| |
|
|
|
Chapter 3: Reverend Moon's Philosophy of Education
3.1 Education: What are the problems?
Education, religion and moral culture have been based on the individual self. Despite the long duration of history, a perfect individual or perfect family has never emerged. We can conclude that at this point, no man or woman has ever by transcended all the cultural standards which have advocated morality, to achieve a true family.
We have to totally deny everything in the satanic world, discarding all the education, "isms" and philosophies we have acquired or learnt. If we only deny ninety-eight percent the remaining two percent will become a problem.
What kind of world are we living in? We should live based on the mind. However, this world has become a totally materialistic world in which many people do not even think about whether they have a mind or not. We can understand this fact by looking at the current education system, which puts so much emphasis on materialistic civilization and values. Modern people have such little regard for the valuable mind inside each person. Rather, their focus is fixed on the money before their eyes. They drift towards denying the mind and God.
Happiness is established in a true position, and God's providence proceeds from a true position. The real issue is: what is "true"? In the center of "trueness" a true self is required. Because people were unable to be their true selves, they developed education, in order to cultivate themselves. Today's education systems are organized based on the problem of remodeling humanity, and they have been launching a revolution based on that goal. However, the "true" position has not yet been defined.
Contemporary men and women do not know or understand how to walk the path of a saint. Education does not touch on this issue at all. The Unification Church does, however. So should Unification Church members become saints, or become the kings of saints, able to raise other saints?
Can the nucleus of human history and the organizational structure of humankind be provided by individualism? That is not possible, or else everything would be divided. The education system in America today aims to nurture men and women of independence. But by stressing independence and autonomy, it has forgotten about relativity and reciprocation. This is a mistake. By emphasizing independence that ignores reciprocation, and by not teaching independence for the sake of reciprocation, the society has stumbled into a morass of individualism. Because Christianity is present, religion has been able to relieve some of the pressure, but, if Christianity were out of the picture, American society would be doomed to perish.
In any education system in any of the world's nations you will find an overemphasis on the competitive advantage that only "the victor" can gain, and an overemphasis on the lifestyle required to obtain that advantage. This is like a contagious disease that interferes with the efforts to guide humankind towards a world of peaceful existence. However, the stress on competition among intellects is now changing and humankind is beginning to realize that cooperation is indispensable for survival. In the light of this view, the purpose and philosophy of education must also undergo in-depth reformation.
In Korea, universities simply confer degrees on their graduates and then send them off to society. Even after receiving a university education, the students are still not proficient in their work. A university education and good job performance are two entirely separate entities. With the university organization, the relationships between its own graduates and alumni are vague and indistinct. With a slightly more sturdier organization, the university could keep up-to-date information on the movement of its graduates as well as its alumni, about what field of work they are in, and then select a few outstanding members so that they can render their services to the country. If such an education system were established, these graduates and alumni could contribute to the progress of society considerably.
If people do not know the love of their parents, teachers or public servants, what will they end up doing? Complaints will prevail throughout the country. Only educational institutions and religions can teach that to people. However, religious denominations and churches are often fighting with each other, saying, "What has the country or the world got to do with me?"
The education you have received until now has emphasized climbing the ladder of success in this fallen world. It sets study as the standard, and does not encourage anyone to seek the opposite way. That is a big problem. The further or higher a man goes, or the more knowledge he has, the further he is away from Heaven. He learns the theory of evolution, not the theory of creation. But we have to make it clear that mankind is created by God, not by evolution.
The current social system is a cultural sphere that is based upon the ideal of the individual. We live in a world of the individualistic ideal, in which we receive a self-centered education from the elementary level to the university level. Is it easy to reshape a man whose personality has been molded to be individualistic into somebody who can break through this kind of environment, who can leap over it its boundaries and limitations? That is an almost impossible task. The only force that can digest everything is love. That is where true power lies. The force of true love can even digest and overcome death.
Take a look at American young people today. The young generation has already turned into living corpses. America has governed and educated her people with democracy, but look at young people today. The reality is that young people are taking drugs and living lives of free sex. They are languishing under the influence of individualism. And there is ideological confusion too. Christianity is supposed to be the mainstay of the ideological foundation, but everything has turned topsy-turvy and plunged into the abyss of despair. The direction has been totally lost.
Democracy has produced secular humanism, and this is ousting God from our society. Secular humanism is driving out the morality and justice taught by the saints and holy men, and is spurring on the trend towards free sex. Humanity is altogether unaware that it is diving into the abyss, into the mire of Satan's blood. It is the same in Japan. And in Korea, the education has to change. The Unification Church has the mission of preventing this kind of tragedy.
Wars give rise tragic events that last through to future generations. In history, many religious representatives and saints have come to guide and educate people, but they only dealt with the external aspect. They spoke about external things such as how to rule the country and how to guide families in order to build a peaceful society, nation and world. However, they failed to point out the internal problem, that the mind and body of each person are in constant conflict and struggle.
3.2 The world of love where education is unnecessary
Did you learn how to love in your family? Does any parent tell their children that they must learn how to love their parent from them? Did you get that kind of education at home? From whom did parents learn how to love their own children? Did anyone teach you how you should make love as a newly wed couple? All mankind knows how to make love without being taught by anyone. Isn't that mysterious? Also, your mind can discern what is good and what is bad without having to go through a learning process. From whom does the mind learn how to tell what is evil and how to be on the alert against it? The body may be bigger in size and stronger than the mind, but that does not matter. Rather, proportionate to that bull strength, the mind uses an instantaneous response more rapid than electricity. If we decide we want to do otherwise, our body will cease performing a particular action instantly. How much education do we need to be able to do that? If a man could be trained to do that through education, he would be a great success. However, no matter how great an educator, he or she can never teach anyone this kind of thing. Did you learn how to do it, or not? Even though you didn't learn from someone how to control your body like that, you all know how to do it well, right?
