Entries in the 'Nations of the World' Category

The Main Law Of Israel: General Integral Education

laitman_254_01Question: We are all very different from one another. The nation of Israel is probably the most fragmented nation in the world since it is divided into a plurality of layers and factions in which there is an infinite number of differences.

If I differ from others, I can present to anyone an entire list of what he must correct about himself. So, how will we ever become one whole with all this criticism? After all, criticism invokes hatred and division. How should we unite if we are in continuous conflict?

Answer: We do it in discussion circles! These circles are held all over the country. In these circles, we try to teach people to connect and unite above all the differences. As it is written, “Love covers all transgressions.”

You can build love only when you ascend above all the “sins” that you see in others. The reason is that I see that the other is immersed in all the sins that are opposite to me, behaving in a contemptuous manner, relating only to others. I must build an umbrella of love that will cover all of us.

Question: What is this umbrella made of? What sustains it?

Answer: It is the fact that each of us ascends above himself in order to work out the connection with others. This is possible only with the help of education that the wisdom of Kabbalah offers to us.

We also must introduce this method of education in kindergartens, schools, universities, workplaces, and to the unemployed. It must become the most important thing! Every person, every citizen in Israel, should have a notebook with the tests and courses he has taken.

Question: What will these people study?

Answer: Integral education. They will learn how to become one nation, how to achieve brotherly love, connection and unity among everyone, and how to ascend above their ego and connect to others. Everyone must learn this; otherwise, he will not get any benefits from the state!

The study must be on a daily basis since a person must be renewed every day and must receive a new portion of knowledge. He must hear what he must fulfill, how crucial it is, what the connection and unity give us, and how it heals all of our illnesses.

This must become the general law, the supreme law of the country. After all, the problem of our country is to turn the nation into the nation of Israel since we will not be able to exist any other way.

We always have existed only if we were united and connected between us. The moment we ceased to be united, we fell from brotherly love to unfounded hatred, were thrown out of our land and dispersed among the nations of the world.

Now, we have returned to this land, but everyone already realizes that it is only temporary. Listen to what the American government says, to what the Europeans say, to what they keep saying in increasingly louder voices. They want to eliminate the state of Israel.

Question: What do you think can save us?

Answer: Just by becoming one whole! Then everyone will understand and feel that we are needed in the world because we set an example of connection and unity above all the differences. After all, this is what the world needs so much! This is called being a Light unto the nations.

All of nature is built on connection. If a single atom did not connect to another atom, we wouldn’t exist in this universe on this planet.

How has nature developed on this planet? It is only thanks to the connection of more and more components that were increasingly more different from one another. See what we have come to! This is the only way we can exist!

Now we must grow and ascend even higher in our internal, spiritual evolution so that we will be able to see the future world now, as it is written, “May you see your world in your lifetime.” It is all thanks to an increasingly greater connection. Nothing is attained any other way but by connection.

This is the reason that integral education isn’t just the education of “good kids” but a means to advance, not under the blows of nature, but thanks to the right solution of the problems that nature intentionally has given to us so that we will continue ascending above them and will unite more and more strongly. Now, we must continue the process of evolution, but by ourselves, implementing it on ourselves.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/2/15

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The Law Of Love Is Not Enforced By Parliament

laitman_547_06Question: How do we turn to people in Israel with our message in such a way that it will not antagonize them?

Answer: It is necessary to give a rational explanation and not present everything all at once, but gradually. Baal HaSulam explains the picture to us in a concrete and clear manner, in a very scientific way, in that he understands all of the troubles that are still liable to appear if the people will not change their direction. And we need to adapt this message for the wider public and explain to people that only through connection between us will we reach anything good.

Success in such areas as education, security, interactions between people and more is assured only by our own powers. The nation is not ready to do this; it is incapable of it. It cannot create a “Ministry of Love” that will resolve all problems between us. No nation is involved in anything similar. It always belongs to the citizens, to the people.

