On November 1 (October 1, Heavenly Calendar), a Pledge Service was held at Shoto Headquarters in Shibuya, Tokyo, to celebrate the 65th True Children’s Day and the 37th Foundation Day for the nation of the Unified Cosmos. Main speaker, President Tomihiro Tanaka, encouraged the participants to “make True Children’s Day a precious opportunity to reflect on whether we are children worthy of facing True Parents.”
Editorial Department
Congratulations on the 65th True Children’s Day and the 37th Foundation Day for the nation of the Unified Cosmos. (Applause)
True Children’s Day was proclaimed on this day in 1960 (October 1, Heavenly Calendar).
In preparation for this day, we have been doing a 40-day course, which ended yesterday. I hope that it was filled with grace, and that you were able to feel Heaven’s guidance.
During this period, I had several opportunities to meet True Mother. Whenever I meet with her, I feel as if I am being asked, “What kind of child am I before the Parents?” It is as if I am always confronted with this question.
I have been praying before Heaven for the occasion of True Children’s Day. I would like to share three things that I was made to think about during this time.
To become the person who has the true nature to be a child of God and True Parents
The first is: what is the position of a child that we should be standing in.
The Family Church Handbook explains the providential significance of True Children’s Day as follows:
True Children’s Day is the day in which the victorious True Parents were established and the standard was set globally and cosmically for fallen humankind to receive the blessing and reborn. In other words, it is a memorable day when humankind was able to change their lineage from Satan’s to God’s, and were allowed to register as God’s children.
During these past forty days, I was grateful, yet again, for the True Parents of humankind being established, and I am deeply indebted because of that grace. If the True Parents had not been established, True Children’s Day would not have existed. It goes without saying that this day could be proclaimed because of True Parents’ victory and we are now welcomed as children of God.
The terms “parents” and “children” are contrasting concepts. If there are no children, people are not parents, and if there are no parents, people are not children. The fact that they are contrasting concepts means that both are needed to supplement each other.
The parents’ joy is also the children’s. The child’s victory is also the parents’. Indeed, parents and children are a perfect “pair” that complement each other.
God intended to rejoice by having human beings fulfill the three great blessings. For this purpose, He began creating heaven and earth. God, the Parent, wanted to rejoice by seeing His children grow up and establish a happy family. He sought to gain even more pleasure from seeing them enjoy and righteously govern all things. That is where God’s Principle of Creation lies.
The greater the joy, the greater the sorrow caused by the fall of Adam and Eve, the progenitors of humankind. The fall undid the joy He was feeling and things did a 180 from there. Six thousand years of history passed where He was the “God in confinement” looking over a world filled with resentment.
True Parents’ life has been spent liberating this kind of God. They established the tradition of hyojeong and restored the position of parents where God should have originally been in. This was the path of True Father and the path of True Mother.
Are they the parents at the family level, clan level, national level, world level, or cosmic level? What do you think?
God’s state has changed along with the providence. Immediately after True Father’s seonghwa, True Mother said the following:
You all know that 2,000 years ago, Jesus revealed God as “Father,” but because of that the Jews said he had blasphemed God, and he suffered the way of the cross. However, True Parents substantially completed the restoration through indemnity on earth and restored God as the innate Creator—in other words, the dignity and glory as the True Parents in charge of Heaven, Earth, and humankind.”
Today’s World Japan, Nov. 2012, Japanese ed., p. 10
It means that the major purpose of True Parents’ life as God’s son and daughters was to restore God to His glory as Parent.
We have been allowed to stand in the position of God’s children who have inherited His lineage. When we consider the relationship between Parent and His children as an internal contrasting concept, I feel that we must ask whether we are entities worthy of being His counterpart and at what level we have become His children, when we face the Parent.
Are we children that are able to stand before the Parent at the family level, the national level, or the cosmic level? True Mother is walking on the front lines of the providence to welcome God, as the Parent, on earth next April 13. With how much thought have we put in to preparing ourselves to be the entities worthy of being in the position of children before the Parent? In order to face this matter, it is necessary for us to be completely united with Mother and pray fervently at the Cheon Shim Won Special Prayer Room.
I hope today can be a day where all of you can clarify the position and state that you should be standing in as His child, and make the determination to take on this challenge.
Facing the domain of the crux of Parent’s forgiveness and the domain of the crux of Parent’s love
The second thing I’d like to share is about the Heavenly Parent’s (God’s) persistent love of over 6,000 years.
God is the Parent of humankind, and He is the One who never gives up. He wants all of His children to come back, up to the last person.
The Bible tells the story of a lone sheep separated from the ninety-nine others (Matthew 18:10-14) and the return of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32). Every day, I feel that God’s persistence in love will never disappear until every last person has been recovered. And when I meet with True Mother, I feel these vibrations even more strongly.