If your son is going to get married, do you ask him whether he has received education for the past twenty years so that he can become a husband? Did anyone educate you from your birth that "this is what you have to do to win a wife"? Did you men receive instructions before your marriage? The way of love transcends all things. If a husband loves his wife, he doesn't need any education about her. If a wife knows about love, she does not need any special education about how to treat her husband. The same for children. Rather, education becomes a hindrance. Imagine if a husband and his wife are living together happily, and their parents suddenly fling open the door of their house to ask "Are you loving each other?" Do you think the young couple will not feel good about that? The place of love is a sphere of equality, a sphere of liberation. Nobody has the right to interfere there, and that is why love is so good.
þYou have to understand that love is in charge of a world that requires no education. You don't need education here! Who teaches love? Think about it. How can sparrows be taught about loving their young? Does God instruct them to how to love, waving a baton in His hand to teach them? No, they just meet and they know how to go about what they have to do. Isn't it strange? How do they bear their young? How do fish lay eggs in the water? Nature is truly mysterious and awe-inspiring. Who teaches nature to be like it is? No one. No one needs to. Everything is carried out according to heavenly law, according to the laws of nature and circular motion. It does not need to be taught.
Love does not need to be taught, nor does it require intervention from anybody. We can feel it in our bodies automatically. We do not learn it due to someone's explanation, or by the use of the brain, through the structure of our consciousness, or thanks to our experiences, but we know it innately through our physical bodies. We do not come to know it only after experiencing it, or being aware of it and then experiencing it. We know it even before we feel it or experience it. It is something we know directly through feeling.
Our minds and bodies become completely one through the power of God's love, but we have never really experienced that oneness, because of the Fall of the human ancestors. If not for the Fall of man, the mind and body would have completely united based on God's substantial love. In a world of love that revolves around that intrinsic love, education does not exist, nor are there any teachers. God is the only teacher. Mankind knows love without being taught.
When the mind and body become one, the universe is like putty in our hands. Everything becomes a microcosm of the universe, and we understand everything. There is no need to learn. Human beings will not need to be told how to live, nor will ethics or morality be necessary. What ethical or moral lessons do the sparrows or the animals need? Animals know how to protect themselves and physiologically group themselves in their own species. Why are human beings, the lords of creation, so ignorant in this regard? It is due of the Fall. Because of the Fall, struggle and conflict came into being.
Only love can become the nucleus. The nucleus always maintains its position even after having rotated for a millennium. If the nucleus becomes circular, the nucleus itself would always be in the vertical position. No matter where it is placed, it always stands at a right angle instantaneously. It does not need to be taught this. It synchronizes itself with the frequency of the universe.
The Unification Church teaches about mind-body unity. There is no secret formula. Mind-body unity cannot be achieved by money, or though any means of training or education. It is only possible with true love. So how can we plant true love? God can only have hope in the sphere that overcomes the connection to the love, life and blood lineage sown by the human ancestors in the satanic world. Only understanding things from this context can we make sense of the paradoxical logic of the Bible.
If love does exist, we have to investigate theoretically the question of where the terminal of love is, of where love leads. As long as this issue remains unresolved, no theory of love will hold water, and accordingly, it cannot be successfully popularized or taught. What on earth is this thing called love? Where does it lead to, where does it come to settlement, and is that place changing or unchanging? This is a very serious question. After all my experiences of difficulty and suffering, I came to the following conclusion: "Love is always the shortest route." When I understood this one fact, I danced with such joy. That joy has the power to transcend thousands of years of time.
At which point do the vertical and horizontal come into unity? Because they move, and because of its spherical nature, these two become one only at the most central point. When they move and converge at the most central point, the entire universe resonates. Even the spiritual world feels it. The world that is based on love does not need an education system nor does it need anyone to dominate and govern it. Rather, you yourself become governed by that love. Even God will submit to the rule of love completely. And if you are headed in the wrong direction, that world corrects your direction and sets you on the right way. You automatically know the way you have to go.
When man is united with true love, it becomes possible to elevate the noble value of humanity to the highest point. Mind-body unity refers to our conscience and physical body standing in continual resonance. When two tuning forks are of the same frequency and one of them is struck, the other one will also resonate. Similarly, if the conscience is struck with true love, the body will resonate, and vice versa. No education is needed there. If you go into the core, you will come to know everything there is to be taught.
True love does not need to be taught. We have been designed to know it automatically. When you arrived at the age of puberty or were old enough to be married, did somebody have to tell you to think about the opposite sex? Even a young woman of high birth who has been raised by a strict mother will climb over a wall if she hears the sound of men coming along the other side. She doesn't need to be told this, nor can anything stop that impulse. In our world today we have sex education and all kinds of free sex, but we don't need it. Does the animal kingdom need sex education? They know how to do it automatically as soon as they come together.
Likewise, a magnetic needle automatically points to the north and south without being taught to do so. If the mind and body are harmonized in God's true love, they will automatically align themselves even with the four directions of north, south, east and west.
