Hak Ja Han and Sun Jin Moon
December 5, 2015
True Family Values Ministry Awards Banquet
Sun Jin Moon
Respected and beloved government and civic leaders -- especially the members of the clergy who represent not only the Christian family of faiths but also the wider family of religions -- it is my honor to be with you today for this True Family Values Banquet, convened here in Chicago, and celebrating twenty years of the True Family Values Ministry.
I want to acknowledge the members of the American Clergy Leadership Conference who are here today, as well as representatives of FFWPU, UPF and other NGOs.
If you are like me -- and I am sure you are -- not a day that goes by when you do not wonder where our world is headed. It sometimes seems as if our world is falling apart. On the one hand, we are facing the impact of climate change, which threaten the viability of the planet, including the quality of our air, water and the food chain. In addition, the conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Ukraine and the terror attacks in Europe, here in our homeland and other places are threatening global order and stability. Additionally, in the communities and on the streets of America’s cities there are cries for justice as gun violence and shootings darken the headlines.
Sometimes the challenges of life can seem almost too much to bear. However, if we reflect on the power of love, faith, benevolence and goodness, we open up to the light. We begin to appreciate heroes among us who, by their examples, their vision and their words, show us the way out of the darkness and lead us to the light. They give us hope. To all of the heroes in this room -- men and women and families of faith, love, and goodness who serve a higher purpose and live to create a world of peace and one family under God -- today I thank you all for being our American heroes of peace.
Two major people in my life have always inspired me, even in the darkest times. They are my parents, and to the worldwide family our True Parents have lived sincere lives of absolute faith in God, lived with an unwavering will to serve humanity and instill a global consciousness of good, with fearless determination, absolute love and selfless devotion for the sake of humankind and creation. There is no other person on earth who can match my father’s life example -- may God bless him -- since his ascension three years ago. But if ever there was a woman of absolute pure love, devotion, faith and goodness that was his balance, his counterpart, the complete harmony of true love in life -- that would be my mother.
She has devoted her life, family, and spent over fifty years in their public mission to serve humankind. She is my light and amazing example of true love. She is my hero.
Despite losing her husband of fifty-two years and the father to their fourteen children; despite being now in this physical world without the irreplaceable half that makes her whole; and despite losing her one and only true love, my mother, True Mother, never stops to focus on, or complain about, her own difficulties. On the contrary, she always looks to ease the pain of others, giving out love and hope, and calling us all to embrace a victorious future, building one universal family under God, our Heavenly Parent.
My mother, Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon, asked me to represent her today and to present her message, which she wanted to share with you. She could not be here, but her heart is with us. In addition, my father’s heart is our eternal light and he is always with us. He is looking down on us from the spiritual world. I am sure he is smiling and sending loving blessings to you all. Please bear with me now as I do my best to present my mother’s message.
Excerpts from Hak Ja Han's Message (read by Sun Jin Moon)
The fulfillment of our Heavenly Parent’s ideal of creation is rooted in family values. However, we see that those values are rapidly deteriorating. It was in order to firmly establish true family values and fulfill our Heavenly Parents’ will to establish one family under God that my late husband, Rev. Sun Myung Moon, and I began our providential work in the United States in 1971. Since that time, we have devoted ourselves to advocating true family ideals and God’s ideals.
Heaven especially prepared and blessed the US, so it could become a pillar of the global providence of restoration. However, my husband and I could see the tragic deterioration of family values in America. Therefore, in 1996, we invited more than five thousand religious leaders from all over America to Washington, D.C. to awaken the nation, teaching them about the absolute centrality of true family values. This educational program was to inspire the religious leaders who had gathered on that occasion to resolve to participate in a great movement that could save America by restoring true family values centered on God, our Heavenly Parent.
I know that many of you seated here today have dedicated yourselves to this great endeavor. It is through your devotion, your efforts through these many years, that the movement has grown and that now we are able to celebrate this meaningful twentieth anniversary. I would like to offer my heartfelt gratitude for your tremendous work. I would also like to congratulate today’s award recipients.
We are born in the bosom of the family and we grow within the family. The family is our origin, our school of love. The universal truth and values embedded in the family transcend religion, culture, race and nationality.
With the Fall, our Heavenly Parent’s ideal of creation was unfulfilled. As a result, Heavenly Parent was unable to experience the happiness of true love within an ideal family. Furthermore, throughout the course of fallen history, true family values were trampled on, swept away into oblivion.
If we consider the history of the rise and fall of civilizations, we observe the decline of family contributes to civilization’s decline. For example, we can generally agree that Western civilization traces to Hebraism and Hellenism. As great as these traditions are, they tended to emphasize the individual more than the family. They did not find a clear vision for an ideal family, nor a forceful declaration of true family values rooted in Heavenly Parent’s ideal of creation. Eventually as Western civilization increasingly raised individualistic ideals and philosophies, a culture centered on individualism emerged. Contrary to God’s will, belief that the basic unit of all relationships in society and the nation was the family has all but disappeared. Instead, the basic unit became the individual. All relationships, including that between parent and child, came to be defined as a type of legal, contractual relationship, similar to that which exists between a ruler and citizens.
This was a grave error. Once one views the relationship between parent and child fundamentally in contractual terms, involving personal interests of the parent and child, the relationship separates from heavenly morality and enters the realm of mere human morality. Today, the human family is divided and in the throes of war are on every level. We are fighting every living being and creation, arming ourselves for eco-wars, religious wars, territorial wars, political wars, racial wars and community shootings in our backyard. Our hometown has become a war zone.
