Address to Interreligious Leadership Conference 2017
Seoul, Korea, November 10 to 14, 2017
Beloved global citizens, leaders of various fields, Ambassadors for Peace, members of the Family Federation, ladies and gentlemen:
Today we have provided this event, which can deeply move Heaven at a time when this nation’s fate is at stake. Many religious leaders and members of the clergy—around 400—have come here from all continents and a hundred people came from America for the ACLC (American Clergy Leadership Conference) choir. I am truly very thankful for that.
When we look at the world today, we see many problems. Though we try to overcome these problems, we cannot find answers through human efforts and strength alone. The future is bleak. Through the First World War and the Second World War, we saw cruel and horrible realities. That was why the U.N. was founded, with the determination that all nations must unite. Seventy-two years have passed since the U.N.’s establishment. However, many difficult problems still need solving throughout the world. We stand lost in a maze, unable to unite. For the religions that lead the world today, it is the same. Especially in the Christian civilization sphere, people say that if you believe in God and believe in Jesus you will go to a good place. But we must not stop with faith alone. We must think of how we can attend God, our Creator, in our families, societies, nations and the world.
The original God created all things in heaven and on earth, and then created the man and woman who would become humankind’s first ancestors. He gave them the responsibility of going through a growth period. They should have received the Blessing in the stance of having absolute faith, absolute love and absolute obedience. Yet, during this time, they developed greed. They thought they could be equal to God. Their self-centered greed caused the world we see today, a world of fallen humankind with no relationship with God.
The omniscient and omnipotent God is a being who is the same from the beginning to end. He cannot ignore the principles of creation, which he established. Thus, God had to begin the bitter providence of restoration through indemnity. Four thousand years ago, God chose the people of Israel. How difficult must it have been that it took 4,000 years of providential history to restore an individual all the way to the national level and for God finally to send Jesus Christ whom he could call “My Son”! Yet what happened? Was there truly no choice but to send to the cross God’s son, who was born after the long period of 4,000 years, after such a short life?
This was not God’s will. The purpose of Jesus’ coming was for him to become the victorious human ancestor, the “True Parent.” Humankind cannot enter God’s presence directly, because they still must indemnify mistakes they have made. The True Parents help us overcome that indemnity.
As Jesus was dying on the cross he said he would return. He said he would return to hold the marriage banquet of the Lamb. The marriage banquet of the Lamb! Heaven’s providence did not go through the Israelites again after they had failed to fulfill their responsibilities. Heaven chose a new people who could give birth to the only daughter of God. I want you to know that the chosen people is the Han people, the people of the Korean Peninsula, the Republic of Korea.
God prepared this people so he could send the only daughter of God through them. As the chosen people, they worshiped Heaven, were advanced in astronomy, loved nature, and hated war. Through this people and on the Christian foundation, just as 2,000 years ago, when God called Jesus “My son,” after 6,000 years, the only daughter of God whom God could call “My daughter” was born. Isn’t this something to be joyful about and thankful for?
According to the principle of creation, heaven had to protect the only daughter of God during her growth period. I was born in 1943 and Korea was liberated in 1945. Near the place I was born, centered on Pyongyang, were many spiritual groups that believed the Lord would return in Pyongyang. However, with Korea’s liberation, the nation divided into north and south based on the confrontation between democratic and communist thought. The north, under a united regime, was planning to invade the south. God would not have been able to fulfill his will if I stayed in that place, so heaven had me go south. In 1950, the Korean War broke out. South Korea was not prepared to confront North Korea. Then like a miracle, Heaven mobilized the U.N. and laid the framework in this land for the True Parents to manifest.
In 1960, True Parents, for whom Heaven and fallen humankind so dearly wished, came into being, but the Christian foundation did not support them. Yet the providence still progressed. True Parents began the global providence through America (a representative democratic nation) to save the world’s 7.4 billion people. God prepared America as a democratic nation so its people could receive the returning Lord. I am saying they received heaven’s blessings. Yet they do not know why Heaven blessed them. America had become a powerful nation, but during times of confusion and difficulties, communism threatened that nation. [True Parents] left everything aside and for 40 years went to America to lead the global providence. At that time missionaries from America, Europe, and Japan were dispatched all over the world. They laid roots in places all over the world. They are educating people in those nations, in all ways necessary in this age.
I wish to say this to all of you today: the figures or nations heaven blesses must fulfill their responsibilities. Happiness grows the more we share it. You need to take responsibility for the blessings, which are not yours alone, but which you can share with your neighbors, other people, and the world. Fallen humankind cannot directly go into God’s presence. The state in which we can receive the blessing through True Parents is that of being resurrected and reborn. That is why righteous leaders and members of the clergy have accepted the order and are putting into practice the true family movement in their churches around the world. This people’s wish for the peaceful unification [of Korea], humankind’s wish for a united world, cannot go on eternally with human effort and thinking alone. Only when God’s providence unfolds centered on True Parents and under the circumstances of one attending God in one’s family and nation can Heaven’s blessing be eternal. Thus, I would like to speak today about “The truth of history seen through heaven’s providence and this nation’s mission.”
I have said this: The numerous religious figures in the world, especially religious figures and believers who call themselves Christians must prepare to greet a new day. Are you prepared to meet the returning Lord who 2,000 years ago said he would return as he died on the cross? Just as it says in Genesis, there was evening, and there was morning—the first day. Why did Genesis not express it as the first and second day but used the word evening? Today, Christianity—all religions—must have a destination. What destination? There is only one conclusion. Beloved global citizens, beloved righteous people of this nation, we can no longer remain in the night but must prepare to greet a new morning. Do you know what that is? It is the marriage blessing through True Parents. It is the true family movement. The world that all humankind wishes for today is a united world centered on God, which begins from a true family. Now, you, especially Christians who believe in God and believe in Jesus, must not stop with only faith but must truly attend God in your families and establish an ideal world through which we can return glory and honor to God, which is the kingdom of heaven on earth, for which Heaven wishes and we hope.
Therefore, I will say this to you today—I will say this to the Korean people: We have received Heaven’s blessing. We must live lives in which we can share that blessing. What must we do for the global providence?
Two thousand years ago after Jesus went the way of the cross, Christianity began through the resurrection of the Holy Spirit. Thus, 313 years later, Rome recognized Christianity and it became more active. Centered on the Italian peninsula, Christianity spread through the European continent and arrived at the island of Britain, where its culture bloomed. The Atlantic Civilization Era had begun. Yet, they did not know Jesus’ essence. [Britain] began to think of its own benefit only and retreated into selfish individualism. Therefore, the providence made effort for all nations to unite through the democratic nation of the United States, but they could not.
What humankind wishes for dearly, and Heavenly Parent’s dream, begins from the True Parents. The True Parents! You must be reborn through the True Parents to become a child of God. I have said the Era of the Pacific Realm Civilization constitutes the revolution of the culture of heart of filial love. I pray that we who now know heaven’s providence through True Parents’ ideology can stand in God’s presence as citizens of Cheon Il Guk who fulfill their duty as filial sons, filial daughters and loyal subjects so that not only we but all humankind can receive blessings and open the way to the past, present and future.
To go to the Interreligious Leadership Conference Schedule 2017, click here.