PureInsight | May 25, 2010
Experience Sharing at the 2009 European Fa Conference
[PureInsight.org] On the12, 13 and 14th of January 2009, a fellow practitioner from Belgium and I went to Strasbourg to help to ensure a successful passing of the written declaration regarding the Eutelsat case. At that moment, we had gathered around 315 signatures from the Members of the European Parliament (MEP’s) and we needed at least 393 signatures for it to pass. It seemed like a difficult task lay ahead of us. We had worked on it for months. In the beginning, a lot of MEP’s signed on, but as we went along it became more and more difficult to get additional signatures, and now we had only two days left.
We arrived at the hotel late in the afternoon on Monday and we found some time to study Fa together with the practitioners who had already checked in. There were about twenty of us there. There was no conference room available at the time. We tried to find a location outside the hotel but it was impossible. In the end we decided to go to the TV room in the basement. We came together around 9PM and started reading the Fa. Every now and then someone tried to enter the room to watch TV. It must have been a strange sight, seeing a group of people reading a book together. Anyway, we had no alternative and there was no key so we couldn’t lock the door… After the reading we had a brief sharing about the European Parliament. Those who had already been there shared their experience on the protocols there and after that we went to bed.
In the morning at the reception, a woman came to me and asked me what we were doing in Strasbourg. I explained about the Eutelsat case and NTDTV and she listened very carefully. She seemed like a very nice lady. I thought it was a good way to clarify the truth to her. Afterwards she asked “What was all that ‘Buddhist reading’ about yesterday evening?” I talked about Falun Dafa and she was very interested. I also mentioned how Falun Dafa started in China and talked about the persecution, the book Zhuan Falun and the exercises. She obviously wanted to know more about it. She wrote down the website on a piece of paper and then she left. The practitioner who was with me said that she saw this lady at the Fa study last night. I said it was impossible but later on it turned out that she was actually present during the Fa study. We didn’t know each other because there were practitioners from all over Europe there and this lady was in the TV room watching television before we came in and started the Fa study. Someone just gave her a book to follow the lecture thinking she was a practitioner too. It seemed like a strong predestined relationship.
Also, a young man came to me asking what we were doing last night. He was one of the people who entered the room and saw us reading. He was also very interested and wanted to know more about it. He asked for the website and he told me he already tried all kinds of things and he felt this was very powerful. It sounded promising for the young man. I hope he can attain the Fa.
After breakfast we went to the European Parliament (EP) by car. When you look at the building it looks like a giant UFO. At the entrance there were practitioners handing out copies of the Epoch Times. We passed the entrance and checked in. My fellow practitioner and I would work on the Belgian MEP’s like we did before in Brussels. The task was easy to describe but not easy to do. We needed to contact all the MEP’s who didn’t sign the written declaration yet and try to go deeper into the case if we got the chance to speak to them. It didn’t take very long to realize that this was going to be a special day! All the offices were literally open for us and we could actually see MEP’s sitting behind their desks. There was a very strong righteous field coming from the cooperation between practitioners inside and outside the building. I received a message on my mobile saying there were more than 60 (!) practitioners doing FZN outside.
The result was very clear. We went inside the office of the Belgian MEP who is chairman of the Chinese Delegation. We explained the case to him and he said, “I received a lot of e-mails about this case and I made it very clear that I’m NOT going to sign!” We talked to him for about two minutes and tried to make clear to him that this was not about gathering his vote but that it was about free information for one third of the world’s population. In the end I said to him, “It’s your choice…” I told him a story about a woman in China who walked to a nearby village every day to check if NTDTV was back on the air yet. After two minutes he said, “I’ll think it over. Maybe I’ll reconsider.” I thought that was already a great result. The day after that we heard that he signed the declaration. As we talked to the MEP’s it seemed like we only needed to open our mouths and the right words just came out. Every time afterwards I hardly could repeat what I said. It was very clear Master was with us and helping us all the way.
