You who have come from Japan! Today the weather is fine, and your mood too looks excellent.
Today, October 14, is an auspicious day. Meeting this day when the surrounding environment is so fine and the weather is so fine, we ought to celebrate this day; yet seen from the meaning this day holds, it is not an altogether joyful anniversary.
Today is a joyful and pleasant day, but when I recall the prison life I underwent behind it, it is a day that is joyful on one side and desolate on the other. In that sense, today I will speak to you under the title “Suffering and Rebirth,” that is, “New Life and Suffering.”
The reason there are periods of suffering
The sixty-year period after 1917, after the First World War, and further, the seventy-year period, can be considered an age of worldwide upheaval. This period was a period of historical destiny that could not help but walk a road of suffering.
I, too, was born in this period. In this period, I have lived until now, continually .
Then for what purpose did this grave period of suffering in history, this period of the suffering of upheaval, come about? Behind undergoing suffering, history has always determined two outcomes: whether one perishes or is reborn.
This period of sixty years, and further seventy years, which is a worldwide period of upheaval, is a worldwide period of suffering. People dislike this period of suffering and yet are still groping their way through it. Will they, then, in this period bring the history of anxiety to a conclusion, and will they make the motive of the start of the rebirth of a new ideal world? This period is a period of historical destiny in which these two problems must be settled.
If the Heavenly Father knows such a position, He cannot lead humankind to ruin. By whatever means and methods, He cannot but save us human beings. When I consider this, I think that this period may become an important period for establishing a standard of God’s special Providence (섭리) upon this earth.
So it is undoubtedly that God, while dragging and pushing history forward amid hardship, has at the same time been reviving behind it a foundation of a new heavenly Providence, a foundation of development. Seen from such a position, it cannot but be so. And we arrive at the conclusion that there must have been a historical process in which He made such a foundation somewhere upon this earth through some people.
Had that not existed, this hardship would without fail bring a result of ruin. God, who turns toward a new world to overcome this, will undoubtedly make inner preparations to lead and overcome with the providential foundation of that new world. Thinking this way, we can know that the nation that can stand at the center of that providential preparation cannot but walk a road of hardship more than any nation in the world. That nation cannot but stand in a central, core position of suffering.
And when we consider that there must be, within it, a new value on one side that drops the anchor of a new Providence and there pioneers the road of a new worldwide providential development, it is a historical fact that from the sixties through the seventies Korea has risen to an important political summit worldwide.
During this period, the Korean people have suffered until now. And among these Korean people who have suffered, there is a group that has been most driven and persecuted. That is, needless to say, the Unification Church.
The Unification Church, which has developed in the midst of hardship
The Unification Church has walked a road of suffering until now. The Unification Church itself must also choose one of two things as the result of that suffering: whether it perishes or gropes its way again along a road of rebirth. If, as a result of suffering, it stands in the position of goodness, it is absorbed into God’s providential realm; and if it does not and stands in the position of evil, it will undoubtedly perish. Such is the conclusion.
Now the Unification Church is being persecuted by the Korean people and is passing through the historical process while keeping the core position of suffering; yet while passing through that historical process of hardship, it is not in a position where its appearance is erased. That it rode over that appearance of hardship and pushed aside the environment of hardship and rode over the family, the lineage, the people, and the nation, and further rode over even the world so that young people of ten nations have gathered and come, is living evidence that it has crossed beyond the people and crossed beyond the world.
Seeing this, if the suffering that has until now been bound up with the environment did not hasten our ruin but rather became the source of the power pushing us from behind in a new direction and became a burning driving force, then we must give thanks to God for that suffering. Such is the result.
Likewise, the suffering our Unification Church has undergone until now can, by standing in a position of goodness that Heaven recognizes, satisfy the present situation. And the suffering the Unification Church has undergone within Korea until now not only determines the structure of the Unification Church; if, through this hardship, the core bond of God’s Providence is being lowered, then that suffering becomes the driving force that re-creates the world.
Yet if we look now at the state of mind of the Japanese members, or the American members, or the members of the Unification Church scattered throughout the world, that is mistaken.
