Oct. 4 is the Mid-Autumn Festival (or Moon Festival) in China, a joyful tradition and time for family reunions. Across the nation people are celebrating their good fortune and sharing appreciation for their family members.
Some people are also considering the plight of fellow Chinese who cannot find so much to celebrate.
In China, every day for the past 18 years, people who practice the meditation exercises called Falun Dafa have endured state-sponsored persecution. They face the possibility of arrest, imprisonment, torture, and even death.
Falun Dafa teaches Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance. The ruling Chinese Communist Party sees these values as being in opposition to their totalitarian, atheistic principles, and they see the popularity of the practice as a threat to their iron grip on China’s populace.
Since July 1999, people in China who believe in Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance have lived in peril—or died at the hands of the communist regime.
Yet faith in the teachings of “Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance” has guided practitioners through the darkest depths of persecution: through the torture chambers deep beneath Chinese prisons, through the loss of family members, through some of the worst cases of abuse humans have ever inflicted upon fellow humans.
Along with the physical persecution, the Chinese regime also created a massive public relations campaign to slander Falun Dafa. The state-run media accused practitioners of terrible crimes, called it a destabilizing force in society, and encouraged all citizens to turn against practitioners.
As time passed and more Chinese citizens came to meet and know Falun Dafa practitioners, these ordinary citizens began to realize that the state propaganda was a lie—Falun Dafa practitioners wanted more than anything to be good people, to live by those principles of Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance.
For years, Falun Dafa practitioners have created traditional cards celebrating the Moon Festival, offering thanks for the blessing of learning the practice. These cards tell how Dafa practitioners have managed to find compassion for their persecutors—they have found peace in knowing that their guiding principles work in even the worst situations.
They give thanks for these principles, and to Mr. Li Hongzhi, the man who first taught these principles publicly, starting in 1992.
Lately a new phenomenon has arisen in China.
Despite the persecution, despite the propaganda campaign, and despite government spies everywhere who report people who do not help persecute Falun Dafa, many Chinese people have been moved to send their own Moon Festival greeting cards to practitioners and to Master Li Hongzhi.
People who do not practice Falun Dafa but who have met those who do, are amazed at the kindness and the resilience practitioners show. Chinese people who were told that Falun Dafa practitioners were criminals, have come to learn that Falun Dafa practitioners can be counted on to tell the truth, can be trusted in times of trouble, and will be tolerant in times of strife.
Chinese people who have learned the truth about Falun Gong are increasingly speaking out—and for this year’s Moon Festival, have offered up an array of beautiful cards expressing their hope for a better future for Falun Dafa and a better future for all of China.
From NTD.tv
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