The Words of In Jin Moon from 2010
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The Words of In Jin Moon from 2010 |
In the following sermon, Rev. In Jin Moon speaks of the message she gave to the attendees of the WFWP 18th National Assembly the day before, and the hope she has for these women to be agents of change. She also addresses the book written by Daniel Pink titled "Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future," which speaks about our world moving into a new way of thinking, which Mr. Pink calls the Conceptual Age.
Good morning, brothers and sisters. How is everyone this morning? This morning I'm feeling unusually well because last night we had the gala for the 18th National Assembly of the Women's Federation for World Peace. I was seated next to two lovely ladies: the former First Lady of Uruguay and Madame Patricia Lalonde, who is doing great humanitarian work in Afghanistan and Iran.
During the ballroom dancing portion of the event, when a young lady approached our table looking for a dance partner, these two distinguished ladies both looked at me and said, "We're not going out if you're not." So the three of us approached the dance floor and experienced serious aerobic training there. I felt that I had a great deal of circulation going. I thanked our Heavenly Parent this morning for giving me a refreshing, beautiful Sunday morning. And I thanked Madame Rompani for being my partner in some great aerobics last night.
For me as a woman, having experienced a life of religion and having grown under the umbrella of my mother, who we call True Mother, I came to realize once again how significant it is for the women of the world to gather together and celebrate sisterhood, motherhood, and the feminine in each of us.
Under the guidance of our True Mother, Women's Federation for World Peace has been a profound and important organization in that we're not here to step on our brothers who may have abused us and done us harm. It's in the hope that by reclaiming our dignity as women, as daughters of our eternal Heavenly Parent, and as eternal and divine beings, we can empower our brothers, sons, and fathers, to work together with us to usher in this new millennium and the world of peace that we so long for.
I realized when I gazed into the eyes of my sisters that every one of them is a great powerhouse. If all of these women could be mobilized and inspired, just as the great women of history such as Catherine Booth, mother of the Salvation Army, and Mother Teresa have transformed their world with the spirit and expression of true love, then I truly believe that this world of peace that we've dreamt about for so long is within our hands. It's within our hands and within the realm of our own responsibility to be agents of change and to make the world a better place, not just for our own families but for the larger family, one family under God.
When contemplating what I wanted to say to the delegation of women, I was thinking maybe we should stress this or that point. One afternoon I went for an outing to pick up a couple of items and while waiting in line overheard two Chinese American women in front of me. One of them was a mother talking about her son, and she seemed quite concerned in talking to the other woman, clearly someone who was close to her. While waiting in line she expressed how concerned she was when in her little boy's classroom each child was given the chance to talk about what their dreams were and what they wanted to become in their life.
In an elementary classroom -- perhaps second or third grade -- usually the boys want to be policemen or firemen, something with a great deal of adventure and drama, fighting the bad guys, taming the flames that are going to burn the house down, all those sorts of exciting things. Or they want to race cars. But this Chinese woman was concerned because when her son's turn came to talk about what he dreams about for the future, he got up and said, "I want to be a nurse." Why are you laughing? Maybe you are laughing precisely because of the same reason his mother had.
She said, "Why would my son want to be a nurse? Why not a doctor? Being a nurse is for women." Here are two women wanting their child to be greater than they are. You would think that if the opposite sex wants to enter into a profession primarily kept for women, they would think, "Unconventional thinking! Convention is the killer of progress, but here is my second-grade son being different, wanting to be a nurse, a profession seen as primarily for women."
The friend turned to the speaker and said, "Your boy is a little different. He's kind of feminine, and maybe nursing would be a good thing." I was standing behind them, wanting to say something, but I learned from my mother many years ago that sometimes it's good to keep silent. I heard her voice in the back of my mind, "Keep silent." As we made our way toward the cashier, this woman kept on saying, "Do you think I should send my son to a psychologist? Do you think it's normal?"
When I got back home, this conversation made me think. My father has declared the dawn of the Pacific Rim Era, that this is the age of women, that the new millennium must have a bit of the feminine. When he and my mother, together as true partners in their work, work together for world peace as the True Parents of humankind, what they are trying to share with the world is not just the beauty of the masculine that we experienced through the history of religion. Here for the first time we have the beauty, power, and magnificence of the feminine.
