In the new millennium, with the world facing the global problems of environmental degradation, competition for scarce natural resources, terrorism, and the proliferation of nuclear weapons, the time calls out for the establishment of world peace.
What was formerly only a distant dream of prophets and visionaries must now become a reality—for humanity’s very survival. As this circumstance has only arisen in modern times, we have supplemented texts from scriptures with statements by significant religious figures and visionaries of the last century. God has inspired Father Moon to present numerous practical proposals for world peace.
This modern-day prophet has quite a different view from the secular apostles of peace in our time, who held that through scientific and technological advances humanity would create a world of shared affluence in which the old prejudices of religion and culture would yield to secular democratic values and the freedom of the marketplace.
Instead, Father Moon teaches that peace must be founded in God, and religion and spirituality must play a central role to move the peoples of the world towards one global family.
As optimistic hope in progress towards a secular utopia has faded, and people are reconsidering the importance of religion and the internal foundations necessary for world peace, his words have taken on new cogency.
Father Moon has some rather specific proposals for building world peace, including reforming the United Nations to add a spiritual dimension, the demise of national borders, the joining of cultures through intercultural marriages, and an international highway linking all the world’s cities. They are each an expression of his fundamental belief that world peace is built through the practice of true love.
Sun Myung Moon
God is the Basis of World Peace
Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; That he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths. For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide for many peoples; They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. Isaiah 2.2-4
I see no hope for permanent world peace. We have tried and failed miserably. Unless the world has a spiritual rebirth, civilization is doomed. Dag Hammarskjöld
The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid…They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Isaiah 11.6-9
We hope that the world’s religious leaders and the rulers thereof will unite for the reformation of this age and the rehabilitation of its fortunes. Let them, after meditating on its needs, take counsel together and, through anxious and full deliberation, administer to a diseased and sorely afflicted world the remedy it requires. Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh 110 (Baha’i Faith)
Sun Myung Moon
Teachings of Sun Myung Moon
When the Cold War ended, the world had a brief moment of celebration, as if peace had arrived. But humanity soon realized that the end of the Cold War did not automatically mean the advent of an era of world peace.
Fierce battles continued. Even at this moment, brutal massacres are occuring in numerous places. This is the reality. Conflicts arise for many reasons. But one of the primary factors contributing to their emergence is the deep-rooted disharmony that exists among the world’s religions.
Therefore, we should recognize how critically important it is that the religions dialogue with one another, learn to accept one another, and harmonize with each other. In the modern age, in most nations, religious ideals have come to hold a place wholly separate from the centers of secular political power, and most people have come to accept this reality as the way things ought to be.
I believe, however, that it is time for the international organizations whose purpose is to support the ideal of world peace to reconsider their relationship with the great religious traditions of the world…
At their root, human problems are not entirely social or political, and so social and political approaches will always be of limited effectiveness. Although secular authorities rule most human societies, religion lies at the heart of most national and cultural identities. In fact, religious faith and devotion have far greater importance in most peoples’ hearts than do political loyalties.
The time has come for religion to renew itself and manifest true leadership in the world. People of faith should feel responsibility for the plight, suffering and injustices experienced by the world’s peoples.
Religious people have not been good examples in the practice of love and living for the sake of others and for this reason should engage in deep self-reflection.
It is time for religious people to repent for their preoccupation with individual salvation and narrow denominational interests. Such practices have prevented religious bodies from giving their utmost to the cause of world salvation.
Our age more than any other demands that we go beyond our faiths and the interests of particular religions and put our love and ideals into practice for the sake of the world.
In particular, God calls upon us leaders, especially religious leaders, in hope that we will stand against the injustices and evils of the world and bestow His true love upon the world. Hence, all people of faith must become one in heart in order to give full expression, both in words and actions, to God’s passionate desire for humanity’s restoration and peace. (332:245-47, August 18, 2000)
From the viewpoint of God’s historical dispensation, humankind is one large family that is to live by attending to God as the True Parent, transcending national boundaries and racial and religious differences.
Humankind is destined to cooperate as a global family and become as a single community. We live in an age when we can no longer feel that we have nothing to do with the problems of our neighbors or the suffering of other countries. We cannot ignore the reality of humanity ravaged by war, crime, drug abuse, pollution, the destruction of ecosystems, moral corruption, and the scourge of AIDS.
