Pyeong Hwa Gyeong (083) BOOK 5. Absolute Values and a New World Order CHAPTER 17. True Knowledge, True Family and World Peace
3. Ideal world based on true love
The original relationship between God and humankind is based on true love. There are many instances of co-ownership between God and the individual, between the whole and the individual, and between the neighborhood and the individual. When co-ownership is based on God’s true love, therefore, it is something for which we can be grateful.
In an ideal world realized by humankind having perfected God’s love, the purposes of the whole and of the individual would be naturally harmonized. As human beings have the desire and need for material things and a natural inclination toward love, an ideal society would permit individual ownership and individual purpose.
Even so, citizens would not seek to have unlimited personal belongings or to fulfill an individual purpose detracting from the whole purpose. Human beings perfected in true love would wish to own an amount of property commensurate with their conscience and original nature.
In particular, economic activity by ideal human beings who have become true owners of all things based on true love would manifest love and gratitude. There could be no greed or corruption. Similarly there could be no emphasis on national or regional interests inconsistent with the purpose of the whole. The aim of economic activity would be the overall welfare, rather than the mere pursuit of gain.
This worldview based on mutual prosperity is rooted in God’s true love. Mutual prosperity allows mutual participation in society and pursues a politics wherein the ideals of freedom, equality and happiness are realized.
Public participation in politics is for the purpose of electing representatives. However, when we understand that the ideal political model is an extended form of the love-based family, we realize that antagonistic relationships would not exist between candidates for public office. Their candidacy would be rooted in a calling to serve others. Groups of neighbors who attend one God and Parent, and relate to each other as brothers and sisters, would field candidates.
After a due electoral process, voters would accept the final decision as being the Will of God. Improper considerations would not influence the result. Citizens would choose a representative through prayer and solemn deliberation. As people would see a representative as having been elected according to the Will of God and heavenly fortune, everyone would come to accept the decision with gratitude and joy.
Important organizations and ministries within a nation of the ideal world would harmonize through reciprocal give-and-receive action centered on a common purpose. This is similar to the organs of the human body, which work together for a common purpose according to the direction of the brain.
The ideal of the common good characterizes a society in which people, under the absolute values of God’s true love, observe universal ethics and morality centered on true love. All members of such a society pursue a life of goodness and righteousness.
An ideal world would exist on the basis of ideal families and perfected human beings. The harmony of ideal parents, ideal husband and wife, and ideal sons and daughters all practicing true love is the indispensable condition for an ideal family. Furthermore, a perfected person is one whose mind and body are harmonized through true love.
When perfected people practice goodness and righteousness voluntarily within the family, on the foundation of true love, they will realize the society and world of the heavenly way and of righteousness—that is, the ideal world.
However sophisticated our knowledge might be, when compared with true love it is found wanting. We need to know that human beings are truly happy when they understand the Will of our omniscient and all-powerful God. True knowledge is the knowledge of God’s Will.
We need to understand and see world history and humankind in the way God understands and sees them. It is wrong for a scholar to be arrogant or to behave as if he were God and take control over others by means of his partial knowledge of the world God has created.
Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, your goal cannot be just to discuss the latest discoveries in physics, biology and chemistry. You need to understand and discuss how such discoveries and academic achievements can benefit each individual and society as a whole, and how harmonious relationships among people, countries and the things of creation can be realized.
Too often, new scientific knowledge has been misused for the gain of one individual or for one nation’s conquest of another or to secure a country’s own prosperity. Academic knowledge and innovation are great blessings that God has bestowed on humankind.
God has given these blessings for the sake of the entire human race and the world. But if the academic achievements resulting from such blessings are used only for selfish purposes, a potential good actually becomes an evil. |