From March 18-20, 2005 a children's workshop was organized in Winston Salem, North Carolina. The workshop focused on helping children from 6- 11 years old learn the "Family Pledge". With the belief that understanding the "Family Pledge" is the key to understanding the path of restoration for our families and the path to elevating our families as true families, we set out to develop a program that we could use to teach the materials available from, True Family Values 2nd edition, Father's words, and inspirations from members. The end result was a draft for a future teachers guide and a children's workbook (copies can be downloaded at http://www.lamsonfamily.org ).

The teachers guide and the workbooks helped keep the workshop focused, and the children were able to see their own progress through completing the workbooks. The workshop explained in detail parts of the Family Pledge such as the Three Great Kingships, The Realm of The Royal Family, Four Great Realms of Heart, Centering on True Love, The Realm of Being Completely Free and many other important parts of the Family Pledge.

Twenty five children participated in the workshop, which started on the 18th and finished on the morning of the 20th. Art Lamson organized and directed the workshop, and I did my best to manage the kitchen with the help of Mr. Tremper and the advice of many of the mothers on hand as support staff. Mika Lamson looked after the girls, and Taddy Dos Anjos looked after the boys.

Most of the workshop was spent indoors completing the sessions and discussing the Family Pledge. But no workshop is complete without morning walks, lots of giggling and whispering in the sleeping bags, sports and a campfire or two, and we managed to squeeze these in along the way. It was amazing to see the strong desire the children showed to learn about the Family Pledge and to understand Father's vision for families. It was also wonderful to see how, when focused on learning about our traditions and values, the children were able to form strong bonds with each other and a sense of belonging to something special developed.

Over the three days we all learned a lot about Fathe'rs vision for us to become engrafted into his family. I was so inspired by the power the Family Pledge has when it is understood. When we started out developing the materials, it was so that the children would be able to understand the Family Pledge. But along the way I came to realize that for me reciting the Family Pledge had become a tradition (a dusty one) with no heart or meaning. I realized that I was the one that needed the workshop the most. Through developing the materials it became clear what Father meant when he said that the Family Pledge is the bone of the Unification Movement.

At the end of the workshop the children were all talking about the Family Pledge, about memorizing it and learning more about how the Pledge can be used to help them center everything on True Love as owners of Cheon Il Guk.

This we hope will be the beginning of a series of workshops on the Family Pledge in North Carolina for older children and adults as well. We will continue to develop the workshop materials on the Family Pledge so that they can be used in our Hoon Dook Churches to teach our new friends about Father's vision for their families and will make materials developed available at www.lamsonfamily.org. Please use these materials in your homes and in your communities and let us know how we can improve them to make the materials touch the heart as well as the mind.

A special thanks must be offered to the Regional Director, Rev. Byung Seok Cho, and the state leader, Rev. Burgi Hutcherson, for their continued support of developing and organizing education programs for the children in North Carolina.

Youth Workshop on True Father's Life

March 20 Ð March 24, 2005 - Winston-Salem, North Carolina

By Se Hyun Rozier (Edited by Dan and Bruce Hutcherson)

Day 1 (Sunday)

After arriving at the CRT Christian farm in Winston-Salem and meeting up with the other second generation, we started off the workshop by having each adult participating give a small talk on True Father's life and/or the general reason for having the workshop. After that we designed two teams: the "Timberwolves," which included Dan as team leader with Shawna as the assistant team leader, and the "Mighty Fighty Shush Bugs," with the leader being Se Hyun and Danila as assistant team leader. After creating the teams, we went to bed and prepared for the workshop.

Day 2 (Monday)

We began our lectures with Rev. Pace speaking about the Second Advent. Tghen Rev. Rozier gave a talk on Jesus' life. After these lectures we had our first team discussion about what we had just heard in the lectures. Then we began our first lunch at the farm. The staff designed a system in which one team would serve the other team members before they ate while the team that was being served would clean up afterwards. It seemed to work out well.

After lunch we went outside for an "activity pertaining to the messiah's course". This activity involved groups of two people washing and getting their feet washed. The idea was to humble yourself before someone else by washing their feet. It seemed those getting their feet washed were more embarrassed than those washing.

The next activity was "the Crucifixion." We all got crucified! One person at a time would pick up a wooden cross and run around a storage shed once and then meet on the hill where everyone would ridicule and throw things. We all felt some heartistic pain. After that we had a human wheelbarrow contest by team. The next activity had us laying firewood logs on top of each other to reach a certain height, which represented the foundation for the messiah to come. At our first success Takamitsu just pushed them over and informed us that Jesus failed and we have to start all over again. Later we went to a large field where the staff had hidden small scraps of paper with our names on them, representing how hard it was for True Parents to find the principle. Some kids found their paper and some did not.

Night fell, and we went inside where we had dinner and watched a musical about Father's life. Then we started a 500-piece jigsaw puzzle just for fun, which we were unable to finish that night even though we stayed up till 1:00 am trying.

Day Three (Tuesday)

After HDK and breakfast Rev. Pace gave us a detailed lecture about Father's early life that included all sorts of facts and interesting side stories.

In the afternoon Rev. Rozier gave a lecture on Father's early life before the founding of the church. Following the lectures the two teams went out to do service projects at the home of the "Jesus Jam" and "Odell Cleveland's Mission Center." Both projects had good results. Around dinnertime both teams began studying for an upcoming test on the messiah's mission.

Day Four (Wednesday)

In the morning we received a lecture from Rev. Pace about Fathers life and blessing until 1993. Then Rev. Rozier talked about 1993 till the Cheon Il Guk. There was some last minute studying and then the test began.

After the test we went outside and built churches out of cardboard boxes and sticks. We made two that were big enough to fit our whole team inside. Just as we had all taken our turns giving a practice sermon, a looming rain and windstorm came down on us and knocked both churches flat. It was quite a dramatic ending to all run inside the house and watch our churches get destroyed by the wind and rain.

Day Five (Thursday)

Our last day was to consist of outdoor fun and challenging activities. But first we had to do a WAIT Team performance at the Salvation Army. The performance went well and we were hopefully able to spread our message of abstinence to about 25 young Hispanic kids.

After the performance we packed the vans and headed to the rural "Jesus Jam" location where we had target practice with a real rifle.

Our last activity was on the banks of the Yadkin River, where we could either go catfishing or rappelling. The majority went rappelling down a fifty-foot sloped cliff, giving some of us a nice challenge.

Since closing time was fast approaching, we all quickly packed the vans and headed for the Hutcherson's home, where we all custom topped our own section of pizza to cook for a pizza party.

This was the best workshop we have had because of all the interesting activities, thanks to our wonderful staff:

Takamitsu Sakuwa from 2nd Generation Department, Rev. Rozier, Rev. Pace and Sharon Pace and Bruce Hutcherson. We also appreciated the support of our Regional Leader Rev. Byung Seok Cho and the delicious fruits, which he send to us on our last day at the farm. Hopefully we'll have more workshops like this in the future.

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