REVEREND SUN MYUNG MOON
March 1, 1981
Translator - Bo Hi Pak
Copyright © 1981 by Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity
When we narrow down "our standard," it becomes "my
standard." When we broaden it, it becomes the "world
standard." Where do we find our standard-the present, the past, or
the future? What should be the central factor in setting up this
standard? Money, knowledge or power? Or a person? But there are all
kinds of people.
We may say the standard should be based on the mind, but the mind
also varies, sometimes being beautiful and other times ugly. Should the
standard be based on a school record, or on religion, or on God? In
thinking about all this, we have to determine what has value for our
lives. In Korean the word for treasure means literally "material
treasure." In talking about value we often are referring to
material value; usually a treasure is based on material value.
How can we determine a standard of value? First of all, something
of value should last a long time, being eternal, unique, and
unchanging. Gold, for instance, has unique character, and is not
easily changed. These are the qualities of value for material things.
Why do people talk about material treasure, but not about a person as a
treasure? A person's labor is often sold for $3.50 an hour. How cheap
a man is!
If we ask why treasure is spoken of as "treasure
material" but not as "treasure people" then we have
arrived at a great question. Why haven't people been regarded as
treasure? Which does the world like better? People may kill other
people to obtain material treasure or territory. This is a real problem
today. How many of you think you are less valuable than gold?
A pearl has a harmonized color which is beautiful. Gold and pearls
are very soft, while diamonds are very hard. Would you exchange your
loved one for gold? Would you give up your loved one's little finger
for an equal amount of diamonds? Doesn't it sound like a good deal? If
you were offered a diamond as big as your wife or husband, would you
trade? Does that mean that men and women are more valuable than gems?
What do you women have that makes you more valuable than diamonds?
Is it your sparkling eyes and soft skin? Or are you precious because
women eat less than men and cost less to feed? Do you have these three
qualities of value? Men and women change; maybe you would be valuable
when you were young and lovely, but what about when you are old? Why do
you tend to like a warm, embracing person more than one who is aloof
and distant? When the weather is warm, people relax, but when the air
is cold you automatically try to protect yourself. Warm weather makes
people more expansive and relaxed.
Do your favorite things change or not? People are changeable, and
particularly women! Changeable women are less liked than more stable
women, right? Is that true for men also? The three qualities of value
apply to people as well as to material things, so we can say that a
changeable person has no everlasting value or uniqueness. We know that
man has the two aspects of mind and body; which changes more? More
specifically, does your conscience change more than your physical
desires? People who advocate the theory of evolution say that there is
not much difference between the basic makeup of men and animals. What
they are saying is that the desires of the mind are illusory, and
therefore, that there is no such thing as an absolute standard of
conscience. In other words, they feel we are only made of material, and
that there is no such thing as a permanent ideal. If we are only
animals then we are no better than any animal, and there is no room for
a permanent standard. Therefore, no permanent quality of value can
If man is really descended from monkeys then man is also only an
animal. Do monkeys have moral standards or ethics? There is no such
thing as keeping one's purity in the monkey world. But man, who seems
to be more advanced culturally seems to be becoming more like the
monkeys today because men and women all have sex casually with each
Moralists today seem to be losing the debate with the evolutionists
because they cannot show how men are really different from animals. In
order to distinguish men from animals, we would have to create even an
imaginary God who could be the embodiment of some absolute standard;
otherwise we would have no way to win this battle. God has been
neglected by mankind throughout history, but now we have reached a
deadlock; without an absolute standard mankind cannot survive.
Power prevails in the animal world, with stronger animals attacking
weaker ones. Is that natural in the human world? Do we naturally need
some power to protect ourselves? Certainly human conduct needs some
moral standards, and to determine those standards we need a fountain;
should that be formed by the body or the conscience? The moral quality
has to be pursuing some intangible value, such as justice and honesty.