And on the other hand, in ancient times, before the destruction of the Temple, the highest political establishment of the people of Israel was specifically the “Ministry of Love.” All the other ministries were under it. There were taxes, education, and security, but all the other areas and ministries occupied lower levels of the national pyramid. And the “Minister of Love” was the High Priest.

Today, in order to transform the pyramid that has been created and bring it to the state that it must be requires painstaking work among the people.
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From the 3rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/4/14, Writings of Baal HaSulam

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Formula For A Happy Life

laitman_565_01Question: What does Putin want from Israel?

Answer: It doesn’t matter what he wants. It is said: “The hearts of ministers and kings are in the Creator’s hands.” Do not think of politicians as an independent power. Not one of them understands exactly what is going on in the world, neither Putin, nor Obama, nor anybody else.

Unfortunately, the same can be said about the Israeli government. Everything is in the Creator’s hands, not Obama’s, Putin’s, or Netanyahu’s. Thank God! Otherwise, the world would have already collapsed.

The world needs to be balanced; it has to attain a state where people clearly see what the system of relations among them really looks like. Only when our relations will be revealed to us, will we learn how to correct them. Only unity can lead us to correction. Politics, economics, industry, all kinds of international trade liaisons are useless. The only thing that can really help is a new type of education that will lead humanity to global unity.

Until now, the world connected through trade, economy, military, and security,but now we see that the connecting threads are temporary; they come and go. The prior world was built on the foundation of egoism. Now, it vanishes.

Question: What kind of unity does Israel have to offer to the world?

Answer: Israel will have to offer unity among and inside the nations. It’s the kind of unity that emerges above our egos. Our selfishness will teach us to rise above it and unite.

Israel is obligated to transfer the methodology of unity to the world since there is no other force that can do it rather than us. If Israel fulfills its mission, it will be the major country in the world; it will govern over and bring benevolence to other nations. It will spread the methodology of correction, unity, and love.

Our world is egoistic since all of us are born with a selfish nature. We have to implement a special methodology, a formula, that allows us to connect beyond the egoism that burns in every individual, each country, and among nations.

The people of Israel possess the methodology. The Jewish people used it three and a half thousand years ago. They still retain “records,” the internal data of the state of unity they have been through.

At some point, the Jewish people managed to implement unity. They constituted a single unity whose major value was connectedness. The Jewish people lived in unity for about fifteen hundred years, starting with Abraham until the destruction of the Temple.

Thousands of years ago, we fell from this height, from the state of unity that connected us above our egoism. Inside every person there is an ego, but there also is a force that helps us rise above it, beyond a constantly growing and renewing personal and overall egoism.

All of us make efforts to rise above our egoism and connect with each other beyond it. Should we succeed, we will reveal a new reality called the Upper world.

The common state we are trying to build together is called Adam (Man). Inside Adam, we will disclose a new spirit called the soul, the Upper Light, or the Creator. The world advances towards the state for which it was created.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 8/6/15

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The Way I Am Is The Way I See Others

laitman_423_02Question: Society in Israel today is very divided and full of hatred. It is split into many communities and factions according to a thousand different factors, and each one hates the others. You say that the holiday of Lag BaOmer is the turning point from hatred to unity between people?

Answer: Love is inseparable from unification. It is impossible to unite without love and it is impossible to love without uniting. Unity is an expression of love.

The counting of days of Omer is the correction from hatred to love. We came out of Egypt, revealed the kind of egoism that dwells in us, and we are beginning to correct it. This correction consists of 49 stages—the 49 days of counting the Omer, during which we fix our relationships with everyone else, starting with the easiest and progressing to more and more complex ones.

The 33rd day of Omer is the so-called “Lag BaOmer”—it is a milestone, and when we reach it we can be certain that we will correct all of our hatred, regardless of its power. When we reach this day, we receive such strength that allows us to correct everything else.

Hatred is corrected only with the force of the Light. With every day of the Omer comes a new portion of Light, a total of 49 portions, like an infusion. The Light is the force that is hidden in nature. Now we feel only a force of evil, egoism. In the whole word that surrounds us: the inanimate, vegetative, animals, people, and in ourselves we see only the force of receiving, consuming, and self-love.

