Heaven in Spirit World Emerges from Heaven on Earth

Historically, people called by God were over fifty or sixty years old, worn out and one step away from death.

God used such people at that time, but knew He would work with the younger generation in the future.  Therefore, God was concerned about how to develop His providence through the young people.

Buddha was able to proclaim that he was his own lord throughout heaven and earth.  A person who becomes a complete object partner of God after disciplining himself to achieve oneness of mind and body, he can become his own lord.

“Once, I felt that I was grasping the world tightly in my hand, and it seemed to melt. When you reach this level, miracles can happen automatically. The curing of diseases comes as a natural result of religious life.”

Most people today go about their lives just waking up and eating and going about a daily routine and think they are fine in God’s eyes.

However, unless they are acknowledged as a partner to God and become owners of heaven, they are not fine in front of God.

Satan remains in the place where a person has not established an absolute faith.

Many religions say that heaven will be established by the their church and their founder’s teachings.  This is a fantasy.

Christianity is divided into hundreds of different denominations.  They call other churches heretical or satanic, but they do not do so from the authorization of God.

If churches judge other churches for their own benefit, then their motivation is not pure.
If our church does this, it will also decline.

Even the spirit world has been divided by walls. 

Buddhists and Confucians are separated by walls.

The barriers are overcome by a higher standard from God’s heart.  All the walls from the lowest to the higher realms must be broken down in reverse order.

The walls that separate ancestors and people from many thousand of years ago must be broken down.

All the walls on the earth must be eliminated and a true path connected to liberate hell must be paved.  Otherwise, the gates of heaven cannot be opened.

Members must be a better person than Buddha, than Confucius and even better than Jesus.

Before, religion had a purpose to only save the individual. Our purpose is family salvation.  This is the difference between Unificationism and other religions.

For salvation we are saving the family. When we go to heaven we are not going alone. 

No one can enter heaven alone.

Only after the ideal of a true couple is realized can heaven come about.  Therefore, in order to go to heaven, fallen human beings must go through  restoration and resurrection.


To give the Marriage Blessing to you is to open wide the gates of heaven.


“Through the Blessing, I am opening the closed gates of heaven for you.”

Jesus taught that the Kingdom of heaven was in our hearts.  But Jesus was miserable when he could not proclaim that that heaven was in our families.

When you have a family, you can sing with happiness that we can live in this way.

Yet Jesus who was God’s pure Son could not even dream of having a family necessary for heaven.

Jesus trodden a sacrificial path for three years in order to awaken to the fact that heaven within our hearts.  But then he was crucified.  Now, there is no heaven on earth.

The tracks of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth and those in the Kingdom of Heaven in the spirit world are the same.

In order for a train to pass the border of one country into the next, the tracks must match so the train continues running.

Likewise, the tracks on earth and in heaven should be connected.

The path of true love connects the rails from earth so the family can be the embodiment of love and go directly to heaven nonstop.

Therefore, the individual path should connect to the family’s path going in the same direction.

We are destined to go to the spirit world whether we like it or not. 

We are each like wanderers that move closer to that destination.

The biggest issue is whether you lived a life for others while on earth for just for yourself.  If you live more for others, you go to heaven, if you lived more for yourself, you go to hell.

This basic formula may be argued given your present situation, but when you die, you will know that this is the truth.

People went to different levels in the spirit world. They went to the position that correlates to the degree they have practiced filial piety according to the way of love.  How much they pledged their loyalty to their nation and fulfilled the way of a saint in the world.

People should take the path of righteousness while on earth. The path for the individual, family, tribe, nation and world or God should be one and the same path.
What is that path?

It is the path of original love.

Which world do you think you will go to in the end?  Are you going to heaven or hell?

On the way there are you the kind of person that says, “Father, please help me!” or a person who says, “Welcome, True Father!”?  That is a matter of life and death.

After marriage, you made a pledge to live happily.

“When I say live you should live well, it means that you should become an unchanging couple. In order to become like that, you should go to the ever-changing world and receive training together.

“You should keep your promises even if you go to a world where people are divided, north and south or in all four directions. You should maintain such a well-trained position.”

Children born of true parents as Adam and Eve should have become by following God’s Word, are true children not false, sinful children.

From such children, a true family, a true tribe, nation and world is created.

People in this world will live a heavenly way of life with God.  This is the only way that this earth becomes the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.

You should not think you are entitled to go to heaven. 

You should focus on building heaven on earth as Jesus came to do.

Also, you must become a heavenly person and become united with Heavenly Father to the point that Father’s heart is your heart.

You should be a representative of God’s heart, the Lord’s heart and the heart of your ancestors.  Through this, the historical problems will be solved.

If a person is on their death bed and they tell God, “God, even though I could not live according to Your will until this moment, I tried to go to heaven in my mind.  Please regard me as making the proper indemnity conditions!”

Since God is a fair God, He will reward the person according to his actions, placing him in a position of wanting to go to heaven.  That position can be just below paradise.

Even people in hell are trying to go to heaven.

You  alone are responsible for deciding the actions you commit while you are on earth. And make any recompense for any wrongdoings.

If this door is closed, no one else can open it again for eternity, only you can be responsible for it.
If the door is opened, no one except you can close it again.

If what is bound on earth is bound in heaven, then it should be released while you are on earth. What does this mean?  For instance, if you did a wrongful act and did not compensate or ask for forgiveness for it while on earth, then you will ever be bound to that sin when you go to spirit world.

You will be bound to it.

Therefore, when you go witnessing now, you should witness to your family members and relatives.

If you can claim that you love the billions of people on earth more than your own mother and father who gave birth to you, then you are able to love in an unified position within the realm of God’s love.
Then you will stand in a position not be related to the satanic world.