The mind works by combining intelligence, heart and will power. Human
value must be based on conscience, which should have everlasting
qualities, being eternal, unchanging and unique. At the same time,
everyone should like and agree on the value of the conscience. The
conscience should be needed morning and night, every moment of our
lives. That's the kind of standard we have to come up with.
The quality that defines a "treasure person" comes from
his conscience and mind, which should be unchanging, eternal and
unique. In the Orient, when a person is bad we say he has a bad mind;
we never say his body is bad. When you value a person, you value his
mind, not his appearance, saying his state of mind or thinking is
good. In criminal law, the most important factor is what motivated
someone to commit a crime, and motive is intangible. Motivation comes
from the mind, and the body reacts to that.
When I asked you whether the mind or body was more changeable, you
couldn't answer. Is the conscience pursuing good or evil things? The
answer will be the same 1,000 years from now. If I ask people from
10,000 years ago, their answer will be the same. That means the
conscience has an unchanging quality, and thus we say that the
conscience must be the base of value. Now we can say that man's unique
value comes from his conscience.
Why is it that we appreciate the three qualities of value in
material things? There must be some corresponding intangible aspect of
man which also includes those qualities. We appreciate certain things
because we have those qualities within ourselves; that reciprocal
relationship is the key for determining value. We can see this same
principle in the relationship between God and man.
We are not the universal subject, so we cherish these qualities of
value because there is a first cause who initiated this; we are merely
in a corresponding position. Evolution tries to deny the power of
conscience by saying it is only the product of material. Evolutionists
don't accept the idea of a first cause, or God. They say conscience is
merely animal instinct which evolved a little higher. Do you feel good
to hear that you are merely descendants of monkeys?
Evolutionists have no solutions for human problems today. To
distinguish ourselves from the animal world we need to have God; if
there is no real God then we must make an imaginary one. Otherwise,
there is no solution. For the last ten years I have been spending an
incredible amount of money inviting the world's leading scholars to
come and think about absolute value, but they don't even want to think
about it. Everyone wants to deny there is absolute value, saying there
is only relative value; they keep saying they are tired of hearing
about absolute value. They are asking me to change the subject of the
conference, but I have refused.
I know that, no matter how great these academics are, they cannot
find absolute value because it can't be observed in a laboratory or
test tube. They are trying to determine things through their physical
senses, and they will not recognize anything that doesn't come that
way. But the physical senses cannot perceive spiritual reality, or
anything beyond the material world, like God. There is no way you can
reach conclusions about value and conscience through the analytic
method. You have to employ one more sense to perceive the complete
reality of the universe.
Today's scientific world is confused about what is reality.
Thinkers say we have to conquer reality in order to advance, but here
is the confusion-what is reality? Religiously and philosophically there
is confusion, and we have to clarify this confusion by setting the
standard. We need philosophy and religion, but what do "I"
need most of all? An active conscience. To determine true reality, we
have to restore our consciences to be true ones. Have people in history
every lived with true consciences? The common desire of all men has
always been to live with true conscience, but how can this be
One important quality in a moral code is filial piety. We value
this, but what is it, and why should we exercise it? Filial piety is
loyalty to the unchanging value of the family. The son of filial piety
pursues the principle of serving his parents and brothers and sisters
even if they do not reciprocate. Conscience dictates that this is the
right thing to do. But if you do not recognize the value of conscience,
you will not recognize the value of filial piety; you have to have some
starting point. Conscience values your parents' welfare more than your
On a large scale, a patriot follows the dictates of his conscience
by serving his country and caring about its welfare. Again, the common
ground is that the conscience dictates the benefit of something higher
than yourself. The conscience does not care only for the self first,
but pursues something of higher value.
What is a saint, or holy man? He follows the same principle, but
obeys his conscience in acting for the sake of mankind, and he
recognizes the subject of all-God. In history holy men have always been
Today, materialistic communists say that awareness, or
consciousness, is merely a by-product of the material world. So where
can they find a moral code? No place. Communism is destructive because
that philosophy is based on materialism, and recognizes consciousness
only as a by-product. There is no room for a "treasure
person" in communism. Because communists don't recognize the
spiritual element, life is expendable in their political system, and
they freely sacrifice people's lives to attain material. There is no
everlasting moral standard in the communist world.
