Many Want to Avoid the Thorny Path that Lies Along the Way

Cheon Seong Gyeong 2156

Today I would like to gratefully take this opportunity and talk about a fundamental solution to the problem of the unification of the Korean peninsula – the unification that is our nation’s most cherished desire as well as the last matter of the Cold War that awaits settlement. I would like to entitle this talk “The Course of Life for the Princes and Princesses of God.”

Cheon Seong Gyeong 1383

    What will happen once we have conducted this ceremony? Families in the world today are breaking down, and resolving this issue remains a problem. With the world struggling to solve this problem of family breakdown, the Unification Church will bring together 360,000 young couples to form new families to live in an ideal manner, and this will lead all disordered families in the world to automatically take great interest in them. This will become a global issue.
    Once I bless these 360,000 couples and rumors spread worldwide that it was the best thing that happened to the world, and as a result 36,000 couples from each nation were brought to participate in the Blessing, how many couples would that add up to? There are some countries that want to send 50,000 couples. Think about it. (269-300, 1995.5.1).5.1)

Beyond Ritual

WHEN RITUAL IS OVERLY RELIED UPON, it may imbue an aura of sanctity not matched by deeds or wisdom. Ritual is no substitute for authentic piety, love of one’s neighbor and personal realization of God. Nearly every religion has its own internal critique of ritualism. Even when the founder of one religion is apparently criticizing the ritualism of another religion, the passage was originally a prophetic word to his own people.
Father Moon concurs in these critiques, and adds two more: First, ritual can create a barrier between different denominations and faiths, which runs contrary to the will of God for religious unity. In this time of coming together, the barriers of ritual should be transcended. Second, acts of pious devotion to God and Jesus do not often grant the inner knowledge to know their heart and will. For example, many Christians revere the cross as the sign of salvation, when for Jesus it was the accursed instrument of his death and the source of millennia of grief and frustration that he could not have lived to complete his mission to build God’s Kingdom on earth.
Chief among the religious rituals in ancient times was animal sacrifice, yet, with a few exceptions, animal sacrifice is rare in religion today. Religions have come to regard acts of devotion, study, and charity the essence of the ancient ritual sacrifices that are required by scripture but no longer practiced. Thus, the Talmud regards charity to one’s neighbor as the equivalent of sacrificing a lamb as a sin offering. In a similar vein, the Buddha criticizes animal sacrifice as creating evil karma by killing life, and instead teaches a spiritual meaning of sacrifice as fulfilled in honoring parents, caring for family, and giving charity to monks.

  1. Better than Ritual Is a Loving Heart and Righteous Deeds

With what shall I come before the Lord?
and bow myself before God on high?
Shall I come before him with burnt offerings,
with calves a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of
rams,
with ten thousands of rivers of oil?
Shall I give my first-born for my transgression,
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
He has showed you, O man, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?
    Micah 6.6-8

Even three times a day to offer
Three hundred cooking pots of food
Does not match a portion of the merit
Acquired in one instant of love.
    Nagarjuna, Precious Garland 283 (Buddhism) Continue reading “Many Want to Avoid the Thorny Path that Lies Along the Way”

Faith Without Works Is Dead

VisionRoot Success Formula Workshops:  Peaceful Families; Peaceful World 
Peace Kingdom Center, Harpers Ferry WV and Online
March 18th to March 20th, 2022
In-person: Registration Deadline March 15th.
Online:  Register before the start time of your selected workshop day(s).
Register Now
Find out more
Listen to the Richard Urban Show #103:  Peaceful Families Make a Peaceful World; Join the Workshop on March 18th to March 20, 2022
Watch the Internet Show

WHOSE CHILDREN ARE THEY? is the groundbreaking and powerfully persuasive documentary featuring brave teachers, empowered parents, and front-line experts who pull back the curtain about what is truly happening in our public schools today.
See it in a theatre near you today, March 14th.