3.3 Education in how to love others
Parents have to educate their children about love, saying, "Your Mom and Dad love you, so if you do such and such, it'll hurt us. So you shouldn't do that, right?" The parents have to be a friend among friends to their children. They have to be the best teacher to their children. So who should teach their children about love? The parents. The children should learn about love by seeing their parents together, loving each other and cooing like a pair of doves. They will say to themselves, "Dad and Mom like each other so much, and I'm so lonely by myself. I also need a love partner who I can coo with just like them." Parents have to teach their children so that they can follow the parents' example when it is their turn to get married. When the children follow the example of their parents, this world will become a world of goodness and human history will become a history of goodness.
If a young man and women are in a garden, whispering their love to each other, and the young man gives the young woman a rose, will she ever forget that? What about if the leaves of the rose become dried and withered? Do you think she will ever forget it? She won't forget it, ever. An education through love, a life of faith through love, that is the Kingdom of Heaven. Any nation governed by knowledge or authority is doomed to come to an end. But knowledge though love, or economics through love - this is what makes the Kingdom of Heaven.
What is the problem with education? The best education is love education, but where can we find the textbook of love? The textbook is the nation. Have you ever really loved before? If I truly love my parents, they cannot help but love me. If I truly love my wife, my wife loves me back. If a perfect minus is there, a plus will appear to complement it. If a perfect plus exists, a corresponding minus will naturally come about.
Love depends on me. It naturally follows that I will receive as much love as I give, but we have to give love first. Who is the textbook of love? That is a difficult thing. It is not easy to be a true husband. If someone has children but does not know about love, that is truly a fearful situation. If I fulfill all my responsibility as a husband, or as a wife, or as a parent, then the education I give will be good. You need to understand that the best possible textbook for an education is my own self.
Hence, love education is carried out based on the parents, then on family members and then based on the nation. The education here is the type of training that enables us to live in the heavenly kingdom. It is linked from the individual through the family, society, nation and world. If you are a mother, you do not have to tell your babies "I love you, I love you." They already sense it from the look in your eyes.
Centering on parental love, you have to move forward with the love of teachers, nations, saints and finally God's love. We normally like our parents until the age of eighteen. After that, we love our teachers. We need love education in our childhood and youth up until we reach the prime of adulthood. Just as I cannot forget my parents, I must not forget my teachers. Just as I cannot forget my teachers, I must not forget my country. Just as I cannot forget my country, I must not forget the saints. Just as I cannot forget the saints, I must not forget God. You have to feel grateful throughout your life for receiving education from all of these.
What does Rev. Moon of the Unification Church do? He is a man's man who comes as the textbook of love. Father Moon's teaching is that you should love your parents even more than you love him. As you could not love your parents and you learnt about love through Rev. Moon, he teaches you to love your parents more than you love him.
You have to expand the three-dimensional love of the family to the world stage. Let us expand to the world level the kind of thinking a husband and wife have for their parents and for their children. Let us expand to the whole world the education you have received here. You have to regard all the world's elderly people as your own grandfathers and grandmothers. You have to regard all the people in world who are your parents' age as your own parents. When you see a man, you have to think, "This is simply an extension of my husband," and you have to see any person just younger than you as your younger brother or sister. You should see people who are the age of your son or daughter as your own children. This is the kind of heart of love we should have towards the people of the world.
The person we call a man and the person we call a woman fundamentally seek to form an interaction of energy based on the reciprocal relationship between a subject and an object. What do we call this? Love. When that happens, the family is formed based on the force of love. What is patriotism? National sovereignty and the foundation for the life of citizens are intertwined based on love. Who are the saints? They are the people in the subject position on the world level who carry out actions which can be intertwined with history, based on love. Therefore, all saints are religious leaders.
The basics of a saint's life are the principles of love. All religions have taught this. In Buddhism it is known as benevolence, and in Christianity, it is called love. Although we have never really understood its essence, this force fundamentally works to connect us to the core love action of the universe. So there is a universal principle of interaction that forms the common denominator, and if someone or something does not conform to this common principle, it becomes separated and disengaged. If an object partner cannot be found after a certain time, that thing or person will then shatter and break apart. If, however, that person or thing can connect to love in the core position, if it can connect to the axial nucleus of love, then it will not be broken apart or destroyed, or dismantled. There is no loss there, but instead, perpetuity.
For instance, what will happen if a daughter-in-law starts complaining, "What's going on? I was educated in the democratic way. My grandparents and parents are the same. So are my sons and daughters." Will there be order there? No. So here education is necessary. When there is one kind of education left in the future world.....The age when education centers on the law is finished. Likewise, the age in which we can bargain with money or govern with authoritative power is all gone. None of these are now applicable. No matter how hard you might try, the time has past and gone. They cannot take root anymore. The only thing that remains for us is our need to establish the order of love based upon universal virtue.
3.4 Go where your conscience leads you
Nobody needs to be taught the path leading to evil. Anybody can take that path without being taught. Because history started from evil, anyone can go the way of evil without any special education. What kind of education is needed there? It is automatic, and that is the reason why humanity is taught to choose and follow the standard of the conscience based upon morality and ethics.
Why is the education based on that? Even though the education is based on virtue and the power of the conscience, how many people actually base their lives on that standard? Evil can always be enacted even without an education. Anybody can get a perfect score.
Even obstinate people know their own mind, regardless of whether they act out the mind's intentions fully or not. Therefore, no education is needed in the world of mind. Your own mind knows completely whether or not you have done what you intended well or poorly. Nonetheless, if you make obstinate demands or insist on your own way, what will happen? You will inherit Satan's nature. It is like poisonous snakes coming and biting you. If poisonous snakes start to bite you, will you just sit still? In fact, inheriting Satan's qualities like that is far worse than being bitten by snakes. If you are bitten by snakes, you are the only one who dies. But if the world of the mind is corrupted, millions of generations are doomed to spiritual death.
