I was watching a video of Father last night. The title of his sermon was champumonim-eui malsseum-eui kachi (True Parent(s)'s word's value) The Value of True Parents Words, 1999.

For the first half hour, Abonim spoke in English. While watching, a few thoughts wandered through my mind:

Boy, Father's English is not easy to understand. One really needs to practice hearing his English as much as one needs to practice hearing his Korean.

I wonder, does anyone tell Father that his English is hard to understand? Would it be a good move? Who would have the courage, anyway?

Does Father understand how much he communicates, or fails to communicate, using English? Is he aware of the limits of his ability in English?

At any rate, his English is very broken, and not clear. Not only pronunciation, but his grammar, syntax, etc, is all far from clear.

Why does Father speak in English?

At this point, Father is talking about the fact that he asked everyone to study and learn Korean starting from 15 years ago.

While watching Father talk about this, I thought about the why - why does Father speak in English?

Is it because he doesn't think that his message gets through the interpreter?

Is it because he wants us to hear the word directly from his mouth?

Looking at Father's face and expression, something dawned on me.

Father asked us to learn Korean because he wants to be able to talk with us directly, to be able to express his heart, emotions, intensities, etc, directly, skin to skin, as it were. He wants to meet us in the sermon. He wants to meet his children and feed them directly. There is a longing there. There is a desire for a meeting of spirit, in both quality and quantity, that can only take place with a common language, a common set of constructs to express what passes along in our minds, our souls.

Here, there was something about the parent's desire. His desire to meet with us. Like God's desire to meet with us.

I think so many children (of TPs) think of learning Korean in terms of what they have to do, why they need to do it, etc. Am I right?

If we thought, "We could learn Korean because Father is longing to be able to speak to us, skin to skin, to touch and meet us in the words, right there," perhaps we would think that we should learn Korean not for ourselves, but because our dad is longing to meet us, and our learning the tongue would open up the way.

Even learning a few words is a way of loving him, of returning to him what he has always given to us.

Of course, there are the providential and historic reasons why the saints should learn Korean. But this other angle was one I hadn't thought about much before, not in a while, anyway.

Perhaps a new angle would encourage some in a way that the providential, the historic, the responsibility and duty angle doesn't.

Well, these are some of the thoughts that went through my mind.

annyong

Andy

 Download entire page and pages related to it in ZIP format
Table of Contents
Information
Tparents Home