This concept of a man and a woman ushering in the new age is something quite profound, and quite liberating for me as a woman. When the religion editor of National Public Radio came to interview me, she asked, "A couple of hundred years from now, what do you think your father will be best remembered for?" I looked her in the eye and responded what I truly feel to the core of my being. I said, "Yes, he's going to be remembered as the True Parent, a man of peace, but for a great multitude he is and she is, together as the True Parents, going to be seen as the liberator of women."
Part of the reason why women have suffered so long is because the traditions of different religious backgrounds have yet to embrace the feminine as a vital and integral part of an active life in ministry because nobody could really understand what we should do with this Eve figure who tempted Adam away from his proper position, which caused a great deal of ill things in the world. Women have been blamed for a lot of things. Usually when two people are blamed, it's the woman who is blamed more. That has been the case.
But with the advent of the True Parents, we women have the dignity that we lost. Through our True Parents women can reclaim the rightful position as that divine and eternal daughter of our Heavenly Parent and therefore, grace the world with the beauty of the feminine, not just the masculine.
I
came across a book written by Daniel Pink. I love his last name
because pink happens to be my father's favorite color. (I find it
quite extraordinary that a man with my father's stature can
confidently stand in front of everybody and declare to the world,
"Pink is my favorite color." I adore a man who has that
courage.)
When I was at the bookstore looking for interesting reading, his last name caught my eye. The title of the book is A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future. He's writing about a new way of thinking, the new mind that will characterize this new age, which he calls the Conceptual Age. The 18th century was understood as predominantly agricultural, exemplified by farmers. The 19th century, the Industrial Age, predominantly represented by factory workers. Then in the 20th century we had the Information Age, or what he calls the age of knowledge workers.
Right now, he says, we're poised to enter the Conceptual Age, which will be exemplified by people who can best be described as creators or empathizers. In reading the book I was struck by some of the arguments he made. The age that we are coming out of is the Information Age, in which the profession that best exemplified that age would be computer programming. The Information Age very much stressed detailed, sequential, logical, analytical, systematic thinking. Therefore, it was very masculine in the sense of emphasizing numbers, the bottom line, and clarity. People operated almost like computers.
In this new age, the world, having gone through what he calls the crisis of the advent of automation and Asian workers flooding the workforce, has drastically transformed the way we see ourselves, the way we understand our professions. Because of the growth of the Asian market, where people can do things faster for a whole lot cheaper, a lot of the work formerly done in the economic superpowers of Germany and Japan is being outsourced.
You can't get ahead and be successful on the basis of your knowledge alone. In the Information Age there was a great deal of stress on being a doctor, lawyer, or businessman. Getting an MBA was seen as the thing to do to be successful. But because the Internet now makes available to anybody information that traditionally was in the sphere of only certain individuals, the way we understand our professions and go about doing things has been drastically altered.
Mr. Pink is warning America and the West to rethink the importance of our lives, even if we are business-minded people and only thinking about materialistic success, because the Asia market, outsourcing, automation, material accumulation, and the technology that makes everything accessible at our fingertips has led to "abundance."
He points to self-storage companies, a $17 billion business in the United States. People have accumulated so much that they don't know what to do with; they simply stash things in storage. He notes that because we have so much abundance, we spend an inordinate amount of money buying garbage bags.
This emerging paradigm shift in how we look at our lives, in how we envision being successful, matches our understanding that we're all divine beings, touched with the wonderful love of God, and extraordinary in our own right. Mr. Pink says that even if we don't want to undergo this paradigm shift, the crises we are experiencing in the age of abundance, automation, and Asia are propelling us into the Conceptual Age, best exemplified by creators or empathizers.
I think his ideas are right in line with what I believe in that one of the things I strive for at Lovin' Life is to raise up a generation of young people that truly understand they belong to one family because we all share a common Parent in Heaven. We also know that we're eternal sons and daughters and therefore have a purpose and personal destiny we need to fulfill. We need to be a group of young people who want to live for the sake of others. We want to be people who are compassionate, caring, caregivers -- empathetic people.
