1 – Eleven Years Old

I am eleven. My hero, my protector, my older brother Terry just died in a car accident at seventeen. I have never known family mourning before. Ours is one of despair and little hope­, occurring between other tragic deaths causing national mourning.

Two years earlier, my parents took me to see President John F. Kennedy at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Politics was often the main topic at the dinner table. So after Kennedy’s speech, we lined up with the rest of the large crowd as his open car went by slowly and he waved at everyone. He looked directly at me and waved, as he did with many others.

About two months later, in my otherwise happy child­hood, he was assassinated. Everyone in my neighborhood mourned. I had never known national or any other kind of mourning before. Sadness joined us to complete strangers. I have recalled John and Terry’s countenance throughout my life, the vivid impres­sion they made upon my pupils, a strong path to the mind of my heart.

Time has stopped because of the loss of my brother. I am eleven in search of my protector, unknowingly joined to my entire nation searching for its protector, Kennedy, or so I thought. I know now what my entire nation felt at an earlier time when we lost our then protector Lincoln, or so I thought. He was assassi­nated one hundred years before my brother’s death in 1965.

Viewed later with better understanding, I know that both assassina­tions took place in a nation deeply divided from its birth and has been ever since. The first followed the civil war; the second was during the early marches for civil rights.

In both periods, half of the nation hated its respective presi­dent, producing a seasoned dichotomy of conflict in our national con­science. Half of it was and is seeking a protector through the words of Kennedy and Lincoln, the other half through the words of Moses as I learn later.

I am aware of my national conscience at eleven because my father woke me up to politics. Not religious himself, he is from a Catholic family. My mother is Jewish, so you might imagine how, aside from being decent people like everyday Catholics and Jews, they often play out an old religious dichot­omy between them. Sadly, it poisoned their suffering over the loss of Terry. Rather than let all these things crush me, I am dreaming of becoming a fixer. 

When my mother was eleven, Hitler was dictator in Ger­many and preparing to carry out the genocide of the Jewish people, our people. And as you must know, the Catholic Church at that time turned a blind eye to this as did most nations, refusing to allow the vast majority of Jews trying to escape Hitler to migrate. A cruel dichotomy to know about, more so to live under.

Time has stopped for the entire world, even though most pretend that life returned to normal after the Holocaust. When hearing the full story, people everywhere escape the sadness every chance they get. I know. I do, for how can we ever fix this? I did find some relief years later reading that the Holocaust was foretold in the Bible some twenty-eight centuries ago. It is a symbolic national refer­ence to the savior’s suffering,1 the savior for Christians, the Jews still waiting. Maybe it can be fixed, as every eleven-year-old imagines.

Albeit the worst, the Holocaust was just the latest con­se­quence of the world dichotomy between these religions. Some­times improved, sometimes worsened by Islam over the last fourteen centuries, the problem has mostly worsened ever since Israel was established in 1948, the year Terry was born. But let me back up.

While my parents worked, as a young white child I was cared for by a Black family in North Las Vegas. Since then, I have always felt connected to these people like they are my people too. But like the Holocaust, I try to escape their suffering every chance I get. How can it be fixed? Three years after Terry’s death though, when Martin Luther King Jr. is assassinated, I feel joined to their search for a pro­tector. It is the same year John’s brother Robert Kennedy is assassi­nated.

During a visit to Disneyland in Anaheim, California, I see Robert walking with a flock of people around him. And like his brother John did, as he goes by me, he looks right at me smiling as he does with many others – just as I, unknowingly standing in front of the exhibit Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, take his picture. Martin and Robert’s countenance have also made a vivid impression upon my pupils throughout my life, a strong path to the mind of my heart.

Seven years from now at eighteen in Hollywood, Florida, I have a momentary awakening and write a booklet about Christ’s love and how it can fix everything. Soon after though, I dismiss it, going in and out of valleys of youthful blindness, depressed for months at a time each year around the anniversary of Terry’s death.

Eleven years from now at twenty-two while in the Air Force in Rapid City, South Dakota, I befriend a fellow servicemember who is a Native American. Later, his memory enlight­ens me to the most elusive dichotomy in my national con­science – between my nation and its families and the Native American nations and their tribes, starting with his, the Lakota Tribe of the Sioux Nation.

Although no longer independent nations on earth, they work together as one spiritually within mine, symboli­cally referred to in the Bible as the nation-wheel in the midst of the nation-wheel.[1] The dichotomy is not just due to this land, as the one between Israel and Palestine is not just due to that land. It is about all land on the earth.