Who is it who educates the mind? Have you heard anybody saying he or she attended elementary school or junior high school for the mind? The mind needs no education whatsoever. No matter how many laws there are today, none of them can teach a more correct or righteous way than the way of the mind. If somebody commits evil, his conscience prick him. The conscience is always straight. If someone is asked if his conscience is straight or crooked, no one will tell you that his conscience is crooked. Generally speaking, everyone thinks that his conscience is straight and upright.
Is education necessary if you want to engage in evil, or not? No education is necessary to become evil. Even without doing anything special, people will turn to all sorts of evil. All anyone needs to do is to follow the body, and without a doubt, he or she will definitely become a villain. He cannot even imagine himself becoming a good person.
Education is totally unnecessary if you want to become an evil person. Not only is education unnecessary, but neither is anything else. If someone wants to do evil or become evil, he will become evil whether you teach him or not. Even if you don't teach him to do evil, automatically he will learn how to do it. On the other hand, it isn't all that easy to become a good person even if you want to. Consequently, education is necessary to transform someone into a good person - to live a life doing good deeds. Because the directions of good and evil are exactly opposite to each other, the path to goodness is not easy at all. How good it would be if the path to good were easy!
To carry out evil, neither education nor discipline is necessary. Anybody can become the most evil person in the world even if they just step outside their house without any preparation. All you have to do is stick a knife into someone walking along the street and there you are. If you follow what your body tells you to do, you will want to kill or destroy everything in the world. You don't need education to become evil. Left by himself, a man can turn as rotten or corrupted as he wants. It's easy. However, in order to become good, a man will always have to pay a certain price in terms of discipline or sacrifice. This goes to prove that the world we are living in is evil.
The original mind knows. No explanation is required in the original mind. It can naturally understand, just like the north and south poles of a magnet automatically enter into give-and-take action. This is both great and wonderful. When the force of true giving combines with the power of true receiving, automatically a universal atmosphere of existence is generated. We call that atmosphere "nature."
If you go into the mind of an original man, you can see that God occupies the center of his mind. The mind is born inheriting the nature of the vertical heavenly parent. The mind born from the vertical parent must be unified with the body born through the horizontal parents. When the mind and the body become one at an angle of ninety degrees, the person can clearly know who God is, where Hell is, for example. Everything in Heaven and Earth becomes visible and understandable.
No education is necessary. Because it is vertical, the conscience does not need any form of education. The vertical can only stay in a single, unique point. Next, when the horizontal has completely been achieved, can you educate the horizontal entity to modify or adjust itself? Think about it. Those who think they can educate the horizontal, please raise your hands high. Whoever thinks that is crazy. Once it has become horizontal, it is already an eternal, unchanging matrix. The vertical is the same.
How much has the conscience been sacrificed for the sake of the body? Do you understand the situation of the conscience that has been trampled upon by the body for an entire lifetime? The conscience gets weary from looking after the person day and night. Nevertheless, if the body tries to do something evil, the conscience still steps in to block it. "Isn't it time you quit? Haven't you done enough? Don't you think you should listen to me now?" The entity that is closest to me, the entity that represents my parents, my teacher, my God, is the conscience. Education is not necessary for the mind itself, but for the body, it is absolutely essential.
What is the situation between the world of our conscience and our body? Our conscience knows all about goodness without being taught. For example, let us say that the rulers of five different nations each enacted a different constitution and decided on them as the standard of goodness for governing the people. Conscientious people would be able to judge who among the five rulers is more righteous. They could also measure which nation was the best, and which one was the worst. Because our conscience knows how to judge such things, it automatically follows the most righteous nation of the five.
What is the purpose of education? Is it to educate our conscience or to educate our body? Our conscience has the ability to discern which of the five nations is good, and which is evil. It always maintains its autonomous position and guides us from that place. But for our body, everything is in a state of chaos and confusion. Therefore, education is absolutely required in order to control and guide the body. But our conscience is already eternally settled in the subjective position, so what does it need in terms of education? The mind can tell if it meets a good person. If you meet a person once, twice, thrice, the mind knows if the person is good. "I'd like to become one with him!" it says. What about the mind uniting with the body? If the mind and body struggle, the world of conscience really does not like it. Our conscience is unchanging. The logical conclusion is that the spirit world, which does not change, has to work to accomplish its goals with the unchanging conscience as its foundation. When we approach the spirit world, as when receiving a revelation for example, our conscience stands in the horizontal position, and must be free from any turbulence before it can get connect naturally to the invisible, spiritual world. The connection cannot be made using the physical body.
Everybody without exception possesses the dual nature of the conscience and body. If you look at your own situation, you will see that the body sometimes acts against the wishes of the conscience. In those cases, the body and conscience fail to become one and keep fighting against each other. If they cannot find unity, there is no way to move towards the ideal. If we look at history, we can see that so far, nothing, not even education, has been able to stop the ongoing war between the conscience and the body.
Your conscience is better than your parents. It is better than me, Rev. Moon. It doesn't need any education, and you have one! The conscience is even better than God! The reason we need God is to be connected through love. When you are connected with love, you are always connected with God.
The absolute conscience is in God's absolute position. You don't need to ask anything of God. Have you ever seen anyone educating the conscience? Our parents cannot issue commands to our conscience. Parents intervene because our body commits a mistake, but if we think with our conscience, it will guide us by an even higher standard than our parents'. The conscience is the second God, so it has an even higher standard than our parents, and even higher standard than our teachers. There is no need to ask your teacher. There is no need to ask God. God does not teach us about our conscience. The conscience has already been taught everything. We have to think of our conscience in terms of absolute importance, otherwise there will never be a way to unite the mind and body.
