The Words of the Ablong Family
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The Words of the Ablong Family |
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Greetings in the name of Heavenly Father and True Parents!!
The year 2010 is fleeting so quickly. It is ending with a lot of hopes and challenges for the coming year 2011. As we pray for the peaceful re-unification of North and South Korea, we should also pray and work to realize our mission: peace and unity of mind and body as individuals, families (peace and unity between husband and wife and between parents and children) and peace and unity within and between our communities and nations.
True Father said that, "when you find some imbalance in your relationship with your spouse, both of you should be sincere enough to supplement each other by heart and faithfulness." (Way of God's Will, p.201) Let us remember that we need to balance our mission and family life on the fulcrum of our faith. We should not lose the love, life, and peace of our family when we do our mission. Divine Principle teaches us that the purpose of the family is to make a healthy society, nation and world. Hence, our families need to be healthy and strong so we can do our purpose. There needs to be a good communication between husband and wife to succeed in family life. Children usually get the example from their parents. They need to see the blessing as a marriage of love, forgiveness, understanding and mutual effort to maintain peace and happiness at home. A peaceful home is the best gift we can ever give to our children everyday in their life.
We have so many directions coming as the year is ending so we need to see which one is first, second, third and so on. There is a serious need to know and to do our mission based on these priorities. Otherwise, our family becomes prone to problems, bickering and stress. If there is no peace in the family, it will be hard to do a real mission from the heart. The husband cannot just go to God to make a perfect, untarnished offering. Jesus said something about this. "If you bring an offering to the Lord on His altar with a resentful person behind you, take your offering with you and go back to that person and ask for forgiveness so that your offering will be accepted."
If the husband values his wife and her effort to serve him and the children, then he should realize that value by helping his wife and his children at home. Husbands should help the wife teach and discipline their children. Spouses should help each other bring a good and balanced education and upbringing for the children. There should be more love and forgiveness, giving and sharing in the family so the children will learn this proper environment for them. Children should be taught the basics of life, of giving and receiving love and of living for the sake of others. But we have to remember that children learn selflessness from selfishness from when they are young. Thus, we need to be patient.
Children discover all their values through the parents. Who do the children resemble when they grow up in a family? They resemble their parents. Who will they follow? They will follow their parents. That's how it is. (CSG, Book 7, Ch. 4, Sec.6, 20-133, 1969.7.20) Children need time to understand things after some pains, mistakes and false starts.
As parents we need to be patient when we teach and help our children grow. In Jin Nim, in her speech last October 24, 2010, said that, "the single most beautiful characteristic that love shows is patience. When my mother was saying, "Think of loving and giving not as duty but as a privilege," she was reminding me to think of it as something to be grateful for. If something doesn't go your way, let it pass. Be patient, be strong, and be steadfast."
Judging from the reality of our life as missionaries. We have two main missions: the mission that we received from church leaders, and the "mission" that we make for the church and other people. One is given to us and the other is made by us. It can be referred to as public mission and private mission. This is natural because, as Unificationists, we cannot live with a peaceful conscience when we do not have a mission. The purpose of life defines our mission for existence. The internal reason for this is seriously apparent, God, Our True Parent and True Father cannot rest or sleep completely while most of His children are hungry, homeless, unhappy, disunited, selfish and killing each other. There is no world peace. So, He cannot sleep easily and completely. He only wants love and happiness for all His children regardless of race, religion, gender, economic situation, and ideology or political affiliation.
Public mission is the mission that comes from True Parents through our International Church President, Rev. Dr. Hyung Jin Moon through their representatives, our leaders from the continental to the national, and then from the regional to the local level. This is our public mission. We have to see to it that this mission takes number one priority in our blessed family life. Sometimes, we need to sacrifice our secondary priorities for the sake of our primary mission. We cannot use our secondary mission as an excuse for not being able to fulfill our primary mission and responsibility.
