Mother Moon: How to Be a Filial Son or Daughter

In message delivered in Copenhagen Dr. Michael Balcomb explains how Mother Moon teaches us to become a filial son or daughter for God, our Heavenly Parent

Part 2 of extracts from a sermon titled “With Whom I Am Well Pleased”, that Dr. Michael Balcomb, the President of the Europe and the Middle East Region of the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, gave at the Sunday service in Copenhagen, Denmark on 10th November 2024. Slightly edited.

See part 1 God and You: “With Whom I Am Well Pleased”

See part 3: “To Change World, Treat Each One as Child of God”

Elsewhere you read that Father said,

“There were days when I felt the presence of God like a gentle spring breeze. And Jesus came to me and spoke loving words and taught me.”

Then you turn the page, and it says,

“And there were days that I felt surrounded by darkness, that there was no word from heaven, no word at all.”

Mother Teresa is famous for explaining when asked about her relationship with God and somebody asked her, “So what do you say to God?”

She said, “I don’t say anything. I just listen.”

Then the same interviewer asked her, “So what does God say to you?”

“He doesn’t say anything,” she replied. “He just listens.”

Listening, and even without words, seems to be at the very core of coming to know who our Heavenly Parent is. These days, we’re hearing a lot about our Heavenly Mother [Editor’s note: the motherly aspect of God], right? About the feminine heart of God. And sometimes, actually almost every day, I get people complaining to me,

“We haven’t heard this before. Why are we hearing this now? What about this? What about that?”

I just feel, every time,

“Can you listen before asking your questions, before raising your alternatives? Could you listen?”

Imagine that our Heavenly Mother [Editor’s note: the motherly aspect of God] has been silent for 6,000 years. And finally, through True Mother, is getting a voice. And the very first thing we do is to start to argue or say, “It doesn’t sound quite like what I heard before.”

How heartbreaking would that be, right? How much better it would be just to listen, even for quite a long time, and be patient and let the truth emerge.

And then what about Mother? I remember early on meeting True Mother right after Father ascended. It was about two weeks later, and Mother called me to Korea. Actually, I didn’t know it was Mother calling, really. […]

I got a sudden call, “Come to Korea!” I came to Korea. When I got there, it turned out that Mother wanted to see me. I didn’t really know Mother at all. Of course, I’d been many times in East Garden [Editor’s note: property in Irvington, New York used for FFWPU events and gatherings] to hoondokhae [Editor’s note: Gatherings to read from Holy Scriptures and learn] meetings with the True Parents, but usually Father did the talking.

Mother asked me to sit down in front of her. […] She looked at me and said,

“You have a doctorate from UTS, don’t you?” [Editor’s note: Unification Theological Seminary, now called HJ International Graduate School for Peace and Public Leadership (HJI)]

I said, “Yes.” She said, “Don’t worry, that’s not why I called you here.”

She proceeded to share with me and asked,

“Do you know what it means to be a filial son?”

How would you answer that question? A part of me would like to say,

“Yes, I know how to be a filial son. Here I am. I’ve been here for 40 years.”

Another part was saying,

“Actually, not really. I’m sorry, I don’t feel I am.”

I think True Mother saw my struggle. She said,

“Let me help you to understand what a filial son is. A filial son has one overriding concern, and that is to see his parents dream fulfilled.

Okay, let me give you an example. Let me make it simple. As you know, in America, there are many Korean families that emigrated there. There are hundreds of thousands, and very often the parents came with nothing. But they worked hard, desperately hard, to make a better future for their children.

Very often, they’d open a laundry or grocery store, which would stay open day and night. The parents would work hard, and then they’d make money. And of course, they would like their children to do better. So they’d like them to get good educations and good careers.

I was listening to Mother, and she said, “Okay? Are you with me so far?”

I said, “Yes, Mother, I understand.”

She said,

“Okay, then the day comes when the parents are getting old. The business that has supported the family for so long is not really working well anymore. […] People don’t want to go to the little grocery store because it’s expensive. They want to go to the big grocery chain. […]

Imagine this: the parents lifelong investment is gradually collapsing, and the children have to think, ‘What are we going to do?’

What do you think the children should do? One child might think, ‘Now we’ve all grown up, we’re mature, we’ll manage, we sell the store, get rid of it; that’s history. You retire mom and dad, and we’ll take care of you.’

Is that filial piety?”

I thought, “It’s a trick question. It sounds like it’s filial piety.”

But I didn’t say anything. Mother said,

“Well, it depends. It depends on whether the parents can feel, ‘I’ve done what I wanted to do. I’ve passed on everything to my children.’

But if they are just taking it away and replacing it with something else – even though it might be better – that’s not really filial piety.”

Instead, you have to think as a filial son, ‘I’m going to fulfill my parents’ dream. I’m going to let them finish well, finish victoriously, not defeated and somehow sliding out.’

Do you understand what I mean? Even if I have a doctoral degree or whatever I am, I have to make sure my parents dream is fulfilled. Even if I think, “It’s maybe a little obsolete,” or “The time is over,” or “You could do it better this way or that way.”

At that moment I realized what Mother must have been thinking. As you know, the True Parents have many children, many capable children with Harvard education, great skills, but actually, unfortunately, all of them – pretty much – are pursuing their own vision of what the providence should be, or life should be, and not ready to stay until the end to see the True Parents’ dream fulfilled.

So it’s very challenging to realize that being a filial child doesn’t necessarily mean that you have better ideas than your parents. But if you do, you might have to keep them to yourself. The first thing can’t be, “Mom, dad, I have a better solution.”

But giving up that, you humble yourself to think,

“Okay, before I try to change anything, let me see if I can’t bring this vision to a successful conclusion.”

And Mother said,

“Then the second duty of the filial child is very simple: ‘You have to persuade your younger brothers and sisters to join in.”

If only one son is doing that, and everyone else is doing their own thing, of course their parents can’t rest, can’t be happy.

She said, “And so, how is America doing in this respect?”

At that time, I was in America. And she said,

“I don’t think it’s doing so well. Father is not even cold in the grave, and already there are ten different ideas of what we should do next, and who should do it, and who’s best.”

Mother said,

“That’s not what I want to leave behind. I want to leave behind a situation when I go where everyone is united, everyone is ready to work together.

Yes, we may have different plans. We may have ideas that would have been fine if we’d been able to make that kind of unity.”

Continued in part 3: “To Change World, Treat Each One as Child of God”

See part 1 God and You: “With Whom I Am Well Pleased”

Featured image above: Mother Moon speaking 21st April 2012 at Cheongshim Peace World Center, Gapyeong, South Korea. Photo: FFWPU

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