Book Fourteen - A Life Of True Filial Piety
Chapter Five - The Inseparability of Filial Piety, Loyalty and Religion

There is no other way to possess God than the way of loyalty, and no other way to possess your parents than that of filial piety. Accordingly, you have to fulfill your duty of loyalty and filial piety. (14-90, 1964.6.12)

Those who are truly filial in their families are on the direct road to becoming the loyal subjects of their nation. Those who are truly loyal to their nation are on the direct road to becoming saints. Please understand this. Therefore, determining to absolutely love your parents is the pathway of becoming filial children in your family. Determining to absolutely love the sovereign and all the citizens of your country is the pathway of loyal subjects. Determining to absolutely love the world is the pathway of saints.

Even the king of a country must follow the saint and absolutely believe him. Patriots and loyal subjects must follow their king, and filial children must follow the patriots. There is only one way. Then who must the saints follow? They must follow God. God has eternal, unchanging and unique love. The saint, the king, the loyal subject and the filial child must all go the same course of eternal and unchanging love. Whatever detours you may take, you will always have to get back on the right track in order to stay on course.

The individual, family, tribe and nation are all to go this way. But there will be obligations to your parents as well as to your nation. If you are torn between these obligations and are unable to fulfill both of them simultaneously, where should your priorities lie? Between filial piety and loyalty to your nation, you should give preference to the latter. This conforms to the rule of law. The reason for this is that the nation encompasses the families and parents. (99-67, 1978.7.23)

Be the friend that your friends always feel safe in confiding all their secrets. Someone like that is the very best friend anyone can have. The man who can even temporarily neglect his wife, parents, brothers and sisters, in order to seek out and visit his friend, is an exemplary friend.

As a friend, become a representative of the past, present and future. Then, become the representative of the family. The father and mother teach their son to practice filial piety in order to establish him as the representative of the family. In other words, you must become children of filial piety.

What is the quickest way to become emotionally one with your parents? By being a filial child. Those who have forged the bonds of filial piety that can be recognized by Heaven and Earth are accorded the privilege of inheriting the Kingdom.

What are the Eastern teachings of the three basic relationships and the five cardinal virtues? Essentially they instruct us to exemplify a level of filial piety in the family that can be recognized by the nation and the world. God also recognizes that kind of filial child and He will send someone from that lineage who can rule the nation. Filial children are determined within the family and loyal subjects are determined within the nation. The people who can become loyal subjects are not those who have loved only God with all their heart, soul and mind. Loyal subjects are those who also love their nation because of their love for God. (32-258, 1970.7.19)

In my viewpoint, the person who is the most devoted and loyal will become the leader. Only that person is qualified to become the leader. A person with a doctorate is not automatically qualified to become the boss. Even if he joins the company and fits in, he cannot just be promoted over the heads of the rank and file workers. The ultimate deciding factors are not knowledge, erudition or competence, but rather devotion and loyalty.

When the Japanese willfully dominated the thirty million people of Korea, the maiden named Yu Kwan-soon, opposed them. We can see that she was no ordinary person by any standard. Even though her people were unable to be loyal, unable to devote themselves to their country, she represented them through her loyalty and devotion. This is why she possessed the kind of ideological authority and leadership that will never be forgotten by the Korean people. Yu Kwan-soon was unable to realize her goal and failed because the time was not ripe and the environment was unfavorable. But if there is someone who is completely devoted and loyal when the time and environment are right, what do you think would happen? Would he just be caught and killed? What do you think?

Consider God's children who have the kind of loyalty that they are prepared to die even when the environment is not right. If those children stand up when the time and environment are right, what will happen to them? The more active they are, the more they will be honored. Do not falter on your path. You have to have the mindset that you were born for this purpose, and this is the only work you are supposed to do. If you maintain your devotion and sincerity for a year, two years, three years, and more, you will be elevated more and more in proportion to the time period you spent. (156-12, 1965.11.2)

You would probably agree that people like Yi Soon-shin and Yu Kwan-soon are patriots. They are called Korean patriots and you might feel that you want to be even more loyal than they were. However, until now, you have been unable to achieve that status. From now on you must walk the path of loyalty. Be the vanguard of liberation in order to seek God's kingdom. Along this path, even if you are accused of being part of a sect or are hunted down or put in prison, you must continue the fight. You need to identify the adversaries you will have to contend with in this fight and then march forth. For Unification Church members, this is the way to go.

Do not boast that you were devoted to your father. Filial piety is just the foundation on which you will be able to fulfill your duty of loyalty. Become people who can be more loyal than your father, people who can receive the blessing of love from your parents. In this quest, the question is: how can we surpass this standard and realize the kingdom desired by God, our Father, who seeks to bless us with His eternal love? We now know our life's work. Let us fulfill our responsibility and mission as citizens of God's kingdom. (29-110, 1970.2.25)

We are overwhelmed by the grace of having been told by Heaven that God predestined us to be His children, and yet we need to ask ourselves, "How much have I attended my Father? To what extent have I become a filial child?" We are to relate to God individually as filial children and manifest the spirit of a loyal subject toward the nation and its people. The Eastern teachings of the three basic relationships and the five cardinal virtues are true and instructive. They are akin to loyalty and filial piety toward God. Someone who is disloyal to his parents cannot become God's filial child. By the same token, people who do not have the integrity of being a loyal subject to their country can never, by any means, become Heaven's loyal subjects. It is the same for heaven and this world. It is the same for the world of the heart, only the content differs. (7-66, 1959.7.12)

In the same way that patriotism is linked to heavenly ideals, the original mind extols the way of loyalty and filial piety. The Japanese and Koreans held divergent views: where Korea's admiral Yi Soon-Ishin was the enemy of Japan, Ito Hirobumi was Korea's enemy. That is how it was. At those points, both Korea and Japan were trying to stand in the center. Each and every country has its own heroes, but not all of them have saints. Heroes love their country, but not the world. Had Ito Hirobumi loved Asia and the world more, he would not have perpetrated the atrocities that he did. (229-247, 1992.4.12)

Let us compare two people. One is a devoted on who lives his life according to how his parents think. The other is unable to fulfill his filial duty to his parents immediately, because he is doing his best for the restoration of their nation in accordance with the wishes of his people. He is waiting impatiently for that one moment when he can do his best for the sake of the world, while deferring his filial family duties to the future. It is the latter person who is more needed by the world. Viewed from this perspective, we can say that religion has come to represent striving for the future, being loyal to the nation of the future, and firmly establishing the foundation of filial piety for the future. (27-307, 1969.12.28)

Patriotism should not be focused only on your country. The philosophy of the Unification Church is to become filial children who have the heart of love to liberate their parents. Before you love your country, you have to love your parents first. You have to become filial children. Only in this way, can you love your country and it is on the road of loving your country that you can love the world. It is only by loving the world that you can love Heaven. That is how it is. You have to become a filial child to your parents first. (139-275, 1986.1.31)

What kind of time will that moment in the future be, the time all religions strive for, in which we can practice filial piety and loyalty? It is the time when all humankind can sing songs of happiness together, rejoicing for the first time over the beginning of hope; and take pride in the joy of God who has been guiding history. Surely religion arose solely for the purpose of ushering in that moment; pledging victory in order to manifest each of us as the center of all heaven and earth. (27-307, 1969.12.28)