Secondary mission is the "mission" and activities that we have chosen to do without asking our leaders' permission or giving them prior knowledge about it. They are always good to have especially when we have nothing else to do. Secondary missions are good when we are able to fulfill our primary mission. But when they become a source of bickering, problems and stress in the family, they should be changed or re-considered.
Since we do not smoke tobacco and drink wine, the best part of our time is always shared in the family and the things that we do for others. Remember that it is good to have more missions when we feel lonely overseas. But, it is better to be doing just one specific mission when the unity and simple lifestyle of the family is at stake. The word "simple" here means "able to live with your united family safely, secured and considerably able to fulfill the primary mission." Sometimes, we need to sacrifice our secondary priorities for the sake of our primary mission. More missions may be a breeder for "omissions". When we commit something more, we omit something we consider "less" and sometimes, the more trouble comes from the "less important" than the "more important.
Choosing to put more secondary missions than we can afford makes our family life unnecessarily difficult. We should think that it is never God's wish to make our family suffer and fight because of our private choices. God as our True Parent, only wants unity and happiness for our family and a good, blessed future for our children while doing a public mission. To have peace in the family, we need to check ourselves every time. That also means blaming "myself" first when something is wrong and helping everyone recover and learn from the wrong, positively. When something good happens, offer it to God first and recognize others first before yourself. I think that this is what encourages peace and multiply goodness.
"Most sages have never known that it was Heaven's Will to raise families after raising individuals. Therefore, we should know that when God blesses families, it is for the purpose of restoring nations." (The Way of God's Will, par. 5, p. 200) The mission of the husband is to love and unite with his wife. The mission of the wife is to love and unite with her husband. Both parents live for the sake of the children. The mission of the whole family is for the society. The mission of the society is for the nation. The mission of the nation is for the peace and happiness of the world. The mission of the world is for the peace and happiness of God.
Husband and wife should talk and plan together how to accomplish public missions peacefully, diplomatically with love as a couple, in order to succeed. If there are things that our spouse do not like for the good of the couple then we have to change it. The change should start with us if our spouse cannot do it. The older we get as a couple, the deeper, stronger and the more in love we should be for each other. Our "fighting" should make us more in love with each other. If you became angry with your wife or scolded your children, you must apologize to them and love them even more. (Way of God's Will, p.200)
We are not in the age of "lip" service. We can no longer say we love our spouse without doing something substantial, something visible. A change in one of our nasty or "ignoring" behavior is a good sign of love and care for our spouse. One measure of conjugal love is the rarity or frequency of our special time or "romantic date" with our spouse. This love and romantic date with our spouse is something that makes our children happy and secure internally. These romantic moments with our spouse make our relationship deep and stronger and help us actually to easily overcome difficult moments together. Love doesn't die if it is always a giving and receiving kind of love. Love, give, forgive, and forget that you love, give and forgive. Working on the "we" factor is very important in the family. Individual uniqueness is important but we have to remember that family is husband and wife partnership. It's not what "I" like but what we like to do. True love compromises for true love and nothing else.
Love is not a word. It is also a present, a food, a dance with your wife, a hot bath together with the family, sweater and gloves for the cold weather, etc. It also means a hug, a kiss, and a love engagement with our spouse. We have to try harder to give love and peace in our family before proclaiming and preaching it to the world.
Christmas gifts, Valentine's Day flowers and chocolates or white day presents, birthday and anniversary presents are always good. Love is action. If we can give other people some gifts of love, why not to our spouse or children? We cannot give complete happiness to our family when we always ignore our basic needs for appreciation and affirmation. And, yes, we can sacrifice the happiness of the family for a greater cause but that should also be done in peace and love as well.
True Father said, "Tithing applies to all things. Even a school one out of every ten classrooms should be used as a free class for unfortunate children." (Way of God's Will, p. 191) This kind of education is important in their life. Principled parents are the best teachers to their children. Those who think they aren't usually has someone to teach their children about this point. Give your child a hundred yen and teach him tithing from there and that child would learn that while he is giving back to God ten percent, he is getting 90% or most of the money that God gave to him. This, I think is the best way to teach tithing. It is the same as love. God gave us everything in life and we only have to reciprocate that love by giving Him a part of ourselves, love..