Our conscience is the second God. I have never seen anybody who tried to teach their conscience, have you? If I meet someone, I always ask if he or she is a conscientious person. I ask the diplomats, I ask the politicians. Even the economists, I ask the same question.
Write this down as you shout out "My conscience is even better than my parents'." Then underline it in red three times or even a hundred times so that you will not forget. Our conscience does not need to consult our parents, for it thoroughly understands itself and knows what it is doing.
The conscience must be absolutely one in the position of the object that can attain the Three-Subject Thought. If it does not stand in a better position than our natural parents, our teachers or the king of any nation, it cannot become the object of God's love. It needs no teaching. You have to absolutely serve and attend it as the representative of God.
If all the countries of the world are able to say "The conscientious person advocates the omnipotence of the conscience, and brings the sphere of conscientious liberation, and is a victor for ten thousand years, Amen!", if the age comes when the conscience is held in greater esteem than even God, than parents, than anything in the nation, then the time will come when those whose consciences have been liberated will rule both heaven and earth. That is why I am teaching you that your conscience must come before your parents. Your parents may be separated from you if you have difficulties after getting married, but your conscience never leaves you, for eternity, and always guides you on the path to the heavenly world, your true hometown, with a love surpassing even your parents' love. Your conscience transcends your teachers. The world of conscience does not need any education or training. Have you ever heard a Minister of Education proclaiming the education of conscience? There is nothing about the path you must take that your conscience does not know. In anything you do, you must not act against your conscience. Acting against your conscience is the way to Hell. Your conscience is one step ahead of your teacher, one step ahead of God even. Why? Because it desires for the object of your love to be even better and higher than yourself.
Your conscience comes before your parents, before your teacher, before your master. You can live separately from them, but not from your conscience. If you obey the orders of your mind, of your conscience, you can become the direct son or daughter of God. For example, if you stand up, a shadow will form in the morning and in the afternoon, but at midday, there is no shadow. Because there is no shadow at noon, it means you are one with that position. You have to become one with the core, with the central entity if there is to be no shadow.
Your conscience comes before your teacher. In the whole world, is there any Minister of Education who seeks to nurture the conscience? The conscience of your original nature does not need to undergo education of any kind. It is planted within you to naturally show you the direction towards the ideal education you need for your life, but your body gets in the way. Because the relationship between your body and your conscience is severed, the body blocks the way and prevents your conscience from clearly pointing you in the right direction. Your conscience comes before your teacher. If you learn this through your own education, you will know whether something is true or not before asking your teacher, or before asking me. You will know whether you can stand in the position of welcoming the master of the eternal world, in the position that you have to settle in, or if you are above that position. Your conscience has all these attributes and is in a position higher than any master or king. No matter how great the teaching of that nation is, the conscience will not want to reside in that country. The wounds or injuries you get while sacrificing, serving or living a public life will be an essential and substantial form of education for both you and your future descendants.
3.5 Education in sacrifice, service and public life
Imagine you are an elementary school teacher. It is not easy to teach young children. They always want to do as they wish. If the children are like that, you cannot train or educate them. As a teacher, you have to love them, bear with them, observe and help them. It is not simple. If a child feels his teacher loves him more than his own parents, or his older brothers and elder sisters, then that teacher is a qualified and truly wonderful teacher. The lesson learned in this example of an elementary school student also applies to our efforts to educate the people of the world, and to the eternal unchanging education we are seeking to implement. To educate and train those people, those souls, how much more preparation do we ourselves have to make? Without our service, sacrifices and dedication for the people, we cannot accomplish this historical task. There is no other way. Even distinguished religious leaders have no means to guide the world or people's lives except for the service and sacrifice that Rev. Moon is teaching.
If God has a means of educating fallen men, what will it be? Fallen man cannot stand in the position where he can directly deal with God. If there is one way for God to approach mankind, we can draw the conclusion that it must be through the mind - the way of showing that He is a loving God. If God intends to love and to bring salvation to humankind again, what method can he use? He can only teach us to sacrifice ourselves for others. You must understand that this is an indisputable iron rule. The Bible states that there is no greater love that for a man to lay down his life for his friend. We can discover similar teachings anywhere in the Scriptures. Through the Holy Book, we can find the logical conclusion that God exists and is alive.
I have been teaching you to sacrifice yourselves for America and the world. When I arrived in America, I laid bare all my property and possessions. I am making the Koreans, Japanese and Europeans suffer in order to save America. If you only try to evade hardships, you will no doubt perish. Thus, I will push you even harder, and make you suffer more than the Koreans, Japanese and Europeans. Then you will receive love, and then good traditions will be established.
The core teaching of mainstream religions is to walk a path completely opposite to the path of the physical body. The main religions teach us to serve, sacrifice and humble ourselves. They teach us not to hold our heads high, but to keep them down low. Hence, Satan has nowhere to go except hell.
Do you wish to receive blessings? Do you want eternal life? Then you must be a public figure. You should not love your children simply as your our own sons and daughters when you teach them. You have to love them as offerings, as sons and daughters for the sake of the world's people. When you hug your baby in your bosom and breast-feed it, you have to feel you are nursing a baby representative of all humanity as a woman representing all womankind. You have to be a mother who can love the baby of another person with the same standard of heart as you would love your own. Babies who suckle on the breast of that mother will grow up to be great people. It may not happen immediately, but after a generation or two, a man of fine character who can govern and guide the world will be born into that blood lineage. This is the formula.