An original person is someone who is not related to Satan, establishes a family based on the love of the ideal couple and goes directly to heaven after his life on earth.  A world of families such as this would be called the Kingdom of Heaven on earth where people live the ideals of the heavenly kingdom.

Therefore, the fact that Peter was given the keys to the gates of heaven means that heaven is first to be established on earth.  Everyone should know this clearly.


Photos courtesy: freedigitalphotos.net

Return for Tomorrow’s Post: Jesus Wasn’t  to be God’s Only True Son

This post was rewritten and derived from the religious book Cheon Seong Gyeong, Book Six, Chapter two, Section 2.

People Serve Each Other in Heaven

If there is a member of the church whose children wear poorer clothes than their own children, you should not be able to sleep and want to give him clothes.

This is the heart of God, of a parent.

The leading thought of the Unification Church is to have the heart of a parent, wear the clothes of a servant, shed sweat for the earth, tears for humankind and blood for heaven.

Heaven is the world of love where you bring your children.  You receive love and give it out to the universe.

“I love God. I know everything right through from the spirit world to the physical world.”

The heavenly spirit world is mystery it is a place where people go who live according to the principles of existence that God established.

This means living for the sake of others. The ideal heaven is a world that is built based on such heaven.

What should you do in order to prosper?

You must be selfless.

We practice selflessness living for the sake of others. This is the dividing line between heaven and hell.

This is how spirit world is.

You know the dwelling place where people lived for others and for this reason you need to live for others and live the way of thinking of the saints, the teachings of the Savior, and God's way of thinking.

God thinking is to live absolutely for the sake of others.

Smaller things are invested for the greater good.

This is why the family should sacrifice itself for the sake of the tribe; the tribe sacrifice for the people; and the people for the nation; and the nation for the world;

Those who take national property and give it to their families will suffer in hell and will perish.  If they do not go to ruin while here on earth, they will hang upside down in spirit world.

Life on earth and heaven are opposites.

People on earth spend their whole lives centered and lived for their own purposes.

Spirit world is a place where people are supposed to live for the sake of the whole, therefore, by becoming people who can become an object partner to God can say ’amen’ for eternity.

Those who live on earth for their own sake cannot go to heaven. 

What is an evil person?

It is a person who unites everything through himself - not God.

Such a person may seem good by human standards, but is a dictator and a villain.  He goes directly to hell. This is not allowed in the Church.

“The individual must live for the family; the family for the tribe; the tribe for the people; the people for the nation; the nation for the world; the world for the universe; the universe for the cosmos; and the cosmos for
God. Then who does God live for? He lives for you.”

Religion must teach them to live for the sake of others.

The higher the level of the religion, the more strongly it places emphasis on living for  others.  Therefore, we must be meek and lift up many people and live for their sake.

Religion teaches to sacrifice and serve because it is training to conform to the rules of the Kingdom of Heaven.

Once people live on earth, they enter the spirit world.

A person who can go to other countries and live for the people in that country with a heart of a mother, and a heart of a saint to save the world from evil will go to a higher place.

“I think in that way. ‘I am one man, a general who represents sons of filial piety of the historical ages, a general of patriots and of saints.

“Although everyone else who had the name of God's son failed, I was born as a victorious son: There is only one thing that will enable you to say that. It is to live absolutely for others.”

It is simple: those who give and serve others and forget what they have given can digest the fallen world.
There is no one born who can avoid death.

After 80 to 100 years living on earth, people will die.  People who lived on for their own interests, when they go to spirit world they enter hell.  On the other hand, those who lived for others go to heaven.

These two worlds are separated at death.

There is a long line of people, the longest line in the world of people who give their property to heaven.

Therefore, everyone should become penniless and offer everything leaving only tears, mucus and blood to offer only.

“I was like that. There was nothing else left to offer. I offered all my life and property. If you have a savings bankbook for your sons and daughters, should you use that for them? Or should you use it for the salvation of the world?

“Only if you think in that way and act upon it can you participate in the ranks of the Messiah's chosen ones. You should live for others. Live for the whole and for the greater good. Live for the world, for God, and for the liberation of humankind.

"You have to motivate people to change to the new lineage through your efforts.”

In the future, there will be a competition to live for the sake of other people.  Why?  Because those who live for others go to the highest position in the Kingdom of Heaven.  Also, when you live for such a person, you can raise up by using them as your foothold.

Just like a launch pad, you will be launched and fly into the sky.

If you live for the sake of someone, you demonstrate the same motivation that God had in creating His partner in love. 

You stand in the position of loving counterpart to that person

For that reason, follow someone and live for others.

“You work following me, don't you? Aren't you trying to occupy God by leaping upwards to become the object of my love? Is it true, or not? Satellites should be launched towards a destination, shouldn't they? It is the same idea. Satellites are symbolic of today's believers trying to jump up towards the Kingdom of Heaven, crossing thousands and tens of thousands of miles.”

"In the spirit world, people live not just for themselves, but for the whole.  A person who lives for others 100 percent says, ‘Walk over me and go on.”

Even though America is big, if there is someone who lives more for the nation than he, everyone will welcome him even if he steps on the president to do so.  But if someone only lives for themselves, everyone becomes his enemy.

It is the same in the spirit world. If someone lives for a greater cause, he can pass along freely

To go beyond the family level, it is to follow the way of true love by living for other people.

If you are fifty years old and lived for the sake of the salvation of the universe and heaven’s principle for over twenty-five years, you can go to heaven.  You will live in the better part of the spirit world.

But the ones who lived their whole lives centered on their own ideas and own thinking go to the original homeland of evil called hell.

By knowing these facts, you can liquidate your own sinful, fallen past way of living for your own being.

If you make effort to live the rest of your life to live for the sake of others, nation, the world, heaven and earth and God, this follows the path to the ideal world of heaven.

Even when Jesus was about to die, he did not protest but told God as He willed even though Jesus asked for the cup to pass from him.  Jesus was ready without question to offer himself as a complete sacrifice for God’s will.
This attitude brought Jesus closest to God because it enabled him to go deeper.