That the Unification Church has been persecuted in Korea is by no means limited to Korea. It crosses national borders and stands in place of the persecution undergone in Japan and stands in place of the persecution undergone in America. It has the same value as the persecution that the members of the Unification Church, actively centered on our mission departments in the various nations of the world, undergo in those nations. Such has been the result.
Therefore, thinking this way, that standard of having walked a road of special suffering in one particular position, when it does not bring about ruin and stands in Heaven’s position, becomes a good foundation that is worldwide.
And so, if one person stood at the end of suffering as an offering and walked a road of destiny of suffering, and if that one person was sacrificed and died upon a good foundation that the world desires, then that is not the carrying out of one person’s mission; through that destiny it becomes the driving force that sounds the beacon of resurrection in any place whatsoever. Thinking this way, hardship is not a bad thing for human beings.
Seen from a position where behind that hardship there is a connection with Heaven’s Providence and where it possesses content that embraces a good horizontal environment, it is a splendid thing. This is a result that cannot be denied when we consider the facts of the historical process by which our Unification Church has grown until now.
The Unification Church has developed in the midst of hardship. Amid persecution, we have advanced. We have pioneered. Even while repeating the battle, we have crossed the crest of persecution and laid this much of a foundation. It absolutely cannot be said that this was accomplished by the desire of individual human beings. We can see many heroes and great men who have appeared in history.
If someone conquered the world with individual desire, then even if he set out with an individual wish and passed through a process of suffering, if he is a person who did not suffer standing in God’s position, he is without fail criticized historically. His road becomes blocked on all four sides and in eight directions. It rather becomes teaching material that warns people not to approach evil.
The more such things happen, the more it can become a condition for guarding against evil. But suffering grounded in goodness, when it stands in a position that the conscience of all people recognizes, is what people seek to establish as a historical center or as a center of worldwide thought, taking the commandment (戒律) of Heaven’s goal as its standard or basing it on social cooperation. This cannot be denied when measured by the working of our conscience.
Considering such things, the Unification Church has, until now, added to the way of development through the road of suffering. How much development this is making is a matter for the future.
The glory of victory must be returned to God
On the road the Unification Church walks, hardship presses in at one time. That hardship is hardship from the individual to the family, society, nation, and world. We who will face worldwide hardship have the confidence to cross it without difficulty. We hold the absolute conviction that if we fight it through, victory will without fail return to us. We hold the conviction that however much persecution is doubled upon that, we can leap over that persecution and have more besides. This cannot but be a joy for us.
Because this exists, the foundation of rebirth can be expanded worldwide. Even if one has met a joy that can be expanded worldwide, that joy cannot first be received as one’s own joy. Yet that is happiness. That joy belongs first to the ancestors and the forerunners. When we consider the toil of the brothers who went before, that glory of victory cannot be met as one’s own glory.
That one returns it to the ancestors, and the forerunners are truly a beautiful thing. What is centered on evil begins from oneself and returns to oneself. One cannot cross beyond such a position, but since we know the merit of the toil of the ancestors of history, we can give thanks to the ancestors of history and can return all the glory to them. That we stand in such a position means that we are furnished with such a character as history welcomes.
Generally, if there is a person who lives standing for others horizontally, such a person will be called conscientious and a person of character. That person will be welcomed historically by spirit people, and it is certain that he will become an object of welcome of Heaven’s joy. He becomes the source of veneration by all people upon earth. If there is an organization or a people standing in such a position, those people can inherit an infinite providential course.
Until now, Christianity has developed through the historical process. At times, while being persecuted on earth, it laid some foundation for salvation through prayer and gave thanks. What was the object of that thanksgiving? It was God who toiled first. Christianity has developed by standing in a position of returning glory to God, the subject of goodness—that nobility—and of returning it to the forerunners who were persecuted and became sacrifices.
Yet even centering on Christianity, when a nation was born possessing the subjecthood of a people, if the glory achieved centering on Christianity was made that nation’s own, then the victory centering on that nation becomes a destiny in which its shadow cannot but be erased from there. Even if victory was won with a national Christianity as the state religion, that glory must be returned to God.
