Discovering the Divine Principle Session 1 Introduction - Script

1 Welcome, my name is ___________________ and it is my great pleasure and joy to be your host for “Discovering the Divine Principle.”

The Divine Principle is a revelation from God that was received by the Rev Sun Myung Moon. Later in this introduction I will share a brief summary of the basic topics that are covered by the Divine Principle. But before doing that I would like to first cover two important points.

2 First, I want to tell you that the part of you that tells you there is an ideal, a perfect vision or purpose for life, an ideal that will fulfill your greatest hopes and dreams, is true. The ideal exists; it is not just imaginary.

3 Second, I would like you to know that you can achieve it, by understanding the Divine Principle and how to apply it. And I will give you one example.

Third, I want to address your questions so you can grasp each session clearly before moving to the next. Each session builds on what you’ve heard before, so as you do that, you’ll have an amazing result that could even change your life, as it did mine.

Thank you for joining us and let’s get started.

4 My first goal is to empower you to believe in your ideal. Let me begin by asking you a question. Why do you dream about an ideal?

5 What makes you believe that as individuals you and I can achieve true happiness? That we can find fulfillment in our lives and in the things that we do and in our relationships?

6 What makes you believe that we can have ideal families where there’s no longer divorce and separation? where men and women can love each other? where parents and children can love each other in a good and healthy way?

7 What makes you believe that we can have a society free of prejudice and conflict?

Realistically, the more you think about these points, the more skeptical you will become. Your mind is going to say, “no way! There’s no way we are ever going to realize the ideal!”

8 I know, in reality, a lot of us face difficulties in life. And if you think about it, there has always been war. People have always suffered. There’s always been evil seeking to destroy that which is good.

So it is natural for us to think that since we have never achieved the ideal, we never will.

But even though our head tells us this, I believe that our heart sees things in a different way.

9 I believe the vast majority of people believe in their heart that the ideal is possible. Think about it. Everybody, everyday, gets up in the morning. They strive to make their life better, they strive to be more successful and to find greater meaning and value and purpose in life. They strive to find love and to make their relationships better, deeper and more wonderful.

Putting it all together, what is it that we are striving for? Stated most simply, we are striving to be truly happy.

Now, people would not strive for these things if in their hearts they didn’t believe it was possible.

Of course, there are some people who give up hope, and that is why they may just live for themselves, slip into destructive habits, or selfishly take advantage of others. But I believe the vast majority of people, in their hearts, believe the ideal is possible. And that is why we continually strive for happiness.

10 Where can we find evidence that the ideal can really happen? Let’s start with human history. Read any history book and you can recognize progress. In the early stages of human history, we were very primitive. Artistic expression consisted of no more than paintings on the walls of the caves in which people lived. All humankind lived in poverty, ignorance and superstition.

11But over time, people striving for a better life, for what is true and good, brought about a advanced global society.

12 Today people believe in human rights, in freedom, in reason and laws. Life has become materially better. We’re not living in an ideal world yet, but we are moving up this mountain, we are getting closer to the ideal. If this continues, and even speeds up as it has in the last few hundred years, the ideal will become a reality one day.

Let’s take for example the issue of slavery. When the founders of America formed the Constitution, they couldn’t deal with the problem of slavery. But over time, things changed.

13 We think of Abraham Lincoln, 14 Rosa Parks and 15 Nelson Mandela among countless heroes in this struggle. Twenty years ago, no one would have believed that an African-American would be president of the United States.

Slavery is related to racism, and in the past people would have thought an interracial couple, a husband and wife of different colors, would be something scandalous or pitiable terrible. But today we look at that and we say, “Wow that’s beautiful!” And we encourage that kind of interracial love that can bring our nation more and more together.

So there is evidence that things can change, because even deeply rooted evils like slavery and racism can be overcome when we make sincere and desperate efforts.

16 And it’s not just the human experience. If you look around us, we can see that an ideal has been planted into every part of the universe, and progress takes place everywhere we look.

17 We have a big bang beginning of our universe. Out of nothingness emerged progress and development. Simple entities came together to form more complex entities…

18 …atoms and molecules, galaxies and planets. Eventually there came the formation of DNA, a very complex molecule that makes life possible – from single-celled organisms to complex forms of life, plant life, animal life, and ultimately people like you and me.

19 And you and I are striving every day for an ideal. So the entire creation is a testimony to the fact that this ideal, what I call “the ideal of creation,” is real and is coming closer.