The fact is that I am an egoist, and therefore I reveal only the egoistic part in every person, animal, and any creature, according to the principle of “one judges according to his own flaws.” The way I am is how I see others.

Thus, we feel that all of nature is a force of evil, egoism, which forces us to think only about ourselves and receive pleasure from the suffering of others. However, there is another force in nature: in addition to a minus, there is also a plus, a positive force. However, this force is hidden and we don’t feel it.

We have to extract this positive force from nature so that it can correct us and balance the evil force in us.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 4/30/15

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A Kabbalist Can Stop A War

laitman_259_01Question: If a person has become a Kabbalist, has revealed the upper world, and senses the forces that are concealed from everyone else, how does that affect his daily life?

Answer: He, like everyone else, goes to work, takes care of his family, and raises his children. Nothing changes in his life except that from the moment that he becomes a Kabbalist, he can make our world better through his actions.

After all, he brings a positive force into the world against all the negative forces that are coming from everyone else.

All the others are egoists, and he is an altruist. So, he begins to make good changes in the world. He stops bad progressions of events, wars, disasters, and terrorist acts. He engages his forces of bestowal and thus tips the balance of forces to the side of good.

Question: How can a Kabbalist stop a war?

Answer: Everything that is happening in our world is a result of the interaction between the forces of good and evil. Only these two forces are acting in our world, divided into many particular forces, positive and negative: 613 desires, 613 forces, 613 Lights.

However, a Kabbalist is able to balance, as if on a weighing scale, the influence that comes from above and make it good. He can put a weight onto the pan of good, which will shift the arrow on the scale from the negative side and bring it to the center of equilibrium. As it is written, “If the soul so merits, it sentences itself and the entire world to the scale of merit.”

Question: Then, why don’t we set up a squadron of Kabbalists in the military to have them stop terrorist attacks and wars?

Answer: It is true! But for that, we first need to raise many Kabbalists. Unfortunately, for the time being, there are none in the world. We really hope that soon we can bring up many such Kabbalists in our organization who can teach it to everyone, reaching out to more and more people.

However, today, the world is short of Kabbalists, and it is evident by what is happening with the people of Israel, within the borders of Israel and beyond, by the negative attitude of the entire world toward it. All of this is the result of the fact that we cannot tip the world to a scale of merit, not ourselves, not the people of Israel, and all the more so, not the entire world.

Only the people of Israel are capable of doing this. Only we are given the freedom of choice, and if we are not able to shift the scale for the entire world, toward the side of merit, and ourselves, then we will receive the negative reaction that we are seeing today.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/16/15

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The Mysterious Nature Of The Russian People  

Laitman_414Question: What is the special role of the Russian civilization?

Answer: It is hard to say something about this because I haven’t seen any historical studies—simple, true, and clear— that can explain why such a nation with such a strange nature, behavior, outlook, motivation, and psychology was created. This is a complete mystery.

The Russian people are not attracted to the normal egoistic life, and the rigid ladder of the development of human desires for food, sex, family, wealth, honor, and knowledge does not apply to them. In their case, a desire to attain honor or knowledge suddenly erupts in them or they may suddenly fall or perform experiments of self-sacrifice, etc. This is especially common in Russian literature, according to which the people just suffer quietly, accepting everything as a fact of life. We cannot see anything parallel to this in other nations. The sufferings described by Shakespeare, Hugo, and Dickens are totally different and incomparable to what Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, and later writers, or even Solzhenitsyn describe.

We see that the people don’t feel the egoistic truth as a destiny they should follow, which means to be filled by anything possible. For them, the American model, according to which a person has everything: money in the bank, a house, a family, and a car and sees himself and others only according to this perspective, is totally unacceptable. Everyone is happy; everyone is satisfied, and we have attained heaven in our America.

This is opposite to the spirit of the Russian person. What does he need? It is the search: “What does he want?” This is an egoistic development, but at the same time, opposite and savage. What are they suffering for? What is the goal? It turns out that the goal is concealed and isn’t egoistic.