Hardened hearts
When we witness these heinous crimes against the human family, we are heartbroken. We struggle to empathize with the devastating pain of God’s heart. Anyone can say that the world we live in today is not an ideal world in which we all live in peace and harmony with our global brothers and sisters as one family under God. I believe that the root cause of these problems lies in the loss of true family values. Our Heavenly Parent blessed the US with the mission of establishing not only one nation under God but one family under God.
Today, this ideal is alive despite the erosion of family values, which is threatening the very foundation of this nation. Divorce rates exceeding 50 percent are directly undermining the sanctity of marriage and family. Unprecedented liberal issues about sex amongst teenagers and free sex among young people are seriously shaking the core of this nation. Aware and concerned of this sad reality, Rev. Moon and I answered heaven’s call to come and heal an ailing America. In 1971, Rev. Moon left our homeland to come to America. Throughout his years here, he devoted himself to restoring America’s moral and spiritual roots in order to revive this great nation. As he toured the US, from shore to shore, he boldly proclaimed that God had sent him in the role of the doctor, the role of the firefighter. That is why he came to America.
America’s rise and decline
Beloved leaders, the Founding Fathers of this nation risked their lives and fought a David versus Goliath battle for independence against Britain with their hope and trust in God. In their hearts and minds, God was everything.
The king and British soldiers united and fought for their empire; however, the Founding Fathers united and fought to advance God’s will. Their sincerity and sacrifice moved heaven. As a result, our Heavenly Parent answered the call of his sons and daughters, who were fighting bravely in this great conflict. As a result, the United States of America, the land of religious freedom was born.
America boldly showed the world that despite having people of many different languages and cultures, building one nation under God and eventually one family under our Heavenly Parent is possible. Unfortunately, the holiness that once characterized America had fallen into decline. Influenced by selfcenteredness, a materialistic culture was weakening spirituality and morality; thus, America had grown increasingly secular. This was shaking its core foundation. Rev. Moon could see that God had become distant in the hearts of people. Even in families, in schools and some churches, feeling Heavenly Parent’s loving presence had become difficult. God was leaving America.
Looking back, it only seemed like yesterday when, fifty years ago, Rev. Moon and I walked down Manhattan’s Fifth Ave with tears in our eyes, and felt that God, our Heavenly Parent, was leaving America. I vividly remember us crying our hearts out when we held onto God in desperation. With that heart, we pledged our absolute determination to lead a spiritual awakening in this nation.
Beloved leaders, what became of America’s founding principles, the Christian ideals that had led to the birth of the nation? Two thousand years ago, Jesus was born as the begotten son and Messiah. What were his ideals and what was his mission?
Jesus’s mission was to establish the kingdom of God and to build one great, global family under our Heavenly Parent. As the only begotten son, he was to meet the only begotten daughter Heaven had prepared, hold the marriage supper of the Lamb, and form a family, tribe, people, nation and world that would lead to the fulfillment of God’s original ideal of creation.
Tragically, due to the faithlessness of the people at that time, Jesus faced great resistance and persecution and was unable to meet the only begotten daughter prepared for him. Therefore, he could not hold the marriage supper of the Lamb and could not establish the position of True Parents at that time. Even though Jesus, together with the Holy Spirit, brings spiritual salvation to humanity, the ideal of True Parents, the ideal of the king and queen of peace had yet to be fulfilled.
This is why Jesus had to promise, even as he hung on the cross, that he would come again. Jesus’s profound anguish was expressed when he said in Matthew 23:37, “How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not.” These words still resonate deep within my heart.
In 2003, we organized a program in Jerusalem to honor and crown Jesus as the king of peace. We wanted to restore his having been misunderstood and rejected two thousand years ago. Also, since the cross was a sorrowful reminder that he was not received by the people of his time, we also engaged in a global movement to take down crosses in the churches. However, these endeavors alone did not completely free our Heavenly Parent and Jesus from the historical pain and sorrow. In fact, we now understand that two thousand years of Christianity has been the providential course to eventually find the only begotten daughter, fulfill the marriage supper of the Lamb, and establish the long awaited position of True Parents.
The Holy Wedding
In 1960, Rev. Moon and I, standing in the presence of God in the position of the only begotten son and only begotten daughter prepared by Heaven, received the holy marriage blessing as the True Parents. Since the Holy Wedding, our lives have been focused on following goals to liberate our Heavenly Parent, who is the cosmic True Parent, restore his lost position as our parent, and save fallen and lost human beings from the realm of death and suffering. To achieve this ideal, Rev. Moon and I to overcame unspeakable hardships and innumerable difficulties.
Beloved leaders, you have witnessed the kind of life my husband and I have led in order to realize our Heavenly Parent’s will. You are aware of the sincere effort we have made to save and revive this nation, which Heaven has blessed. I am certain that your truthful eyes and your truthful ears have helped you understand for whom and for what ideals we dedicated our lives.
Stand together for God
Beloved leaders, let us stand up for our Heavenly Parent, who throughout human history has anxiously searched for his lost children. Let us remember the Pilgrim Fathers, who with their childlike hearts desperately seeking for their Heavenly Parent travelled thousands of miles across treacherous seas and settled in America during the harshest of winters. Let us remember the people who came to this country from all over the world in search of religious freedom. Let us remember how they overcame persecution and suffering, so that America could take root as a land of faith. Let us remember their ardent devotion and sincere faith and their lofty aspirations. God, our Heavenly Parent, abundantly blessed America as a pillar of his providence. Let this beautiful nation once again attend Heavenly Parent. Let us revive and transform America into a nation where ideals of family are alive, a nation where Heavenly Parent can freely move, dance and sing together with us.
If you devote yourselves to fulfilling this goal, Heaven and the unified nation of Cheon Il Guk will certainly remember each and every one of you.