And it must be returned to one’s forerunners, who walked a road of self-denying (滅私的) sacrifice for the development of Christianity. Standing for them is not limited to the glory of one particular citizenry. This must be expanded and broadened into worldwide glory.
If a citizenry unites, standing in such a position, that citizenry can develop to the very end of the future world. But if, in the opposite position, they make it a glory centered on themselves and limit themselves as the owners of that glory, history is cut off there.
Now we are to hold a worldwide group wedding of 777 Couples. Considering such a position, we must consider whether to make this glory the glory of the Unification Church itself. Then, will this joyful and pleasant and thankworthy matter end with being returned to Teacher Moon of the Unification Church? I do not think so. This has been God’s desire ever since the creation until now. God has sacrificed until now to accomplish that desire.
How shall we express our thanks for God’s sublime toil, for that grace?
With such an environment before us, we can hold a feast and receive the praise of all people; if one person rides over Heaven and makes that glory his own, he betrays everything God has toiled for until now. Such a one does not remain in history. When something good happens, one must first return it to God.
The person who remains together with history
And though in the historical process until now a history of failure has been established, there was not one among those who bore responsibility who wished for failure. They all wished for completion, accomplishment, and victory, but caught in the cord of a destiny they did not wish for, such a result came about. That such a result came about is, seen from that self, a sorrowful thing. Not only that—if God has been carrying out that Providence, God too is pitiful.
Thinking of it that way, toward the countless ancestors who have groped along the course of restoration centering on Christianity, even though they failed, we must inwardly hold a heart of sympathy and have a generous heart that lets them take part in the position of glory.
If there is such a person, such an organization, that can, when there is such a joyful matter, pray for the forgiveness of the mistakes of the ancestors who went wrong, this too will remain together with history. But if one stands in a position of saying that it was accomplished by oneself alone and that such a result came about by one’s own merit—a position of returning that merit to oneself—then because this is a position of rebellion against Heaven, or against the ancestors who lived and suffered holding a heavenly hope, if there is a spirit world, it will completely block off that person’s road.
Thinking of such things, the suffering we have undergone until now is not suffering within one century but suffering within a few decades. But the road of hardship Christianity has walked until now has been several thousand years. The road of toil that humankind’s history has groped along has been several thousand, several tens of thousands of years.
Thinking this way, if in that process there were people who strove single-mindedly for Heaven’s will or conscientiously toward Heaven, and if there were someone who returned this joy to all the people of that realm, then the spirit world would hereafter protect the road they walk and open a road of development.
If the Unification Church is such a church for the will, then before the people of the Unification Church go, the spirit world first comes to hold a heart of wanting to mobilize and pioneer. As long as they are spirit people with a conscience, they cannot but hold such a heart. Therefore, our wedding hereafter is worldwide.
We are making a new realm of atmosphere within the realm of the Unification Church. Seen providentially, making a new family centering on the problem of organizing a family — that is, centering on the problem of marriage — means that we are entering a new territory. This is not our glory alone but God’s eternal glory. It began from the grace of God, who has toiled in creation from before ancestors of several thousand, several tens of thousands of generations before you were born, of whom we know nothing. Therefore, that glory must be returned to God. That glory must be returned to the good ancestors. Insofar as one receives it oneself, one must rejoice.
Even in suffering, one must do so from a position of goodness
One must stand in a position of being completely united with Heaven and the spirit world, taking the spirit world as subject and being led by the spirit world. If there is a person who goes standing in such a position, then whatever persecution there is, that persecution will without fail crumble. Here lies the reason I have continued to struggle for several decades until now.
If there is a road of the cross, that road is contrary (反) to God’s glory. There was not one person who, placing before himself the han (恨) the ancestors have groped through until now, wished to walk that road of toil along with sounds of lamentation in the future.
If it accords with the purpose of suffering, and if one suffered without relating it to God, and yet as a result it comes to be related to God, then he stands in a position of being able to be completely trusted.
If one does not form a relationship with the good ancestors, then however historical that suffering is, one must bear it oneself. Here one can guard against both historical sin and what is newly added.
