Our Mission in the Last Days of Providential History

Founder's Keynote Address
Rev. Sun Myung Moon

Congratulatory Banquet
Crown of Peace Awards

Washington, DC
December 13, 2004

Respected leaders from countries around the world, representing all religions and nations! Let us first gather our hearts together. Let us sincerely offer glory and gratitude to God, the True Parent of all creation and Lord of true love. And let us make today a day of the greatest value, a day that will be remembered as having provided a new foundation for America.

The Cold War held humanity captive to fear and insecurity for half a century. Communist machinations and duplicity deceived people of faith and all humankind. That has ended. We live in a new century. And yet, how secure and happy are we?

Look at the world. Young people, now liberated from the yoke of communism, are enjoying their freedom to such an extent that they are in danger of running pell-mell off the cliff of debauchery. Instead of seeking God's ideal of creation, they embrace the perspective of selfish individualism and become slaves to free sex. This gives rise to all manner of social evils. Homosexual activists have hoisted the flag of the so-called "gay" movement. They advocate marriage between people of the same sex. Put simply, this is barbaric and it infuriates Heaven and humanity. Imagine, for a moment, the world that would result from what they advocate. Humanity would become extinct within two generations.

Those who turn away from Heaven's will dig their own graves in the soil of decadence and immorality. The evil of this age has its own punishing consequences. The incurable disease known as AIDS is a sign of this from Heaven. Even as we sit here, is not this cursed plague infecting thousands of innocent people? Is it not casting them onto the path of death?

Another plague, known as divorce, is destroying family values. It is throwing humanity into an unprecedented crisis. Children suddenly find themselves separated from one parent and being raised by a stepfather or stepmother. In some cases, they are even placed in foster homes and orphanages. They are not at fault, yet their tiny hearts are left with scars that will never heal. Who will compensate them for the parental love that was snatched away from them?

Then we turn our eyes to the conflict in the Middle East. What began as a struggle between religions is now grinding the entire world in a crucible of fear over terrorism and murder. Meanwhile, the Korean peninsula, my homeland, tragically remains the world's only divided nation. It still awaits its day of unification with deep longing. By what means can we possibly save today's world, where morality and family values are utterly degraded?

Leaders from around the world, tonight I would like to convey to you a new message from God to the six billion people living in this age. It is both His commandment and a revelation. The title of this message is "Our Mission in the Last Days of Providential History."

The Manifestation of the True Parents

The fall of Adam and Eve, our first ancestors, imprisoned us within the dungeon of false love, false life and false lineage. We drag the chains of a history of unfathomable damnation and resentment. All people without exception have inherited Satan's false blood lineage accumulated through a history of thousands and tens of thousands of years. We are trapped by that history, with no choice but to lead speckled lives littered with falsehood and evil. This is humanity's fate. There is no escape from this predicament, regardless of human effort.

Humanity has waited eagerly for the day when someone would save us from our fallen condition. Humanity writhes in agony, engulfed by evil and falsehood, because due to the fall of the first human ancestors everyone is bound to the filthy and dreadful lineage of Satan. Therefore humanity awaits the coming of someone who is of the lineage of Heaven and has no relation to Satan's lineage.

This is the True Parents, who are able to liberate us from the Satan's bondage.

We must understand that humankind is in a position to consider Satan our parent. In biblical terms, we are in the position of wild olive trees, separated from the true root. The True Parents, who are sent as the Savior and Messiah of all humanity, have the mission to ruthlessly cut down the wild olive trees that have been growing for thousands and tens of thousands of years and graft them into the true olive tree. This represents the change of humanity's blood lineage. The True Parents come to complete this great revolutionary endeavor on an inter-religious and international level.

The True Parents do not appear just because someone wants it, or anywhere at any time. They can manifest only in the providential Last Days. The term "Last Days" means the moment when the restoration providence, which Heaven has carried forward throughout history, bears its final fruit. In other words, we meet the original era of the True Parents only in conjunction with heavenly fortune.

The providence to save humanity is administered by Heaven, so how can you know where you stand in it? Only the True Parents, who come with Heaven's love, life and lineage, know the providential time. Knowing the providential time, they work in line with it to bring the providence to its conclusion. Only the True Parents come with the authority to govern the spirit world. By this authority they have mobilized the leaders of the four major religions and myriads of good ancestors in order to take responsibility for your eternal life.