The one who strikes such a person will be instantly destroyed.  God would personally inflict punishment upon that person.

The person who lives self-centered life can never occupy heaven - he will be in hell.  Even if he was a great minister he will find out how such a life leads to death when he gets to spirit world.

The Unification Church tries to save its enemies and even the communists, but the communists try to torture members.

So, what kind of love should have dominion over the world.  You should not become strong by becoming an evil person.  But, if we become strong based on love that lives for other people, it will be enough to save the world.

Heaven is where you live a life of giving. 

Even God has to give and parents give to their children.

A parent’s mind is such that they want to give and give again when you have something good.

“If I can give one thousand things and forget that I gave, in front of God who gives a hundred things and forgets, God will surely become my partner. Do you know this?”

If a person tries to live for goodness more than God would such a person go to hell or heaven?  He would be in the position to sit with God at the supper table and share meals of love with Him.

“I have experienced the reality of the spirit world more than anyone else.”

Heaven is our original homeland.  The spirit world is a major special field of study.


Return for Tomorrow’s Post: Heaven in Spirit World Emerges from Heaven on Earth

This post was rewritten and derived from the religious book Cheon Seong Gyeong, Book Six, Chapter two, Section 2.

Heaven is a World of Pure Love

Heaven is the world of living for the sake of God

“If I say that heaven is empty, people will think I am demented. But Jesus could not enter heaven. You cannot go there alone. Our original ancestors should have grown through adolescence, established the ideal of love in which God dwelt, become parents and bequeathed the seeds of true love.

“Then the first place they would have entered would have been heaven. But up until now, there have been no parents embodying God's love, who were able to leave the seeds of true love.”

Adam and Eve did not leave such a glorious foundation to have such descendants.  Thus, heaven is empty.
“I have been going this way, enduring persecution for forty years, because I too am greedy to grasp the line of love that leads to the global heaven.

"This was so I could grasp the line of love beyond the individual, family, tribe, people, nation and world. Then, with this in my grasp where will I go?

“After finding the love line of the world, we must go back to our hometown because we have received many blessings and succeeded in life. Shouldn't we go to our hometown and save the unfortunate people there?”


The way to heaven is opened by loving your brothers as God does. You are trying to follow me, but while keeping such a heart you should strive to reach out and bring your brothers with you.

We can conclude that the one who teaches the highest, quickest and best way to go to heaven is neither God nor me, but your brothers.

People of faith scream out about going to heaven, but can people just automatically go to heaven without encountering it first on earth?

In order to enter heaven on earth, you have to go through the law of love.

A family that has many children can restore many sins and the greater the additional cross of loving God’s Kingdom.

A family has many children because they have many responsibilities for the sake of the kingdom.  Children will be born in this family who can inherit good fortune in the generation to come.
What kind of person can enter heaven?

The person who can enter heaven is the one who is one with God’s mind.  They should center on God to the point when God works on His will that person should be in harmony with God’s mind for eternity.

This harmony should not last for just ten years, but eternally align to the eternal God.

How can we find unity with God and be like God?  In order to be His son, you should not appear to be a sad person.  Heaven is established from removing the satanic lifestyle and denying everything that is related to his will and thinking.  Futhermore, we should eliminate him.

To enter heaven, a person must not sin, must receive God's love directly.

A person who can unite completely with God and eliminates Satan, does not need a savior because they will be directly linked to God.

Only when a person such as this goes to heaven can a peaceful world be established.

The future descendants will unite this world and all heaven.  God, the first one, and these descendants are connected by the family.  Not the nation or individual.

When you go to heaven, no one will recognize you because you are an American and you will not be rejected for being from a poor nation. Only the family that can exhibit a true family will be acknowledged. This is the formula.

The warehouse where the fruits of such true families are stored is heaven.

You must practice a life of attendance before attending God.

Those who wholeheartedly attend God while on earth go to heaven.  This is our destiny to follow the course that advances toward the world of heavenly purpose.

You cannot enter heaven without being joined in heart. 

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Heaven is the original nation, the which can have dominion over the whole of humanity.

This nation had the original godly nature, not the fallen nature of today.  

Only people who have a deep bond of heart can posses such a nation.  Christianity deals with heart.  God is creating a foundation where we share our heart beyond our personal circumstances and live for others.

What kind of place is heaven?

Is heaven for those who just want to seek blessings?  No, it is for those who prepared themselves attending God with their whole heart while on earth.  They leave their life of attendance as their legacy and continue to push forward even if they were to die in the process.

It is where you can take pride in what you prepared during your life on earth, and where you take pride in your life of attendance?

We should think seriously about the importance of how we should live from now on in this life of attendance.
Dr. Lee Sang-hun talks about the reality of the spirit world.  He saw heaven and said it is bright wherever you go.

Heaven is where God's light of love shines into all  corners of the universe, and all creation within its bosom. 

If we are liberated from Satan’s hold and let go of all their resentments, we should shout out for liberation!
To enter heaven, you must be united with God and the Messiah of the Second Coming’s true love.

Now that the True Parents have emerged and restored the fallen act of the first parents on earth, those related to children who are born from God’s lineage can go to heaven.

Up until this era, no one has been able to live such a life and go to spirit world.  Therefore, heaven is empty.

Even one who goes to church service for a hundred years, but they have a self-centered mind, they can never enter heaven or salvation.  A person who centers everything on him or herself has no value.

What kind of person is a true person?

Only the one who invests all of themselves including is own life for the sake of other people can live continuously in the realm of God’s love.

The great people of history and saints lived in this way.   This is the way we were all meant to live.


Return for Tomorrow’s Post: People Serve Each Other in Heaven

This post was rewritten and derived from the religious book Cheon Seong Gyeong, Book Six, Chapter two, Section 2.

