Summary of True Parents Life Course and the Founding of the Family Federation for World Peace
A testimony given by
Antonio L. Betancourt
Deputy Secretary General
Federation for World Peace(Useful as an inspiration or a resource for one / two-day FFWPU workshops)
Washington, D.C.
November 18, 1999
The following testimony has been prepared by Antonio Betancourt with the purpose to explain the life of the True Parents, their legitimacy as True Parents, where do their claims come from, and where is the True Family Movement going, and in the case of the United States, the role of the Japanese women who are volunteering in many cities to create an awareness of the True Family movement and the necessity of establishing true families. The objective, of course, is to have the participants, if single, agree to participate in the matching and if married, to connect their marriage to the true family movement for the purpose of restoring their positions as true families. With this in mind, I offer this testimony which has worked effectively in Washington, D.C. as part of my own work. This can be used an inspirational or at the conclusion of 1-day and 2-day workshops. The presentation is not perfect. It may need some improvements. I encourage the readers to borrow all or part of this material. The goal is to help you succeed in your witnessing activities. May you bring victory to comfort the True Parents heart! Background:
The birth of the true child 400 years after the Reformation Introduction
The last 2000 years, but most particularly 400 years since 1517 when Martin Luther posted his treatise that led to the Protestant Reformation, have been the preparation for the coming of the True Parents which is the fulfillment of prophecy.
The messiah comes as True Parents, a man and a woman to bring the standard of manhood, womanhood, fatherhood, and motherhood according to the original blueprint that God intended for Adam and Eve.
Since 1917 the world was ready for the coming of True Parents. In 1920, a child was born in Jong Ju in what is today North Korea. His name was Sun Myung Moon. Since early childhood he demonstrated an extraordinary ability to understand human nature and the creation. Especially he was very concerned with human suffering. Since Korea was occupied by Japan, his people were subject to enormous hardships, imprisonment, torture and violations of all kinds. He could not understand where the source of this evil and suffering came from since he believed God was absolute love. While other kids were pursuing ordinary children’s games, Sun M. Moon decided to look for answers to his internal yearnings through deep prayer in the mountains.
On Easter Sunday in 1936, Jesus appeared to him and told him, "you are the true child and the fulfillment of the prophecy, the seed of Jacob’s victory. Tamar, the Old Testament, and my own victory is in you. I will raise you up. I will help you to fulfill your mission. God will reveal to you within the next nine years the pattern for the establishment of the true family which consists of your individual perfection and then later the restoration of a true Eve and the establishment of a true family as a model for the restoration of all families in the world."
Sun Myung Moon embarked on a painful preparation process of internal and external education both guided by Jesus and God. Internally he engaged an intensive search for the truth which could not be given by God on a silver platter. This led him to enormous battles in the spirit world with the forces of evil over which he was victorious. He had daily encounters with Jesus and the other saints and founders of other religions. Externally he went to high school and eventually traveled to Japan where he received his degree in electrical engineering at Waseda University.
Since that first encounter with Jesus, nine years later in 1945 according to God’s plan, Sun Myung Moon was ready to present himself to the Christian leaders in Korea who represented world wide Christianity and this he did. God’s plan was that with the support of these Christian leaders, he was to begin the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification. Through Christianity he was to bring to the world the original ideal of the true family and then establish true families worldwide. From Christianity this movement would expand to other religions as a true ecumenical movement of inter religious unity and activity centered on the true family.
For this fulfillment the Christian world had to shed an incredible amount of blood in the first and second world wars. The world in 1945 was at this time ready to be led by Christianity centered on the U.S., England, and France to begin the culture of peace centered on the true family movement. From Korea the true family movement should have expanded to the United States later covering the four corners of the earth.
Unfortunately the Korean Christians led by their foreign elders, Americans and Europeans failed to receive this message and the messenger. Rev. Moon was rejected. They argued that if there was going to be a fulfillment of prophecy it had to be through their own denominations and races. They could not conceive that a Korean and Korea could be chosen for such a cosmic mission.
The failure of Christianity to receive Rev. Moon destroyed the foundation that God had prepared for a unified culture of peace. The cold war started first with a division of North and South Korea. A Cain and Abel bi-polar world began within the communist and democratic world. God could no longer protect Christianity and other religions from Satanic invasions and the Cain-like world became very strong.
From 1945 to 1952, Sun M. Moon tried by all means to be accepted and initiate the true family movement on his own. His last effort in 1949 was in North Korea where he ended up in Hung Nam concentration camp where he was condemned to death. He was liberated in 1952 by General MacArthur’s army. It was then that it became evident that the Christian foundation of 2000 years was totally lost.
