Claim. SMM instructs members that when praying ‘in the name of True Parents,’ they should not think only of Mother and himself but of cosmic Parents who transcend any people or nation and embrace the world in true love — a deliberately broader referent.
Elaboration. In Section 5. Prayer in the Name of True Parents SMM both affirms and complicates the personal identification: ‘When you pray, you pray in the name of True Parents, but who are the True Parents? Do not think of this term only with regard to Mother and me. No, think of True Parents from a higher point of view. Think of them in terms of the mother and father who can embrace the world at a higher level and truly love all people as one, transcending the emotions of any people or nation.’
This is theologically significant. The formula ‘in the name of True Parents’ replaces the Christian ‘in Jesus’ name’ as the closing of UC prayer, but SMM is explicit that the referent is not merely the two historical persons. The True Parents are a positional reality — God is the ‘first True Parent’ (also stated in this section), and SMM and Hak Ja han are the manifested expression of that positional reality. ‘God is the first True Parent.’
The move parallels how christology distinguishes Jesus’ historical person from his cosmic/eternal role (Logos, Cosmic Christ). Here True Parents has both an indexical referent (SMM and Hak Ja Han) and a positional/cosmic referent (the universal Parents who embrace humanity). ‘This is why I also pray in the name of True Parents’ — SMM himself prays in that name, which only makes sense if the name refers to something larger than his own person.
The parent-as-savior reasoning is also notable: ‘You want your parents to come to save you. You would like your parents, the highest ranking saviors of all, to come to rescue you. Since parents know their children’s pain as pain penetrating their own bones, children are looking to their father and mother to be their saviors.’ Salvation through parental love displaces salvation through judicial substitution — a structural alternative to evangelical atonement theology. Critics typically engage on whether the parental metaphor can carry the soteriological weight Christ’s death traditionally bears.