In Nepal, where I felt God closely was the house of Jitendra and Nila Shreshtha

The Shreshtha family, who welcomed Laurent Ladouce into their gracious home during his visit to Nepal

In Nepal, the place where I felt God the most closely was the house of Jitendra and Nila Shreshtha. I wanted to witness how the invisible God can manifest in the union of a couple and reach out to others. We associate Nepal with physical ascensions to the highest mountains on the globe, as well as with spiritual elevation. This predominantly Hindu country, which is also the birthplace of Gautama Buddha, has helped people reach illumination through detachment from earthly concerns. In my last evening in Kathmandu, I observed how high spirituality can descend deeply into the valleys of the heart and from there flow horizontally to many, instead of separating from them. Jitendra and Nila did not teach me anything. They simply shared their joyful experiences in tribal messiahship.

Cheon Il Guk where two are one

Jitendra Shreshtha (forty-two) and his wife Nila (thirty-four) are building a nest of love with their two children. Their beautiful residence is where shortly before True Father’s Seonghwa in 2012, this couple had the first breakthrough in heavenly tribal messiahship in Nepal. Since then, many other couples have also completed blessing their 430 couples.

A key to their victory is their marital spirituality, making God the center of the couple. False love dragged our first ancestors into a crime called the Fall. Therefore, we had to climb back to the original position. Much of religion until our age was about ascension, detachment, asceticism, even celibacy for the clergy. In the present age, however, God’s true love and the true word are descending from heaven to earth and are to stay at home. Cheon Il Guk is where two become one. These two are the husband and the wife. Jitendra and Nila enjoy a conjugal bliss that acts as a magnet, pulling hundreds of couples onto the path of family and tribal happiness. We exist indeed in a religious logic by which this couple minds deeply about saving their country. They are public, selfless, dedicated, but instead of living in detachment, or in a permanent campaign or mobilization, they simply try to live in togetherness with their loved ones, sharing the blessings horizontally. This comes from the heart, not from duty.

Jitendra and Nila Shreshtha are both Newari, the dominant tribe in Kathmandu. Jitendra has faithfully assisted Ek Nath Dhakal for eighteen years. Ek Nath Dhakal, the former national leader of FFWPU, became a parliamentarian and served twice as a government minister. Jitendra has been selflessly loyal to his leader, in order to facilitate that political ascension. At home, Jitendra attends his wife and has helped her build her victory in tribal messiahship. I think of him as a spiritual Sherpa, who completely serves others until they reach the summit.

The home, where God resides

In the living room of their house, I felt the presence of God immediately but also a high human quality. I was wrapped in an atmosphere of warm heart, hospitality, smiles, kindness, togetherness. I felt that this harmony was channeling a natural spirituality. Exposition of Divine Principle contains much guidance

about family ethics, but less about the house, the home. In the chapter on Christology, we read that “Christ is the head of the church, and we are his body and members.” This means that the blessing entails a whole life of attending the living God in our households. The interior design, the cleanliness and the good vibrations everywhere touched me. I felt that the living room was both simple, cozy, and rich in spiritual presence, as if the designer had wished that everything welcome visitor. It is a typical Unificationist interior, where a family attends God and True Parents with love. The personal or intimate, and the public, do not oppose each other, but work in harmony.

True Mother insists that we should know the True God, but more importantly, we should attend God in spirit and in truth. This means that we should be living together with Heavenly Parent and True Parents, every day, in our natural environment — our home, our community, our tribe, our nation. This is what Jitendra and Nila have been trying to do. As I was remembering my evening with them, I came across something Father said that describes my impression: “If you create the environment in which you can engage with strangers as if they were your parents and siblings, you will link to the spirit world immediately. This is how you should live in your home.”

As a natural expression of who Nila is, 430 couples meant her family members, loved ones she grew up with and with whom she shares a common ancestry, and their spouses.

Like three generations

When Nila greeted me, her beauty, her elegant manners, her perfect English diction, her melodious voice struck me. She conveyed something “glamorous” and her closing words confirmed my first intuition. Nila is endowed with various spiritual gifts and her husband has been attending his wife in her vision of tribal messiahship, so that the couple could grow, serve their family, their tribe, the Unificationist community and the nation. Sometimes, when a person is gifted, it remains within the self, but she has been able to reach out to her husband and their entourage, who became supportive.

“We were living for over ten years with Robert Kittel and his wife Teresia. We always did the Hoon Dok Hae together, with joy,” she explained. I asked, “How was the communal life between a young Nepali family and an elder American couple?”

