Cheonan, Korea, July 4th, Michael Balcomb: The 12th World Culture and Sports Festival opened today in Cheonan, Korea, with the 1200 participants of the Inter-religious Peace Sports Festival joining more than 6,000 applauding guests at the Cheonan Sports Stadium.

Congratulatory speakers included Sir James Mancham, chair of the UPF Global Peace Council and founding President of the Seychelles and former Korean Prime Minister Sang Joo Lee.

WCSF chair Hyun Jin Moon congratulated the athletes of the IPSF, representing more than 60 nations.

UPF founder Rev. Dr. Sun Myung Moon delivered the keynote peace address (see below), and an exciting martial arts dramatic presentation finished the official ceremony.

After several days of rain and drizzle, the skies cleared in the afternoon and the rest of the day was taken up with practices of the various sports teams, in diverse locations around Asan and Cheonan.

The soccer field, located directly across from the Sun Moon University dining hall, has become a natural place for people to relax and watch the various teams play, and for impromptu matches to take place as well. Various delegations have still been arriving, some held up by visa and other regulatory problems.

The cultural programs were once again a time of fun and inspiration. An impromptu dance between the Thailand Phrae dance troupe and the participants took place during the evening celebrations, with a delightful team in a Llama costume, elegant Thai dancers, and the joy-filled participants weaving and flowing through the vast Sun Moon gymnasium. Later, the Sri Lankan dancers seemed to bring to life some beautiful tableau in a rare book, with their beautiful poses and graceful movements accentuated by colorful costumes.

UPF Presiding Council member Bishop Abel Muzorewa encouraged the young people, telling them clearly that they were the ones who could 'put the brake' on society's spiral to violence and conflict.

In a moving example of the unifying nature of faith, the final prayer was chanted in unison by a trio of Muslim participants from Afghanistan and Indonesia.

The sports competitions now begin in earnest, with the men's soccer tournament the most closely watched. The host team and six-time Korean college champions Sun Moon University are hot favorites, but the emotional wave is running with the Iraqi team, which includes both Sunni and Shia players and is coached by former Iraqi National Soccer team star Ali Shahan. Also favored are the Taiwan team and the US entry from Miami, previous finalists.

Distinguished guests from at home and abroad, athletes participating in the tournament games: Thank you for taking part in the World Culture and Sports Festival 2007, which is growing in stature as a meaningful peace festival for all humanity.

I first proposed the holding of the WCSF in 1988 at the time of the Seoul Olympics, as a way to create a new model for harmony and peace, and to bring the six and a half billion people of the world to become one family under God. This year as we celebrate the 12th WCSF, we have the overall theme of "The Era for the Beginning of a New Universal Civilization of Peace."

Ladies and gentlemen, please look at the world today. Can we find even one leader in the world today who is genuinely concerned with the future of humankind and sacrifices himself or herself to bring harmony and peace to humanity on an inter-religious and international level? On the contrary, selfishness is almost universal. Human beings are like orphans who have lost their parents, like misdirected youth without a teacher, or like servants who have lost their masters. Human beings have become almost blind to the needs of others, unable to see even an inch in front of their own faces.

There are now some two hundred nations in the world. Are they cooperating in peace? On the contrary, many of these nations are engaged in fierce conflicts, either directly or indirectly. All are intent on pursuing their own interests. What about the United Nations, which was launched with the noble hope and ideal of protecting the welfare and peace of humankind? It too has reached its limitations. Watching helplessly without a solution to the global crises of war, starvation and disease afflicting the world, the United Nations is an organization that sadly exists more in name than in substance.

Calling ourselves lords of creation and acting according to our own desires, we human beings have been creating a disastrous history. We have perpetrated terrible massacres and suffered incredible natural disasters. Despite this, we have survived and have continued to multiply until this day. We still seek a bright and happy world, although with only a vague concept of what that might be. Why is it that the human race is still unable to escape from this mire of sin and disease?

Ladies and gentlemen, long ago I made a promise to God to fulfill his providential calling to create one global family under God, and to establish a sacred reign of peace by helping humankind overcome the tragic reality of the world.

Throughout my life, I have been teaching the heavenly truths God has revealed to me. Just a year ago, on June 13, 2006, on the occasion of the coronation of the king and queen of peace and the opening of the Peace Palace here in Korea, I proclaimed the basic contents of the heavenly way of life which every human being should know and practice in order to become a citizen of Cheon Il Guk, the Kingdom of God.