Fourteen years from now at twenty-five, I have a life-changing awakening. Alone in my apartment in Garden Grove, Califor­nia, a bright light seems to appear in my living room. It appears in the mind of my heart. I immediately go into a trance. It releases particles of light that fall right through me, lifting me out of all these dichotomies and bringing me into a remarkable peace. Time has resumed.

Over the next couple of days, I go in and out of the trance just thinking about it. Later on, I learn that these particles are called the shachaqs in Hebrew. For the next eleven years, the experi­ence compels me to study the major world religions, asking the question: As the nation-wheel within all others in the world, will we mature democracy beyond its Moses foundation or use this foundation to turn America into an autocracy?

2 – Thirty-Six Years Old

I am thirty-six. Again, time has stopped, but not because of someone dying, because of a different dichotomy in the world, gender on the cultural level. It’s been eleven years since my awakening, all of which has prepared me for under­standing this dichotomy through my eyes and hers.2

Her name is Gabriela, which means ‘strong one of God [Name]’.3 I don’t see any of the other dichoto­mies in her heart. Her eyes look around free in this country but cautiously, no doubt because of the hard life she left in Mexico.

In parts of Mexico and many countries, there is a gender role that works to the disadvantage of women. Usually for the economic survival of the family, girls are brought up to reach the necessary maturity to get married and bear children at a younger age than those in affluent countries like my own. They are expected to take on this responsibility sooner. It was a customary practice in my country as late as the nineteenth century, in some parts not long ago at all, and in a rare few, it is still practiced.

Gabriela’s mother married under this custom at fourteen years of age and so did the wife of her uncle. I don’t know how many others in her family did, but growing up under this custom in Mexico, Gabriela has reached this cultural maturity at the same age. Her mother respectfully calls her little mother in Spanish, but as a cultural habit. She does not say it with a conscious effort to encourage her to marry, for they are in California now. Either way, such a title is not common at all here.

I first meet Gabriela in my classroom in Los Angeles, where I teach English at a middle school. Never having known anyone like her, I am startled by her expression of such feelings for me. I dismiss it but sense something exceptional about her. Before she graduates from a private exclusive high school four years from now, having received four years of scholarships to attend, she is offered a full scholarship to Wellesley College. Notable women such as Hillary Clinton, Madeleine Albright and famous journalists are alumni. The offer is no doubt due to Gabriela’s promising skills as a journalist at her high school.

During that year in my classroom, she expresses such feelings again for me. The different dichotomies that I struggled with years earlier and the peace I had in the mind of my heart give me no insight into this. Sitting here at home, I am wrestling with my feelings. I am being tested. These are not true feelings. She’s a child. I am fool­ing myself into thinking she is capable of such feelings. During most of my school years, including college, most of my closest friends were Mexican Americans. I’ve always been attracted to the culture, but I never knew about this part of it.

Her heart is pure because she is innocent, a child without entanglement in the world, not perfect but not entangled. And yet, she is not like girls her age in my country or even like other Mexican girls her age here. Some of them, in fact, I suspect have also been raised in the Mexican culture to marry young, but even among them, she is different.

She tells me that they all act like children. I wonder, is this what her mother was like at this age, when she married and had her, what her great aunt was like, or even Mary in the Bible, who also married around this age and knew about the mind of the heart?

Later, Gabriela plays the role of Mary in our church Christmas play. You see, in a couple of years from now, I join her family and attend the church where her great uncle is the head pastor. He is very well respected even though, as I mentioned, his wife was this same age when they got married. He was in his mid-thirties. They are much older now with two adult children.

As I said, this is a gender dichotomy on the cultural level, for her great uncle would not have been respected by the same church at the time of their marriage. It shows an inability to respect other cultures until they align with one’s own, an inability to adapt our conscience to other standards, an inability to use the mind of the heart.

As for my level of maturity, my brother’s death stopped much of my development at eleven, and it has only been eleven years since it resumed at twenty-five. So in American culture, socially I am more like a twenty-two year old just starting his career. Am I rejecting my feelings for Gabriela because of cul­tural blindness in me? Maybe she is the one. There are no maybes in the heart. I love her. The question is whether she is willing to wait until she is eighteen, of legal age here, and goes to college first if she so chooses. I am willing to wait to marry her.