Heaven instructed him that year in 1952 to begin a 40-year indemnity (sacrifice) course at the individual, family, society, and worldwide level to restore and rebuild what was lost. This led him two years later in 1954 to create the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, known as the Unification Church. The purpose of this church was not to compete with other religions since the objective is very different. It was to restore the lost foundation due to the disbelief of the Christians in Korea. This 40-year indemnity course was concluded in 1992.
In 1960, eight years after beginning his 40-year indemnity course, he established the true family with Hak Ja Han, a young woman chosen by God to be the restored Eve coming also from a very special lineage. In the same year he began to give out the blessings as dictated by heaven with 3 disciples, 12, 36, 72, and in later years, 420, 777, 1800, 8000, and finally with 30,000 couples in 1992 he concluded his 40 year indemnity course.
For 40 years he endured hardships, sacrifice and untold difficulties that only God knows, attempts of assassination by the communist camp, character assassination by Christians, Jews, religious and non-religious people. He has been opposed by the world’s secular and religious establishment. The media has made of him a caricature. As he toiled for 40 years of indemnity, God has not been able to work with the rest of the religious world in order to stop the culture of death that has entrenched itself in the United States and the developed world and has rendered God irrelevant in today’s modern society.
The institution that has suffered the most in the past 40 years is the family, the one that Rev. Moon came to restore. Divorce, where 65% of families separate with great pain for their children, drug addiction, sexual promiscuity as a result of the sexual revolution of the 1960s, perverted lifestyles, single parenthood, and a violent youthful society characterized by mass murders and serial killers is the result of not allowing God to work in modern days. Religions, especially Christianity has been unable to effectively judge evil and reverse the process of decadence in today’s culture.
During those 40 years of indemnity, Rev. and Mrs. Moon revealed themselves as the true parents only to the people inside the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, the Unification Church, and never made a public proclamation as true parents.
In December 6, 1991 upon the completion of the 40-year indemnity course and in anticipation of the worldwide proclamation of the true parents, Rev. and Mrs. Moon visited North Korea and reconciled with their ancient foe, the one who stole his position 40 years earlier, Kim Il Sung.
In 1992 upon the fulfillment of the 40 years of restoration he could proclaim the true parents to the outside world. This began in Korea during the blessing of the 30,000 couples and in front of world leaders coming from more than 60 nations around the world including former and current presidents, leaders in the field of science, academia, world religions, world media, the youth, women’s organizations, and world religions, he proclaimed that Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han Moon were the true parents of mankind, and that this was the fulfillment of the second coming of Christ according to God’s will, and that there will be no other fulfillment of prophecy.
Later this was followed by proclamations on a tour of more than 40 nations where they personally proclaimed, "true parents and the completed testament age," in front of thousands of distinguished leaders and citizens of those nations in 40 capitals of the world.
Four years later, on August 1, 1996, at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, witnessed by world leaders, east, west, north, and south, including two former presidents of the United States, and world leaders from all levels in an unprecedented, landmark event, Rev. and Mrs. Moon inaugurated the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification as the culmination of God’s mandate that started back in 1936, the organization that should have started after 1945
The world today is a broken world, very different from the one in 1945. Evil is no longer in the periphery in human life and society. Evil has now become central and accepted in the life of individuals, families and society. Evil is now camouflaged as good and goodness is now on the defensive and in the periphery in people’s lives. This has brought untold misery and suffering to God who is parent to us and to this world. However every human is a child of God and everyone has to come through the original true home of God through the true parents.
The purpose of the Family Federation for World Peace is to introduce to individuals and families the original blueprint or roadmap in how to establish the true family. This organization will achieve the ancient dream that rests in every human heart to bring people of all races, nationalities, cultures, traditions, and religions to work together to create the culture of peace centered on the family.
The standard of the true family, since it is based on universal shared values and self-evident truths recognized by everyone regardless of their nature or background, is the only way that all peoples of the earth can come together with a common ideal, common objective and methodology to build a world of a true love and everlasting peace.
This movement of true families uniting north and south, the east and the west, the poor and the rich, the educated and the illiterate, all colors, all religions, all nationalities, recognizing our common parents will be the Kingdom of God on Earth which is the model of the Kingdom of God in Heaven as these people pass through this life on earth to the spiritual world. As Jesus said, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."
The work of the Family Federation for World Peace provides the foundation to become one with God through the blessing and the establishment of the true family. This role is different from the role of traditional religions whose purpose is to bring people closer to God. Their role is very positive but they cannot make people one with God since they have neither the mandate from God nor the formula to do this. We will still need religions even as blessed couples and families in order to keep that closeness with God.
The people of the FFWPU, awakened by the truth, understand the correlation between the purpose of the individual and the purpose of the whole and try to harmonize these two purposes by harnessing their resources, external and internal, for the improvement of their communities for the changing of the world from an uncaring, self-destructive world into a loving, self-sustaining kingdom of God on earth.