20 Let’s look at an everyday phenomenon that is actually quite amazing, the phenomenon of growth. Here we have some seeds. Given the right conditions they’ll germinate and grow. If obstacles come against a plant from these seeds, the plant will try to overcome them. Let’s say some kids decide this plant is going to be first base in their baseball game. By the end of the game, this plant is going to look as if it’s destroyed.

21 But if there is still life in it, and the rain comes, it will sprout again and new leaves will come. If an animal comes and eats it or if something falls on it, if there is still life in that plant, it will strive to grow, to find the sunlight, and put forth new stems and leaves and fulfill its role in the ideal creation. It’s unstoppable. – like the grass breaking through concrete in the driveways and parking lots

22 You might ask, what role does a bean sprout play in the ideal creation? Well, the flowers display beauty to us. The leaves produce oxygen for us. And we eat the beans. Some love baked beans or bean sprouts in a salad or sandwich. It’s the same for all the fruits of the earth. In other words, plants brings us health and joy.

So the ideal of creation is that everything in creation exists to bring joy to humankind, to you and me.

23 I propose that you and I fit with this universal phenomenon of achieving an ideal. We strive through the obstacles of life to reach an ideal of creation, and that has to do with beauty, and life, and joy.

But the problem is, we don’t fully understand how to achieve that ideal.

This is why Discovering the Divine Principle is important. It will tell you what the ideal is. And it will tell you how we can work together to realize this ideal. When we finally achieve it, this world and our lives are going to be really, really great. That’s what this series is about.

24 This brings us to my second goal in this introduction. I want to tell you that we can achieve this ideal in the same way that we achieve anything in life, whether baking a cupcake, building a jet engine, or performing eye surgery. Whatever the goal or purpose may be, there is one common necessity.

25 And that is, you need to learn the principles underlying that which you are trying to achieve.

26/27If you want to bake a cupcake, you achieve that by applying principles of baking.

28/29If you want to build a jet engine, you apply principles of airflow and mechanics.

30/31 And if you understood the principles of optics, nerves and tissues, you would be able to perform eye surgery.

And so the way we achieve anything in life is to learn the relevant principles and then get training to apply those principles with the proper tools in actual life.

Then we can achieve whatever it is that we want to achieve.

32 When it comes to achieving the ideal of creation, what are the principles of life?

Actually there are two categories.

33 Some of these principles are external.

34 For example, the house you live in, your physical health, the food you eat, or the car you drive. These are external things, and they are important. If you’re sick, if you are homeless, if you are starving, it’s going to be hard to enjoy the ideal of creation.

These external things, living comfortably, having resources, and a job, earning money, these are essential. And those are things you probably focus on learning. You go to a university, a trade school, or online to learn what you need to know in order to achieve external success.

So the ultimate problem is not the external principles. We have those.

35 The challenge is the other category, the internal principles. These have to do with the inner aspects of life, the heart, the human character, the place where we experience lasting happiness joy.

We have not fully understood the principles that govern that part of us. In this area we are still struggling. We see this in our high rate of failure in marriage, in happy relationships with parents, with children, in societal harmony, crime, dishonesty, abuse, high-risk behaviors, suicide.

A lot of the time, a lot of people—even those very rich and famous—aren’t happy inside.

36 Where do these internal principles come from? Well, none of these principles come from us. We don’t create the principles of a cupcake, jet engine or eye; we discover them.

These principles don’t come from us. They came from some source, some origin. We traditionally call this source…

37 …God. that one creator who designed the universe, who actually applied these universal principles in designing everything to bring forth the ideal.

38 The one who programmed it into the universe applied it into each of us. So we need to look to the origin of the ideal in order to understand these internal principles.

39 Knowledge of these internal principles has come about through a process of discovery going back in time. About 4,000 years ago, written records appear expressing the human comprehension that there is one origin of everything, who is a personal God. By the biblical tradition, we didn’t figure this out by logic. It came as a revelation to a man named Abraham.

40 About 400 years after that, according to Hebrew Scriptures, this same God spoke to Moses and revealed a moral law, called the Ten Commandments.

41 About 1,600 years after Moses, God revealed more through Jesus. Jesus taught us a greater understanding of those internal principles. For example Moses said, don’t kill people, but Jesus said, it’s not just about not killing people, it’s about totally loving and forgiving people, even those who hate and hurt us.

This amazing principle would seem to endanger one’s life, but Jesus shows that it brings life, resurrection and joy. So two billion people today consider him to be not just a teacher of these principles, but their living embodiment—the son of God.