Recently, I read the autobiography of our senior member, Dr. Kim Hyo-yul (777 couple). In it, he described several episodes about True Parents’ trip to North Korea on November 30, 1991.
On this occasion, they had received a letter of invitation from North Korean Vice Premier Kim Dal -hyun, and Yun Ki Bok, Chairman of the Overseas Koreans Assistance Committee of the DPRK. However, there was no mention of any meeting with President Kim Il Sung.
The attendants were conflicted and nervous, wondering if they should go to the North under such circumstances. He confided that even though True Parents were in Hawaii preparing for the trip to North Korea, he remained conflicted about the situation.
At that time, Kim mentions that True Father said this about the visit:
The way to meeting the son of the enemy is not to have him take care of us, but to give him the best we have.
(Kim Hyo-yul, The Grace of Service: Days Spent with True Parents, Japanese ed., Cheon Won Publishing, p. 54)
All of the attendants were drawn into True Father’s strong and loving persistence. They were no longer distracted by whether or not they would be able to meet President Kim Il Sung, and they were able to head to the North with courage. The visit to North Korea was truly heaven’s providence that was filled with love and forgiveness of the Parents.
True Mother’s autobiography states the following:
Before setting foot in North Korea, we had to resolve any painful feelings knotted up in our hearts. We had to forgive Kim Il Sung, whose regime had hurt the nation and world, not to mention our extended family and ourselves. If we had thought of him only as our enemy, we could not have forgiven him. Only in the position of his parents, only with the heart of his mother, could I forgive. To save her own son sentenced to death, a mother will even try to change the laws of her country. That is what the maternal heart is like. With that heart, I pledged to forgive my enemy. I did not pray for our safe return from North Korea.
Mother of Peace, p. 191
Thus, on the path of restoration, Parents have only one weapon. There is only forgiveness. I feel this when I am face to face with True Mother. No matter what happens, the last option True Mother has is to forgive. She waits for he children to repent, rise up, and start anew. This image of her screams, “God will not leave the word ‘enemy’ in the dictionary. Everything needs to be forgiven and every person needs to be restored,” and you can feel the Parents’ persistence in love.
Parents forgive us again and again in this way, but it goes without saying that we must not take it for granted. As I have said before, unless we understand and accept this forgiveness correctly, we will not be able to be children who can properly stand before Parents.
Today, I would like to read the Bible as well to deepen our understanding of forgiveness.
So He got into a boat, crossed over, and came to His own city. Then behold, they brought to Him a paralytic lying on a bed. When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, “Son, be of good cheer; your sins are forgiven you.” And at once some of the scribes said within themselves, “This Man blasphemes!” But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, “Why do you think evil in your hearts? For which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Arise and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins”—then He said to the paralytic, “Arise, take up your bed, and go to your house.” And he arose and departed to his house. Now when the multitudes saw it, they marveled and glorified God, who had given such power to men.
Matthew 9:1-8
The scribes and the people saw God’s authority through the miracle of the paralytic standing up. Jesus dared to perform miracles for those who could only feel God’s authority in that way. But the real authority of God was not in the miracles, but in the authority of forgiveness and the authority of the love of Parents.
This scripture reminds us to what extent children should understand and realize the world of forgiveness and love of Parents. I believe that each of us, as children, must face the domain of the crux of forgiveness and the crux of love of the Parents.
I am sure there are people here who participate in the Cheon Shim Won Special Night Vigil Prayers every night. You must have heard many miraculous testimonies of illnesses being cured, family problems being resolved, and so on.
Through those testimonies, we realize the power and the greatness of God, but we must be aware that experiencing miracles is not our goal. We need to experience what is behind those miracles, which is the deep love and forgiveness of God that wants to bring back all of His children. Let us set this as our goal and continue to do our utmost with sincerity.
True Mother’s boundless love has been poured into Cheon Shim Won. Mother has prepared Cheon Shim Won so that we can meet True Father. Cheon Shim Won is Father’s office on earth. It is the place for our spiritual enlightenment, the main hall of spiritual works, and the main hall for education.
As I see the second generation community being educated through the Cheon Shim Won Special Night Vigil Prayers, I feel more and more convinced that this is how heaven’s providence is moving forward. And every day, I feel that they want to be children who can witness the love and forgiveness of Parents who are behind Cheon Shim Won.
It has already been announced that a special grace will be granted next April. The special grace, which will cover all blessed families and all members, will not be granted lightly.
God will be welcomed as the Parent on earth, and a completely new era will begin, which has not been seen in the long history of humankind. For this reason, we have prepared a new type of music that is not conventional. In addition, new sacred paintings are being created to convey the Great Epic of the Chosen Korean People to the entire world.