Which is first-consciousness or existence? How do we determine that
consciousness came first? An eye is material, of course, whether in man
or some animal. Would the first eye know that it would encounter dust,
or sunlight? Whoever designed the eye must have had an understanding of
all these phenomena. Without knowing there would be light, how could
the eye have been designed as it is? If anyone tries to say that the
eye came about at random, you can show him his mistake. Is it a random
event that the eye has tear ducts to keep the eye clean and moist? It
is logical that long before the eye came into being a universal
consciousness realized the circumstances and designed the eye
accordingly. So we can say that consciousness came first.
In school, many of my acquaintances were communists and we
discussed dialectical materialism, so I gave them this example and
challenged them to answer me. If the eye came first and created the sun
and dust and temperature, then their thinking might be correct, but
otherwise their theory must die out. Finally those communists just gave
up in confusion, and one of the honest ones admitted that there must be
a universal consciousness.
I don't deny the process of evolution in development, but I am
saying that there is a creative process going on behind it. In the
theory of evolution there are sudden occurrences called mutations, in
which something new comes from its parent body. But we have to say that
there must have been some energy or willpower that authorized that
occurrence. Could evolution itself create a new awareness and make a
new design? Absolutely not.
There must be something outside evolution that can supply creative
energy. It is true that development occurred between the lowest and the
highest stages, but it did not happen automatically. Each stage was the
result of a design and input of additional energy. Evolutionists don't
want to recognize that. When they recognize that creative energy was
put in, then they have to acknowledge a universal consciousness that
provided the know-how. When you talk about man's conscience then you
have to recognize a universal truth that ties into it. Thus, you have
to recognize God.
Does conscience also evolve? Communists want to say so. Unless you
recognize the unchanging quality of conscience within yourself, it is
contradictory to look for unchanging and unique characteristics within
gold, gems and pearls. Unless you have that quality in yourself, you
have no reason to seek it elsewhere. You appreciate precious things
because you have in yourself the qualities of those things. You cannot
compare two things unless you have the capacity to appreciate both.
A constitution is the base of all laws of a nation and it is used
as a yardstick for determining what is good and evil. When you make a
judgment, you are doing so based on a standard which is within
yourself. If you are a person without principles and then you say that
something is good or bad, your judgment has no value. Random judgments
are based on self-centeredness: a true judgment can only come from a
basic law or principle within yourself. It is the mind which has
unchanging qualities, while the body always changes. The mind should
have a permanent foundation.
The body will follow the direction dictated by your five senses,
and they are always changing direction. If your eyes see a lovely
flower, your body will walk over to it, for instance. But your mind is
not bound by the five senses; it can refuse to obey, and give other
directions to your body instead. The mind is trying to bring the body
to the place where all the senses can be contented. If the mind
favored only the eyes then the other four senses would complain; the
mind thinks of all five senses.
The mind decides how to respond to the desires of each sense, but
the mind can only make these decisions based on some principle.
Actually we can thank God that we have a conscience as a command post
for the body. Before now you only felt it bothered you and limited your
activities, but after listening to me this morning you can thank your
The American way of life is pragmatic, so Americans look for
comfortable and convenient things in life. To people who want to go to
the disco or enjoy sex, the conscience seems to be an obstacle. When
your body eats, it wants delicious food, and prefers to have delicious
pleasures always. Why does the conscience put the brake on what the
body desires? Habits and customs are hard to change, no matter how
logical it is to I change them. Addiction to drugs and alcohol, which
poison the body, are hard to cure, but how can you cure the sex
addiction? Have you ever thought about that?
