TARRYTOWN, New York -- On Sept. 12 at the Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall, in New York City, Rev. Dr. Sun Myung Moon announced the launch of a new global institution, called the Universal Peace Federation. The federation is dedicated to renewal of the United Nations and the establishment of a new standard of global leadership for peace. Dr. Moon is also the founder of News World Communications Inc., that owns UPI and publishes World Peace Herald.

We may have to go back to 1945, and the aftermath of World War II, to find a comparably bold initiative. This speaks to the conviction and determination of Dr. Moon, who considers that we stand literally on the threshold of an entirely new era of peace.

This is the last in a series of three articles. To read the first article in the series, go to: www.wpherald.com/storyview.php?StoryID=20050928-115549-1587r .

Dr. Moon is no latecomer to the peace movement. His entire life has been a pursuit of peace. Having lived through the Japanese occupation and rule of Korea, through World War II, through the communist takeover of his homeland of North Korea, at which time he was imprisoned by Kim Il Sung, and through the Korean War, he knows the taste of suffering that arises from war and the diabolical side of the human heart. His experience of God as a young boy of 16, in 1936, has never been shaken, and his entire life has been a constant struggle to realize a world of peace.

Now 86, he is guided by the vision of God's providence as moving toward a world of peace that will emerge as human beings rise above their fallen nature and take responsibility in accordance with the providence of God. He has always affirmed the value of the world's religions, but at the same time has exhorted the religions to put off narrow sectarianism and to abandon their enslavement to a heartless, literalistic dogmatism. Religion, above all, must be an instrument of true love, and a vehicle that carries human beings from selfishness to unselfishness.

In this sense there needs to be a revolution, a spiritual awakening, moving humanity from its preoccupation with secular, humanistic, materialistic values, toward spiritual, God-centered values. The goal is the harmonious integration of these two dimensions of human reality. The spiritual and material capacities of the human being, as well as the cosmos itself, are to be harmonized. In particular, polarized, confrontational, dialectical thinking and practice will only yield suffering and decline. Humanity must adopt the principle of true love, and pursue reconciliation, cooperation and peace.

God is indeed the origin of existence. There is no existence without the origin. Furthermore, all existing things are interrelated. We are fundamentally relational beings. All things exist in relationships of subject and object. There are no isolated or individual being. All existence develops and thrives through the mutual giving and receiving of energy in reciprocal relationships.

These relationships, at the human level, are not merely functional or external, but rather are to be rooted in the human heart of true love. God is the origin of not only the material world, but of the most fundamental aspect of life, namely, true love, expressed in living for the sake of the other. When human relationships are rooted in the heart, and the action of giving and receiving in those relationships is grounded in unselfish true love, peace is possible. This is the direction in which God is guiding humanity in our time.

Based on these principles Father Moon has pioneered a wide range of organizations, each of which seeks to advance the cause of world peace in their respective field or in relation to a particular constituency of members. These include interfaith organizations such as the New Ecumenical Research Association, the Youth Seminar on World's Religions, the Religious Youth Service, the Assembly of the World's Religions, the Council for the World's Religions, and the Inter-Religious Federation for World Peace.

He has pioneered a number of organizations that link sports with peace, including the Sun Moon Peace Cup, the World Culture and Sports Festival and the Interreligious Peace Sports Festival. He has established the Women's Federation for World Peace, the Youth Federation for World Peace, the Professors World Peace Academy, the International Relief Friendship Foundation, and a worldwide student movement known as CARP, Collegiate Association for Research of Principles.

He has promoted the integration Oriental and Western approaches to medicine and health care, and he has established an International College at the University of Bridgeport, aimed at laying an academic foundation for United Nations renewal. Also, he has established organizations that appreciate the unique role of island, peninsula and continental nations in relation to the history of world civilizations; these are the Federation of Island Nations for World Peace, the Federation of Peninsula Nations for World Peace, and the Federation of Continental Nations for World Peace. Each of these organizations works across barriers of race, religion, nationality and culture.

More recently, Father Moon has announced a major new project, calling for a Peace Tunnel under the Bering Strait, to unify East and West and open up new markets for shared value and co-prosperity for the world's people. This tunnel, furthermore, would be linked to an international highway system within a 120-mile "peace zone" strip running throughout the world.

Building on this foundation he proposes the UPF work to promote the following:

The UPF is calling for a radical and innovative approach to peace, one that is both profoundly spiritual and yet fundamentally rooted in history and the material world. Peace is the cause of our time. The quest for peace, long desired by all humanity, is now at hand. Conditions for its achievement are being established in the spiritual world itself, and the providence for peace is being guided by the hand of God. Its marks are unselfishness, forgiveness, reconciliation and love of enemies. These are the forces that will bring in a new era of peace. Efforts that rely on force, or on political, military or economic power alone, will fail.

(Dr. Thomas G. Walsh is secretary-general of the Interreligious and International Federation for World Peace.)

(United Press International's "Outside View" commentaries are written by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of important issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of World Peace Herald or United Press International. In the interests of creating an open forum, original submissions are invited.)

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