Thinking this way, if indeed one man appears with such a resolve, he stands as the target of worldwide suffering. The spirit world does not assist him. On earth too, they do not assist him. Satan does not assist him either. He is a sovereign (王者) of solitude, standing in the most solitary position, and a sovereign of suffering. If he had become so for his own sake, there would not be one person to sympathize with him.
But if it is suffering done to turn history back and indemnify the history of suffering and the history of solitude, then, leaving aside the present age and the future, the spirit people who had a bond with the will in the historical process cannot but mobilize there and assist. That toil must be done for all people. The people of this present world upon the earth oppose, but in any case, through conscientious knowledge, and through that knowledge, after several generations they come to stand in a decisive position of destiny in which they cannot but welcome that one. The world must without fail welcome him.
If the people of that present world stand in a position of opposition, the spirit world judges them proportionally to the value of that opposition. Moreover, if one goes bearing the cross centering on the descendants of the future, the person who bore that cross absolutely does not perish.
Those historical descendants must, without fail, inherit that sublime spirit. If it does not become so, there is no God and no Heaven and nothing at all. If there is a man who stands as such a worldwide or cosmic sovereign of solitude and sovereign of toil, and who himself bears everything and takes responsibility and resolves it, then from there the world cannot but make a new start in a new direction.
Seen from that point, that I have suffered is something I do not even wish to bring to mind. That is a natural position. The greater one's desires and the broader one’s good sense of purpose, and the greater its three-dimensionality, the more natural it is. In a fallen world, one cannot but stand in such a position all the more. That is a settled principle.
What we desire is to occupy suffering and to collide head-on with hardship. Do not lament that there is no companion on the road of suffering. If there is anyone who laments without inner resolve, he cannot carry out responsibility for the sake of history. In this sense, looking at Jesus’ prayer, the prayer “Not as I will, but as You will” cannot be. The very foundation (根底) of the spirit of the members of the Unification Church is that, standing in such a position, wherever in the world they go, in an environment of suffering and persecution, they secure that inner standard, and even if they collapse, they do not perish. People who raise that flagpole again will rise by the tens, the hundreds, and the thousands. Meeting this meaningful day today, you must not forget this matter.
In that process, countless people were opposed and persecuted. Or they were dragged into detention and tortured. The extremity of that torture was interrogation, with the question of life and death at stake. One cannot but walk one of these two roads. For the sake of that purpose, for a good purpose, though one’s own physical body perishes, a strong spirit does not perish. In that case, a road of resurrection remains.
For a person standing in the position of evil, at the same time as his physical body perishes, his spirit perishes together with it. A person who has done evil may say, “Ah, this evil I have done will someday appear as goodness. Though the nation opposes and the world opposes, you may occupy my body, but you cannot occupy my spirit”—but it does not turn out that way. When one receives the punishment of evil, the spirit too naturally dies. Nothing at all remains. That is the end of it.
The Unification spirit
But in the case of standing in the position of goodness, the realms of life and death are connected. One survives. However much one is suppressed, one remains again. One conquers the world. If one dies leaving behind a firm spiritual standard through the historical process, he absolutely does not perish. Therefore, what is good is strong. It is not subjugated by history. It subjugates history. One must know this.
Considering the individual, when one is conscientious and without error, one is full of confidence whatever one’s parents say. One is full of confidence whatever the nation says. One is full of confidence whatever God says. But when one has done wrong, at one word — “Hey!” — one is completely brought down. That perishes. That perishes. You must know the fact that history has been developing while crossing back and forth, centering on the bonds of these two contents and repeating an up-and-down motion.
Our Unification spirit is not a spirit for establishing a nation centered on Japan, centering on the Japanese if they are Japanese. It is the world—no, the Cosmos. And further, it is the liberation of God. Then what is centering on God’s liberation? It is liberation centered on love. To hold an absolute conviction and goal is a splendid thing. However much one dies, this spirit cannot be drawn out of one. When it is a spirit God desires, God cannot but cooperate. He cannot but assist.
If there is one who attacks, that attacker without fail becomes a condition of being set up as an offering that can indemnify those people. When one who opposes it—when it is established as righteousness—a scene of glory in which not only he himself but also his children, if children, and his grandchildren, if grandchildren, three generations at once submit, will without fail manifest before us. We hold such a conviction. In that, dying or suffering is a natural thing. In an evil world, it is a phenomenon one inevitably runs into wherever one goes. It is a phenomenon like a natural phenomenon.