What Kind of Place is Heaven?

What kind of place is Heaven?

It is a place where God’s love dwells at the core.  It is the realm where the environment of God’s love is established.

The kind of person that lives here is one who can harmonize with His love.

Since heaven is the world where we live for the sake of other people, you have to go based on this concept.

If you only want to be served, you will be destroyed. 

Heaven is filled with God’s love.

Heaven is different from the secular world.  We are taught by religion to live for the sake of others, be obedient to sacrifice and serve.  The secular world does not have such teachings.

This was God’s secret strategy against Satan so people could receive a good fortune, even though they are unaware of the heavenly law.

You go to heaven on the tracks of love. 

Love is not like elastic, so when it is pulled, it will not be thinned.

The more the line of love is pulled, the thicker it becomes.  Therefore, when one becomes the king of suffering for the sake of God’s will, this is a secret weapon to occupy the world.

What kind of world is heaven?

It is not a world where people treat each other with animosity, jealousy or turn green over another’s fortune or happiness.



One person's success represents the success of the whole.


A person’s joy is not for himself only, but can be shared by the whole.

Heaven is such a place where people can be pleased over other’s happiness and everyone can join in and rejoices in other’s rejoices.

In heaven, you smell through the air of love.  There is no place in heaven that does not throb with life.
   
Since people in heaven would be from God’s pure lineage, when God is sad, then the entire spirit world living as a cell would feel sad.  Also, when God feels joy, everyone would feel the same.

This is how God’s love moves throughout the Kingdom of Heaven.  The world responds to this love and becomes artistically beautiful through the relationship between the elements of creation which are all connected by lineage.

If God is happy, you are happy; if God is sad, you are sad. 

Will we struggle in heaven?

Wouldn’t that world be boring?  What would we do there?  When you eat, you should do so feeling love.

 You should wear clothes feeling love -live feeling love and travel embodying God’s essential love.

If we do not live in this way daily feeling God’s love, there will be no harmony.

A person who lives in this way where they occupy God’s essential love, they will occupy a high place in spirit world.

Why does God exist?

He came into being and lives through true love.  For this reason, we were born and live because of true love.

True love expressed through human beings is the blossoming of absolute value. 

God and human beings do not have a reason to complain when we live in this way.

Human beings are the flower of the universe; with true love as the center, both sides become one.

The right and left sides will both scream out in joy with their hands in the air. Everyone unites and releases a fragrance.

While we are on earth, we train to attend God.  We should attune with other peoples’ minds.

Siblings with the same mind live together in the spirit world. If  you aren't trained to live like that in this world, there will be a collision in the next world.

God is absolute; there is no forgiveness if you deviate from the Principle.

You should be in accord with peoples’ minds and harmonize with them.

When one perfects his character, he makes friends wherever he goes and can be at hoe anywhere including God’s throne.

How do you go to heaven?

You have to be crazy for God’s love. You have to love God more than Adam and Eve, love Jesus more than Peter.

If you are not able to reach this level of loving, then the realm where God can love cannot be restore.


Do not worry that you have no money. Do not worry that you have no children. If you continuously follow this path for ten or twenty years, you will be able to scale very high and steep mountains.

You may feel when you walk this religious path that you only go through hardships and gradually decline, but actually, you are moving higher and higher.

By being persecuted, the church becomes bigger.

One in the family who is being constantly persecuted for the common good, can become the master of that family.  In other words, he becomes an owner in the Kingdom of Heaven.


Return for Tomorrow’s Post: Heaven is a World of Pure Love

This post was rewritten and derived from the religious book Cheon Seong Gyeong, Book Six, Chapter two, Section 2.

Most Successful Marriages Center on God

Marriage is a major and indispensable step toward knowing God. 

Marriage is holy because it partakes and mirrors God’s true nature and the creative process.

Marriage is an ordained blessing and an eternal covenant with God.  Therefore, it should be treated as a sacred institution.  Marriage should be undertaken with seriousness, binding vows and promises.

Divorce, infidelity, sex without the commitment of marriage are frowned upon and profanes the sacred grounds of holy marriage.

Marriage propels people into a whole new realm of spiritual/physical being—the spouse’s realm of heart. 

In the realm of heart within marriage, a couple can transcend toward resembling the heart of God and love more than in any other relationship before.

To try to live in the spouse’s realm of heart without God’s blessing and laws is risky and the relationship will be fraught with difficulties.

Such relationships of love without God bring incredible pain upon each other in the relationship.  This is evidenced by the high divorce rate in developed countries.

Marriages do best centered upon God, connected to the very Source of love. 

Without the foundation of God, these relationships erode easily.

God’s love empowers couples with His true love which men and women need to get through all the difficulties of life together.

If women and men do not tap into this Source of love, they come up short to give and forgive, serve and stay steadfast and faithful to one another throughout the years.

Loving as God Loves

Marriage calls a couple to love just as God loves His children and mature the growth of our heart.

Traditional marriage vows echo the unconditional aspirations of marital love:


“To have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do us part.”


A couple who can love the other day in and day out when conditions are good or bad, and in all aspects of the other’s being, this love resembles the unconditional love of God.

Psychologist Lori Gordon describes conjugal love as “to feel that you can trust another person with your whole being, your laughter, your tears, your rage, your joy . . . . Its essence lies in total certainty that your partner is . . . open to you in body, heart and mind—and knowing that you are accepted and loved for what you really are, and knowing that you don’t have to pretend.”

Loving a spouse in good times and bad stretches a person’s character and capacity to love. 

One husband in a long-term marriage puts it:


“You’ve seen each other in every possible light, the very ugliest and worst and the most evil as well as the most divine and compassionate.”
We can say that marriage is a metaphor for God’s relationship to humanity.