I have always wanted a family, to have children, but par­tially under the burden of my mother’s pain of not having any grand­children from either of my sisters, and particu­larly after losing her first son. She looks to me to continue the family name and give her grand­children, eminently important in the Jewish reli­gion.

With the thought of losing her, I proposed today. She can hardly believe that I am willing to wait four years for her. She says yes. The joy we feel cannot be taken away, nor can we imagine the heartache we will feel during these four years. It is all very real to us.

A oneness of spirit has formed between us, where each of us makes the other more important, strengthening the oneness each time. Our cultures are not in a oneness though. To encour­age each other through the many complications of these years, we tap each other on the arm or shoulder three times, signi­fying the three children we plan to have, Lucero, Rice and Terry.

As for the complications, let me start again from the begin­ning. I first meet Gabriela as her English teacher. Her mother, Tierra, which means ‘earth’, works at the same school as a teacher’s assis­tant, a very good woman, having such maturity for many years. She loves Gabriela with devotion, always insisting that she study hard and become a success here.

But without citizenship and divorced, leaving her to con­stantly struggle, Tierra is in fear that they will be sent back to Mexico. On the other hand, Gabriela fears that she will send her back if she learns of our engagement, for Tierra wants to break the cycle in her family, which I completely understand. There is no need for it here.

Unfortunately though, and I sincerely say unfortunately, she started raising Gabriela this way, unknowingly or not, probably before ever deciding to come here. In any case, she doesn’t seem to understand that Gabriela’s feelings cannot be unlearned. As it turns out, like for many families making the migration, not all, this has become a pivotal generation of cultural change for her family lineage, one which always works from contradictory feelings. 

The very thought of being made to return puts Gabriela in severe panic, wanting to obey her mother but driven by her feel­ings for me. So you see, we cannot tell her of our plans. Gabriela makes this decision out of a fierce independence, a charac­teristic she got from Tierra.

Now, of her own choosing, Gabriela studies hard and wants to go to college here, sharing with me her fear of returning to Mexico where she had been molested. Under such pressures, a young girl in one culture, a young woman in another, she starts her transition between them with courage and humility. In the face of it all, she is extremely happy with her new life. Tapping me on the arm three times once or twice a day, Gabriela sees me as her protector.

We didn’t fall in love all at once. We got the chance to get to know each other because Gabriela is a gifted student, as you might expect, and as the teacher of students gifted in English, I am responsible for provid­ing them with a more challenging cur­riculum. This includes coach­ing her after class for intermural debates.

Over the course of the school year, we have maintained our teacher/student relationship while becoming friends. I don’t know what her cultural upbringing allowed her to feel during this time, but no such feelings even crossed my mind because of my cultural upbringing.

Another student in the gifted program, Alondra, is the only other person Gabriela finds mature enough to spend time with. On occasion, they jokingly argue over which of them will marry me. This is months before I propose to Gabriela or have any idea of this side of their culture. Do they know that part of this is their culture speak­ing?

With their parents’ approval, I have been taking them to various markets around LA to collect the money from donation boxes I set up as a volun­teer for a world aid organization. We continue this through the school year and into summer school, during which time, also with their parents’ approval, I take them on local sight-seeing trips with Japa­nese foreign students I teach during the summer. As part of an affluent nation, Japanese girls are not raised to marry young, and yet, what happened seven years earlier is another example of cultural inabilities to adapt in the conscience.

Attracted to one of my Japa­nese students, both of us in our twenties, I flew to Japan to develop the relationship we started here. But her parents forbade her from marrying me because I was not Japanese. While my culture respects age-dissimilar marriages only if their outcome aligns with its own standards, this part of Japan’s culture does not respect ethnic-dissimilar marriages regardless of their outcome. This has much to do with Japan’s isolated history, while America’s immigrant history provides us with a variety of customs that do adapt in many ways.

Having adapted to Mexican customs so well, I have practically lost sight of my own during this period. For by the end of summer school, I am not only engaged to Gabriela, but I am asking myself the same questions about Alondra. For it appears that she also has developed such feelings for me. But this time, I understand her culture, probably more than she does in this area.

Yet, in a confused moment together, I ask her if she will marry me when she turns eighteen, thinking that some­thing could go wrong waiting for Gabriela. How can this be? But if it were happening in Mexico or any other place where culture is built around this custom, it would be quite normal. Many people in every culture fall in love with more than one person before they marry one of them. My feelings are true for Gabriela, so why can’t they be true for Alondra?

