A story on the first Falun Dafa promoting parade and public conference on "the Truth of Falun Gong and Freedom of Belief in China"
On July 22, the first public conference on "the Truth of Falun Gong and Freedom of Belief in China" was held at the Chinese Public Hall in Manhattan Chinatown of New York City. After the conference, Falun Dafa practitioners held a 2-hour parade starting from 5th Avenue, passing Welf Street, Morbely Street, Columbus Park, and returning to 5th Avenue. The conference and the parade aroused strong reaction from Chinatown. The positive outcome was beyond practitioners' expectations.
Recently, the Minghui Net proposed the idea that telling the truth of Falun Gong to the world is the most important method of "assisting our teacher in human society." Since then, almost every Falun Dafa practitioner in New York began to reveal the truth of Falun Dafa to the public through various approaches and communication channels. We realized that indifference towards Dafa among Westerners is the biggest barrier for them. Therefore, it is important to inspire their kind nature in order to have them step forward for justice and against evil. Easterners, particularly Chinese, are deeply misled by false media propaganda. To change this situation, we need to do a lot of work.
New York City is a place where a lot of Chinese people live. There is one Chinese person for every 6 New Yorkers. There are 3 Chinatowns, the largest located in Manhattan District, with an estimated combined population of over 200,000. A mixture of different social and political forces is also here. In particular, the Chinese government has been trying to mislead people on the issues of Falun Gong. As a result there is much negativity in New York's Chinatowns. It has always been quite difficult for us to promote the Fa in Chinatown. However, the celestial condition is changing and we must act accordingly. How do we act? Previous methods are not very effective. Merely disseminating flyers did not yield satisfactory results. The hardest part in overcoming these barriers is to break our own conceptions. When looking back, we realize that every step we made has been to break our conceptions. There has always been disagreement among practitioners on the issue of "being involved in politics" when going to DC, the UN, and organizing parades. How can we reach an agreement? The only way is to read and study the Fa further.
The Teacher has told us many times that we should understand the Fa from within the Fa. When we work for Dafa, we should look at everything from Fa's perspective, instead of from normal people's perspective, let alone from the individual's perspective. Politics belong to everyday people; no Dafa cultivator is interested in them. However, politics has penetrated into every aspect of social life. We are cultivating in everyday people's society; we are assisting the Teacher in the human world. Therefore, we cannot avoid this environment. When we look at matters from the Fa's perspective, every job is just a job, regardless if it is working for factories, on farms, for business, government, religious institutes or party organizations. People who are doing these jobs are living beings in the human world. They are not different from each other. As long as the Fa can use them, we can take part in these activities. As cultivators, we just adopt forms that are accepted by society, such as gatherings, parades, petitions, etc. We only have one goal: to tell the whole world Falun Dafa is good.
Our behavior is also based on Fa whenever we do something. This way we abandoned concepts for politics, economy, social class, etc. After we get rid of the restrictions to these concepts in our thoughts, we are able to face any person who wants to know us, with an open and kind heart. We tell them "Falun Dafa is good"; the suppression on Falun Gong in China manipulated by a few people is false. Meanwhile, we are slowly and unnoticeably inspiring people's kind nature with our righteous behavior. This provides them with a valuable opportunity to place their future positions in the Fa. After they obtain an objective point of view towards Dafa, and start to support and help Dafa, they become a part of human society that has a correct understanding of Dafa. Dafa belongs to the whole universe, also the entire human world.
After realizing this, we started to contact society with a magnanimous heart based on the Fa. Under the suggestion of a scholar who has some objective understanding of Dafa, we went to community organizations in Chinatown to tell the truth of the persecution on Falun Gong in China. We consulted with them on issues such as social structure and cultural habits in this area. They are very sympathetic toward the hardship Dafa is enduring in China and suggested many methods that would help us. In a short period of time, we were able to rent the famous Chinese Public Hall.
Soon after this, practitioners from New York drafted 3 large-scale activities to promote the Fa. First, from July 18 to July 21, we had group study of the Fa and practiced in front of the Chinese Embassy from 10:00am to 10:00pm. In late afternoon, we lit white candles to remember those cultivators who had been persecuted to death in China. Second, we held a "Public Conference on The Truth of Falun Gong and Freedom of Belief in China." Third, we had a Dafa promoting parade in Chinatown, followed by a press conference.
On July 20, at the Chinese Public Hall, a blue banner with yellow characters said: "Seminar on the Truth of Falun Gong" hung from the rostrum. It was solemn and respectful. There were long tables on both sides of the hall. One side of the table had pictures and flyers promoting the Fa, the other side displayed photos that reveal the cruel truth on how the Chinese government persecutes Falun Dafa practitioners. The meeting officially started at 2:00pm. The representative of the New York Buddha Law Research Institute gave an opening speech that was translated into Cantonese. During the speech, he expressed Falun Gong practitioners' gratitude towards the Chinese Public Hall and overseas Chinese people for their support. They then introduced the truth of Falun Dafa to the Chinese community.