Today, with the eyes of history upon us, we must answer to God. How can humankind, whose mandate is the realization of complete harmony and unity, overcome the unfortunate reality and greet the coming millennium with hope?
How can we realize a peaceful world in which everyone lives for and trusts others irrespective of personal and national interests?
What is the new value system by which we shall attain this ideal?
Rather than riding the chariot of science and technology pulled by the horses of secular humanism, we must humbly seek the answers within our original mind. If we cannot find the solution on earth, we must find it through listening to the voice of Heaven. (279:211-12, August 20, 1996)
Sun Myung Moon
The United Nations and Global Governance
We the peoples of the United Nations, determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom, And for these ends— to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbors, and to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, and to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and to employ international machinery for the pro- motion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples —have resolved to combine our efforts to accomplish these aims. Accordingly, our respective governments, through representatives assembled in the city of San Francisco who have exhibited their full powers found to be in good and due form, have agreed to the present charter of the United Nations and do hereby establish an international organization to be known as the United Nations. Preamble of the United Nations Charter
Now is the gracious Lord’s ordinance promulgated, No one shall cause another pain or injury; All mankind shall live in peace together, Under a shield of administrative benevolence. Adi Granth, Sri Raga, M.5, p. 74 (Sikhism)
In times past, one would be justified in feeling that the public authorities of the different political communities might be in a position to provide for the universal common good, either through normal diplomatic channels or through top-level meetings, by making use of juridical instruments such as conventions and treaties… Today the universal common good presents us with problems which are worldwide in their dimensions; problems, therefore, which cannot be solved except by a public authority with power, organization and means co-extensive with these problems, and with a worldwide sphere of activity. Consequently ,the moral order itself demands the establishment of some such general form of public authority…set up by common accord and not imposed by force… By the principle of subsidiarity…the public authority of the world community is not intended to limit the sphere of action of the public authority of the individual political community, much less to take its place. On the contrary, its purpose is to create, on a world basis, an environment in which the public authorities of each political community, its citizens and intermediate associations, can carry out their tasks, fulfill their duties and exercise their rights with greater security… It is Our earnest wish that the United Nations Organization—in its structure and in its means—may become ever more equal to the magnitude and nobility of its tasks… This is all the more to be hoped for since all human beings…are becoming more consciously aware that they are living members of a universal family of humankind. Pope John XXIII, Pacem in Terris (Christianity)
Sun Myung Moon
Teachings of Sun Myung Moon
The biblical account of Cain and Abel reveals the beginnings of human conflict right in Adam’s family. It provides the archetype for humankind’s unending history of struggle, war and conflict.
We are conflicted on many levels, beginning with the war between body and mind within each individual and extending to wars between nations and even to the global conflict between materialism and theism. Who can untie this ancient knot of Cain and Abel?
It has been tightened for thousands of years and grows ever more tangled. Do you think the United Nations can do it? The U.N. at its founding proclaimed a movement for world peace, and for sixty years it has dedicated itself to this task; yet world peace still remains far distant.
Peace among nations can never come when those entrusted with the task have not resolved the Cain-Abel relationship between their own mind and body. Therefore, the time has come to launch the Abel-type sovereignty for the peaceful, ideal world that will set its course according to God’s Will. (September 21, 2005)
World peace can be fully accomplished only when the wisdom and efforts of the world’s religious leaders, who represent the internal concerns of the mind and conscience, work cooperatively and respectfully with national leaders who have much practical wisdom and worldly experience about the external reality or “body.” In this light, it is time for us to give serious consideration even to the prospect of restructuring the United Nations.
For example, perhaps it is possible to envision the United Nations as a bicameral institution. The existing United Nations structure, composed of national representatives, may be regarded as a congress where the interests of each member nation are represented.
However, I submit that serious consideration should be given to forming a religious assembly, or council of religious representatives within the structure of the United Nations.
This assembly or council would consist of respected spiritual leaders in fields such as religion, culture and education. Of course, the members of this interreligious assembly will need to have demonstrated an ability to transcend the limited interests of individual nations and to speak for the concerns of the entire world and humanity at large.
The two chambers, working together in mutual respect and cooperation, will be able to make great advances in ushering in a world of peace.