Finally, just a few notes before this year slips away. Let us remind ourselves again of the important directions from our Continental Director, Rev. Yong through our National Leader, Rev. Jun Basuil, in order of priority:
1. Donation for the Re-Construction of the Philippine National Church Building. Donation per FilJap (PUCMJ) Family for the re-construction of the Philippine National Church Headquarters is fixed. Its original goal was March 2011 but because of our situation in Japan, it can now be accomplished within the year 2011 by installment. Contact your leader about this direction and or follow the fax advise about this matter.
2. Take note of the following from Philippine UM National Leader, Rev. Jun Basuil: This time, we are on the process of reaping the harvest from our PR Foundation. From December 26-31, 2010, four hundred (400) pastors will be attending a 5-Day Original Divine Principle Seminar at Midway Resort, Initao, Cagayan De Oro, Misamis Oriental. This is our best chance to educate these religious leaders so they can understand True Parents' teachings.
In line with this, we would like to request financial support from all brothers and sisters in order to carry out this project. We are asking a special donation of Php 2,100 from each blessed family, Php 1, 200 from single working members and Php 400 from all single full time members and students.
The deadline for sending this donation is on December 24, 2010.
Send me an email for the bank account information if you are interested. You may also directly communicate with your leader about how to send you donation.
3. Also be reminded that Rev. Yong has also asked all families to support students at the International Peace Leadership College (IPLC) in Tanay. Each student scholar that you will support for a monthly allowance of Y5,000 for 4 years will become your spiritual child. Members in Mie-Ken and Osaka have promised to support 30 student scholars at IPLC while at the same time aiming to accomplish the financial goal.
4. All Blessed Families are also encouraged to distribute 430 books of True Father's Biography to their tribe members and friends, and to have 8 books that True Father mentioned a few times already:
5. If you have not done it yet. Mr. Rolando Alcayaga, UM Philippines-in-charge of membership has asked all Filipino-Japanese families in Japan (or PUCM-J) to update our membership and 2nd generation files.
Please submit ASAP or before Sunday, December 4, 2010, the following information:
Couple's name and Blessing Order
Husband's Job:
Wife's Job:
Address and Contact Numbers including email addresses
Number and Names of Blessed Children, Gender, Age and Birthdays
Where do you do (or attend) Sunday Service?
5. Unless corrected by another memo about God's day celebration on February 3, 2011. Please take note of the following celebrations next year 2011:
Major Holy Days in Lunar Calendar with Solar Dates in parenthesis
God's Day January 1 (February 14)
Day of Victory of Love January 2 (February 15)
God's Kingship Coronation January 6 (February 19)
True Parents birthday January 6 (February 19)
Lastly, let me remind you again about having a working computer with an internet connection. It is not too late to study computers if you do not know how to do it yet. Most of those who didn't have time or didn't want to have a computer before now have a computer but we still have a few among us who do not have it yet. So please find a way to have a computer and spare some time to study it.
Please take note of the dates when we need to submit some papers or celebrate special holy days.
Thank you.
Merry, merry Christmas and Advance Happy God's Day 2011!!
Yours,
Rafael E. Ablong
Western Regional Minister
Philippine Unification Church
Ministry in Japan
1. www.tparents.org/Moon-Books/SunMyungMoon-CSG/CSG-07-04-06.htm
2. www.unification.net/wogw/wogw4-03.html
3. UM Philippines forwarded letter signed by National Leader Jun Basuil Dated December 20, 2010.
4. Letter of National Executive Minister Edgar Nacorda
5. Blessed Family and Ideal Kingdom, p. 191, 200-201.
6. www.tparents.org/Library/Unification/Topics/Calendar/Unification Church-calendar-2010b.htm