The point I always like to make is the need for both internal and external excellence. If you think about it, the Information Age stressed external excellence above and beyond. Now people are realizing that regardless of how successful, smart, and knowledgeable we are, we're not tapping into the great divine mind in each one of us if we do not tap into what is spiritual, emotional, and moving to all of us.
In discussing the characteristics of the Conceptual Age, Mr. Pink says that we're moving from function to design. For example, everybody knows what the function of a wastebasket is, but how should it be designed? Is it going to look nice? Will it be the color pink? Will it fit into the color scheme of the room?
In the Conceptual Age we'll move from simple arguments, like the way lawyers argue different points, to the importance of a compelling narrative, or what Mr. Pink calls a story. Regardless of the culture we come from, we all love a hero. When children are asked what they want to be, many times they answer, "A hero." To my ear, having been born in Korea and learning English later in life, I hear not "hero" but "here" and "row." Usually when you think about a hero you think about someone who became great by overcoming great obstacles or afflictions, working through them, and then transforming into a beautiful butterfly able to soar and become a great man or woman in history.
When I hear the word "hero," I think it's an invitation here and now for you to row. You've got to do a lot of hard rowing to get where you want to go. But the three main points Mr. Pink talks about are what he calls the departure; the initiation; and the return. It's interesting how these themes are found throughout the great works of literature regardless of which country you look at: In Homer's Odyssey, the story of King Arthur, and the Star Wars saga you see the same three themes.
By departure, Mr. Pink means the period just after the potential hero receives a calling, when the person commonly refuses and tries to overcome the initial surprise, or has to work through and become the courageous individual who accepts the calling and departs, crossing over the threshold into a new world where the second theme, the initiation, waits.
Initiation, according to Mr. Pink, means meeting face to face with afflictions, difficulties, or obstacles that must be overcome, and then, usually with the help of great mentors tapping into the rich reservoir of what is divine and being transformed, like a butterfly. During the third theme, return, the hero returns to the place of the calling, now representing two worlds that have been experienced and possessed -- the world that had been left behind and the newly discovered world.
In this conceptual age, what people are longing for is not just a simple argument of what we need to be. People want an understanding; they want to bite into a great story, an understanding of who we are in the larger picture. Unlike in the Information Age, when we were so focus driven, linear, sequential, and analytically minded, we are now looking toward a more symphonic way of thinking. Mr. Pink uses the orchestra as metaphor: Great individual instrumentalists -- oboist, violinist, and percussionist -- together become a whole new medium of music that people can experience, a symphonic work of art.
What people long for in this conceptual age is more of a big picture, something eternal, not fleeting and temporary such as what characterized the Information Age. The Conceptual Age also stresses the importance of empathy. Previously great importance was placed on logic. Logic reigned supreme in the Information Age, but in the Conceptual Age, empathy will reign supreme.
His definition of empathy is interesting. He says that empathy is not to be understood as sympathy, merely feeling sorry for somebody. Rather, it's the ability to feel with the person in question. It's the ability to understand the person next to you, and think and feel as if you were with that person, a part of that person. He very much sees that as something that will be prevalent in this coming age.
The Information Age, with its business suits, is characterized by Gordon Gekko of the movie Wall Street, where everything is so professional, cold, and hard-edged, with the bottom line and board room all so serious. But we are moving from incredible seriousness to the importance of play.
I've often thought that one of the most interesting companies we have is Google. When you visit their offices, of course, they have the typical office workers, but in the middle of a conference room is a basketball hoop, or beanbags for tossing, and different games will be available to play. There is an understanding that in order for humans to be creative, a sense of play and humor are very important. We all know how important humor is. I remind myself every morning about the importance of smiling, of laughing away the burdens and obstacles.
We are moving away from what we considered the most important things in the Information Age -- the accumulation of wealth, knowledge, power, and prestige -- to this new Conceptual Age, when accumulation is being replaced by a search for understanding and meaning. People are looking for the spirituality that will answer the void they felt in the Information Age. They want something warm, embracing. They want to experience care, to experience love.