The wisdom and vision of great religious leaders will substantially supplement the political insight, experience and skill of the world’s political leaders. (August 18, 2000)
Sun Myung Moon
Building a Culture of Peace that Unites the Peoples of the Earth as One
O mankind! We created you from a single pair of a male and a female and made you into nations and tribes, that you might know each other [not that you might despise each other]. Qur’an 49.13
For the development of a peaceful, friendly human family of nations with a rich variety of faith and political and economic systems, each of us has the responsibility to strive towards such harmony. There is no alternative. Tenzin Gyatso, The Fourteenth Dalai Lama (Buddhism)
Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defenses of peace must be constructed; That ignorance of each other’s ways and lives has been a common cause, throughout the history of mankind, of that suspicion and mistrust between the peoples of the world through which their differences have all too often broken into war… That a peace based exclusively upon the political and economic arrangements of governments would not be a peace which could secure the unanimous, lasting and sincere support of the peoples of the world, and that the peace must therefore be founded, if it is not to fail, upon the intellectual and moral solidarity of mankind. Preamble to the Constitution of UNESCO
Peace is not something that you and I or a few great souls can create at once, by command. Even a million Christs or Krishnas could not do it. Try as he would, Lord Krishna could not prevent the great war between the Pandavas and Kauravas which is described in the Mahabharata. All humanity has to become Christ-like to bring peace on earth. When each one of us shapes his life according to the wisdom and example of a Christ, a Krishna, a Buddha, we can have peace here; not before… So long as God’s children differentiate, “We are Indians and you are Americans; we are Germans, you are English,” so long will they be bound by delusion and the world divided. Much war and suffering and destruction will be prevented if we cease to emphasize differences and learn to love all without distinction or prejudice. Be more proud that you are made in the image of God than that you are of a certain nationality; for “American” and “Indian” and all the other nationalities are just outer coats, which in time will be discarded. But you are a child of God throughout eternity. Isn’t it better to teach that ideal to your children? It is the only way to peace: Establish the true ideals of peace in the schools, and live peace in your own life. Paramahansa Yogananda (Hinduism)
Let there be a small country with a few inhabitants. Though there be labor-saving contrivances, the people would not use them. Let people mind death and not migrate far. Though there be boats and carriages, there would be no occasion to ride in them. Though there be armor and weapons, there would be no occasion to display them. Let people revert to the practice of knotting ropes [instead of writing], and be contented with their food, pleased with their clothing, satisfied with their houses, and happy with their customs. Though there be a neighboring country in sight, and the people hear each other’s cocks crowing and dogs barking, they would grow old and die without having anything to do with each other.23 Tao Te Ching 80 (Taoism)
When the eighty-four thousand kings of the eighty-four thousand cities of India are contented with their own territories and with their own kingly state and their own hoards of treasure, they will not attack one another or raise mutual strife. They will gain their thrones by the due accumulation of the merit of their former deeds; they will be satisfied with their own royal state, and will not destroy one another nor show their mettle by laying waste whole provinces. When all the eighty-four thousand kings of the eighty-four thousand capital cities of India think of their mutual welfare and feel mutual affection and joy…contented in their own domains… India will be prosperous, well-fed, pleasant, and populous. Golden Light Sutra (Buddhism)
World peace is inconceivable unless the world’s leaders come to recognize that interdependence in itself demands the abandonment of the politics of blocs, the sacrifice of all forms of economic, military or political imperialism, and the transformation of mutual distrust into collaboration. This is precisely the act proper to solidarity among individuals and nations. Pope John Paul II, Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (Christianity)
In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrian will come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into Assyria, and the Egyptians will worship with the Assyrians. In that day Israel will be the third with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the earth, whom the Lord of hosts has blessed, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel my heritage.” Isaiah 19.23-25
Sun Myung Moon
Teachings of Sun Myung Moon
In the 21st century, people will not be able to exercise dominion on the earth, or even exist there, while disregarding the ultimate principle of the Creator.
The future of humanity will require closer relationships among people. In the future, people will have no choice but to live very closely together, transcending their region, nationality, and race. In other words, the vision of a global family will become a reality.
People will not only have to understand others who have different religions, cultures, traditions, and lifestyles; they will have to accept them and interrelate with them. No individual or group will be able to selfishly maintain its own sanctuary. (219:9, August 24, 1991)
Today, on every level, boundaries cause division and conflict. If we can eliminate all the boundaries in this world, a world of peace would inevitably come about. We must recognize who owns those boundaries. Clearly, it is not God. It was the devil, Satan, who first created boundaries.
Wherever a boundary exists, there is always the devil and his cohorts. This is a result of the Human Fall, when the first human ancestors switched their lineage, and good and evil began to diverge from each other.
