～from familyfed.org
Contributed by Shinyoung Chang
The Global Top Gun Youth (GTGY) Workshop began on August 1. Because of True Mother’s sincere desire to invest in the education of youth, she generously offered to cover the workshop fee for all 1,200 participants, allowing as many as 120 American Unificationist youth to attend.
On our first day, the GTGYers heard from True Mother directly. You can read more about our experiences of meeting with True Mother here.
Today, Sun Jin Moon, International President of Family Federation for World Peace and Unification (FFWPU) came with her husband In Sup Moon, International Vice President of FFWPU, and sister-in-law Professor Yeon Ah Moon, International President of Women’s Federation for World Peace (WFWP), to spend time with the workshop participants.
The Universal Peace Academy (UPA) band played a few songs to lift up our hearts and minds as we started our day together. Then the three guests walked up on stage, where they sat cross-legged on the stage floor wearing GTGY shirts! This set up made the participants particularly excited and open to hearing their remarks because it felt very familial and engaging.
Sun Jin Moon guided the participants in a reading of True Father’s autobiography, A Peace Loving Global Citizen, then talked about her life and how the love of God and True Parents have helped her to address the obstacles she has faced.
At the conclusion of her main remarks, there was an opportunity for question-and-answer, and a lot of the Japanese and international participants asked questions about True Mother and how to better understand her heart. They also asked how to serve True Parents well when they’re still so young. Sun Jin Moon answered the participants honestly and openly, sharing that True Parents, like our own parents, love us and want us to be happy and to excel in what we create.
After the question-and-answer session ended, Sun Jin Moon then led a combined dance and exercise session featuring the famous “Bounce” song and also freestyle dancing. The international participants were particularly excited by the opportunity to dance together with Sun Jin Moon and the other GTGY participants.
In the afternoon, all of the participants gathered together again to play icebreakers and get to know one another better. Because there are so many GTGYers here, it turned out to be a huge competition with games and prizes, and the winners were ultimately chosen by voting with rousing cheers.
The participants then ended their day together as they will every day: practicing a song for one hour in the evening to be performed at the upcoming commemoration of True Father’s fourth Seonghwa anniversary. Many are even preparing to continue practicing the songs once we go on pilgrimage tomorrow, August 3.
Be sure to stay tuned for more updates about our adventures as we head out on the road!