True Mother announced early on that there would be a special grace with the hope that we would “reevaluate the history of the Chosen Korean People from a new perspective, and become members and blessed families suitable for this new culture. We must understand this and work hard to become children who can face heaven’s love and forgiveness that lies behind the special grace.
Testify about True Parents with our example and convey the truth of the Family Federation
The third point I’d like to mention is about our responsibility as children standing in the Heavenly Parent’s lineage. As mentioned earlier, parents and children are contrasting concepts. Therefore, no matter how great the parents are, the ultimate victory for parents depends on the victory of the children. “The dreams of parents are to be fulfilled by their children.” This is another truth.
The other day, I met with Ms. Yeon-ah Moon. She told me this:
“Since Mother announced that she was the Only Begotten Daughter, there have been many difficulties. Difficulties also arose in the True Parents’ family. At first I wondered how much better off we would be if Mother had never mentioned it. I felt very distant from Mother.
“Mother is risking her life to proclaim the Only Daughter. There is only one purpose. It is to welcome God on Earth as the Parent. The Heavenly Father alone is not enough. God cannot become the Parent unless humankind is firmly confronted with the Heavenly Mother. In order to restore this Parent, Mother has been working on it, even willing to be misunderstood.”
In addition, True Mother said this to me:
“Tanaka! No matter how hard you try, there’s no way for Japan. The only way for Japan to survive is to become one with me. Peace will never come without Parents. If Japan wants to become a peaceful country, it must become one with me. If you want to attract fortune, you have to be one with me.”
I answered, “Yes!” and turned to receive all of True Mother’s vibrations. Then, Mother asked, “Do you know why I want to educate the leaders of Japan about the Great Epic of the Chosen Korean People?”
When I was at a loss on how to respond, True Mother continued, “I want Japan to cooperate with us toward the unification of North and South Korea. However, we must be clearly aware of how Japan has been involved in the history of the Chosen People of Korea before we get involved. If you look at the history of the Korean people, Japan owes a debt to heaven. You must be fully aware of this fact. The way to overcome this is to become one with me.”
So how should we educate the Japanese people? With our example, we must testify about True Parents and convey the truth of the Family Federation. This is the important mission we have been charged with, to link Japan to Heaven.
About two weeks ago, I heard the testimony of Mr. An Ho-yeol, who previously served as the public relations officer of the Family Federation in Korea. When he was appointed to that position, he asked True Father how he should go about with PR. True Father told him, “Your life, your lifestyle, that is how you promote (the Family Federation).” The reality of being a child who bears the Heavenly Parent is how to promote (the Family Federation).
The Family Federation in Japan is still under severe scrutiny from society. We have entered into a legal battle regarding the request for a dissolution order. It is our example that can create an environment to turn these situations around. As True Mother emphasizes, “The members are Heaven’s treasure and weapon,” let us convey the truth of the Family Federation to as many people as possible through our example.
Many VIPs who support us are gaining more and more strength by being exposed to members who lead by example. Seeing how different the members are from media reports (painting them in a bad light), they are becoming more convinced in validating their support for us.
Let us be the ones who create an inspirational ripple in people’s hearts
I would like to share another memorable scene from Dr. Kim Hyo-yul’s autobiography.
On July 20, 1984, True Father was imprisoned in Danbury Prison in America. When Dr. Kim met with Father one day at Danbury and reported to him that many pastors had established a coalition and were fighting for religious freedom, Father told him this:
When you throw a stone into a deep river, the stone sinks instantly and disappears, but the ripples on the surface of the water continue to spread. The sunken stone has not disappeared forever. It exists at the bottom of the river. I am sitting here in prison, at the bottom of society, but the ripples I caused are now spreading from heart to heart among hundreds of thousands and millions of Christians and all those with a conscience.
The Grace of Service: Days Spent with True Parents, Japanese ed., pp. 163-164
A stone that can continue to live with dignity in the center of the ripples. We must become such an example. I strongly feel that I want to be that person who can create ripples that inspire people and stand at the center of such ripples.
In front of us is the substance of True Mother. Once again, when you stand as children before the True Parents of humankind, please ask yourself which level of parents you are facing. How do you view Mother: the Parent at the family level, at the national level, or at the cosmic level?
We are celebrating the day of True Children’s Day. Let us make this day a precious opportunity to reflect on whether we are worthy children of True Parents.
There are only two months left this year. True Mother is continuing to traverse the course with the heart as if one day were a thousand years, focusing on one goal: the entrance ceremony into Cheon Won Gung and Cheon Il Sanctum, which will be held on April 13 of next year.
Let us connect our hearts to True Mother’s thoughts through prayer. And I sincerely hope that this will be a place where we can make a decision and depart in a manner befitting a child.