Leaders from around the world! While you were unaware of it, humankind has entered a new realm of grace. Heavenly fortune has arrived. I openly declare to Heaven and Earth that I have received Heaven's anointing and that I have been entrusted with the mission to be humanity's True Parent. We are now in the Last Days of God's providence. This is the era of the Holy Blessing, by which humanity's lineage is changed from Satan's lineage to Heaven's lineage. Now the Era After the Coming of Heaven is unfolding within the realm of Ssang-hab Shib-seung. In the Era Before the Coming of Heaven, those who pursued evil prospered and it was difficult to distinguish right from wrong. Now Heaven no longer condones that diseased and disordered world!

Have powerful hope, as you live in accordance with the path of Heaven. You can come to resemble God, with His attributes being absolute, unique, unchanging and eternal. Practice a life of living for the sake of others, and you will go through a revolution of character. Following this path will enable us to establish the Kingdom of God on Earth that is, the Peace Kingdom, where we all can live together. Heaven has longed passionately to see this come to pass.

The Mission of Homeland Liberation

The term, "homeland liberation," may sound unfamiliar. You probably think that you never lost your homeland, so you have no need to recover it. The homeland to which I refer today, however, is different from the one you usually think of. I refer to the original homeland, the Kingdom of God on Earth that was lost at the fall of the first ancestors, Adam and Eve.

What would the world have been like had the fall not occurred? God would have blessed Adam and Eve in marriage. They would have produced children who were sinless and true, and become true parents. That family would have served as the nucleus of the Kingdom of God on Earth. The children would have formed the realm of God's third generation. Centering on God, they would have established an eternal kingdom of peace on this Earth. Adam and Eve would have been the king and queen of an Adamic tribe, Adamic people, and Adamic nation that represented the realm of three ages. Adam's kingdom would have continued eternally. That would have been humanity's eternal homeland, the Peace Kingdom.

Unfortunately, history did not start out that smoothly. The fall of Adam and Eve orphaned humanity for thousands and tens of thousands of years. We lost our homeland and lived like vagabonds drifting here and there, begging for food. Humanity was to have attended God as the vertical True Parent. All the world's people would have lived as one family in accordance with the principles of absolute faith, absolute love and absolute obedience. Instead, we find ourselves divided from one another by all manner of barriers and international boundaries planted by Satan.

What, then, is the true meaning of homeland liberation? How do we begin to accomplish it? Homeland liberation means to transform this world into a new nation, the true homeland. We will not find this homeland anywhere in today's world. It emerges out of a process of re-creation through love. God's new homeland has no borders. It is a part of the original creation that bears no relationship to the fall. So homeland liberation begins with a life of true love, in which we love even our enemies.

If we sow soybeans, we will harvest soybeans, and if we sow red beans, we will harvest red beans. If we sow revenge, which is Satan's seed, we will harvest an evil fruit, more bloodshed. On the other hand, wherever we sow true love, by forgiving and embracing our enemies, a tree of goodness will grow. This is the law of the universe, and it never fails. We find humanity's true homeland, the homeland of the true God, on the path of loving our enemies. This path begins with loving our individual enemies, and extends to loving our family's enemies, our tribe's enemies, our nation's enemies, and the world's enemies. This is how we establish the tradition of true love, true life and true lineage.

As world leaders, what do you consider your mission? As long as Satan's sovereignty rules the world, you do not really have a country. I know there are some 200 countries in the world, but has even one nation brought God's will into reality? Is even one a true homeland for God and humanity? The world's six billion people, through no fault of their own, were born as Satan's descendants, carrying the false lineage. Irrespective of whether you are citizens of the United States, Japan, or whatever nation, Satan's love, Satan's life and Satan's filthy blood still flow in your body. Unless you remove this stained legacy of the fall from yourselves, you will never realize the dream of homeland liberation. For this, you each must experience a revolution of character, a true love revolution.

The Three Great Revolutions of True Love

How can we accomplish a revolution of character and come to resemble God? Because we descended from the fall and are born with fallen nature, each of us must go through three great revolutions in order to accomplish the perfection of our character. I call these 1) the revolution through making atonement, 2) the revolution of conscience, and 3) the revolution of heart.