The only meaningful thing for the Russians is their pride of power. If the Europeans are ready to sell themselves for money, the Russians can be bought by the admiration that they are strong and can stand against the whole world. Their ego is greater than money. If Europe can be manipulated in any direction for 5-10 billion Euros, in Russia every revolution involves pain and suffering, but at the same time sympathy. This is a totally different level of ideals.

Comment: We keep attributing the notion of God-seeking to the Russians.

Answer: I don’t know if they search for the Creator, because we see what religion is turning into. In fact there is no search for the Creator anywhere. All the religions are rapidly deteriorating, stagnating, and dying, including the Russian Orthodox religion, which doesn’t allow progressive growth. All the Russian Orthodox counties are in very difficult economic situations, although they adopted the Russian Orthodox religion as the basis for their life and developed it.

In other words, religion isn’t the main thing here, but the attitude to life, the inner psychology of a nation, that basically differs from the psychology of the Protestants, for example. These are two opposite things. Thus it turns out that they cannot develop and are forced to live in poverty in today’s world, all because of their psychology and their inner understanding of the world.  The people feel, understand, and know this, and so the government can steal from them and the people will never rise against it. There have never been bourgeoisie revolutions in these countries.

But the Russians will see themselves in the future because their search is above money. Typically, the animal desires such as food, sex, and family exist in Russia on a minimal level. The next level is the desire for wealth that is so highly valued in the West, whereas the Russians prefer knowledge, which is a higher desire. But this isn’t suitable for our world, and so on the one hand, the Russian civilization has great potential, but on the other hand, it cannot be fulfilled because in order to fulfill knowledge and honor in our world, you need money, but they don’t feel it.

Question: Does this mean that Russia and Israel can basically work together?

Answer: The point is that we only seem to be close in spirit, but in fact we have a different approach, because for the Israelis, everything stems from the spark that is aimed at the Creator, whereas for the Russians, it stems from the nature in which they developed. From a Kabbalistic perspective, these are the attributes of the souls. Russia will undergo this process in its own special way, but in the meantime, everything depends on us. If we succeed in the spiritual work, they will be attracted to us.
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From KabTV’s “Conversations with Michael Laitman” 8/5/15

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Dr. Michael LaitmanThe Creator’s Tower in the Place of the Tower of Babylon

Question: Modern Israeli society is torn apart by egoism and hatred. It is completely detached. Its systems are rotten and are involved in egoistic games. Everybody cares solely about themselves.

How can the society based on the most negative attitude among its members be brought to the state of connectedness, unity, and love, taking into consideration that it is extremely far from the picture you draw for us?

Answer: It is true: Israeli society is the most egoistic of all. When the people of Israel rise, they can reach a stellar height. However, if they fall, they fall deeper than the rest.

We critically lack unity. It’s obvious! It is good that our drawbacks are openly shown to us. It is wonderful that we know how terrible our state is and how desperately we need unity. The good thing is that we also have the “instruction book” that explains how to achieve it.

The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us steps to attract the higher force of benevolence. It is the science of the Creator’s revelation in this world. The Creator is the power of love and mutual bestowal, the force of unity.

The main thing is to attract and reveal the force of bestowal, love, unity, and mutual inclusion among us. Then, the opposite force, the power of detachment, egoism, in conjunction with the benevolent force will give additional energy.

Strength always comes as a result of the joint work of opposite forces. The bigger the potential difference is, the stronger the discrepancy between a plus and a minus is,  one hundred volts, a thousand volts, a million volts, the greater the power.

If we add a positive power to the huge minus that we have today, we’d connect the entire universe in one unified, joint structure.

Question: Israel is the country where people have the biggest egoism in the world, isn’t it?

Answer: Israel is not just a country. Israel is a nation that previously attained a spiritual level, but then lost it. That’s why it fell so deeply into materiality and has the greatest egoism compared to other nations.