Marriage means to “be open to the call of another without qualification.” It calls for love that is ”the steady gaze on another that does not withdraw simply because they fail to please . . . .”

This mimics the heart of God toward saving humankind.

God likens His relations with His people to the marriage of Hosea.

St. Paul said that Christ relates to the church as a husband to his wife.  The history of salvation in Christianity is to be a marriage - the Marriage of the Lamb.

Loving as God loves is crucial in the close quarters of marriage.

Marriage unleashes strong emotional and psychological forces.

Because such high emotions are experienced in marriage, the spouse may seem like one’s worst enemy.

One’s deepest needs may feel left unfulfilled by the very one whom he or she had high hopes.  Therefore, each should forgive one another 70 times 7 and be faithful when it seems impossible to go on.

When a couple going through difficulty can act lovingly when love is nowhere to be found, be kind and merciful to evoke kindness and mercy - all of these traits school a person in the qualities of divine love.

This is an example of how God love us vulnerable, flawed human beings.

God is always seeking to restore us with His love and set our feet on solid ground.  He continues to encourage us forward toward the realization that we have full potential as His children.


True Love Is Built, Not Born

This love is a far cry from the romantic love experienced in the Western world.

Western society sees love as a force that is out of one’s control and outside of oneself.  They see it as a mysterious, grand and is illogical.  It is seen as an overpowering visitation upon two people by forces outside of themselves.


Marriage Encompasses All Family Relationships


Other cultures maintain that love is not born, but built and depends on the sacrifice, commitment and faithfulness of the couple involved.

Marital love, in these views, has a strong moral component.

It is believed that if a husband and wife maintain their moral and religious beliefs that they will naturally grow together in love.

The Jewish and Hindu faiths are strong on this point.

They advocate that love is built in an arranged marriage through the husband and wife’s virtues.

Modern marital therapists such as Stephen Wolin recommend that society take a second look at arranged marriages.  Wolin believes that the process of building love into a marriage is needed in order to improve people’s chances at marital satisfaction.

His research shows that in resilient marriages, a strong spiritual element is always presence in successful marriages.

Sometimes, a couple may play the role of the following to his or her spouse at any given time:

Wife
Mother
Elder Sister
Younger Sister
Daughter
Husband
Father
Elder Brother
Younger Brother
Son


The Bible describes the perfect wife in Proverbs as a woman of virtue.

Such a perfect wife is trustworthy, benevolent, diligent, prudent and charitable.  She will be kind, well spoken and is beloved by both her children and husband.

A husband’s good stature is due to his wife’s good offices.  She becomes the reward and treasure of her man.

It is the fear of the Lord that keeps good marriages intact in fear that they will stray from His paths.

Buddhist scriptures also describe the good wife of virtue as her husbands “mother, a sister, a companion and a servant” (Anguttara Nikayaiv.91)

The Hindu author Ved Mehta points out, it is also the husband’s duty to earn his wife’s respect through his sacrifice and good character.

Virtues of character attract God and His love to a marriage.

“A noble man and woman are necessary for the sake of making a noble couple. We need a noble couple in order to achieve God’s noble love.”

Reverend Sun Myung Moon




Psychological research backs up the view that having virtue or good character is the bedrock of happy marriages.

A marital expert, Judith Wallerstein, agrees about virtue in happy marriages:

“For everyone, happiness in marriage meant feeling respected and cherished . . . Based on integrity. A partner was admired and loved for his or her honesty, compassion, generosity of spirit, decency, loyalty to the family, and fairness . . . . The value these couples place on the partner’s moral qualities . . . helps explain why many divorcing people speak so vehemently of losing respect for their former partners.”


Another highly respected marital theorist and therapist, Blaine Fowers, has said, “As I
have observed many different couples, I have become convinced that strong marriages are built on the virtues or character strengths of the spouses. In other words, the best way to have a good marriage is to be a good person.”

People who have failed in marriage were asked on a relationship website what they would have done to make their marriage better.  People named improved traits of character:

“I would not have been unfaithful,” said one. “I would be more patient, loving and forgiving,” said another. Yet another said,  “I would make more effort to be affectionate, supportive, loving, cheerful, and a better friend.”

Godly persons make good marriages

Ephesians shows that the love in a Christian marriage is described in terms of virtue of character is likened to the love of Christ for the church (5.25)

This love is a giving love, it is sacrificial that resembles the love of Jesus.

Author Michael G. Lawler characterizes Christian marital love: “It is a love that seeks to give way to the other whenever possible.”

Lawler continues to say that in Christian marriages, both are bound as servants to one another just as Christ served the people.

He says, “Marital love exists only inchoately on the wedding day . . . marital love, as mutual giving way, as mutual service, as mutual fidelity . . . is not a given in a Christian marriage but a task to be undertaken.”

Because traditional Christian values leads to successful marriages, theologian Stanley Hauerwas warns that Christians must not yield to the popular cultural non-moralistic notion that emotions and feelings are the measure of a marriage.

“What the church cares about,” he says, is not love per se, but “whether you are a person capable of sustaining the kind of fidelity that makes love, even in marriage, a possibility.”

Hauerwas underlines that the early church did not have an illusion about ‘love’ creating or legitimizing marriages.

They assumed that those entering marriage would develop the character strengths or virtues necessary for a loving marriage through following the traditions of the church faithfully.

Hauerwas notes the ongoing nature of virtue development: “I do not pretend that any of us ever have a character sufficient for marriage when we enter a marriage, but I am contending that at least some beginning has to have been made if we are to have the ability to grow into the kind of person capable of being called to undertake . . . the vocation of marriage.”

Psychologist Erik Erikson agrees with this religious view defining marital intimacy as, “ “the capacity to commit oneself to . . . partnership and to develop the ethical strength to abide by such commitments even though they may call for significant sacrifices and compromises.”

The Mormon faith and the Unificiation Church both recommend members to have a mission service prior to engagement or marriage.