The meeting ended peacefully, and people awoke from deep pondering. They were overwhelmed for quite some time. There were more than 100 people that attended the meeting, all of whom had different social backgrounds. Media attendance included World Daily, Singtao Daily, Mingbao, and Ruteurs. Everyone, whether they were practitioners or not, were inspired and learned a great deal from different perspectives.
Silence took the hall when the video played, and eyes intently focused on the screen; there was no chatter. Many reporters said they would report Falun Gong objectively and would also take part in the parade afterwards.
The demo practice right before the end of the meeting excited everyone. There was a sea of smiles. A Chinese reporter said, "How could this be called an evil religion? Where can I learn the practice?" When he looked up, he saw more than ten people already begun to learn the practice. It was later known that many people had never seen Falun Gong before, that is why they were misled by false propaganda.
The parade started in front of the Chinese Public Hall. The first banner in front read, "Falun Dafa is Good." Followed by banners that read, "Return Our Freedom of Belief," "Return Our Freedom of Cultivation," "Kindness will be Rewarded and Evil will be Punished," "It is not Allowed by the Celestial Law to Indifferently Kill Innocent People." In the middle of the parade there was a banner that read "Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance." It matched with the banners in front of it, and practitioners that walked under the banners held bright yellow flags. Twenty to thirty practitioners spread Dafa materials.
The rhythm of the song "Pudu" played and all of Chinatown bathed in the light of truth. People were shocked, without moving at all they were staring at us murmuring, "How could it be like this? How could this be an evil religion?" Slowly, they began to take Dafa materials that practitioners handed out. Later they began to smile and some of them even walked with our parade.
An elderly man came to our parade and watched practitioners' possessions for them. He said he changed his mind about Falun Gong after reading the Dafa materials. He followed us the whole way. What was even more interesting was that some people at first were not willing to take Dafa materials when the parade came by, however, they began to do so when half of the parade passed them. After the whole parade passed, many ended up following behind us.
Some practitioners were pushing baby carts and others brought children. They held small flags with smiles were on their faces. They walked by peacefully, and from time to time stopped to practice with the music. The parade was quiet and slow. An elderly man who has lived here for a long time said, "People from Chinatown have never seen a parade like this: no slogan, no big noise, only music and practice. You are so peaceful. It has been a long time since we saw such spirit. You should have come a long time ago! The street you are walking on is where Chinatown originated. I hope Chinatown will have a good start from now on."
This was our first independent Fa promoting parade. It was purely composed of practitioners. What was presented to the public was a totally new and fresh spirit, the spirit of Dafa practitioners. Our spirits are moving those around us. The Teacher said in "Falun Buddha Law - Singapore Speech": "In fact I can tell you that safeguarding the law is not equal to using violence. Kindness and evil both exist in humans. We should abandon the evil side and safeguard Dafa only with the kind side. Other people say we are not good; we can let them understand why we are good. Tell them the truth only with our kind nature."(Chinese version, p7) During our practice in safeguarding Dafa, we truly realized what the Teacher said, "the power of compassion is immense."
The parade lasted an hour and 45 minutes. Everyone felt the solemn and amicable atmosphere around us. The way one practitioner described her feeling at that time was "the flag I was holding read 'Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance,' I was holding it very carefully in order to keep the flag completely open. I didn't want anyone to miss the words on the flag because of my carelessness. I watched the words on the flag and felt sacred in my heart. I smiled at people and they smiled back. I wished in my heart that they would not miss this opportunity to get to understand Dafa."
The parade ended at 6:00pm. Happiness permeated all around. By breaking human concepts that restrict our thoughts, we stepped forward for Dafa. We walked into society and people's hearts, as our hearts were harmonized with the Fa.
In "Falun Buddha Law - Singapore Speech", the Teacher said: "What is perfecting the Fa? Many cultivators might not know it yet. Dafa is so great as to be able to save us, enabling us to return to different levels and reach consummation. Then, why do we still need to perfect it? In fact, many people might have already realized that human society is the representation of Dafa at the lowest level. Every norm in human society is provided and created by the Fa. As cultivators, we are using this environment to cultivate. Although the human world is considered bad at different levels, it is a level created by the Fa. How do we surpass this level? How do we abandon various human concepts that restrict our thought? Once you realize this, you can break these barriers and rise to a higher level. This is what you must achieve during cultivation."
During our practice in promoting and safeguarding the Fa, we acted according to what the Teacher has taught us. Indeed, the human shell on us is shed layer by layer and we gradually rise to higher levels in the Fa.
On the next day, practitioners went to Chinatown to distribute Dafa materials as they always do. People were very enthusiastic in getting Dafa newspapers and other materials. The practitioners ran back several times to get more, but still there were not enough. The environment has significantly changed. Practitioners from New York worked even harder and held another Falun Gong truth revealing conference at the Taiwan Community Hall in Faluson where there is also a large Chinese population.
Falun Dafa Practitioners from NYC July 28, 2000