Question: Do we really have a chance to unite considering we have such huge egoism?

Answer: The Jews are the biggest egoists who have a potential to reach unity. There is no other nation that is as egoistic, cruel, shortsighted, and blind when it comes to its mission. This is why we are capable of self-correction and push the entire humanity forward.

It was not an accident that Israel was elevated to a spiritual height and then fell in the abyss of egoism, thus acquiring a chance to correct. When the Jews correct themselves, the entire world is also corrected.

At this time of our historic development, humanity has returned to the state of ancient Babylon, to the Babylonians who nowadays have become the multi-billion of Earth’s population. The people of Israel are not at all numerous; on the contrary, this nation is still quite small, but the Light and abundance can be transmitted through it as through the eye of a needle and can be delivered to all of humanity. The Jewish people possess an enormous power.

The only thing that should be triggered in this world is the power of unity, the upper force of connection and love. It will fill our life with happiness and abundance. The power will balance the existing minus and make the world harmonious, undivided, and benevolent.

The mourning day of the 9th of Av will transform into a day of joy and love, as it is said in the Prophets. Whether it will happen or not depends only on us. We can transform the dark day that stems from a spiritual root of a complete darkness in which the destructions took place: the shattering of the first tablets, the collapse of the First and Second Temples, and endless disasters that happened throughout the Jewish history.

By bringing the power of unity into the existing darkness, we will correct prior destructions and build the Creator’s power, thus elevating the entire humanity to the state of unity. Then, all our world will ascend to the upper, spiritual height. We will ascend to eternal life, the transition to the next dimension. Let it happen!
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 7/5/15

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Europe, The Point Of No Return

Laitman_419Opinion (Boris Gulko, chess-player, writer): “We have passed through the point of no return. The Muslims have arrived, replacing these dying people, moving from Africa and Asia to live in the West.

“If the settlement of the dying Roman Empire by barbarian settlers took three hundred years, the present population of Europe will change its identity within a hundred years. In the background of all this pessimism is found one culture and one people who live separately and hidden among the peoples, as the prophet Balaam said in the Torah about the Jews. The Europeans have invited Israel to take part with them in the process of surrender and decay when faced by the Muslims.

“Why is decay happening in the European culture, whereas among the Israeli Jews a revival is happening? It is possible to understand this by comparing the religions that nourish these various cultures. The decline of Europe and the flourishing of Israel were already predicted in the Torah, teaching us which of the religions of the world will become the religion of life.”

My Comment: There is a solution to our common problem, the transition to the next stage of the development of civilization: all participate in this transition together, i.e.,  implementing a universal united civilization, the unity of the entire world, each one on his level, as described in the wisdom of Kabbalah.

And then nobody will suffer; rather, everyone will rise happily to the level of discovery of the Creator: “…and all nations shall flow unto it” (Isaiah 2:2), “…for they shall all know Me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them” (Jeremiah 31:33), “…for My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples” (Isaiah 56:7).
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Uniting Above All The Differences

laitman_944Question: How can we unite above all our differences? After all, we are so different and it is hard for us to accept others the way they are.

Answer: It is hard for a person to accept others because he doesn’t have the general integral perspective. If he had it, he would see to what extent everyone complements each other and that everyone has his own special role: one is an engineer, another is a teacher, another a worker, and another a doctor, etc. And in addition, a person could see that the greater the difference between us, the stronger our special connection between us is, and that the wisdom of Kabbalah guides us to it.

When we are finally able to connect and unite, a special jigsaw puzzle will suddenly be created by our connection and it will begin to illuminate. This is what we call, to bring Light unto the nations of the world: When we show the world an example of unity. After all, the world is in a terrible low state!

Question: Based on what do we unite?

Answer: Based on what we see in our inner eye, how much everyone is needed in this puzzle that we have to put together correctly, as each one is an essential part in it and must be in his right place. What is more, we don’t correct anyone!