Turning that around, our Unification Church is what set out, raising the banner of a liberation movement, aiming at a free globe in which we go on our road without receiving such persecution, meeting humankind without persecution, and meeting nations that cannot persecute.
We go until we accomplish that. However much death comes one after another, we go. The young people of Japan go, and the old people of America go. If there is a road along which anyone, man or woman, old or young, can go rejoicing, that road is a road that will remain to the very last.
What has religion until now taken as its purpose?
It has centered on the problem of one’s own salvation. Such a religion without fail perishes. Its end comes. However worldwide it has become now, it must without fail be resurrected once again. Where does the purpose of a religion for saving one’s own single life and of the believers who believe in Christianity lie? They say that they themselves are saved and go to the kingdom of heaven. That will not do. In going to the kingdom of heaven, what would one do going alone? One must have faith to take all people along.
Therefore, even if told not to witness, one cannot but witness. Even if told not to do good, one cannot but do it. Such faith—its purpose is not salvation conscious of oneself; one has such faith for the sake of the people and has such faith for the sake of the world. And further, one has faith for the sake of God. The position is different. The position is different.
Considering human beings, human beings number many hundreds of millions. One is one of many hundreds of millions. The further one follows history, the smaller one gradually becomes.
True faith
To put forward such a stifling self and have faith in the purpose of saving it is not something desirable to anyone. Rather than that, one must do it for the sake of the world. The world is gradually developing. Now it is 3.6 billion, but with time it increases. A gradually larger stage unfolds.
Seeing such things, goodness absolutely cannot be where one retreats. A person who sacrifices himself for the multitude and himself walks a road of suffering and goes staking his whole life.
Even if one does not return God’s such environment of suffering to oneself, if there is one person who himself bears the burden of suffering for Heaven’s sake and goes, that person will without fail prosper. Today’s glory and today’s position are the most favorable environment given to us, so let us prepare with our own will. From there one comes not to perish.
Historically, the standard of judging destiny is arranged that way. The standard of perishing is below oneself, and the standard of prospering is above oneself. Only when one stands in a position of goodness like that does one prosper. This is an iron rule.
If each has made these words today certain within his inner heart, a person who meets this day holding such a heart is a person qualified to celebrate this day. If not, he is a person not qualified to celebrate this day.
When I was dragged to prison, I collided head-on, saying inwardly while looking toward such a time of persecution, “It is from now on. My real ability will appear from now on.” Such was my appearance. It is not the serving of several years in prison that is the problem; the time before meeting that is a still graver problem.
What will my appearance be afterward?
At that time I pledged, “You must, hoping for a motive of heavenly rebirth, become an appearance of ruin.” That is for the sake of history, for the sake of the age, and also for the sake of the future.
Naturally, history desires a person who says he will bear this, not because the other side asks for it, but whether the other side wants it or not. Even if history does not want it, when one has decided for oneself and done so, this is received by the Cosmos. Do you understand?
If one does this for one’s own purpose, it is not received. As a result of colliding with such conviction, such a result without fail comes. This means that in your lives too, you cannot escape such a road of destiny.
That is so in the family and so in the ideologies of the people, the nation, and the world. Considering communism and democracy, even if a nation with somewhat larger territory wins, when it lacks that, however firm an appearance it displays in history, its appearance is erased from history.
Thus, knowing clearly this standard of diagnosing history, you must from now on establish the goal of your lives. It is so in individual activity and living, but one must also go that way in walking the road of the will. A person who goes that way absolutely does not perish.
Even in prison, even if one is confined deeper than that, there is infinite comfort from God there. It is a position so solitary and solitary as to be pitiful, a position in which, seen outwardly, not one person even takes an interest; yet one experiences that the infinite spirit world and all the subject-like driving force of the infinite world of hope wish to be together with one. Such a splendid, absolutely imperishable standard of history is the only thing that is even now moving unbrokenly toward the future behind a history we do not know. From such a view, I am now leading the Unification Church.