We have to base our lives on a firm foundation of principle; if we
don't have that then we have to create one. Without standards or
principles, we will see only destruction around us. If no principles
bind parents and children or husband and wife, the family will fall
apart. The mind wants a principled life, but the body pursues all kinds
of addictions. The friction caused by that contradiction is a terrible
burden. People feel sorry for a mentally ill person, but once a
person's mind or conscience becomes sick, it is even harder to
restore. Religion deals with that world.
A grasshopper doesn't plan for the winter, but enjoys the warm
weather and thinks he has a sweet life. Spring and summer always come
to an end, however. The important point is that we must arrive at a
standard of law and principle which is followed by everyone in our
homes, society, nation and world. Such a standard should be based in
your conscience. That standard should be acceptable to everyone and
still be unchanging, eternal and unique. We conclude that the
conscience provides such a standard.
Everyone likes material treasure, but would material things like
just anyone? If treasure could speak, it would say that it likes anyone
who has a higher standard than it does. You feel this is true because
you yourself are like that. You like something that is higher and
nobler than yourself. So also do material things.
A diamond likes someone who is harder, and shines more brightly
than it does. Gold with its deep color represents peace, and wants to
be loved by someone more deeply golden and peace loving than itself. A
pearl will respect and love someone with a more harmonious color than
itself. Would a diamond like some unworthy person who just grabbed it,
or would it prefer to be possessed by someone with a moral ethic? A
diamond has a preference, and would like to resist the thief who
reaches out to snatch it. If a diamond has consciousness then this
should be the case. That's how we would react.
One person never thinks about whether he is worthy to possess the
diamond, while the better person considers whether he is really
entitled to it. If you have this nature, then even the diamond would
have that inclination. This is elementary, but necessary education.
America's problem is that it doesn't really know the power and
existence of the world of conscience.
How large is the conscience? There are four billion people in the
world today, so there are four billion different kinds of conscience.
If we include people in the spirit world then there are billions more.
Is there room for still more? It is difficult to conceive how there
could be no time or space, so I'll give you an example.
If one day you do the work of ten, will your conscience say the
next day, "Just do the work of nine"? There is no such
conscience. Instead, it will tell you to do even more work next time.
If you give ten people ten dollars, will your conscience permit you to
give nine people ten dollars the next day and keep ten for yourself?
No; it will tell you to give money to eleven people instead. The
conscience is never fully satisfied.
Even if you contained the whole planet earth in your conscience, it
would still want to reach out farther and possess the whole galaxy.
Even if it had the whole universe, it would still want to have God.
Your journey wouldn't end until you owned the heart of God and had His
love. That's how the conscience works. Trying to set a standard for
this extraordinary kind of conscience is not easy. Who made the
conscience so big? God did if He had nothing to put into it then He
would run away. He is responsible, after all.
What does God have that can fill the conscience? God knows you like
diamonds. If God is almighty then would He be satisfied to make a lot
of diamonds to fill everyone's conscience bag? Why not? God can make
diamonds and gold, but there is something that God cannot control at
will: that is true love, which is activated only in a reciprocal
relationship with an object. Without an object, love cannot be
If you have love, can you show it to me? Man's love is activated
only when he finds a partner; when you are sitting by yourself your
love is not activated. God has been sitting all by
Himself, so can He enjoy His love, slapping His side and laughing?
God has been lonely just like you would be. If He has even a small
piece of chalk and can laugh with enjoyment at it, then it would make a
little better sense. No matter how much potential love God has, by
Himself God cannot feel its excitement. Always an object is needed to
activate love through give and take. Is this true for women? With a man
to relate to, the give and take vibration can begin; how about woman-to
Even God needs an ideal object. Why did God create the whole
universe? For the perfection of His object. God is gigantic, and He
needs an equivalent object who can stand side-by-side with Him, so He
created man with a conscience as big as God's conscience. When man
completely fills his conscience and he starts to laugh, then God can
respond, and the whole universe will laugh together with them. That is
Nothing else except love can fill that conscience, however. Love
alone can excite God. In love God is an enormous plus and man is an
enormous minus, and when they join a giant spark will flash. How much
power would that generate? The entire universe will be jolted by the
shock. God and men and women will all be totally intoxicated and melted
by the power of that love. All the creation will be affected, from the
one-celled amoeba to insects to the galaxies.
