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Beyond the Cain-Abel Culture, page 5
 

The Temptations for Cain and Abel

According to the Bible, God spoke to Cain: “If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not well, sin is couching at the door; it’s desire is for you, but you must master it.” (Genesis 4:7) According to the Principle this indicates that Cain has to master his sin and submit to Abel. This is his contribution to the foundation for the messiah to come. The movement stresses a lot that Cain must follow Abel, overcoming the constant influence of Satan who wants to create ‘disunity’ and thus prevent the foundation from being established.

Of course, the movement also speaks about Abel’s responsibility to win Cain’s heart. After all, Abel is the central figure and has the ultimate responsibility for success. But in reality Abel’s part in the foundation of substance looks like an optional contribution. His job was the foundation of faith, now it is up to Cain to follow him. This is a common misconception - if not in theory, then at least in practice. A corresponding attitude can often be observed and has been the cause of much heartache and failure. But if Abel fails, apologies like “Nobody is perfect. He tries real hard.” appear almost instantly - as an additional effort of other Cains to ‘unite’ and ‘support’ Abel and thus separate from Satan.

Great lectures have been given how Abel (the leader) should treat Cain (the follower) in order to win his heart. But the reality – on average – is rather dim. When it comes to resolving differences, more often than not, the requirement of Cain to unconditionally unite with Abel used to be the preferred solution.

The temptation for Abel is to avoid and discourage any criticism by labeling it an attempt to create ‘disunity’ – a foundation on which ‘Satan can invade’. Thus, the apparent need for Cain to comply with Abel ‘unconditionally’ in order to separate from Satan can be exploited to exercise extremely coercive leadership. Indeed, the environment and the conditions in which members used to operate, allows a leader to get away with coercion quite easily.

But leadership is always a difficult task. Examples abound both for exceptional failure and success – within the movement as well as outside. In the next section I will shortly discuss six different styles of leadership. I will then apply the result to the approaches towards leadership in the unification movement.
 

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the old man

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