Baal HaSulam tells us in his article “The Arvut” that no one should be changed, it is necessary to find the right relationship with others. After all, the characteristics each has were developed by nature, and even under the influence of others, a corrupt environment, and will eventually develop according to the general upper leadership, and all these attributes are essential and vital.

When people connect, it is actually their different qualities that will create the general picture, one whole jigsaw puzzle, and by uniting correctly, they will be able to see what the nation of Israel is, how versatile it is to such an extent that all its members are opposite from another, but together they all make one whole, one united nation. That’s the way it actually is when they ascend and connect above all the differences.

Question: But what do all these different people have in common?

Answer:  The point is that together and only together they reach wholeness and a state in which they ascend above nature and feel that they are on the next level of human evolution. This is actually what humanity demands of the Israeli nation and it is the reason that they hate us, because they believe that we steal their good future from them. We have to attain this future and set an example for humanity, because the world doesn’t need anything but unity.

When we are not united, we even cause harm to nature and invoke natural disasters and afflictions, disturbing the balance on our planet. We are the ones who cause all that! It is because we are on a higher level of development than all the levels of the still, vegetative, animate, and human nature, and therefore affect the whole world and its ecology.
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From the Israeli Radio Program 103FM, 8/2/15

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Dr. Michael LaitmanDay of Sorrow Will Turn Into the Day of Joy

At some point of their history, the Jewish people revealed the upper system, but after the destruction of two Temples they lost this knowledge. The First Temple was obliterated several centuries BC; the Second Temple was destroyed in the beginning of our era.

Nowadays, in the 21st century, we should build new liaisons among us. This process is called the “construction of the Third Temple.”

If so, the worst periods of manifestation of the evil and selfishness will turn into the most benevolent times. The 9th of Av, the worst day of the year, will become the best and most wonderful day.

The evil that is revealed on this day in accordance with its internal spiritual root can be transformed into benevolence, thus turning a big minus into a huge plus. By doing so, we will trigger changes in the system of the upper governance throughout the entire world.

This explains why on the 9th of Av certain traditions of mourning must be observed to commemorate what happened to the Jews on this day. On the other hand, we have to relate to this day as conscious adults.

It really is a special time. Long time ago, when the people of Israel wandered in the dessert, on the 9th of Av the sons of Israel dug graves and stayed in them. If they died on this day, they were already in the grave, if they survived, they left the grave.

And yet this day can be transformed into the most benevolent one. This period of time was considered very negative because of the influence of the upper system. This is the time when turning the evil into the good is possible.

This explains why we shouldn’t cry on the 9th of Av. We continue mourning, but we do so only to make the transformation of a “dark” day into a “blessed” day possible. Eventually, the evil will transform into the good; the day of mourning will turn into the day of the biggest joy and a festivity of love.

Question: Why do so many tragic events in the history of the Jewish people happen on the 9th of Av?

Answer: Good and bad events are the result of the upper governance program that was explored by the first man, Adam, by Abraham, Moses, and other Kabbalists. Everything that ever happens is for the sake of bringing us to unity and to a stronger connection with the rest of the world.

Before anything else, unity has to be attained among the people of Israel. It is our direct responsibility. Other nations hate the Jews because they subconsciously feel that the Jews have the knowledge about the program of world unity and hold all the threads in their hands.

The Jews are able to connect with the internal system and balance the rest of the world by bringing the power of benevolence, bestowal, love, and unity into this realm. It is the people of Israel’s mission. It’s not an accident that anti-Semitism doesn’t disappear from the face of earth and continues growing. Only the Jewish people can bring the rest of the world to correction.

The nations of the world are incapable of doing this on their own.  It’s not their “fault” since they do not have the freedom of choice, nor can they select which way to go—good or bad. It’s useless to expect them to change. We can only obligate ourselves to reach the unity that our forefather Abraham wanted us to attain.

The wisdom of Kabbalah explains how to reach it. This is why we created our organization. Our group grows, strengthens, and acts all over the globe. Everything we do is meant to avoid a terrible period that should never happen again; rather, bad times have to be transformed into benevolent and happy times.

To be continued…
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 7/5/15

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