The "revolution through making atonement" means to recover your internal and external right of ownership by completely atoning for the past. After you have done this victoriously, you then live by a standard beyond that for which any atonement is required. This requires that you purge yourself completely of all the habits and thoughts that you accumulated during the Age Before the Coming of Heaven. It is completed when you accomplish it in the realms of the individual, family and nation.

On that basis you can fulfill and perfect an ideal family, a family of true love based upon the absolute values that are the standard for life in the Age After the Coming of Heaven. In God's family ideal, these absolute values are perfected in a three-generation family composed of parents, husband and wife, and children.

Only after the birth of their children can a man and woman stand in the position of owners of true parental love. Only after marrying and cherishing his wife is a man able to own true conjugal love. Similarly, it is the younger sibling that makes the older sibling an owner of true sibling love. Thus, in any relationship, it is the object-partner who places the subject-partner in the position of an owner of true love. To fulfill this position the subject-partner must live for the sake of that object-partner, invest in that person and forget that investment, and sacrifice for the sake of a greater purpose. Here we create absolute values that are eternal and unchanging. In this way, parents, husband and wife, and children bring each other to perfection as owners of true love. Thereby they form a three-generational realm in the family. The family settles into an eternal realm of unity. They live with absolute values in interdependence and eternal communion with God.

Further, you take the revolutionary step of returning all your property and ownership rights to Heaven. Give up your lingering attachments. This cuts all your ties with the satanic world and separates you from Satan. In exchange, you will inherit all those things and more with Heaven's blessing. In other words, you will accumulate Heaven's riches, riches that have been separated from Satan and over which Satan can never again claim ownership.

What is the "revolution of conscience"? It is an inner revolution by which you become absolutely obedient to your conscience. You cannot deny that you endure an unending struggle within. Your conscience, which tends toward goodness, struggles against the desires of the flesh. To bring an end to this shame-ridden inner conflict, you need to clearly understand the conscience and its function.

Your conscience possesses pinpoint awareness of your every action, every step and every thought. It knows before your spiritual teacher knows. It knows before your parents know. It knows before God knows. And it tells you the right action to take in every instance. What results from violation of the conscience? You feel guilt. Dust settles on your soul; it becomes filthy and scarred. These scars on your soul cannot be removed for eternity. They are fearful baggage that you take with you when you enter the spirit world. I am voicing a supreme command that you work in a revolutionary way to overcome your physical desires, accept the guidance of your conscience, and live in oneness with Heaven's will. Treasure the unblemished, clean and pure state of your soul.

What is the third revolution, the "revolution of heart"? God created human beings as His children. What, then, is the tie that binds you and God together? It is the true love and true heart that exist between a parent and child. If a parent and child do not communicate with true heart, how can they possibly maintain a relationship of true love and true respect?

We have lived for thousands of years within the realm of the fall. Our hearts continue to be enslaved under false parents, false love and false lineage. To remove this yoke, you must live with true love, forgiving, giving and sacrificing continually. This is the life that Satan hates most. By doing this, you return to the realm where God's heart rules.

If your heart is still bound by selfish individualism and still pursues the vain glory of the satanic world, you are on a dark and dismal path whose end is despair and lamentation. On the other hand, if you lead a constructive life, being the first to yield and give to others, then your heart will be bound in eternal oneness with God's heart. This requires that you first sever your heart's ties to the false parent and be engrafted onto God's lineage through the Holy Marriage Blessing instituted by the True Parents. Through the True Parents, who are incarnations of the invisible God, you will secure the true love and lineage of Heaven.

The Mission of the Personal Emissary

Respected ladies and gentlemen, until today you have led fairly conventional lives. Now, however, I call you to take on a mission as Heaven's direct emissary.

As individuals, there are many differences among us. We are large and small, wide and narrow, tall and short. Despite our differences, God is commissioning us to become Heaven's direct emissaries. Let us be patriots who proudly uphold Heaven's lineage of goodness. Let us stand resolutely, with heavenly authority, and answer the call to liberate our homeland.

How can you qualify for the mission of Heaven's personal emissary? You must desire the liberation of your homeland a thousand times, even ten thousand times more than your desire for the present reality. You must be determined to liberate the homeland even at the sacrifice of your life. Eating or sleeping, coming or going, every action you take should be for the sake of establishing the Peace Kingdom.