42 Mother Teresa and countless believers embodied Jesus’ teachings and changed the lives of millions around the world.

These great figures of human history brought us to understand a lot, but the ultimate answer has eluded us until today. It is said that Christianity is a great religion, but it’s too bad no one practices it. Jesus often spoke in symbols and in parables. That’s why we have so many different opinions and even conflicts over his teachings.

Jesus said in John 16:25, “I have said these things to you in figures of speech; the hour is coming when I will no longer speak to in figures, but will tell you plainly of the Father.”

43 Jesus knew that what he was sharing with us was indirect, because the people around him could not bear to hear the truth directly. But he said that in the future God would reveal more when we are ready to receive it.

And what I am excited to share with you today is that that time has come. God is actually working now in this world to reveal these principles.

44 At this point I want to introduce Rev. Sun Myung Moon. It is his inspiration which is the basis for this series, Discovering the Divine Principle. He grew up in the northern part of Korea on a farm. At the time, the Japanese military government occupied Korea. It was brutal. The people of Korea suffered terribly during that time. He often went to the hills near his home to pray to God, asking Him why there is so much suffering in life, why does it have to be this way?

When he went to pray on Easter morning, 1935, he had an experience with Jesus Christ. At that time Jesus expressed to the young Rev Moon that he was to clarify these internal principles, so that all of humanity would be able to realize the ideal of creation.

45 From that point, the young man dedicated himself to the task Jesus gave him. He has often been misunderstood. He has been unjustly imprisoned for his uncompromising commitment to live by his conscience six times. But despite the persecution, he never gave up on this mission that was given to him by God and Jesus Christ.

46 In 1960, he married Hak Ja Han, and since then they have lead their church and movement as co-equal partners. It is couple-ministry. He ascended to God in September of 2012, but his ministry continues through his wife, his family and couples in ministry around the world.

You may ask, why would God speak to someone like Rev. Moon? Why didn’t God speak to someone else?

47 I don’t know ultimately. You would have to ask God that question. But I would make a guess. Rev. Moon is a special person. When he was young he came to know that God, as our Heavenly Parent, must be suffering intensely. Imagine, how would a parent feel if their children were killing each other and doing terrible evil things to each other? And therefore, he prayed asking what he could do to alleviate God’s suffering, what could he do with his life in order to comfort God’s heart.

I think if I were a parent and I heard such a prayer, I would be moved. I would be touched by that. And I think God was touched.

48 Early in his ministry, he put together what he understood from nature, from the Bible and from Jesus and God, into a book called Exposition of the Divine Principle. It presents the internal principles that will enable us to achieve the ideal of creation.

Now, as promised, I am going to introduce to you one of the principles. I will cover it more fully in a future segment, but I want to introduce it here. It is the principle of human responsibility.

49 I would like to begin by telling you a story. There was a young man, a very faithful person, who was walking along the beach in California. God spoke to this person, and told him that because he was so faithful he wanted to give him one wish.

And so the man thought for a moment and he asked God to build him a bridge to Hawaii so that he could drive his car there. There was a moment of silence. Then God said that he was asking too much. All of the resources necessary to do that would affect the ecology and it would be so dangerous, and he’d run out of gas on the way, and so forth. So God asked him to choose something different.

50 And the man said, “Okay, I want a wife and a marriage in which I will always be happy, a relationship of love that will be problem free.”

And there was a long moment of silence, and then God said, “How many lanes did you want on that highway?”

The point here is that there is a limit even to what God can do in terms of human relationships. When God designed us, He made it so that we would share in the responsibility of love.

51 The ideal of creation, according to God’s plan, involves two parties. It involves God. God makes effort, God does work – and God does a lot. God does 95% of the work. God made the universe, God made the earth, God brought forth life, God made us, he gave us a spirit and the desire to love and find the ideal. So God takes responsibility for all of that, but he leaves something for us to do. We can say that God takes responsibility for 95%, but he left the rest in our hands.

52 So He gave to us responsibility, which is a great honor. The downside is, if we don’t fulfill our responsibility, the ideal cannot and will not be realized. This is the principle that the human responsibility fits with God’s responsibility to fulfill the ideal.

Now, obviously we mess it up. Everything else is perfect; it all works like a fine-tuned machine, totally beautiful, abundant and overflowing with life, until you get to our part. Starvation, injustice, pollution, ugliness, lies, abuse…

The question is, why would God give us responsibility?