Private matters and affairs belong to evil, whereas public matters belong to the sphere of goodness. It is the same for history. Personal and private history is Satan's history, and is destined to perish. On the other hand, public history is God's history of goodness. You have to teach these concepts. When you look at, listen to or smell something, are you doing it with a public mind, or an individual mind? When you work or walk, are you doing so with a public mind, or an individual mind? All problems have to be solved with this kind of standard.
Of all the education you are receiving, which is the true one? A genuine education is one that teaches a person to offer his life for others. No other education is higher than that.
Those among you who want to perish, raise your hands. Those who want to flourish, put up your hands. The way to prosperity is simple. If you become true, you will thrive. Why? Because everybody stands on your side and gives everything they have to you. On the other hand, if everybody wants to devour and dishonor you, you will perish. If you run amuck centering on yourself, you will not last long. If you center on others, however, you can continue for a long time. The origins of good and evil divide at this very point.
Old people have to think like this: "If God gives me a son, I will raise him so that he can fulfill anything of God's Will that I have left unaccomplished." You have to teach and bring up your children this way. So the one thing you must never forget is that in proportion to the sacrifices you make, in proportion to the blood, sweat and tears you invest, blessings will be bestowed upon your future generations. You should always keep this in mind. If you live a miserable life for the sake of the public good instead of a a happy, cozy life for your own sake, if you suffer for the sake of the public purpose instead of leading a life pursuing your own happiness, and if you can be happy about that kind of life, your sons and daughters will receive blessings tenfold, even a hundredfold.
Rev. Moon has been teaching Unification Church members to be patriots among patriots. This is a declaration, Article 1 of the Unification Church education. What is after that? I tell them that they have to stand in a higher position than any other churchgoer or follower of any religion.
What is the teaching of a great parent? "No matter how difficult it is, you have to sacrifice yourself and be an example for this village and neighborhood." Parents who teach their children to be like this are truly parents of goodness. Love precedes education. Love came into existence because this basic principle started from love before the existence of anything in the world of creation. That is the nature of the essence of things. Material things are like that too. Every person has a body composed of material elements but also has a mind which seeks to return to the love contained in all material things, to return to God's highest love. That is the way that the original mind works.
How can we set up educational principles? An education system that focuses only on the benefit of America will drop behind in its standards. We have to implement education that can transcend national borders to guide and raise all the people of the world. We have to think like this: "The world is one: therefore my study, our study is for the sake of the entire world." In the end, things are such that the world has no choice but to become united, to become one, and that is what will happen in the end. When we think about education from this viewpoint, we come to realize that religious education is important and necessary. Religious education can transcend national boundaries. After that we need ideological education. Ideological education is global in nature. It too can go beyond national borders. Thus, education has to comprise both religious and ideological elements. In the future, then, any country which does not base itself upon the principle of education for the sake of the world will be unable to stand before humankind.
3.6 The responsibilities and attitude of a leader
Among the people who follow the goals of the Unification Church, there are probably some people who are right up the front in 1st place, and some people who are coming in last. There will also be some who have dropped out of the movement altogether. There are a lot of differences among the different members of our church. The kinds of things that take place at sports competitions also happen in your families, or at the place where you do church activity. But whether we are talking about a nation or whether we are talking about an organization of some sort, the problem is how one can train and produce athletes of top quality. In other words, what kind of education and training must one carry out in order to produce athletes of the highest order? This is your mission. But in order to train or coach athletes, you yourselves must first possess at least the level of skills you are seeking to develop in them. You must also be able to train your trainees to surpass your own personal records. Then, based on the goals of the Unification Church, you have to train the kind of people who can be "marathon runners" on the world level. The leaders who can raise such people will go down in history with them together.
When you meet your successors in the future, you have to be able to criticize them coldly and dispassionately. You must be able to tell in what areas they are like you, and in what areas they are not. If there is no single person qualified to totally inherit your responsibility, you must set up even a few people to whom you can teach everything together. Then how should you teach them? As each person has a different path, you have to educate each individual based on the field in which he or she has been given responsibility. They have to undergo education and a course by which they can become one.
During the 1960s I traveled around South Korea and trained all the core personnel. As long as there are three members in each district, this will suffice. There is no need for a lot of people. Among the three, one should take care of educational matters, another church-related matters and the other economic matters. Each should be responsible for his own area. If they can die for sake of God's Will, the time will surely come when they can move the whole nation. That time will come.
Right now I am getting a sense of what percent of you leaders here come up to the standard of jeongseong (devotional effort) made for the sake of your missions. I do not look at you with secular knowledge as the standard, but rather the extent of your devotion and effort. Some leaders deliberately avoid the suffering course. When it's time for a reshuffle of personnel, I send such people off to remote places they never dreamed of, telling them this is my special instruction. They may complain, saying, "Oh, I did this and that and now all I get is a demotion!" A demotion? From whom did they learn the concept of "demotion"? Do I have a special position or something? Is what I do a "job"?
The church should not be run based only on the Principle. Of course we have to establish the ideological foundation based on the principle, and also strengthen our lives of faith based on the Principle. But in addition to that, you also have to carry out large-scaled social movements, and also carry out education. Education is the most important. It has to be implemented properly. It has to begin in the family, based on the village community life if the family lives in a small village. Everything will be based on the church itself if it exerts its influence on the area of education. It is not enough for our members to meet only on Sundays, and only study about a life of faith.