When we look at the division between the East and the West, we see that different cultural spheres have led to antagonism at their boundaries and that the devil is encamped there. It was Satan, not God, who created boundaries by digging all sorts of traps and enmeshing people in racial discrimination and evil cultures, histories, and traditions.
God’s desire is for a world of goodness and unity—a world of oneness in which all humanity lives as one great family. Boundaries have no place in such a world. In a world without boundaries, there can be no enemies.
The concept of “enemy” entails the existence of boundaries. When we love our enemies and make oneness with them, the boundaries between us will collapse.
That is why God’s strategy and tactic has always been “Love your enemy.”
There can be no greater strategy for peace than this. Throughout history, this incredible fact has escaped humanity’s understanding, and it has yet to be grasped even in modern times. (October 3, 2003)
The spirit world does not acknowledge national borders; it transcends them. We were given the responsibility to lead this dispensation on earth; hence, we all have to go beyond national boundaries…
We bring Asian people to live in the West and Western people to the Orient. By virtue of this work, Oriental spirits are able to live in the West and Western spirits can move to the East.
Muslim spirits can visit the Christian world and Christian spirits can visit the Islamic world. Before [this work was done] they were separated from one another, but now they can come and go anywhere they want. Movements to make external unity have come into being, like the European Union that permits Europeans to travel freely throughout Europe.
No power can succeed in blocking this trend. The world can have a future only when people are free to move about and live anywhere on earth. Yet still America restricts immigration and the communists prevent their people from leaving. That is not our way in the Unification Church.
We don’t say only Whites can join or that Blacks are not welcome. I come from Asia, but I don’t say that anyone who is not an Asian should leave. We are colorblind and recognize no borders. (101:331-32, November 12, 1978)
Once true love is perfected in the human world, what possible political, economic, cultural, or environmental problems could persist? In the world of true love, every problem can be solved. It is a world of freedom, peace and happiness, replete with joy. It is the world of God’s ideal.
It is a world where joy and happiness are magnified infinitely and eternally, and where everyone has the right to equal position, equal participation, and equal inheritance. (294:65, June 11, 1998)
In the future there will be no fighting. Up to now we have had useless fights centering on the self. People fought to rob each other. In the unified world under God’s sovereignty where people live for the sake of others, there will be no need for wars. Brothers do not need to rob each other; rather a needy person will have to run away as others try to give him more than he can use…
Laws will all disappear. When all people govern themselves by love, they will observe the law automatically. If all people practice love for the sake of others, there will be no crime. Higher and lower become one, and front and back, left and right, all become one. (224:173, November 24, 1991)
When minorities can receive equal benefit from the system, and when advanced nations supply the less advanced nations with technology in the spirit of helping them become economically independent, instead of exploiting them and their resources, then humankind will eliminate war and starvation. Then the conditions will be right for God’s love to blossom and open the hearts of all humankind to establish the world of peace.
We should go beyond racism and even overcome the whole world with this thought. In the future, the five races should become one. Because God’s love is one, and because God beholds beauty in oneness, God’s interest and affection cannot differ among the lands He created.
Interracial marriage is a symbol of God’s love and will. Even the secular world recognizes that love does not respect national borders. How much more is it true in God’s dominion?
God’s love is fundamentally different from the tragic bonds of love formed in a world historically dominated by power and authority. God’s love does not just seek individual security and self-interest. It is the way of dedication for the benefit of God, the world and all humankind. (Blessing and Ideal Family 6.4.3)
For the sake of peace and human welfare, I propose that we build a passage for transit across the Bering Strait, where Satan has historically divided East and West, and North and South, and where the North American and Russian land masses are separated.
This passage, which I call the “World Peace King Bridge and Tunnel,” will link an International Highway System that will allow people to travel on land from Africa’s Cape of Good Hope to Santiago, Chile, and from London to New York, across the Bering Strait, connecting the world as a single community. God is warning that He will no longer tolerate separation and division.
Carrying out this project will bind the world together as one village. It will tear down the manmade walls of race, culture, religion and country, and establish the world of peace that has been God’s cherished desire. The United States and Russia can become as one.
The European Union, China, India, Japan, Brazil and all nations, and also the world’s religions, can combine their energies to succeed in this project.
The success of this project will be decisive in establishing the kingdom of the peaceful, ideal world, where people will no longer make war with each other.24 (September 12, 2005)
Sun Myung Moon