What I Really Learned

Never ever ever under any circumstances ever ever listen to or believe a single word any person, particularly a religious person, ever says ever. Watch only their actions.

Here is how that one came to be: Sun Myung Moon (SMM) would say “live for the sake of others”. But his actions suggested one should instead control others and in doing so amass oneself great wealth. SMM would speak about being humble, but crowned himself king of all kings in a gaudy spectacle the likes of which should have sickened the members that paid for it. He would say love and serve others, but not one single church activity was truly charitable or humanitarian other than R.Y.S (which he didn’t create) – their primary purpose was influence peddling. SMM said he wanted peace, but I knew for certain that there would be no peace if someone else was king.

The chorus of clueless cheerleaders helped solidify the lesson. They would tell me SMM and co. founded a utopian movement that would bring about world peace and establish one big global family. But I could see as plain as day that what SMM actually built was a regressive social structure of royalty and serf classes. They would go on and on about how SMM was a “true parent of all mankind”. But I had the misfortune of spending a lot of time being one of the serfs for his children and it was quite clear to me that in fact he had fathered some of the most heartless and vicious people in the world. And he certainly made no evident effort to provide much of anything tangible for the members that were supposed to be his “spiritual” children.

I thank SMM for the lesson. Although maybe it was not quite what he intended…

I contrast all this with my mother. She never gave speeches and never tried to have power over other people or control them. She never flew around in private jets and never crowned herself queen of anything. And yet those who knew her would have done anything for her.

At her funeral a woman came up to me and told me how perplexed she had been by my mother. During the last few months of my mother’s life, this woman had come to our house every few days to minister, something I guess church women do these days. She said that despite being the one doing the talking, it was actually she who also did the learning, not my mother. Without anyone realizing it the tables had been turned.

I knew exactly what she meant. I had come home to see the process in action a few times. Picture a frail and emaciated woman, bed-ridden and subject to bouts of extreme coughing, being lectured on God’s providence by some do-gooder. And then when the speaker finished, with a big smile on her face, she would breathlessly and with difficulty ask about the speaker’s family. How are they doing? How are your husband and daughter? I was always stricken by how tangible her concern was. She was dying, could barely breath, was in unimaginable pain, and yet would sit through a lecture on a topic she knew far more about than the speaker, and her first concern was how this other person’s family was. And it was genuine. It was all real.

Was this the illusive, much talked about, but rarely seen “true love”? Was this genuine selflessness? I do not know. Maybe.

My mother’s life taught me that personal goodness is self evident. It does not need to be advertised, does not require power or the absolute obedience of an ever expanding audience and does not seek recognition of any kind. And considering she was one of the most “good” people I have ever known, I would have to say that she was also evidence of a big inverse correlation between power/money and goodness. The two do not appear to mix well.

Her later years also taught me the value of independence. She was not particularly obedient. She had the temerity and strength to question things honestly and sincerely and arrive at conclusions that were not necessarily the dictated orthedoxy. It was not arrogance as I have so often seen the Moons accuse people of when they showed open objectivity. It was honesty. And to be honest, particularly with oneself, it was apparent to me that one has to figure things out independently and cannot let an organization or a dogma or any sort authority figure dictate it, particularly one that benefits financially from another’s obedience.

Conversely, the steadfastness with which Moons sought total control over people by preaching absolute obedience and deterring questioning led me to several conclusions. First, people who try to control you are never your friends. They are either your parents or they are your enemy. Sometimes they are both. Second, obedience where the ultimate goal has not been thoroughly questioned is a sign of mental weakness and should not be respected or emulated (can you imagine how much less bloodshed the world would have seen if soldiers had questioned their commanders and refused to fight without a good reason?). Third, real wisdom generates its following organically without force, pressure or heavy advertising. Those things are often a sure sign that the peddlers of the product are insecure about its quality.

Ironically, I also learned the value of humility and compassion from my parents and the first gens around them, and had a great example in the Moons of the horrible effects of excess and hubris. My parents are good people, not “great” people. To me “great” people, people of historical significance, are a lot like black holes. Their gravitational pull swirls everyone around them into an order of sorts. In a strange way the social order requires their existence, just as our galaxy requires the existence of the massive black hole at its center. But, like black holes, they pull others into their orbit and don’t let go. If some happen to benefit from that, it is chance, not design.

SMM is a “great” person. But so was Saddam Hussein. George W. Bush tried to be a “great” person, chasing a dream of being the man that brought democracy and christian goodness to the Middle East. But mostly the results were a bunch of people killed, lives ruined and the US citizens further in debt.

Good people, on the other hand are like one of my favorite bumper stickers – they think globally but act locally. They give back and they care. You, their friends and family, are important to them and are why they do what they do. It is basic, simple and seems small and not all that glamorous, but their collective action is very tangible and very real and very large. They do the right thing without chasing personal glory or trying to outdo historical figures in pointless endeavors that ruin lives.

Unfortunately good people are all too often collaterally damaged by the actions of “great” people as they pursue ever greater glory for whatever reason they use to justify their actions. And sometimes no one does anything about it, which brings to mind another lesson I learned from SMM. There is no justice. There is no cosmic retribution. Bad people can and do get away with their crimes.

If you want justice you have to get off your ass and pursue it yourself.

I watched a video of SMM recently having a jolly time at some mansion surrounded by fruit stacks and sycophants and thought to myself, “He’s going to get away with it. Soon he’ll be dead and there will never have been any restitution for the lives he ruined. He’s won.”

The truth is that he has not really won. While it may be small comfort to his victims, like many bad people he has in a way reaped what he has sown. His children are miserable people who don’t know friendship or empathy and lack most qualities one would consider basic and good in humanity. None will ever be happy. That fact cannot possibly be lost on SMM. He cannot trust them and he cannot even trust his old friends like Kwak any more. They have been corrupted by the money and power as he has, and have left him alone and afraid. For all his show of power, for all the empty ceremonies, invisible victories, coronations, and pointless speeches, his legacy is no different than any of the many “great” people before him - a family of moral ghosts. And the world is no better for his existence.

It’s probably worse.

Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you angry.

-Aldous Huxley

MLP

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