Members of FFWPU can meet God daily through loving service, internal or external, either by teaching the truth to the unlearned or by caring for the external needs of the people in the community. It is through giving ourselves for the sake of others we can meet God face to face by challenging not only our selfishness but our own limitations and unpreparedness to take responsibility both internally and externally for our fellow men.
By living for the sake of others, internally educating people about God’s truth, and externally taking care of their needs, we become a living testimony of God’s presence in people’s lives and we can resonate with the life course and work of the True Parents.
A good example of the FFWPU is manifested by the Japanese women that have come to America to bequeath the traditions of service, internal and external to the American people, living for the sake of others. They have left behind their husbands, children, the pursuits of hobbies, leisure and good life in Japan for the uncertainties, difficulties, language, environment, etc., of a foreign country, America. These women more than anyone else understand the role of America as the elder son nation. America is today the center of modern culture, the mecca of modernism, and as such, is the number one exporter of lifestyle, culture and behavior. If America embraces true family values, there is hope for Japan, Japan will follow. The whole world will follow America. These Japanese women are willing to give their lives in order to create a rebirth in America centered on the true family. True mother country bequeathing the tradition
of service to the elder son nationIndividuals or couples who associate or join the Family Federation for World Peace through the blessing can enjoy the benefits of a community of people worldwide in more than 195 countries and territories who will stand by them and support them in the quest to build a true family and collectively to build the world of true love. The possibilities are endless for the external benefits, jobs, fellowships, cultural exchanges, business, and advancement of sciences. Through the Family Federation for World Peace movement we will become true citizens of the world.
There is a profound difference between blessed couples, blessed in marriage by the true parents and generic marriage coming from the secular or religious world. We have a living example of what is a true man and a true woman, a true father and a true mother, a living example of a true family multiplied thousands of times worldwide.
The key point for the fulfillment of the perfection of love at the individual and couple level in order to establish myself as true parents is the maintenance of absolute fidelity in love. All forms of love can be perfected by multiplying them as far as you can go except sexual love. Sexual love can only be perfected between one man and one woman. It loses the potential for perfection the moment it is spread or multiplied. The only way I can become a true child of God or a true husband or wife, and a true parent is by perfecting sexual love and by maintaining absolute fidelity to my spouse by keeping my pure love pledge.
By becoming an example for other couples and families we can greatly contribute to the building of a different community, one that God can use as a source of hope and healing for other families within the community, and by relating to the sons and daughters of my fellow FFWPU neighbors as my "nieces" and "nephews."
Rev. and Mrs. Moon could have never fulfilled their mission without a very deep communion with God through prayer. Prayer is a conversation with God in which we share our daily life with the ups and downs, and ins and outs. Rev. Moon’s extraordinary life of prayer is a prerequisite for the enlightenment of true family values and the becoming of a true child, a true husband, and a true parent in front of God.
The new members of the Family Federation for World Peace should be able to teach and take care of other people and to reach out to their families, neighbors, and community. To do this they need education. Advanced training courses are a necessity. If they want to grow both internally and externally they need to attend the training whether in evening programs and hoon dok hae, or on weekends with a 1-day workshop, or 2-day workshop, and as much as is available.
They should own the Family Federation by investing their time, money, and whatever resources they have. 400 years before the coming of Jesus, one of the great contributions that Malachi, the great prophet and reformer brought to the faithful was the idea of tithing as a prerequisite to be counted among the chosen people of Israel and to build a strong chosen nation.
Today we have to declare ourselves as chosen people to build the kingdom of God on earth with our own hands by contributing whatever resources we have both internal and external on a daily, weekly, monthly basis according to each individual family’s situation. Otherwise there is no ownership, the Family Federation will remain alien to me if I don’t invest whatever I have in it.
People should be invited if they don’t have a house of worship to come and worship with us in the Family Church which is made out of a community of blessed families and to tithe to that organization as the members of other churches do. If they have a church of their own they should contribute to the FFWPU with a monthly donation and their time and other resources for the advancement of God’s kingdom.
In conclusion, the Family Federation for World Peace member should be able to understand the deep heart of our True Parents, Rev. and Mrs. Moon by studying their life course, the personal sacrifices they have made, sacrificing their children, their family in the altar of God’s providence for the sake of the movement and the world. They have to understand the deep commitment for the liberation of God’s heart and sorrow. This will move the member to tears. A good way to do that is to read the speeches and prayers from the early days until today and to work these prayers into practice by working in the field. This will demonstrate Rev. Moon’s sorrowful heart, the liberation of God’s heart, which is the path we all have to follow as co-liberators of God’s heart and mind together with the True Parents.
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