Recent events show that the Russians are currently facing a dangerous situation in Chechya and anti-Russian sentiment grows. The facts are inescapable. The Russians will never win the war. The Chechens continue to fight with unbelievable bravado and they bring themselves close to destruction. They are taking risks as they never have before, because the goal is control over their own lives. They are willing to risk their lives for something that they believe will bring them freedom to breakaway from Russia. They are willing to sacrifice their lives for what they believe is their ultimate right, the right to govern themselves. They had the choice between the hard steel of guns and the cold reality of mediation. They are an intractable people. They will continue even if it means their own death , even if their own families have to die for it, their whole town, or their country. The only way to survive is not to care about survival. This is what the Russians face, not only on a daily basis, but maybe months and years into the future. There is nothing noble about it at all, it is merely ugly and pitiful. The past will continue to come together in one vortex after another. The will move further into a hatred, fuming and fulminating. Why are men, such perfect fools?

I have to tell you that today, Friday, has been a long, long day for me. I want to tell you my story but I don't have as much time as I would like so please bear with me. Those who wish me to remain silent and not tell you what it is I know and have seen are seeking me. Those who seek me are something more formidable and more deadly than can be imagined. Yes, you may ask, I have fear and I am filled with a deep, terrible dread as these predators prowl and I feel angry with myself for being afraid, even though the source of my fear is understandable.

But let me begin. I am sure most of you here know the story ... some of you may even know of me. I once was a journalist. Even if I say so myself, I was a good journalist. My Editor, at a Washington newspaper asked me to follow the man who had developed a cult following worldwide and who was purported to be a Mystic. Of course I had reservations. At first, like many of us here today, I didn't believe. I didn't think I would become so deeply involved in his life. But I did. It changed my life irrevocably. But to cut a long story short, most of you know what occurred during those years, of his following and how people, throughout the world would come and listen to him speak. Everything he said had meaning not only to myself but also to the hundreds of thousands who listened to him in person, via satellite tv or radio. He was, as I am sure you all know, no ordinary man. He changed the framework of theory.

I followed him for years, not as one of his followers, but as a journalist. I recorded what it was I saw and witnessed. I have neither the language nor the context to explain some of his miracles to you. Memory is fallible and generally unreliable. What happened may be the truth to me but to others it would have a different perspective, a different life circumstance and would seem a different experience. I still have difficulty figuring it out and difficulty believing that everything happened as I recall. In retrospect, he was desperately vulnerable. Suspicion and hatred was his stark reality. Those last months of his life were traumatic, he was betrayed by one of his own, but he accepted what was to happen and he went to his death asking God to forgive us.

You may ask yourself why did he die? Why was he put to death? I did not, like you, believe it would happen. But it did. Was it because they feared him not knowing what he was but because of whom he was? Did they fear him because he preached peace? Did they fear him because he fed the millions of hungry in Africa? Did they fear him because he railed against corruption and big business, wealth and greed? Did they fear him because he gained a following throughout the world? Did they fear him because he was becoming greater than Governments? Did the Israelis disown him because they saw him as a menace and because he called them `bigots'? Did his own Government disown him because he was a threat to the system? Did the Catholic Church disown him because they did not believe or want to believe in him?

Like you, I've always believed the myth that Government has our best interests at heart because I believed in the benign intentions of those who desire to serve the public. But now I've been confronted with the worst in humankind and have learned that cruelty is the way of this world. I wish I could convey my thoughts adequately to you but I find I tie my words into knots. I ask myself are those who washed their hands of his death, such as the Church, the UN, the President and other world leaders, touched by guilt and regret? What did his death achieve in the end? It would be so easy to hate, knowing what I do, witnessing what I did. I have a sense of heartbreak and impotence, terribly compounded.

He told once that if I allowed hate in, it would fester. I've accepted what occurred,in regard to his death, there is no hate and anger within myself. If anything, just sadness. I realise that time has to be spent, not saved. Do you know what I mean? Enjoy every moment as it comes, take every minute as being precious. We inhibit our bodies but our bodies aren't ourselves. We possess them like a house - but only for a time. This is what his death and resurrection taught me. We're only visitors really on this earth and perhaps we leave traces of ourselves in subtle ways.

I'm not even sure it matters who or what you have faith in, or how your faith is expressed. My faith has become my reassuring stability. Everything outside may change, I myself may change, but as long as I know there's something that goes on unchanged I have a sense of security. The Church has become all system and no God. People start believing such a way of life is absolute, immutable, fundamental, a precondition. When the reality of God is so different. It is the experience itself that is important. God can only be found by personal experience and once one has experienced His enlightenment you cannot take that awareness away. It remains a part of you forever. It goes beyond everything and anything. I cannot arrange my words into any coherent narrative to give you a glimpse of my experience. I cannot describe what is incomprehensible. I am drawn to the extremes of emotion and experience. All I know is that I am as much a part of Him as He is of me. The one thing I have discovered is the more one gets involved in transcendental things, the more one is forced back to the absolute, to earth.

Much more remains for me to understand. I have begun to see what lies within us but I suspect I have only glimpsed a small part of the truth. I have taken only the first steps along the road to discovery. I cannot yet see where this road will lead me but already I have learned much and still have much to learn. My journey will not be short, nor will it be without detours and stumbling. It is not a journey I intended to make but has become one that I cannot avoid. Now I preach his word and tell people all that I can. I am grateful for your unfailing interest. All of us here today are on the periphery of His teaching.

Yes, we're all governed by laws, God's law, our own or others. If we ignore them or break them then we have to watch out, we have to be true to ourselves. In the end it all boils down to that speech old Polonius gave "This above all to thine own self be true: thou canst not then be false to any other man".

To conclude, I tell myself that in the past He would have been crucified, today He has been murdered and in the future, what would happen to Him in the future? ...Would it be like today? ...

copyright SJW
14.1.03