You might say, "We are here on earth and God is far away. How
can we make a spark with God?" Is there any distance when we speak
of electricity? God's electricity travels faster than electricity that
we know on earth. When God is totally happy and intoxicated in love
then all mankind can respond that they too are happy, and then the
entire creation will echo around the world, "We too are
I like the word "too." The cross bar on the "t"
represents the horizontal absolute; the vertical line represents
you-you are a pillar of love. The "oo" means everything is
OK. Americans say OK; the O means perfection, and K comes from
"keep." So OK means that you keep perfection, that everything
is going well. You didn't know I had a definition for this!
Conscience is OK, but it is centered on what? Life? That is good.
On knowledge? That is nice too. On power? But these are not the central
things. What is it that everyone likes and can participate in? One
substance alone has that universal character-love. When the cornerstone
of existence is conscience that is based on true love, or true love
that is based on conscience, then everything will be in the right
place. That is the standard. Would that be only a temporal standard?
No, it would be eternal, unique and unchanging.
The essentiality of love is always the same, but the components are
different from person to person, depending on where love appears. Each
individual is a truth body with unique characteristics, but they all
share a common essentiality in God. Thus, each individual contains
unique love with a common essentiality, like the cells in a body. Each
person is a cell of love. Each individual's love has uniqueness which
cannot be duplicated by anyone else, yet also it is unchanging and
If you have true universal love within you then you have become a
standard man or woman of the universe. We come to the conclusion that
we need the standard of conscience which is true love. With that alone
can we digest the world and bring it into our consciences. We can even
bring God in with invisible true love. As long as you have that true
love, you can turn in any direction. That world of true love also
transcends time and space.
With that standard of true love all five senses will cooperate
instead of repelling each other, for they do so out of happiness, not
duty. All five senses should function in the intoxication of love. Even
if you use all kinds of uncomplimentary adjectives in describing
someone, as long as you speak from love there is no disharmony between
you. At any time of day, whether you are young or old, you welcome that
love. What quality can create such a permanent interest and
intoxication? Only true love.
This is not a daydream, but something real. I searched in all
directions and in all philosophies, but I couldn't find the answer
there, so I had to find it on my own. I knew very well what path I had
started on, so it didn't matter how America or the government
criticized me. I know myself better than our critics do, and I just go
where I am destined to go. For that reason I can be bold and strong.
Unless we have the standard of true love and conscience, we have no way
to reach the true ideal world; we could not even glimpse that world
without it. If there were no real, true love, we would have to make
something up to take its place.
The Principle explains about the dual of God, how the subject and
object create a circuit, and how the energy of that give and take can
bring the perfection of creation. Everything has dual aspects of mind
and body, and in order to be persons of conscience and true love, we
must first unite mind and body. There are only two directions to go
in-the heavenly way or the secular way. That means each person is in
between heaven and earth. The mind is in the center, with the physical
world on one side and the heavenly world on the other, so the mind is a
buffer between the visible and invisible worlds.
Conscience and spirit are two different things, but conscience
sometimes looks like spirit, and vice versa. The foremost part of
conscience is spirit, but they are a continuation of each other. When
you follow your conscience deeper and deeper, you inevitably make a
deeper spiritual connection. When God visits, He will land in the
foremost position of your conscience. Therefore, the only place to
search for God is deep in your conscience.
Today many people seem to be psychic and have supernatural powers,
but they don't know the basic truth. In observing these phenomena, most
people overlook the reasons behind them. Those who study psychic
phenomena today don't know why it happens. When you go all the way in
pursuing the standard of conscience, you will connect with spirit
world. Whenever you make some turn in spirit world, God is always in
the position of axis.
Love is the central factor around which the whole thing will turn.