I recall Master’s teaching on this: “With such an enormous Fa here, the Fa will be with you when your thoughts are righteous, and this is the greatest assurance. But on the other hand, when your righteous thoughts are inadequate and not in line with the Fa, you will be cut off from the Fa’s power, and it will seem like you are alone and getting no help. Even if the things you are doing are Dafa things, you still have to conform to the Fa or else the Fa’s power will not be there.” (“Fa Teaching Given in Manhattan 2006”)
After that we went to the office of another member of the Chinese delegation and a former Belgian Prime minister. We were able to convince him to sign in the same way. It was a little bit strange to see how someone like him, who is used to be around world leaders, was listening very carefully to someone like me, who doesn’t know anything about politics, and then changes his mind and simply signs the declaration. This can only be achieved with help from above. I could feel the energy being emitted while I was speaking. I saw the energy go from myself to the other person and the result was wondrous. We were able to reach everybody and the day was a big success.
In that same lecture Master says: “If your righteous thoughts are strong, the evil will be dissolved. The power of true compassion can dissolve all deviant factors, and when you talk with a person you will be emitting energy outwardly that dissolves evil things, and the evil in other dimensions will not dare to approach or control that person anymore. When you then reason with that person, he will listen, and you will be able to purge the lies infused into him by the wicked CCP, thus removing the block in his mind.”
On the top floors you can go outside the building and stand on the balcony. We saw the practitioners in front of the building sending forth righteous (SFRT) thoughts in the freezing cold and doing the exercises continuously. It was a beautiful sight. The MEP’s were also touched to see this as they told other practitioners who were inside.
The Chairman of the Belgian political party CD&V and a member of the group of Christian Democrats in Europe is a so-called ‘strong lady’ who is very hard to reach, in every meaning of the word. We went to her office and her assistant opened the door. He said she was very busy. We told him that we needed just one minute of her time to make clear that this was the last chance to sign the declaration. Her assistant waved his hand and closed the door. We had finished with everyone on our list for that day so we decided to wait. It was almost 5 o’clock in the afternoon and she couldn’t keep on working forever. When she would come out of her office we could hand over the documents. But it wasn’t so easy. After more than an hour we still didn’t see her. Her assistant went in and out of the office several times and he saw us waiting. We smiled at him and didn’t ask for anything. I could see he wasn’t feeling very comfortable.
Another Belgian MEP, who had his office right next door, also passed us several times in the corridor while we were waiting. He recognized us from the last time we were there a few weeks earlier. That time we were able to convince him to sign the declaration. After passing us a third time, he turned around and said to us, “Hold on and you’ll make it....” It was a nice gesture from him. At first he also didn’t want to sign at all until after we explained our case to him. Later on we met him again at the other side of the building. He sat down right next to our table to eat something. It seemed to be arranged that way and after hesitating a bit, we decided to talk to him again. After saying a few more words about the case, he suddenly changed his mind. We left a good impression on him that day I guess. He still remembered us. If he had only known what he had signed that day, he would be very grateful. He made the right choice… After more than one and a half hours, we gave up. I suggested to my fellow practitioner to come back the next day.
That night, during a sharing, a German practitioner said he never felt such a strong field at the European Parliment in all those years he had worked there on several cases. The next day we went back and we had a long way to go. A lot of MEP’s signed but we were not there yet. First we went directly back to the office of our ‘Iron Lady.’ We could hear through the door she was on the telephone. The phone call kept on going. We took our chance and knocked on the door. We were surprised when she opened the door herself. The first thing she said was, “I don’t have time for this. I’m answering an important phone call.” We told her that we tried to reach her the other day and that we just wanted to make clear that this was the last day she could sign the declaration. She said, “Ok, just give me the documentation. I’ll talk about it with my colleague next door.” I thought to myself, “I hope you do that!” He saw us waiting the day before so he would definitely give a good impression about us. It was again perfectly arranged by Master. It was very touching and later on, her name was on the list.
There was a certain enthusiasm among the practitioners because of the good result of the first day and this might have had a negative effect. It didn’t go so smoothly again like it did on the first day. The interference was getting stronger as we came closer to our goal. Outside it wasn’t that cold anymore. Instead, it was snowing now! And it didn’t stop for the whole day. The practitioners outside stood strong and kept on sending forth righteous thoughts without stopping. A practitioner from NTDTV interviewed the practitioners outside and they said to her, “We’re not cold at all. We feel very warm while sending righteous thoughts in the snow.” A practitioner from Greece gave her own impression and she said, “It seems like very bad weather but it’s arranged that way by Master to show MEP’s how steadfast our practitioners are.” And it worked!! In the late afternoon we got the message that we had reached the necessary amount of signatures and that the written declaration passed! And it wasn’t a close call… We gathered 477 signatures in total. On only one prior occasion was a higher number of signatures gathered for a Written Declaration in the history of the European Parliament! Not long after that, we went back home with a good feeling in our hearts. The hard work and the righteous thoughts of the practitioners made it impossible for the old forces to get through. A German practitioner who’s celestial eye is open said later on how he saw Gods, Dao’s and Buddha’s coming down to help. I felt deeply touched when I heard this story. I felt it that way myself….