Today, I would again like to address this urgent topic of how each one of us must make peace by becoming a true parent, true teacher and a true citizen of heaven. My title is "The 'Three Great Subjects' Principle from the Viewpoint of God's Providence". This message is Heaven's blessing and serves as an important teaching in guiding humanity's future. Please open your heart in listening to these words and that you may prepare for your eternal life.

The "Three Great Subjects" Principle: Our Three Primary Roles in Life Ladies and gentlemen, at the time of creation God gave humankind the "Three Great Subjects" Principle. In other words, he gave us three primary roles in life that we must each learn to fulfill as our own contribution to a world of peace.

The first of these roles is to become a true parent. God created us as His children. We were to become true children by perfecting our character as individuals. We do this by first going through a period of growth and responsibility, living according to the moral laws and principles established by God. Upon reaching spiritual maturity, we were then to become true couples, have children, and thus attain the position of true parents. In short, we were to perfect ourselves in love and life by practicing and embodying the true love that was bestowed on us by God with the act of our creation.

However, in reality moral values in our world today are deteriorating uncontrollably. The moral laws governing the relationship between parents and children have been thrown to the ground; fidelity between couples is being discarded as an old-fashioned concept of the older generation, and brotherly love between siblings has become a rare commodity, buried in the swamp of self-centered individualism.

This is why in order to establish peace, we must first and foremost establish true families based on true love. These will be families in which three generations can live together in true love, centered on the true parents.

The second of the three roles we must each fulfill is to become a true teacher. One way or another, during our lifetime all people enter relationships where one is a teacher and the other a student. Our first teachers are our parents and our first school is in the family. Indeed, our parents should be the first and greatest teachers among all teachers. Parents have the primary responsibility, in the position of true teachers, in raising true children.

Children who are raised well by true parents through a true and good family education will easily progress into their school education. Although at school we receive an institutionalized level of education, even within that framework teachers have the responsibility not only to impart knowledge but also to raise and educate their students to become true children, with the heart of a parent. By this I mean that horizontal academic education must be carried out on the foundation of vertical character education. Thus, a true teacher must first become one who possesses the heart of a true parent.

The third of the three roles is to become a true owner and a true citizen of God's kingdom of peace. God, who created the universe, is of course the original and true owner and lord of all the things of creation. God's creation is the fruit of His complete investment, carried out on the standard of his own absolute faith, absolute love, and absolute obedience to the heavenly law of living for others. God wants all of us to gain the wisdom that will allow each one of us to inherit everything he has and to become a true owner. I am referring to the secret wisdom of being able to live for others by investing true love on the basis of God's absolute standard. The prerequisite to becoming a true owner is to first possess the heart of a true parent.

The "Three Great Subjects" principle is an organic relationship that is mutual, absolute, and indivisible. In other words, each of the three primary roles of parent, teacher and owner is related to each of the others. Once you attain the position of a true parent, the positions of a true teacher and true owner emerge from there. Once you reach the position of a true teacher, the positions of true parent and true owner are included. Once you attain the position of the true owner, you will immediately become a true parent and true teacher.

Human beings were originally born to inherit and embody God's complete Three Great Subjects principle. This means that if we become a person of character who has perfected the Three Great Subjects principle, we will become like God Himself. We must have a heart such as God has. We must love human beings and all things of creation on the basis of an absolutely unselfish standard, just as God does. In other words, we each must attain a state of loving unity with God. At that point, the true parent, the true teacher and the true owner all converge.

In this complex and diverse world the principle of becoming a true owner applies to the relationships between people as well as the relationship between human beings and the creation. The question is what kind of person can be called a true owner? Only the person who lives for others, caring for others, sacrificing himself in serving others -- in other words a person who practices and lives a life of true love -- is a true owner. Only someone who treats everything in the creation with true love, protecting and nurturing them, can become a true owner of all things of creation.

It is not your external position or status that makes you a true owner; that is determined only by your character and capacity to love. The president of a company who loves and cares for all his employees with a parental heart is the true owner of that company. Only a nation's president who loves his people in the same way as a parent would caringly raise his or her children and who shares the sorrows and joys of life with them can become the true owner of that nation.

Ladies and gentlemen, God's creation is truly mysterious and profound. God created human beings as His children and to be the lords of creation. In order to help us fulfill this destiny, he gave us each the highest and greatest gift of our conscience. This special gift of the conscience is given to us to be our compass in guiding our life in this earthly world. We often say that our life is one hundred years, and regardless of who we are, we cannot escape the influence of our conscience from the moment of our birth to that of our death.