There are three reasons: by serving others, sacrificing selfish means for other’s sakes, giving up entertainment and comforts and dedicate to the commandment to love God

Through this time period, the youth develop such a strong good character or virtues that will stand them in good stead when they embark into marriage which is spiritually demanding.

Theravada Buddhists in Thailand require a six month period of monastic life prior to marriage as well. This time for missions and service helps the young people make a good start at developing good virtues that are necessary to succeed in married life.


Return for Tomorrow's Post: Qualities of True Love in Marriage

This post was rewritten and derived from the religious textbook, "Educating for True Love" written by a team of writers to explain Reverend Sun Myung Moon's philosophy on love and marriage.

Importance of Children Growing in Love

The most basic and central truth of the universe is that

God is the Father and we are His children.

—Sun Myung Moon

In order for a son or daughter to learn how to love, it involves the heart to develops which begins at a very young age and matures throughout the lifetime.

The toddler who clings to his or her parents' hand is decades apart from the weeping adult who must place his or her parents to rest in the grave and vow not to let their wishes go unfulfilled.

Even though the experience is different, the essence of the heart is the same: a heart of attachment, appreciation and love toward the parents that only deepens and becomes conscious and responsible over time.

A child's growth determines the person's relationship not only toward his or her parents, but also toward society in general, and ultimately God.

The East calls a child's devotion to his or her parents “filial piety” and is considered the root of all goodness and morality.

Confucius taught that a child's responsiveness to one's parents is the root for empathy. Mencius taught

that if a person loved his parents, he would be kind to people in general and caring toward everything in the world (7A45).

Jesus demonstrated how important a child's heart is when he instructed his disciples to not turn away children from him. 

“Such are the kingdom of heaven made of,” he said. Saint Paul said that a Christian’s right relationship to God was to cry out trustingly like a child, “Abba!” which means “Papa” or “Daddy.”

The child’s realm of heart is foundational to a life of true love.

The success within the children's realm of love places a person in a position to receive and respond to the love of parents and the love of the ultimate Parent, God.

On this strong foundation, a person is well-placed to learn to love others as oneself.

The Formation of a Loving Child

Before religious leaders were accepted to say so, Reverend Moon was pointing to the breakdown of the family as the main culprit in society's main problems.

Now, these assertions are widely accepted among social scientists.  Developmental psychologists widely agree

that having loving relationships with caregivers (usually a parent or parents) promote the development of empathy with others and impacts a person's relationship to the world at large over a lifetime.

Children who lack such loving relationships are left without maturing a proper heart of compassion toward others, which leaves the growing young person crippled morally. 

 Such children are prone to get involved in all sorts of risky and destructive behaviors.

When a mother plays with her child, the natural facial expressions prepares them to be able to 'read' other people's facial expressions then understand what the person must be feeling based on this. This is an example of training in empathy.

The ability to empathize: to recognize and feel another person’s pain, suffering or joy as one’s own. To have empathy is the basis of the capacity to give love, take responsibility, and have fulfilling relationships with others.

Those who develop early loving relationships are able to attain trust over mistrust. This is what Erick Erickson calls the first 'crisis' of life.

When a baby cries, someone comes to comfort. When the baby is hungry, someone brings food. When the baby needs warmth and dryness this is provided. 

When the baby needs to be held, someone's tender arms are there. When a child is lonely or frightened, someone's soft voice reassures the child.

A baby who grows up in this nurturing environment, sets the stage to grow up to be benevolent, helpful participator in the world.

A view of a larger universe and of God are imprinted firmly on the mind of a young person through these early interactions.

James M. Barrie, author of Peter Pan, said, “The God to whom little boys say

their prayers has a face very much like their mother’s.”

If a mother had a smiling sympathetic face, the child will respond with a similar face to the world whenever they interact outside the family.

“We learn how valuable and worthy of love we are almost exclusively through interactions with attachment figures, especially parents,” observes Stephen Stosny, a psychologist.

A child who grew up in a loving home, assumes others are similarly lovable and worthy. He or she will behave in a manner that is just and kind toward them and treat others as he or she has been treated at home.

Operating from a core of being loved, the child is able to love others.

Studies have shown one common characteristic of rescuers of Jews under Nazism: The rescuers all have very warm relationships with one or both parents which caused them to have empathy for others in maximum proportions.

Since they were convinced of their own worthiness, it was easy for them to see others as similarly worthy and to take a stand for others' human rights.

History is laden with children who have been neglected or abandoned. They have moral impairment that can result from having a poor relationship with parents.

1940s psychologist William Goldfarb did a study of seventy children who have been raised for the first three years of their lives in institutions. He found that they were cruel to one another and also to animals.

They severely lacked an ability to control impulses, especially aggressive ones.

Researcher Selma H. Fraiberg studied children who were misplaced out of their homes. She studied abandoned babies, children raised in institutions, children shifted from foster home to foster home and children who had to be torn from their family during wartime.

She remarked, “These children who had never experienced love, who had never belonged to anyone, and were never bonded to anyone except on the most primitive basis . . . were unable in later years to bind themselves to other people, to love deeply, to feel deeply, to tenderness, grief, or shame.”

Since these children were denied the most pivotal relationship in the children's realm of heart and love, these children could never mature their heart to empathize and love others. They could not see other people as themselves.

Ambivalence in the Love Relationship between Parent and Child

In average families, there is enough ambivalence in the love relationships to produce ambivalence in a child.

Morally, this places children between great altruism and great cruelty.

The average person tends not to be cruel or or consciously try to hurt or oppress others. But the same person may have not developed empathy for instance for people in poverty and think that they are responsible for their own fate.

Freud explored the human psyche and uncovered the ambivalence of a child's relationship to the parents. He found child's relationship with their parent “contained not only impulses of an affectionate submissive nature, but also hostile and defiant ones.”