53 It’s because the ideal of creation, if we look at it closely, as we will do in the following segments, is all about love.

54 It’s about realizing true love between man and woman,

55 between parent and child,

56 between brothers and sisters. But it begins with the personal relationship of love you, as a unique individual, can develop with God.

And, as you and I know, you cannot force love. You can’t manufacture love. You can’t pretend love. Love is given and received as an act of freedom. And with freedom comes responsibility. God gave us responsibility to love authentically.

This is why we must share in the creation of the ideal, because the ideal is all about love.

57 I am sure that at times you have felt that God is far away. God doesn’t just appear when we want Him to. We feel sometimes that God is distant. If you were to pray right now to God, “hey I want to talk to you!” Will you hear a voice, “here I am. I’m God.” It’s not that easy to find God.

Some people say that proves there is no God. But we are going to propose, based on this principle of human responsibility, that God does exist, and that God has fulfilled His entire portion of responsibility. God has reached His limit and now we must do something in order to forge the final link.

If you think about these biblical figures that we mentioned earlier, did they easily find God? No.

58 They made a lot of effort in the relationship. Moses had to invest sacrificially for 40 years in the wilderness and on top of that he fasted 40 days, two times, before he was finally able to receive the Ten Commandments. Mary went through poverty and exile giving birth to Jesus, only to see him brutally executed 33 years later.

This tells us that we have to make effort. God does not leave us. God does not turn His love away from us. We leave Him. We don’t know how to love Him. Until we turn our love back to God, we are not going to be able to experience God.

So the reality is that God loves each and every one of us. God is doing all that God can possibly do, every moment of every day, to reach each one of us. So the problem is not with God. The problem is with us. We have not fulfilled our portion of responsibility.

59 And so the million-dollar question, the question we should all want to answer, is, “what exactly is it that God needs us to do, so that God can be able to connect with us and we can connect with God?”

That’s the big question and that’s what these Principles are all about. Discovering the Divine Principle is all about understanding what it is that we need to do, our responsibility, so that we can connect with God and experience God.

60 Now for my third goal: I want you to invest in getting all your questions answered so you understand and agree with each session before moving to the next. I respect your integrity, your right to make up your own mind and proceed at your own pace.

Each session builds on what you’ve heard before, so I want to give you on overall map for Discovering the Divine Principle.

61 The series covers three basic areas. The first topic is the ideal, which I have already mentioned. We will go into more depth in the next few segments into the ideal of creation.

62 What is the ideal?

63 Who is God?

64 What is my purpose?

65 Is there life after death?

66 Is there a long-term plan in the march of history?

67 What is the role of love?

68 What is the role of marriage?

69 The second part of this series is about the turning away from God, what religions call the Human Fall. Something happened—what was it? If we can understand clearly how we distanced ourselves from God’s heart and God’s love then we will be able to understand clearly how we can come back. Since we’ve never understood the nature of the mistake, we’ve never been able to rectify it—until today.

70 And that brings us to the third part of our series—about turning around, cleaning up our mistake, and fulfilling the original dream of an ideal. We call it Restoration. It is the process to get back to our original position, the ideal deep within our heart.

I hope that what I have shared with you today has been helpful. Now let’s review my three goals.

First, I hope that you have a renewed sense that the ideal is something that you can achieve in your life and in the world.

71 Second, I hope that you could understand that you can achieve it through understanding and applying the relevant principles. One of them is the importance of your responsibility. And one way you can take responsibility is to invest yourself in the study of this entire series. Take time to think it over, ask questions, and test out key points in practice. If you don’t take that responsibility personally, this truth will be of little value to you.

And that brings me to my third goal. I want you to make a commitment to set aside the time and invest your attention fully in each session before moving to the next. I invite you to talk to someone who understands these principles well, the person who invited you or who is mentoring, to review the key points of this talk and each presentation, and make sure all your questions or concerns are answered and that you are ready to move forward.

72 Each session builds on what you’ve heard before, so if you do that, you’ll have an amazing result.

If what you are hearing appeals to you, I encourage you to pray and get God’s guidance about that.

We call this ideal of creation one family under God. We believe that God is, ultimately, the Parent of all humanity, and that God’s original intention was that all people would live in the love of God as one family.

But what does that family look like? How can we bring it about? How can you know the nature of God and, more importantly, feel God’s love for you personally? Is it something that just happens to you, or do you play a part in it?

So there is a lot to address in the next session. Thank you for joining us in Discovering the Divine Principle.