When you follow Mr. Pink's line of reasoning, you realize that what he is saying in fine print is very much what my father has spoken about, that we've become so professional, so technologically advanced, so good at accumulating, that we forgot to look at what is truly important. That is our relationship with our Heavenly Parent, our families, and the other people in our lives.
When we concentrate on the need to be compassionate, we are, I believe, concentrating on the hallmark of the new millennium. We need to be raised up as and living as compassionate human beings who leave that as our legacy. In this light, we can realize how important it is to be able to empathize, to feel with other people.
Instead of our world being cold, fragmented, and isolated, where we act like rulers in measuring how important our positions are or how much we're earning vis-à-vis the other person, we should recognize that what is truly important is how we are. Are we internally excellent in our relationship with our Heavenly Parent? Are we internally excellent in our life of faith vis-à-vis the people in our families? Are we internally excellent in wanting to be good people for the people in our lives?
When we ask ourselves these questions, we realize that all of us have to go through a process or road of self-discovery that allows us to be profound and deep human beings. The difficulties we deal with on a daily basis and tackle one by one are going to make us richer in emotional wealth, they are going to make us deeper in spiritual wealth, and they are going to make us feel more fulfilled as physical human beings.
Dr. Lauren Artress, an Episcopal priest, said something a while back that I like to remember. She said that we are not human beings on a spiritual path but rather spiritual beings on a human path. We need to understand that when Father teaches that the greatest purpose for each of us is to be born in love, to be raised in love, to live in love, and to leave a legacy of love, it means the path we are on as human beings is not going to be an easy one, but we must not forget that we are essentially spiritual beings, divine beings, on a human path.
As long as we remember that we are divine, eternal human beings on this human path, then no matter how difficult an episode or period might be, we realize that just as a caterpillar enters into a chrysalis before it is transformed into a beautiful butterfly that can soar to the heavens and enjoy the air, we too eventually will meet such a future awaiting us if we understand that we are spiritual beings.
I realize this point each day when I see the sun rise and the beauty of the day -- which does not always equate to blue skies. I love thunder and lightning. I love hailstorms. I love great gusts of wind just as much as I love sunny skies. I realize that everything we experience in life -- the good and the bad, the beautiful and the profane, the pretty and the ugly -- are all different dimensions of the divine that we experience so that we become better people in the process.
I truly believe, just as I shared with my sisters yesterday, that if we can decide to be that agent of change, that divine person who is going to harness the power of the Conceptual Age and take flight on the power of the spiritual and our own divinity, then we can each become the creator of our own destiny.
We can decide the kind of life we want to live, and we can create it. If we truly desire to live in a world of peace, we are the creators, the agents of change. What we decide today about stepping up to the plate and starting to live like a peaceful person will determine whether we will have a peaceful world at the end of our lives.
As a mother, having given birth to five children and being still in the process of raising them, the legacy that I wish to leave behind is the legacy of a wise mother. I shared with you many weeks ago that in my understanding a wise mother is somebody who serves the world with integrity, service, and excellence. I want to be that wise mother and leave my essence personified in the beauty of my children. I want them to be proud members of this Generation of Peace. I want them to be an expression of everything that I was about.
I think many fathers and mothers in the audience probably would agree with me that the greatest legacy any of us can leave behind is the beauty of our children. If we can concentrate on our families -- building ideal families as the cornerstone of the society, nation and world, becoming loving families seeking to empower and nurture each other to be greater than what we originally thought we could be, being a community that inspires each other, loves each other, and takes care of each other -- then this peaceful world is within our hands.
We need to live each day just as it says in Luke 1:44, [actually Like 1:47] "How I rejoice in my Lord, my God." We must rejoice and celebrate the gift of life. That's why here at Lovin' Life we aim to do just that. Have a wonderful Sunday and a beautiful week. Thank you.
1: Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things which have been accomplished among us,
2: just as they were delivered to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word,
3: it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent The-oph'ilus,
4: that you may know the truth concerning the things of which you have been informed.
5: In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechari'ah, of the division of Abi'jah; and he had a wife of the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth.
6: And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.
7: But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and both were advanced in years.
8: Now while he was serving as priest before God when his division was on duty,
9: according to the custom of the priesthood, it fell to him by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense.