To have influence on the materialistic aspects of life, there are things like agricultural improvement. You need to guide your members about things which are useful in their daily lives and which are directly related to economic aspects. You have to give them the benefit of such areas as education or agricultural know-how. They will not follow you or the church should they make any loss. Anything ranging from materialistic and spiritual aspects to general education, so long as they are positive contents about the church, related people will automatically be attracted to the church. The conclusion is that a regional leader has to be knowledgeable in the overall basics of education. A regional leader is God's representative. Is God unidirectional? God is the one in charge of leading the entire fallen world into the ideal realm. Likewise, a church leader should not take charge of the church alone, but should also influence people in the general administrative area, and get them involved in discussions. Therefore, not only must you lead our church organization spiritually, but you must also think about how to create better conditions in your community in the fields of everyday life and education. If people feel the church is an indispensable part of their lives, they will naturally set up more churches. So you have to think very hard about different kinds of concrete activities.
What will happen if you become people who are eloquent in speaking, good at liaison work and making money? All of you will be made leaders. What should you do to train and educate people how to assume leadership? Only through activities. How difficult and serious it is to have to go and fundraise when you have no money and only have your own bare hands. Every day, you need to put on your thinking cap and think about how to convince and persuade people.
To save people under the bondage of Satan, you have to launch a campaign to liberate them from that environment by giving them internal guidance. You have to take responsibility to guide and teach them from the position of servant of servants.
Those believers who vow to be God's sons must forget all thoughts of eating well and living comfortably. God needs children who can say, "I'm in charge of teaching these people who come from the most difficult and lowly positions in society, including even beggars who live in caves. I also have to educate the provincial governors, and even the president himself!" You should not become worthless sons and daughters. You have to teach people of all walks of life, from the bottom to the top, in place of God. You are not worthy to be God's children if you do not walk the path of dedicating your entire life to teaching everything you know.
Now, leaders, after listening to my speech, you have to think like this: "As a new person, I have been entrusted with the duty to establish the tradition of a new way of life in this land, in this nation." You have to stand in the vanguard. Whenever I have the time, I educate the elder 36 and 72 blessed couples, too. When I am in New York, I always tell them to come to East Garden. I cannot educate Korean leaders when I stay in America, but I have to be responsible to teach them before die. Once I start something, I will always finish it. I know I am responsible for training people who can go straight to the world, to heaven.....It is not easy. It is not the kind of thing that can be done in just one year.
As the trunk is, so the boughs and twigs will be, too. I am the root. The root does not go up to the branches, and neither do the branches go to the leaves. When others see Unification Church leaders, they should be able to catch the traditions and ideas of our church. You have to become those branches. This is my policy. Any leader who does not conform to this principle will be replaced. Otherwise, I will have to educate them myself again at another training ground, for example in Keumgang (Diamond) Mountain [in North Korea].
You have to stand on your own two feet, set up your strategy for living and raise the people of Heaven. You have to work twice as hard to raise them as you would to establish your own livelihood by receiving education in a specialized field. Doubling the amount of effort is more significant. You can lay the foundation upon which church members can live and cooperate, without being indebted to them. Leaders who can only handle economic problems will be insignificant in the future. The political, social and scientific problems are also unimportant. Instead, the central position will naturally fall to leaders who can teach and train others with God's love, armed with Unification Thought.
3.7 How education should change
The most problematic issue is the issue of education. Education will be carried out through watching videos. Schools will phase out gradually. Education will be implemented with three-hour, seven-hour and ten-hour lecture series of renowned lecturers on videotapes. A student who studies through video does not need to go to a four-year university. He can even complete the whole course in one year. If he passes the state examination, he can seek for employment in his field of major in any country.
What is the most problematic issue? It is the educational problem, a school problem. Language may be a problem in the end, but language education is now being implemented through videos. Therefore, schools will disappear very soon. If you manage to make the grade in the qualifying examination specified by the state, you will be able to graduate with a doctorate without turning up for classes.
Instead of a compulsory system, universities will gradually have to go. The borderline beyond middle and high schools or universities will no longer exist. If you self-study through videotapes and take the state examination, you are allowed to graduate from elementary, middle or high schools, as well as colleges or universities. A genius can even graduate from a graduate school in five years. If languages are unified, such an age will come.
Schools will no longer be necessary in the future. I am making a head start on this. We have entered the age of video-based education. I have built up good rapport with all the world's scholars. Inviting scholars in every discipline, I am making arrangements with them to produce videotapes. I am already carrying out that project at the Washington television center.
This is a society where the written word has been used as a means of communication. From now on, it will be done through images or motion pictures. We are at the forefront of the development of this technology. It is being used in 280 broadcasting stations.
What do we plan to do? America is going to ruin now. Mobilizing the young people, what are we going to do? Radio and television programs are broadcast round the clock in America. Programs on current affairs are not more than an hour and a half, and educational programs are less than three hours, though. The rest are music programs and movies. This is the direction a dying country is moving toward. I am making preparation to produce a series of weekly movies related to the world's current events. The contents of these weekly movies must be for educational purposes.
The construction of new church buildings must be completed within the shortest possible time. I have to implement cultural education and so am building 1,700 churches. The nation cannot accomplish this. About 2,000 wholesome movies will be selected and dubbed into Korean for education. I have the intention to teach people through cultural activities ranging from geography to zoology. You must be ready to introduce this. All have to be dubbed with Korean songs, folk songs and melodies. We are about to get started on it. The Unification Church has to become an educational base.
Education has now become a problem. The age of video education is coming soon. The project is in the pipeline. We are now producing weekly movies on current topics at the Washington Television Center. I am mobilizing celebrated scholars from around the world. A request by telephone for the papers or opinions of the world's versatile scholars to be published in The Washington Times, Insight Magazine and The World & I, has never been rejected by scholars. There are many scientists and scholars in the field of advanced scientific technology.