The most elevated function of the conscience is its role in helping us become a true parent, true teacher and true owner. In other words, our conscience acts on behalf of God in the position of a true parent, true teacher and true owner in guiding and educating us from the time we are born. One function of our conscience is the responsibility to guide and keep watch over our every action in every moment. That is why our conscience knows our every word, action and though, even before our parents, our teachers and God know. God instilled into the conscience the fundamental function of guiding and supervising our lives.

Yet the conscience, which was to be clear and transparent like a crystal, was blemished due to the human Fall and was unable to fully manifest its original function amid all manner of sin and sickness. This is why it is an urgent necessity that you become people who can hear the voice of your conscience, crying out for liberation and complete inner freedom from this evil world that is fallen under Satan's dominion.

However, there is no way for fallen people to return and restore the conscience to its original function. This is because they have not established a direct vertical relationship with God. The six and a half billion people in this world today are all off at a tangent, each and every one living under the illusion that they are genuine and the best in their field.

Beloved leaders from around the world, there is however one person, who is the first and probably the last to hold such a position in history, who has the keys to free humankind from Satan's bondage and to lead them to heaven.

I, Rev. Moon, am that person standing before you today! I never aspired or wished for this position. But I was anointed by God and placed in the position of the Savior, Messiah, Lord at his Second Coming and True Parent of humankind. It is a position that is absolutely free from Satan's sphere of influence. The path I have pioneered, of a true parent, true teacher and true owner will allow the people of the world, who are now going six and a half billion separate ways, to be reconnected to God at a true ninety degree angle. I, Rev. Moon have been charged by God to be the one setting the example of living a life based on the truth and conscience.

Even the people in spirit world have no way to be saved without receiving the grace of the Blessing from the True Parents. The absolute good spirits in the spirit world, who number as many as 300 billion, are testifying in unison to this fact. The founders of the great religions, beginning with Jesus, as well as the philosophers and thinkers, and even including communists, are shedding tears of gratitude for this amazing reality.

Ladies and gentlemen, the time has come for humanity to fulfill the heavenly decree of creating one family under God. I, Rev. Moon, the True Parent, am teaching the way to do this through the Cross-cultural Marriage Blessing. What other way is there to create the kingdom of heaven on earth and in heaven, other than becoming one family under God? What other way is there to create the ideal world God envisioned at the time of the Creation, a world in which all people are united as one beyond the boundaries of their race, culture, religion and nation, and where war and conflict do not exist?

Without your being aware of it, the True Parents have already proclaimed the arrival of the revolutionary era after the coming of heaven, a time of divine grace in which all humanity will be liberated and even God will be liberated and set completely free in His heart. The True Parents are now blazing a trail to all corners of the world with this revolutionary truth that we must all become true parents, true teachers and true owners and citizens of God's kingdom of peace.

Ladies and gentlemen, the fundamental spirit of the World Culture and Sports Festival 2007 is to fulfill the great task of making all humankind into one family. Please remember that we, as people of religion, culture and athletic prowess have the mission to come together as one and bring the "Era for the Beginning of a New Universal Civilization of Peace" into bloom. Please keep in mind that religious people, in particular, must become the vanguard in carrying out this consecrated revolution of true love.

With a view to the building of the ideal kingdom of heaven that is God's desire, I am promoting a grand project of building a tunnel under the Bering Strait as a part of the creation of an International Highway of Peace that will connect all the oceans and continents, allowing people to travel around the globe.

Since the United Nations, which began with the lofty ideal of realizing world peace, is now only a shadow of what it was to be, I am also promoting the renewal of the UN. With the belief that we must pour "new wine into new wine skins" and in support of these efforts, I founded the Universal Peace Federation (UPF) as a new Peace UN, or 'Abel UN', to guide humanity in the era for the beginning of a new and universal civilization of peace. The UPF is already active in 120 nations of the world.

I, Rev. Moon, have already completed all the necessary preparations. All you have to do now is believe in and follow the True Parents. Follow the compass of your conscience in attaining the status a true parent, true teacher and true owner, and practice a life of true love that will ensure your eternal spiritual life.

Heavenly fortune will speed you on your path, and your good ancestors who have been blessed will actively assist you in your activities. Have courage, and actively strive to go forward!

I pray that you all may perfect the true family ideal through the three great subject principles, and join in singing praises of eog-mansei or eternal victory for the coming of the "Era for the Beginning of a New Universal Civilization of Peace".

Thank you very much.