One day while gazing out of Her window at the vast expanse of bamboo thickets and rice fields, Oyasama said: "Someday this neighborhood will be filled with houses. Houses will line the street for seven ri between Nara and Hase. One ri square will be filled with inns. The Divine Residence will become eight cho square." She also often said "Eight buildings for eight trades." Whatever needed to be purchased could all be found here. This vision of the Home of the Parent is not one of a world of concepts and beliefs apart from the actual world. It is a place where living beings can lead their lives, and place where they will have everything that is required for their lives. Yet it is not an ordinary place for living. Centered on the Jiba, it is a place to which the children return out of their longing for their Parent. Here, embraced by the love of God the Parent, they seek and cultivate the mind that is single-hearted with God. Here, they savor the joy of Parent and children living together in peace and harmony.

The core of this vision of the Home of the Parent extending seven ri from Nara to Hase is the Residence which is eight cho square, centering on the Jiba. The construction of the Oyasato-yakata was begun to actualize this. Since the ground-breaking ceremony held on April 26, 1954, the construction of the Oyasato-yakata has continued without break. When completed, this building complex will form a grand quadrangle, 873 meters to a side, with a total of 68 wings. The wings that have already been completed primarily serve as places to study the teachings. They house the Besseki Lecture Hall, the Administrative Headquarters, schools, followers dormitories, and Ikoi-no-Ie Hospital.

Buildings called "Moya" are also being constructed one after another. Considered as annexes or extensions of the Oayasato-yakata, these buildings, mostly followers dormitories, have come to number more than a hundred in just the span of a few years. This reminds us of the words "One ri square will be filled with inns."

The construction of the Home of the Parent, centering on the Jiba, the Main Sanctuary, and on the construction of the Oaysato-yakata, continues even today, as we aim toward the actualization of the great ideal of spiritual construction.

How impatiently Oyasama must be awaiting the day when the people of the world, returning to this Home of the Parent out of their longing for the Parent, will savor the true life of joy in which Parent and children are reunited. Let us apply our minds of sincerity to this construction so we may see its completion even a day earlier.

(The above is a translation--first published in the September 1990 issue of TENRIKYO--of an article excerpted from Omichi-no-kotoba by Yoshikazu Fukaya, published by Doyusha Publishing Company.)