no matter how learned a person may be, if he or she gained that knowledge to use it for their own sake instead of for the greater good, that knowledge will come back around to strike them. In the spirit world, such people will make their way to hell.
We need to live for the sake of the world, upholding the ideal, God’s ideal, of one global family. If we disregard the world and live only for our own sake, the world will judge us.
I have not asked you to recite the Family Pledge centering on “my family.” You must offer your pledge centering on “our family.” Everyone is equal. I, Rev. Moon, make this pledge representing “our family,” that is, on behalf of all families. That is why we say, “Our family, the owner of Cheon Il Guk, pledges to build the universal family encompassing heaven and earth, which is God’s ideal of creation and perfect the world of freedom, peace, unity, and happiness by centering on true love.”
The fifth verse of the Family Pledge is, “Our family, the owner of Cheon Il Guk, pledges to strive every day to advance the unification of the spirit world and the physical world as subject and object partners, by centering on true love.”
When thinking about anything, we must first think about the spirit world. It is in the position of the subject partner, while the physical world is the object partner. Do you think there are more people living in the spirit world or on earth? The population of the spirit world is far greater than the population on the earth.
The spirit world relates to the physical world as subject partner to object partner, and yang to yin. In the same way, the mind is in the position of subject partner and yang in relation to the body, which is in the position of its object partner and yin. The mind represents the spirit world and the body, the physical world. If we act in a way such that we do not recognize the mind and the world of the mind as the subject partner, we are bound to go to hell. If previously we lived by allowing our body to lead our mind, now we must live so that our mind leads our body and subjugates it. I am saying that such a time has come.
In our daily life, we need to be aware that the spirit world is the subject partner. This means that our task on earth, the object partner, is to perfect ourselves so that we may establish the foundation for perfection when we pass into the spirit world. There is a direct relationship between the two worlds. The spirit world is linked to us every day of every year throughout our entire life. But only by perfecting ourselves on earth does it become our second sphere of activity and a place where we can peacefully abide when we go there.
In other words, “the unification of the spirit world and the physical world as subject and object partners” means that the two worlds must constantly move towards oneness. To “strive every day to advance this unification” means that we must help the two worlds progress toward this unity. We are urged to do it quickly. We must not stop. If we do, we are already backsliding toward hell and death.
Stagnation leads down to hell, whereas pushing forward leads to development. When relating to God’s providence, to sleep long hours and be lazy, gluttonous, and self-indulgent are not acceptable. We must keep ourselves busy. Life is short. Run without resting, just as I do. Run even without sleeping. Only then can you be connected to the world that we all hope for. How can you be connected to that world when you are not even thinking about it? We need to always be busy and always concerned; this is how oneness is brought about. We need to think about both the spirit world and the physical world, for they are partners.
The sixth verse of the Family Pledge is, “Our family, the owner of Cheon Il Guk, pledges to become a family that moves heavenly fortune by embodying God and True Parents, and to perfect a family that conveys Heaven’s blessing to our community, by centering on true love.”
“Our family pledges… by embodying God and True Parents” means that your family is to embody God and True Parents. Families that embody God and True Parents are the families that mobilize heavenly fortune. When we say that we pledge to “become a family that moves heavenly fortune” and “conveys Heaven’s blessing to our community,” we are not saying that we want to be blessed by God and enjoy a good life just for ourselves. We are saying that God’s blessing is for all people so that all can ultimately become part of God’s royal family. We are saying that everyone needs to become a citizen of God’s kingdom of Cheon Il Guk.
We are making a vow to become a channel of God’s blessing, sharing it equally with all the people of the world. The family of God and the True Parents is one family. Although there is only one set of True Parents, there are many blessed families throughout the world, and God wants all of them to become channels for sharing the blessing of God and True Parents with others. You must work to become such a family. This means that you are striving to bring everyone to receive many blessings.
The seventh verse is, “Our family, the owner of Cheon Il Guk, pledges, through living for the sake of others, to perfect the world based on the culture of heart, which is rooted in the original lineage, by centering on true love.”
In our path of faith, the most important point is not to defile the original lineage. That means your descendants must not stain their lineage, as Adam and Eve did when they fell. That is what is meant when “Our family pledges… to perfect the world based on the culture of heart, which is rooted in the original lineage.”
The world in heaven, the world on earth, and the world of True Parents’ heart, are all meant to be one with the world of God’s heart. That is what is meant when our family pledges “to perfect the world based on the culture of heart.” This is our ideal. The culture of heart cannot be two; it must be one. The cultures of the fallen world are complex and various. Without establishing the world based on the one culture of heart, there is no way for us to connect to God on all levels, from the individual to the family, tribe, people, nation, world, and eternal world.
Without establishing the culture of heart, the individual, family, and tribe cannot be connected. Without a world based on the culture of heart, there is no way for us to make connections from the individual out to the cosmos.
That is why the world has been going up and down in a zigzag, unable to reach the final destination even after thousands of years. However, in the world, based on the culture of heart, we can reach that destination right away.
This is possible because true love is there.
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