He explained that we all relate to the Father, God, with the same ambivalence we have toward our parents in general. This creates the idea in the evil Satan.

From the standpoint of cause and effect, it can be thought that a child's 'hostile and defiant' interactions toward the parent reflects a relationship with their false father Satan and evil even though they have a relationship with goodness and God.

Since the parents heart is divided between good and evil, they raise children who are similarly divided in heart.

This creates a great need for parents who have true love. These parents resemble the selfless love of God and are able to love their children in a healthy and a beneficial way.

Children raised in this ideal home, they can be true to their parents' good expectations and thus become brothers and sisters who are true to one another. These siblings can support one anther's growth and successful entry into the spouse's realm of love.

Marriages that come from adults raised in this type of environment will have peace and harmony which will become shelters for the new generation as they are guided by true parental love.

The more the parents' love reflects the love of God, the happier and healthier, and more productive the child will be.

The child will demonstrate empathy will have a more benevolent impact upon the larger world.

To have such Godly parents of true love is thus a very pressing social need to nurture and guide a child's heart.

Return for Tomorrow's Post: Children Need God, Too

This post was rewritten and derived from the religious textbook, "Educating for True Love" written by a team of writers to explain Reverend Sun Myung Moon's philosophy.

A Loving Family Expands to Loving World

The ideal family alone can serve as the building block of the Kingdom of God.

—Sun Myung Moon

What if every human was raised in a godly, ideal home? 

Where brothers and sisters respected each other, mother and father were devoted to another and were the examples of true love? Abuse, fighting and separation did not exist?

We can easily see that this would mature into the Kingdom of Heaven. Such people raised in a family would understand how to love others in the world based on the teachings of exemplary love within their own family.

When they encountered younger people their sisters and brother's age they would treat them just the same. When they encountered the elderly who are their grandparents' age, they would treat them just like their own flesh and blood.

The family is the primary means through which most people learn about love.

Unfortunately, this is also how evil entered the world.

Through the first family of Adam and Eve, thousands of generations later followed in their footsteps. What if Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel were to have followed in God's ways? 

What kind of society would we be born into in this day and age?

In order to cultivate true love over a lifetime, we need to establish loving relationships and family. The family packs a double punch in a life of love more than any other relationship.

The way one was raised in their family trains him or her in love as a child and sibling. This leads them to their own personal growth and maturity. 

Then, each individual based on their upbringing, takes what they learn to cultivate love in a new family with a spouse and children.

All of these experiences come full circle to educate a person in true love.

Many religions and moral traditions equate a loving relationship in the family as a template for a person's relationship with God.

In the Talmud, for instance, it is written, “When a man honors his father and mother, God says, ‘I regard it as though I had dwelt among them and they had honored me” Kiddushin, 30b

Jesus was the first to encourage his followers to think and relate with God as their father.

Confucius said, “Surely proper behavior toward parents and elder brothers is the trunk of goodness,” Analects 1.2 and “Filial piety is the root of all virtue” Classic of Filial Piety

Hinduism, Shinto, Buddhism, Islam and the traditional Native American and African faiths also echoes this sentiment.

Family life may be seen as a vocation for growing closer to God and allowing Him/Her to manifest and dwell in true love.

A Buddhist master stated that the family is demanding of members responsibilities as any monastery.

From this viewpoint, the family can be a vehicle of holiness and an instrument of salvation.

People within a community of faith refer to one another as 'brothers and sisters' or 'brethren.' Priests lead the members of the Catholic Church and they call him 'Father', and the title of the head of the Catholic Church is the “Holy Father.” 

Such communities are led by nuns who are called 'Sister' and sometimes 'Mother'.

The importance of the family in raising good human beings is corroborated by the findings of social scientists.

Family enhances human and moral development in numerous and positive ways.

Social scientists and policymakers uphold the family as the crucial factor in the physical as well as the mental, emotional, and moral well-being of the children. Therefore, the family is the backbone of social order.

Unfortunately, the status of the family in society in our times have come into question.

Even though times have changed, the fundamental patterns of father, mother and children are still in place showing that the members of the family has basic need for its structure.

Couples live together and raise their children even if they are from previous relationships. Even though there are are the non traditional relationships of same-sex couples, there is still a masculine and feminine role in each relationship. 

Many still want to have their union recognized through a traditional marriage and even adopt children.

Those who do not have a family form surrogate and substitute families. Gangs are joined by youngsters in order to get the same strength and protection they get from the feeling of a family from their 'home boys'.

A convicted criminal leader of the L.A. Crips notorious gang had said in an interview that he turned toward the streets because he did not have a proper family upbringing. 

The same with homeless children, or teenagers of the street, they also form 'families' and band together.

Still, none of these substitutes for the missing qualities in their own homes can fulfill the same benefits as a basic family structure of a father, mother with their biological children.

As far back as our knowledge takes us, anthropologist Margaret Mead affirmed about the centrality of the traditional family, human beings have always lived in families. There is no period where this was not so.

Even though modern society has made proposals for change and there have been actual experiments to dissolve the family or displace the traditional roles, human society still reaffirms their dependence on the family as the basic unit of human living. This is a family with a father, mother and children.

Return for Tomorrow's Post:

This post was rewritten and derived from the religious textbook “Educating for True Love” written by a team of writers to explain the philosophy of Reverend Sun Myung Moon.

True Love is....

In addition to love being kind and patient and several qualities listed in the Bible, it is also forgiving, other-Centered,, serving and sacrificial, eternal faithful and obedient and principled.

In order for true love to benefit another person, it has to be unconditional. This means that love is based on the person's worth as a human being. 

No matter what a person's status or appearance, unconditional love respects and recognizes the worth of the other person simply because he was created by God.