“Normally, two blessed families living under one roof can be challenging, but we got on well. It was like three generations: the Kittels, who are significantly older than we are, my husband and I, and our two children. When I was preparing meals, Teresia was often with me. We talked about internal matters. She made me listen to good stuff and was feeding me spiritually. She always corrected my English and was training me and coaching me, with heart.” Later, as I was writing this article, I came across these remarks of True Father that confirmed how this lifestyle had been the foundation for tribal messiahship. “Your grandfather and grandmother stand in the position of ancestors; your father and mother stand in a position representing the present and you represent the future. These three generations encapsulate the tribal messiah’s textbook of love.”

Blessing loved ones

Teresia Kittel and Nila decided to start home groups and to study at home with close friends. One day, Nila had the idea to highlight the Divine Principle in Nepali with the three colors. They had the English colored edition, but they did not have a Nepali colored version. While coloring it, an inspiration appeared in her mind. “That is the root of everything and it explains where we are now,” she said. “I wanted to start the tribal messiah mission, but not do it far from home, with strangers. With my husband and the Kittels, we agreed to divide the tasks.”

Nila’s role was to make a close relationships with all her beloved family. Jitendra would prepare the

decorations, the logistics, the food, the photographs, and Dr. Kittel would fulfill his role as educator. “I wanted to invite twelve of my relatives, and their spouses, but finally, seventeen came,” Nila said. “They had to come to my birthday party. If I had invited them to something else, it would not have worked.”

Finally, in the house where two blessed families were living together, they gave the blessing to Nila’s closest relatives, who took the holy wine and did the indemnity stick ceremony. All, without exception, did the forty- day separation and the three-day ceremony.

So at a time when Father was still living, Nila blessed her close family members on her own birthday. The experience helped bring them much closer together than before. She is now working with them to improve their future.

“One of the couples had big difficulties.” Nila explained, “They wanted to divorce. I absolutely wanted them to be there. Dr. Kittel’s lecture was the electroshock that saved them. Since then, they have completed their mission as tribal messiahs in turn.” Nila’s brother was at first rather hostile. He received the blessing but failed to observe the forty days of abstinence. They decided to hold a new ceremony at the FFWPU headquarters, and she set many conditions for him.

Broader horizons

“I then wanted to start restoring my more remote tribe. The Newari tribes are often extended with many ramifications, even within the urban life of Kathmandu.”

They were performing small blessings at a time but had reached seventy- five couples in 2014. Little by little, they gained confidence. “Something clicked when I felt that I was just at the beginning of a new phase of my life and that I had to learn everything. And then, the desire to do bigger things started to grow. My husband and I accepted to put a lot of pressure on ourselves and in 2015, we organized a blessing of 575 couples in my hometown. For a month and a half, twelve couples were meeting every day in order to succeed. We had a former prime minister, several MPs, many school directors.”

Probably guessing my thoughts (I was thinking to myself that this couple is living some sort of fairy tale), Nila suddenly looked at me with a smile full of grace and her conclusion was so surprising.

“From a young age, I have been cherished. I was destined for a glamorous life and I liked that. Many wanted to see me in the entertainment industry, movies, singing and dancing. Everyone thought that I was very beautiful. If I had followed this path, I would have destroyed my life. God helped me make the right choices. And I have chosen the life of seeking God’s blessing instead of a glamorous life.”

Today, Nila is beaming. She has not opted for a career but has invested everything in spiritual growth and the creation of a beautiful couple and family. She shares her dream with her husband; they have been able to work together in harmony for a higher purpose in which both are growing. She went deeper and deeper and further and further into the relationship with her siblings. More than anything, this happiness motivates people to receive the blessing.

Living together, (other-and-I consciousness)

The lifestyle of this family is a form of Unificationist culture that explains many victories of our movement in Nepal. We often advocate that we have to live for the sake of others (ta ui sa sang), but what I learned from Nitendra and Nila is rather living with others (tta ah ju ui), exactly in line with Father’s teachings.

Up to this point, we have been talking about living for the sake of others. From now on, we need to talk about living for the sake of others and the self at the same time. Who are others? “Others” includes “me.” We say we have to live for the sake of the Cain world, but that is not exactly so. We must bring them to us because those others and I are actually one body. It is no longer the time for teaching the principle of living for the sake of others; rather, we should teach living for the sake of “others and me.” We have to bring our partners to the point that they become one with us, and in so doing, we make something greater — “us.” Then we can go to the kingdom of heaven together. There should be no barriers, only equality, peace, unity and freedom. Thus, we are not merely living for the sake of others. Our heart and body have to be united based on a greater heart through the principle of “others and I.” (Cheon Seong Gyeong 4.3.3.7)