The Words of the Witt Family
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The Words of the Witt Family |
My dear Heavenly Family,
Last Tuesday night, June 16th, at a meeting called "The Group", I gave my first public address to about 100 people. 1 was the last speaker of three on the program and when I was finally given the floor the people in the audience were bored, tired, and disgusted at having to listen to a lot of empty words which told them exactly nothing. And they were at the point of getting up and leaving before I had a chance to say even one word. So I sized up the situation fast, got up quickly, told them that I was just as tired as they were and that, since we all had to go to work in the morning, I promised to be brief and to the point. Then I proceeded to do just that!
The title of my presentation was "The Utopian World of Edward Bellamy -- Man's Higher Destiny and The Principles of Sun Myung Moon -- The Spiritual Means to Achieve That World."
I told them about the three revelations I had experienced which prepared me to recognize the New Truth in the teaching of Sun Myung Moon. The first revelation came to me as I read the book called "Looking Backward-2000-1887", by the American author, Edward Bellamy who described a perfect society of mankind which he prophesied for the year 2000. This was a Utopian world in which t. e nations were organized into an Industrial Army in which each citizen served for a period of 24 years, from the age 21-45, at which time he retired. The citizens of this perfect society were motivated by patriotism and love of country and God, just as our soldiers are in the military army (in theory anyway). There was complete nationalization of industry, such as would be found in a system of Christian socialism or Christian communism.
Wars were outlawed and men had at last learned to live with one another in peace. This world was accomplished in Edward Bellamy's religious fable by a new party called "nationalists" whose standard was solidarity and who spread the gospel of benevolent nationalism based on "newly discovered truth which was the ideal of the whole people bound together not as association of man for merely political functions, but as a family, a vital union, a common life, a mighty heaven-touching tree whose leaves are its people fed from its veins and feeding it in turn."
There was a massive shift of psychic energies to a spiritual pole.
Many contemporary readers of "looking backward..." saw in his picture of a perfect society, a blueprint for a house fog practical man, instead of a palace in the clouds.
Bellamy's followers included such distinguished men as a group of retired army officers, theosophists John Storer Cobb, Henry Austin, and John Ransome Bridge. Also, Edward Everett Hale, William Dean Howells, W.D.P. Bliss, Vida Scudder, Jessee Cox, and Clarence Darrow in Chicago.
The book was translated into dozens of languages, and appeared regularly on lists of Ten Great Books issued by publishers.
Judge Ben Lindsay and Norman Thomas ranked Bellamy with Saint Francis of Assisi as great Lovers of Mankind. Edward Bellamy seemed to have been far beyond his generation in understanding of the dual nature of man, and the spiritual essence in man's nature.
On page 15 of the Introduction by John L. Thomas, permit me to quote one sentence which will help to illustrate the link between this great American prophet and Sun Myung Moon, the great Korean sage, and founder of the Principle Movement:
"If culture could be consciously directed toward the discovery of a new spiritual dimension to life, then for the first time Utopia was distinctly possible."
On the inside of the cover of our textbook, in the upper left-hand corner, appears a brief description of its contents:
The Principles: a new concept of world religion based upon reason, logic, and proper application of universal laws, are discussed and interpreted. Within these pages lies a new dimension of life and religion for those who seek further understanding of God and all things.
I then proceeded to draw diagrams 1 and 2 of David Kim's book, and gave them about the other two revelations I had had, one which occurred about 5 years and 6 months ago, and which told me that I was to tell something to many, many people, and the last one about three years ago, while I was re-editing our textbook, and I was suddenly bathed in a pure white light and transported to the place where Jesus was being executed, and I was shown the truth, and then suddenly transported back to my kitchen where I was working alone in the house that Yom Kippur day, which is the holiest day of the year beside the Sabbath for Jewish people. I said that it took me quite a while to understand why I was so fortunate as to have had this beautiful spiritual experience, and finally realized that I was given a spiritual rebirth to Jesus and the Holy Spirit in order that I might be justified and acceptable to God as one of His representatives.
After the short lecture, I invited people in the audience to study with me, and gave out many copies of the articles I had prepared. Thus far, I have not had any definite commitments, but I certainly had a very gratifying response to my presentation which lasted just one-half hour, and in which I was able to say everything I planned to say. After I had finished, many people came up to me and told me how much they had enjoyed listening to me and that I had made the entire evening worthwhile to them. Also, I was told that I was very specific, and didn't waste a word, at which I answered that I didn't had time to waste any words. I had to make every word count. I was grateful that I had been able to prepare for this evening very carefully since everything depended on my knowing exactly what and how I was going to say.
I am very grateful to God for giving me the help I so sorely needed to begin a successful career in public speaking in which I intend to show, beyond a doubt, the Utopian World of Edward Bellamy as the Kingdom of God, and the principles of Sun Myung Moon as the spiritual means to achieve that beautiful, harmonious world which will actually by the perfect man by God in the beginning.
The response to my talk was very encouraging, since I had spoken to many people during the eighteen years from the time I had first read the book until the day I was first introduced to the Principles and could not find one single person who had the courage and foresight to see that here was, indeed, the future destiny of mankind. Yet, here were 100 people in the audience who responded to my description of Utopia in such a positive way, that all were seemingly anxious to get this book and read it for themselves. Now I understand what my second revelation meant -- that I was to speak to as many people as possible and tell them about the Utopian World of Edward Bellamy, one of their own countrymen, and then show them how to prepare themselves to build that world by achieving perfection through the Principles of Sun Myung Moon, the New Truth which transforms the mind and spirit of man.
We must always keep in mind the fact that a perfect society cannot be built by imperfect men. Therefore, there must first be a nucleus of perfect men to build the perfect world in which the mass of humanity can then proceed to accomplish perfection also.
Sarah Witt