True love can transcend national boundaries or racial boundaries and discrimination between religious sects. In this unity, we are all brothers and sisters. In the sight of God, there is no such thing as Orientals, Whites, and Blacks . . . we are different only on the surface. Underneath, we come from the same God.

Reverend Sun Myung Moon's comment on unconditional true love:

A second aspect of true love's unconditional nature is that it is given to the worthy and unworthy alike. The Bible states that God's sun shins upon both the good and evil people. Of course, it is easier for us to love those who are lovable, but unconditional love asks us to love those who are unlovable in the moment just because they were conceived in the perfect love of God. In addition, we should love others because they are destined to return to God's bosom.

The day will come when they are restored and revealed as an indispensable part of God: His precious and beloved children.

Unconditional love does not meant to overlook and accept bad conduct, but to give with the hope of redeeming the other and calling him back to live in God's true way.

Once people feel accepted and love, they are far more likely to confess, repent and make the necessary effofrts to change.

The founder of Boys Town, Father Flanagan, had a philosophy that, “There is no such thing as a bad boy.” He believed that beneath the rough, tough, dirty exterior of the worst street urchin, God's child awaited to be allowed to thus come out in safety in order to be loved. 

This kind of unconditional love 'broke down' many many incorrigible boys and cleansed them with healing tears and inspired many to live amended lives.

To this day, Boys Town remains the most successful child rehabilitation system in the world.

Many of its alumni who were once abused and neglect, go on to live a productive and valuable life just because one man had a vision to love without any condition.

True Love Is Eternal

Reverend Sun Myung Moon commented on the quality of true love:

People like gold because it doesn’t change . . . . What element in diamonds makes people love them? As far as its hardness and solidity is concerned, the diamond excels any other stone. Other rocks and metals will be eroded as time goes by, but diamonds won’t . . . . The more valuable something is, the less changeable it is.

True love does not waver – it is eternal. It does not change based on a whim, circumstance or outo f convenience.

A good friend will stay at his pal's side through the good and also the bad times. A devoted husband stays with his wife in her beautiful youth and as her beauty fades. A parent who is deserted by his child will still look out he window every night hoping for his rebellious son's return.

Constancy is the ballast of all lasting and true relationships.

People who truly practice unconditional love, they are there for one another in times of pleasure as well as time of pain.

Also, God's unchanging love is a place where the heart can return again and again for forgiveness, renewal, reassurance, wisdom and a fresh determination.

There was a bumper sticker that read, “If you don't feel close to God – guess who moved?” We are assured that it wasn't God that moved.

One parent won the heart of her teenage daughter through her unending determination. The teenager became rebellious and increasingly 'smart-mouthed' and rebellious which caused the parent pain.

Everything came to a crisis point when the police department called her and said they had her daughter. The mother was understandingly furious and didn't speak to her daughter all night. 

Then she thought again how she believed in her daughter's essential goodness. So, to demonstrate her faith in her daughter, the mother wrapped a small gift box and gave it to her daughter.

The daughter unwrapped it and found a rock inside with a note that read:

This rock is a thousand years old. That's how long it will take before I give up on you.

Right then, the teenager broke down in extreme tears when she witnessed her mother's devotion to her. The two became very close after that incident.

Just as a human mother does not give up on her child, God does not give up on His children either. Even when people give up on themselves. 

They may feel worthless, hopeless, in despair and feel they are beyond redemption just as the teenager girl undoubtedly felt about herself in the story above.

God's love is like a rock.

God is always there waiting and hoping for His child's return. Jesus expressed, “Ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find, knock and the door shall be opened unto you.”

God is a parent who is always home and ready to answer the door. He always hopes that the children He loves so steadfastly come to pay Him a visit. He hopes to be embraced again in the love that never wavers.

“What made Jesus sacred was that he trusted and loved people, wanted to live with them and save them more than anything else—even though they betrayed him. He blessed his enemies.”

Sixty-six volumes in the Holy Scripture can be condensed into a significant meaning – Jesus' main teaching is unchangeability.

True Love Is Unique

The uniqueness of each individual is taken in account in true love. It is not a 'one size fits all' kind of love. Each person needs to be loved exactly for who he or she is. Each one of us is a unique entity in the universe with their own likes and dislikes and preferences.

To love with discernment requires wisdom, attentiveness, and patience.

No two petals on a flower look alike as well as small stones, pebbles on the side of a mountain upon careful examination. This is one of the beauties of nature. Also, in the way you were born. True love's uniqueness is vividly demonstrated through family relationships.

A highly-successful marriage program advises the husband and wife to make an individual list of the kinds of things that make them feel loved. Then the couple share their list with their spouse.

A wife may feel cared for when her husband brings her a cup of tea in the morning. The husband may feel loved when the wife lines up fresh socks in the linen drawer.

Little favors such as these may not seem profound if they are not catered to the person's unique ways.

Siblings are different from each other and need to be encouraged and nurtured in different ways. This compells parents to love their children in unique ways. Children's love needs change as they grow. A nine-year-old who loved being kissed when he was younger will feel that his mother is smothering him when she does it at ten years old.

A way of giving love has turned into an offense and must be adjusted to the uniqueness of the growing individual.

Children’s lives are a veritable education in how to love the unique adults who are their parents.

Even though there are principles of love that work for and apply to everyone, love is tailor-made to each individual in order to make him or her feel uniquely loved.

God shows this kind of understanding toward each of His children. He gently guides us through things that spake most strongly to each of our individual hearts.

God shows his appreciation for our uniqueness by speaking to the person's heart through music, art literature, sports pets and dancing. Whatever a person love, God uses such things to reach out to him or her. In essencece, God is saying, “I know you. I understand you. I love you for who you are.”

Return for Tomorrow’s Post:




This post was rewritten and derived from the religious textbook, Educating for True Love, Chapter 1 written by a team of writers to explaining Dr. Rev. Sun Myung Moon's thoughts on morality, society and Family.