Preparation for Eternity

Religions do not expound on the reality of a future life merely as a comfort to the bereaved or as an opiate to the oppressed in this life. Rather, the fact of a future life enhances the purpose and sharpens the meaning of earthly existence. How a person lives on earth mainly determines his or her ultimate destiny. A wise person lives in this world with an eye toward eternity.

Indeed, it is generally taught that life in this world is the only chance we have to prepare for life in the next world. The link between deed and retribution is not severed by death; rather we reap in the eternal world the fruits of our actions in this life. Just as importantly, a person’s qualities of character survive death: As a person in this life was hard-working or lazy, generous or miserly, courageous or timid, forgiving or begrudging, so will he or she continue to be in the afterlife.

Therefore, the wise person lives with an eye to eternity by following religious precepts, repenting for misdeeds, and seeking to clear up all accounts before the day of his death. For one who is prepared, death is not to be feared. But for those who are heedless and do not prepare, death comes suddenly, fearfully and leaving them with regret. As Father Moon teaches, souls in the spirit world breathe the air of love; therefore, unless they have cultivated on earth the capacity for love, they will find the spirit world suffocating. Hence, the measure of our future happiness in the eternal world is the ability to love that we cultivate during earthly life.