In the lecture in Manhattan in 2006, Master said: “Here amidst the secular world, it is all up to you to walk the path correctly and to go beyond ordinary people when immersed in this complicated setting. Everything that ordinary people seek; everything that ordinary people want to gain; everything that ordinary people act on, say, and do—all of this is, for you, what needs to be cultivated away. But, since you still need to remain among ordinary people until your cultivation meets with Consummation, you have to reach a state in which you have such things but have no heart for them, in which you can do such things but without attachment. Or seen from another perspective, all of these things that ordinary people do serve to provide you with a cultivation setting.”
This is precisely what this experience meant for me. It helped me a lot in my own personal cultivation. It made me realize how powerful and important righteous thoughts are.
In July 2009, NTDTV petitioned the Commerce Court in Paris to appoint an expert to investigate the true reason behind Eutelsat’s decision to shutdown NTDTV’s broadcast to China in June 2008.
Before the court hearing, NTDTV organized a large group sharing. Practitioners were enlightened that if we, as a group, do not pay enough attention to this issue and many of us just stay involved in the issues we’re immediately involved in but ignore the progress of this issue, the old force factors would have an excuse to interfere. This is a hard fought battle between righteousness and evil. Therefore, a suggestion was made to all practitioners to add a thought on this issue during the daily four times of sending forth righteous thoughts and to do it with strong righteous thoughts.
In one area of North America, practitioners got the time of the court hearing beforehand in order to inform all practitioners to send forth righteous thoughts. The main body of Dafa is in the Mainland of China. After reading sharing articles published on the Clearwisdom.net and PureInsight.org websites, practitioners there actively joined the sending forth righteous thoughts. There was no gap among different parts of the world, and everyone had a thought to let lawyers from both sides, these sentient beings in the legal system, know the truth and be saved together with the audience of NTDTV. We must deny the old force factors and let the process move in a positive direction and let more beings be saved.
On October 13th when the court hearing was held, there were practitioners outside the court unfurling banners, delivering materials and clarifying the truth. Inside the court, there were also practitioners sending forth righteous thoughts. Everyone was cooperative with each other so the energy field was very strong. Many people inside and outside the court accepted materials and got to know the truth. There was even a barrister who said to practitioners that he supported our action. Mainstream media also broadcast an interview with the NTDTV spokesperson outside the court.
On November 17, 2009, the judge of the Commerce Court in Paris made the decision not to send an independent expert to carry out an investigation, giving the reason that there was no direct contract between NTDTV and Eutelsat and a denial of the validity of the evidence published by Reporters Without Borders. NTDTV's lawyer does not think the decision was fair and will make an appeal until the truth is revealed.
Some practitioners shared on the unjustified court decision. One practitioner from France pointed out that the investigation into the Eutelsat issue and finding out who is responsible are both not what we should be attached to. Even if the judge agreed to investigate, it would not be a short-term issue. The most important issue is to clarify the truth and save sentient beings. Therefore, the lawsuit itself is an opportunity to clarify the truth that has not been known by the upper class of the society. We should try even harder in truth clarification.
Other practitioners also said that the issue of Eutelsat is in Europe but it affects an audience in Mainland China or even the global audience. There have been many in the Chinese audience who have said that the programs on NTDTV are like a breath of fresh air. They have been waiting for a quick restoration of NTDTV's signals.
In order to let more beings, especially the people inside China, know the truth and be saved, we, as practitioners in Europe, should realize our responsibilities on the Eutelsal issue. We must take the leading role. We should have better cooperation, and not only try harder to clarify the truth to the whole society in France but also take more serious actions by using this incident as an opportunity to clarify the truth.
Master said in the “Fa Teaching Given at the NTDTV Meeting,” “If you can work together better and add some more manpower, perhaps the situation will change dramatically.”
Thank you Master and thank you fellow practitioners for this experience.