What do you go to university for? How can you jot down all the notes during a lecture? Therefore, I will record good lectures of famous professors on videotapes, inserting interesting things such as their anecdotes and jokes during intervals. A student who sits and listens to the series of lectures out of interest will be able to make it through the course. If language is unified, there is no need to attend a university. You could carry the tapes in a backpack or book bag wherever you go. If you succeed in the state examination just by listening to the tapes, you can chalk up the grades required for graduation. In that case, it wouldn't cost anything.
The population concentrated in cities and towns will dwindle in the near future. Due to various factors - such as the quality of children's schools there and the convenient lifestyle, people have flocked to large satellite towns. Through televisions and other modern facilities we can enjoy pursuing what interests us and our hobbies, watch an orchestra or dance performance, while sitting down in the comfort of our own homes. Nowadays, we can view all library books, secrets of the world and entertainment on television screens. We do not need to move anywhere to make access to these things easier.
In Washington D.C., I intend to initiate a movement for awarding academic credits to people by educating them through worldwide telecommunications. The student watches a stipulated number of lectures on videotapes and then answers questions that are asked in a television program three or four times a year. It is the same as in schools and universities. Scholars deliver expert lectures on video and then ask question about the material. This is happening in America now.
With a radio or television set at hand, we can live even in a valley. Schools and universities will be phased out gradually. Teaching is to be done with videotapes. The time has already come. In the international management system, elementary school curriculum is implemented through videos. Bright school children can finish the entire course and graduate within two years instead of the conventional six years. At the tertiary level, university students who study through videos can be accredited anywhere as long as they pass the official examination recognized by the state. If language is not a barrier, the vice-ministers of education of America and Korea will be the same person. Education can be carried out this way. The age of settlement has passed. We can be just like birds, living wherever we feel is the most beautiful. Schools and administrative departments will slowly die out.
Movements for the abolition of school systems are in progress. Cities are densely populated owing to schools and educational problems. Smart students will be able to graduate in just five years if they study through videotapes what they have to study in sixteen to twenty years. I am presently setting up such a system, which can prevent environmental destruction such as pollution due to high population density. Everything in the industrial zone must be decentralized or dismantled. Now is the right time to do these things.
Not long after, schools will have to go. Classes will be taught through the mass media and videotapes. The plan to teach the world's university courses at the University of Bridgeport is underway. If only languages were unified, the project would be possible in the twinkling of an eye. Standing behind Rev. Moon are many scholars from throughout the world. I will videotape the lectures of well-known university professors, each of which can last for ten hours or so. It will be possible to obtain all the knowledge necessary for a major through video compilations of the top three professors in the given field.
If there is a television and a video player at a ranch, anybody in any part of the world can tune into American TV programs and study with textbooks used in America. An opportunity for self-study is given. This system requires students to meet only once a week or every other week so that the lecturer can further guide them in the form of questions and answers based on the materials they have studied on their own.
Kindergartens, elementary, middle and high schools should be built in proportion to the population of each state. An educational system that can link them to universities and colleges should be established. From grade four onward, students could be taught farming methods, tree planting methods, cultivation methods and how to manage the wilderness. By the time they graduate from high school, they could become experts. I will build up a system such that they can become teachers and guides at local universities when they graduate from university.
Students graduate from elementary school at around twelve or thirteen. When they go to high school, they could be taught to develop and manage a stock farm, and all about business. They have to receive specialized training at the ranch for sixteen years to become a university graduate or twenty years if they complete a doctorate course. Once they are trained under our system, they do not need to worry about food because they can be self-sustaining and self-sufficient.
You have to teach by correspondence. Anybody can take a correspondence course. As education for elementary school is compulsory, web-based education by correspondence should be implemented from middle school until university. The age of the Internet has come for you to teach the whole world. Had you talked about this dream fifty years ago, you would have been treated as a moron. People would have thought you were out of your mind if you tried to sit down and educate all humankind. Haven't we entered the age in which we can communicate of our own free will with the world now, while sitting comfortably in front of the computer? Before I pass on to the other world, a world of free communications has to be established on earth.
The epoch where schools become unnecessary will come in the future. The global problem of schools closing down can crop up if one hundred different subject courses have been prepared. An age of great chaos will arrive. Everyone will receive equal education. Do you think it is possible or impossible? There is absolutely every possibility.
Many young people are here. Those below forty are full of hope. Do you want to settle down in the future and live in mansions, or do you want to just live, play, eat and sleep while traveling around the world? Ninety percent of young men and women of the ideal type reply that they prefer to live a vagabond life. Study is the issue. They can study through the distance learning system. By listening to sixty tapes a hundred times, they can take the middle or high school examination anywhere and pass it. If such a system were to be put into practice, it would not take twenty years but less than a decade to earn a doctorate.
Schools are not required, and have to be done away with. The distance learning examination ought to be held worldwide on a certain date for students of every grade and level. They can later find out the examination results from the newspapers. In this way, they can earn their certificates and degrees without actually attending classes. School buildings would then have to be demolished. Do you like going to school? Students would have to study and thoroughly understand all the materials before taking the examinations. How fabulous it would be for students to carry lecture tapes and books of eminent professors in their schoolbags and study them everywhere they go! These ideas are on my drawing board.
|
Federatie voor Wereldvrede en Unificatie http://www.fwu.nl Tel1: (0570) 52-3910 Tel2: (020) 695 7440 Emailadres: info@fwu.nl |
| |
|
|
|