Not only the spirit world but also the physical world is meant to turn
centered on love. The body should be centered on love and harmonized
with all things of creation. Love is the central factor which can
harmonize all creation. Thus, when man becomes a being of love he is
the supreme creation of God. Without that love man is no different from
an animal or plant.
The center of the two worlds is the same love and same God, making
a gigantic turn together. They are centered upon true love and upon
you. Man can ask for nothing more; there is nothing greater or higher.
At that point man is totally fulfilled; then your conscience is totally
filled and you feel complete satisfaction and happiness. Then you can
maneuver as a unique, everlasting and unchanging entity in the
universe, on your eternal journey. Amen!
With this as a standard you have a goal to accomplish, and when you
reach that universal goal you will shout out "Amen!" I am
introducing you to the taste of true love, so even if the entire world
comes against us, nothing can stop you once you taste that love. If
people are even willing to die for their secular love affairs, how much
more would people be willing to give everything for heavenly love? When
someone pinches you, you say, "Ouch," but when heavenly love
hooks you, you say "Ouch love! " When you are traveling with
the love of God, you can be accepted anywhere, even in Hell.
We are front-line soldiers in the war to restore true love to the
world. There are all kinds of commotion when the world sees these flag
bearers marching forward, and people accuse me of taking their children
or their husbands or wives. People around the world have accused me of
being a love thief.
"Our standard" is true love and conscience. "My
standard" is also true love and conscience. In order to make it
the "world standard" we have to give to the world by serving
all mankind-eating, fund raising, witnessing, marrying and having
children-everything for the sake of the world. We want to reach the
nation and world quickly in order to achieve the standard of God.
In centering upon this standard, everything-whether family, nation,
world or universe-is consummated by following the one goal. This is the
beauty of it. This is truly a supreme ideology. Can you find any other
preacher teaching this love? I am not just speaking about it, but
living it, and you too can become
deeper and deeper. When your spiritual state nears mine, then I
will appear in your dreams and give revelations. It is the law of love
that when you pursue this goal, God will definitely intervene in your
life. This is our permanent, supreme standard. It has been victorious
in the past, will conquer the present, and will be victorious in the
future. It will bring permanent: eternal happiness. That is the goal.
Have you lived that way?
Totally empty yourself and be filled with this new command. When
you listen to the voice of your mind, tears of joy and liberation will
overflow. At that moment you will feel that universal love has touched
you. Just as you like to touch beautiful flowers or butterflies, when
you become lovable the universal love will want to touch you. When you
are united with that love, you can give it to all things.
When I teach you here at Belvedere, I am always thinking that I
speak to you so that you can reach the same goal. My fervent desire in
teaching you is for you to become intoxicated in that deep love also.
When I am away you feel that Belvedere is empty, but when I walk in,
the room feels full. Why is that? It is because I am a messenger of
this love. Your privilege is to come and be ignited. It is completely
possible. You want to be sons and daughters of the True Parents,
becoming children of true filial piety, then true patriots, and then
I view the family as formation stage, the nation as growth stage,
and the world as perfection stage. In order to be accepted by the
heavenly world it is not good enough to be only a child of filial piety
or a patriot. You must be a saint, a child of God. Religious leaders
have taught various moral codes, but they have not dwelt on love. But I
am teaching sainthood based on love, and teaching a way to achieve it.
This is the first such group in the world.
We are known, therefore, as the love race. In that race all five
colors of skin are assembled. We live together and feel as close to
other races as we do to our own race. Your brothers and sisters are
like your clothes. When you are with black people, you can feel you are
wearing a tuxedo. When you are with white people you can feel you have
white clothes, and with yellow people as though you wear spring
In order for a white object to stand out, it must be placed
against a dark background, so we can say that its brilliance and value
comes from the background. If whites don't like black people, then
they shouldn't wear black clothes. In our world we transcend these
race problems and we want to marry interracially to create greater
beauty. We want to live with that standard forever. Whoever wants to
live that standard, raise your hand.
God bless you.