Cheon Seong Gyeon 2292

The families of Joseph and Zechariah should have united to lay the foundation for Jesus to stand on as the tribal messiah. If they had done so, the nation was to be restored through indemnity; but this did not happen. The Unification Church is currently laying the peoplelevel foundation to restore the nation. We stand on the basis of having passed through the tribal age. You are serving the True Parents and are called their children. You can now be their children – not their legitimate children (in the traditional and legal sense), but also not adopted children (for adopted children have no blood relationship with the parent). You now stand in the position of the child by a concubine. If this position were not established there would be no way for us to save this world. We have crossed over the tribal realm and are heading towards the realm of one people. It was within that realm that you were blessed. (141-209, 1986.2.22)

Richard: In biblical history, a concubine is a woman who lives with a man as a second wife, but without the status of a wife. The point in this passage is that we need to change our lineage to God’s lineage. Physically, that would be done by actually being the physical children of the True Parents (Christ and his bride). That, however, is impossible. Rather, the wife in a Blessed marriage is in a position to relate to Christ, the True Parent, as a spouse. But, of course, she is not the physical spouse of Christ. Thus, this is like the position of a concubine. This is why the church is referred to as a bride to Jesus. It is to prepare us to understand the concept of rebirth to a true father and true mother.

Cheon Seong Gyeong 1302

All of you must carry out the mission of a second creator who can disseminate the words of God. In other words, you must become the propagators of the Word, of life, and of its substance. Only when you accomplish this, and become one in love, can you attend God eternally. Such is the standard of the third Israel. Only in this manner can you sow the Word, the substance, and the life. You must become the substantial embodiments of the Word and the life, representing the heart of six thousand years of biblical history. You must know how to attend God, how to understand and feel the Word, and how to fulfill your mission of recreating the second Israel. You must constantly bear in mind that only by doing so can you become the sons and daughters who completely understand the internal heart of God. Only when you become the true children of God can you live in eternal glory centering on God’s love. (3-331, 1958.2.2)

Faith

3. To Trust in God and Live by Faith in Him

Put your trust on the Exalted in Might, the Merciful—who sees you standing forth in prayer, and your movements among those who prostrate themselves. For it is He who hears and sees all things.
    Qur’an 26.218-20

Trust in the Lord with all your heart,
and do not rely on your own insight.
In all your ways acknowledge Him
and he will make straight your paths.
    Proverbs 3.5-6

Continue reading “Faith Without Works Is Dead”

Faith apart from Works is Dead

Book Review: Standing Up to Goliath: Battling State and National Teachers’ Unions for the Heart and Soul of Our Kids and Country by Rebecca Friedrichs

Cheon Seong Gyeong 269

Then, where is it that I live? I do not stand only in the teacher’s position or only in the owner’s position. Even the president of a university returns home as a parent in the evening and even the president of Korea returns to the Blue House. Even the one who commands the royal courtiers must go home to sleep and there he becomes a father, a parent.
    When we see these things, we realize that parents are the center. The school is based on parents and the position of owner is based on parents. Everyone may go out, but they will eventually return to their parents. The place where you can live without having to return is the place where your parents are. That is how it works with all things involving true love. The saying that the king, the teacher and the parents are equal has its basis there. I am now conveying a true teaching to you. This is why I am the best of all teachers.
    Among rulers there has been none who ruled with love. This is why your mind and body desire to live forever resonating with me and the way I am going. Those who really love the Unification Church and those in the Unification Church who have the heart to love God, love humankind and love the fundamental essence of human beings, are unable to leave me. This is because I have the heart of a parent, the heart of a teacher and the heart of an owner. Through me, you can become parents, you can become owners and you can become teachers. (215-78, 1991.2.6)

Cheon Seong Gyeong 1242

You must understand how important the Blessing is from a providential point of view. God’s Blessing is received where the Kingdom of Heaven on earth and the Kingdom of Heaven in the spirit world meet. It is the place where the eternal world and the corporeal world meet horizontally. (Blessed Family – 544)

Good Deeds

Good deeds are a manifestation of a healthy spiritual life. Good deeds promote friendship and harmony in our dealings with people. Good deeds create merit for heaven and improve our relationship with God. While religions often emphasize faith as the key to salvation, all genuine faith is manifested outwardly in transformed behavior. Father Moon recommends unflagging efforts to do good deeds, whether they are appreciated or not, both to fulfill love in our hearts and as spiritual training to love more profoundly.

Many garlands can be made from a heap of flowers. Many good deeds should be done by one born a mortal.
    Dhammapada 53 (Buddhism)

Be mindful of your duty [to God], and do good works; and again, be mindful of your duty, and believe; and once again: be mindful of your duty, and do right. God loves the doers of good.
    Qur’an 5.93

Continue reading “Faith apart from Works is Dead”