10: And the whole multitude of the people were praying outside at the hour of incense.
11: And there appeared to him an angel of the Lord standing on the right side of the altar of incense.
12: And Zechari'ah was troubled when he saw him, and fear fell upon him.
13: But the angel said to him, "Do not be afraid, Zechari'ah, for your prayer is heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John.
14: And you will have joy and gladness,
and many will rejoice
at his birth;
15: for he will be great before the Lord,
and he shall drink no
wine nor strong drink,
and he will be filled with the Holy
Spirit,
even from his mother's womb.
16: And he will turn many of the sons of Israel to the Lord their God,
17: and he will go before him in the spirit and power of
Eli'jah,
to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,
and
the disobedient to the wisdom of the just,
to make ready for the
Lord a people prepared."
18: And Zechari'ah said to the angel, "How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years."
19: And the angel answered him, "I am Gabriel, who stand in the presence of God; and I was sent to speak to you, and to bring you this good news.
20: And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things come to pass, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time."
21: And the people were waiting for Zechari'ah, and they wondered at his delay in the temple.
22: And when he came out, he could not speak to them, and they perceived that he had seen a vision in the temple; and he made signs to them and remained dumb.
23: And when his time of service was ended, he went to his home.
24: After these days his wife Elizabeth conceived, and for five months she hid herself, saying,
25: "Thus the Lord has done to me in the days when he looked on me, to take away my reproach among men."
26: In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth,
27: to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin's name was Mary.
28: And he came to her and said, "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you!"
29: But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be.
30: And the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.
31: And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.
32: He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most
High;
and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father
David,
33: and he will reign over the house of Jacob for ever;
and of
his kingdom there will be no end."
34: And Mary said to the angel, "How shall this be, since I have no husband?"
35: And the angel said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come
upon you,
and the power of the Most High will overshadow
you;
therefore the child to be born will be called holy,
the
Son of God.
36: And behold, your kinswoman Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren.
37: For with God nothing will be impossible."
38: And Mary said, "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word." And the angel departed from her.
39: In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a city of Judah,
40: and she entered the house of Zechari'ah and greeted Elizabeth.
41: And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit
42: and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!
43: And why is this granted me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
44: For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leaped for joy.
45: And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her from the Lord."
46: And Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord,
47: and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48: for he has regarded the low estate of his handmaiden.
For
behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed;
49: for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy
is his name.
50: And his mercy is on those who fear him
from generation to
generation.
51: He has shown strength with his arm,
he has scattered the
proud in the imagination of their hearts,
52: he has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted
those of low degree;
53: he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he
has sent empty away.
54: He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his
mercy,
55: as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his posterity
for ever."
56: And Mary remained with her about three months, and returned to her home.
57: Now the time came for Elizabeth to be delivered, and she gave birth to a son.
58: And her neighbors and kinsfolk heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her.
59: And on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child; and they would have named him Zechari'ah after his father,
60: but his mother said, "Not so; he shall be called John."
61: And they said to her, "None of your kindred is called by this name."
62: And they made signs to his father, inquiring what he would have him called.
63: And he asked for a writing tablet, and wrote, "His name is John." And they all marveled.
64: And immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, blessing God.
65: And fear came on all their neighbors. And all these things were talked about through all the hill country of Judea;
66: and all who heard them laid them up in their hearts, saying, "What then will this child be?" For the hand of the Lord was with him.
67: And his father Zechari'ah was filled with the Holy Spirit, and prophesied, saying,
68: "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel,
for he has visited
and redeemed his people,
69: and has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house
of his servant David,
70: as he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old,
71: that we should be saved from our enemies,
and from the hand
of all who hate us;
72: to perform the mercy promised to our fathers,
and to
remember his holy covenant,
73: the oath which he swore to our father Abraham,
74: to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies,
might serve him without fear,
75: in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our life.
76: And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most
High;
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways,
77: to give knowledge of salvation to his people
in the
forgiveness of their sins,
78: through the tender mercy of our God,
when the day shall
dawn upon us from on high
79: to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow
of
death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace."
80: And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness till the day of his manifestation to Israel.