The Bible teaches, "Seek ye first His kingdom and His righteousness." Go forward with confidence, because while your body may belong to the realm of the satanic world, you have been reborn with a true lineage. You are Heaven's direct emissary for the purpose of establishing the homeland.

Do you recognize God's plight? He is a Parent who, in one instant, lost His children, was forced to suffer a history of maltreatment, and was blocked at every turn as he sought to unfold His will. Let us become filial sons and daughters capable of understanding this sorrowful heart of God. How can you be leaders unless you know the truth and practice it?

Leaders of the world, please think deeply about how you came to be here today. Did you simply come half out of sincerity and half out of curiosity, hoping to enjoy a Christmas party? Whether you like it or not, you have now received Heaven's call. I suddenly received Heaven's command when I was a young man of sixteen. I accepted His call, and ever since I have spent my entire life, over 80 years, walking a course of blood, sweat and tears. It was to rescue humanity from Satan's dominion and to bring God into a state of true liberation and complete freedom. Just as I did, you too can now accomplish the exalted will of God for harmony and peace on an inter-religious and international level. That is, you can complete the sacred task of establishing the homeland.

You and Reverend Moon are one, with the common denominator being absolute faith, absolute love and absolute obedience. You as well as I are to be true parents and kings and queens of peace. Today, heavenly fortune is with us.

We now have the opportunity to establish our common homeland that will also be Heaven's homeland. That homeland requires sovereignty, territory and godly people. Heaven's lineage of goodness must extend powerfully throughout that homeland. The pulse of God's providential history must be felt there in a way that cannot be experienced anywhere else. If it is possible to build this homeland right now, how can you hesitate? Please complete the mission of Heaven's direct emissary. Please live as prophets who have been given the promise of eternal life.

Ladies and gentlemen, I recently founded the Mongolian Peoples' Federation for World Peace, a movement to bring together people of Mongolian descent from throughout the world. My intent certainly is not nationalistic. This is a comprehensive movement for peace. The people of Mongolian ancestry are the descendants of Cain and Shem, the eldest sons of Adam and Noah, respectively. God called Noah's family to restore through indemnity the historical errors committed by Adam's family. Now, in the final period of the providence, Sham's descendants can accomplish their mission as the first born among humanity. Thus, it is a movement to comfort God's heart of pain over Adam's family, which lost Abel by murder and waited 130 years to establish Seth. It is a movement to make the world into one brotherhood and one family by enabling us to tear down the walls of the heart that divide us, that all humanity might live together in a society characterized by interdependence, mutual prosperity and universally shared values. It is a providential step to hasten the establishment of God's homeland.

I think we should return gratitude and glory to God and True Parents. They have enlightened us about the incredible providential age in which we are living. They even have bestowed on us the glorious mission to establish Heaven's kingship as direct emissaries. Through all eternity, we will gratefully glorify and praise True Parents, who have inaugurated the Era of the Opening of Heaven and Earth After the Coming of Heaven. Therefore, we offer this Coronation Ceremony for the Peace King to True Parents today. This is unprecedented in history and will never be repeated in the future. True Parents have established the realm of true liberation and complete freedom.

Just as the sun rises with brilliant light in the eastern sky, heavenly fortune is now shining upon all people. The curtain of darkness that shrouded us for thousands and tens of thousands of years is drawing back at last. The divine command to complete Heaven's will is taking root in your hearts. This is a path of destiny you cannot avoid. Therefore be courageous and stand up! We have the Age after the Coming of Heaven working with us. You can experience with certainty the meaning of Jesus' teaching that those who lose their life will live and those who seek their life will die. Let us resolve heroically to do whatever it takes to complete the sacred task of homeland liberation and establish the Peace Kingdom, God's ideal of creation on this planet Earth.

Please engrave the heavenly command you received today deep in your heart. From this time forward, as a leader chosen by God to build the Fatherland, you must pledge to lead a beautiful and precious life. Everyone here without exception will eventually pass on to the spirit world. You do not want to carry with you any regret.

Today I have conveyed to you God's message for the new era. I pray that God's blessings will forever be upon you, your families, and your mission as His direct emissaries.

Thank you.