When I must resolve a great problem, people may say, “Ah, since Mr. Moon has such talent, it will be easy,” but it cannot be decided carelessly. The graver the matter, the more prudently it must be done. Even in the quiet of night, or in the midst of suffocation, even at the moment when one’s last breath is cut off, God’s providential hand is being extended. Within that, God’s instruction that quietly arises is always there.
When one goes to God with a heart of inquiring about anything, always standing in a serious position overflowing with the conviction of one’s whole person and unknowingly holding back tears, one comes to discover at some point that one has already crossed the boundary of resolution.
Go forward fighting with the Unification spirit
Such a course of going forward will, when others look at it, appear to have failed. Whoever looks will say it cannot succeed and that it is a reckless thing, yet it is without fail accomplished. There will be differences in the length of the period, but as long as the degrees of heaven and earth are not mistaken, that decision is without fail accomplished and has more besides.
When one has made such a resolve, one must stake one’s life upon that resolve. If, having staked one’s life, one still has not accomplished it, then if there is a testament—or a teaching, or a parent, a teacher, or an ideology—that establishes one’s descendants and leaves at least a will saying that this will be accomplished even if it is prolonged for several dozen generations or several hundred generations, such an ideology can create the future world and have more besides.
A world centered on oneself does not come into being. Why? For fallen descendants, that is a dream and a fantasy. Considering this, we must not forget the authority of being forerunners of a pioneering age who, in such a period of hardship, pioneer the one road of resurrection.
Even when going to Japan, looking at the Japanese people, one must say, “God, love the Japanese people,” more than the emperor of Japan, more than the prime minister. They, too, must be loved by God. For a person who must not be loved to love,love it is not true love.
Considering it from such a position, God will undoubtedly love with such a heart. And so, if one loves Japan standing in such a position, then even if Japan’s central figures—that is, political circles, financial circles, and the Japanese state—oppose it, and even if Japan perishes, the ideology of having loved standing in such a position remains.
Therefore, I hold the conviction that hereafter, in Japan, Unificationism will without fail become a matter of consequence. Why? Because it is grounded in such an origin. This without fail remains. The more the enemy attacks, the more it is a sign that the time has come. The more the environment ripens, the more it shows that the time has come. In this, the pain of a mother with a child, the pain of giving birth to the child in her womb. But after that has passed, a new world of joy one could not even conceive of unfolds.
If there is a person who cannot experience pain like a mother giving birth to a child, he is not qualified to receive joy one hundred percent.
Therefore, you will know all too well that through history one age must pass and one new age must come as an age of new birth. Here the question is who becomes the standard-bearer, the central figure, who sends off the one and welcomes the other, or what family, what lineage, what people, or what nation becomes so.
If there is a person who, holding an ideology of returning it to Heaven and returning it to all people and returning it for the sake of the future, buries himself within it and rejoices in that very living and that very sacrifice, then he dies holding the world in his hand.
Who leads on the spirit of that person who died? Even if he does not lead it himself, Heaven leads it. Then all the environment that person desires enters at some point into that person’s realm of dominion. You will have known clearly that in this way the degree of the development of the Providence has been added to.
If you return to Japan and the people of other countries return each to their country and fight centering on this standard of spirit, numbers are not the problem. I do not desire numbers. Such a single person, a single family a single lineage are what matter. And a single nation matters. If there is such a single nation, the world will in any case be embraced within it.
We hold such a far-reaching hope. Wherever we go, we are not lonely. The road we must walk is determined as a formula. Even in the very face of death, we do not submit to that death. If we go with such confidence, no road of suffering whatsoever can become a condition of damage to us. It rather becomes medicine.
A person who has been ill is arranged to fear falling ill. A person who has once fallen ill takes care not to fall ill again. Likewise, when suffering becomes medicine to a person who underwent it, he can revive it as the character of his own new life and advance into a second, valuable world.
Keeping such facts in memory, I ask you to fight well through the time ahead. In particular, I ask you to remember suffering and rebirth.
Keeping such facts in mind, I ask you to fight well through the time ahead. In particular, I ask you to remember suffering and rebirth.