It is not about age, for I have felt nothing for any of the other girls I taught their age over the five years at this school, hundreds of them, even though some did for me. But like I said, I asked Alondra in a moment of confusion, even though the same feelings are present in both of us.

Today, the following day, she says, “Sorry, but I can’t.” She does not act as though it was wrong of me to ask and wants to continue seeing me. But shortly after, Gabriela finds out about her visits to my classroom and is getting jealous, so I ask Alondra to stop coming by on her way to high school, also an exclusive school for exceptional students.

Now back to the first school year. Tierra has been following Gabriela’s academic progress with me very closely, during which time, we have become friends. She approached me today and told me about some serious financial problems she is having. She is at risk of being evicted. I help her with this month’s rent but see that it is an on-going problem, one which I cannot afford to keep up with. But there is no way that I am going to let them get evicted.

We agree to a temporary arrangement that makes it possible for me to help. In a plutonic relationship with Tierra, I move in with them. I did not know of her uncle then, who lived in a nearby city, otherwise, I would have told her to move in with his family. Later, I learn that they were not talking at that time, but I am sure she would have reached out to him if I had not helped.

Everyone has peace of mind and stability, at least until Tierra starts expressing more than friendship. These are good people, and I am doing the good I know – making them more important without being against myself.

I keep our relationship on a friendship basis, while, out of necessity, Gabriela and I keep our engagement secret, believing that when we marry and have children, Tierra will be happy for us. As for our cultures not having the oneness we have, I have accepted the risks of being engaged to Gabriela. As for any details, let me explain it this way.

I have been celibate4 ever since my awakening at twenty-five, over eleven years now, and I intend to remain so until married to her. You see, this purifies my heart and helps me see the purity of Gabriela and Tierra’s heart. To keep it this way, I follow the biblical teaching on engagements.

Paraphrased, it reads, If one supposes that he might not be acting properly with the one he is engaged to, one beyond youth as it ought to be [considering Mary’s age and the custom of her day, youth does not refer to teenage youth unless culturally established], let him do as seems appro­priate to him; he is not sinning. Let them marry.[2]

Remember, through my cultural eyes, I first saw her as a child and was not attracted to her, never considering this teaching to have any relevance. I saw only the appearance of a person that was too young, unable to see her for who she was (and yet later, I can only hope people will look beyond my appearance of age and see me for who I am). But having looked beyond the appearance and now being engaged to her, I have turned to this passage to understand what is appropriate according to the biblical standard. The problem is we are unable to marry now.

We are stuck between two culturally-established stand­ards of what beyond youth means, both of us with feelings of love for the other that cannot be unfelt in the mind of our hearts. So, imagine what it would be like if your engagement, or the engagement of those you love, were suddenly treated like a crime, turned into public shame. It is, however, deeply transforma­tional to suffer this way for someone you love.

3 – Marriage

With no substantial change to our income, we have continued in our living arrangement. After three years, my love for Gabriela remains true and my love for Tierra is what one feels for a dear friend. It has been truly painful though for Gabriela and me to live with Tierra and keep our engagement secret. But the cost of her being sent back to Mexico where she was abused is more than either of us can bear.

And yet, on several occasions, without Tierra’s knowledge, I tried to leave and told Gabriela to just tell her that I left, not to say anything about our engagement. But Gabriela cried and wouldn’t let me go. She said that her mother would blame her for my leaving and still send her back to Mexico, not believing her about the abuse.

Recently though, things are changing. The contradictory feelings Gabriela has as part of a pivotal generation can go either way. I always knew this. Families merge into a new culture or, living dangerously under the laws of the new culture, isolate themselves under their original customs.

I am glad that Gabriela has the choice, but contradictory feel­ings have started rising up in her more and more and I am working from blindness at the thought of losing her. Turning to Tierra’s friendship takes some of the sting away.

But the more I blind myself to what I do not want to see the more I make matters worse. Of course, I have always known that it may not work out even if she keeps her original cultural values. As she takes each step toward a college scholarship, the very thing that declares her future success here, I am so proud of her yet feel her slipping away.

A new teaching job at a high school keeps me busy as I hope for things to improve. In a gang-ridden neighbor­hood, it is full of students in need of hope and direction. Teachers are so fortunate. But time is running out for us. I steady the mind of my heart.

Today, Gabriela tells me that to qualify for a scholarship she needs to prove that she is in the process of becoming a U.S. citizen. We both know that the only way to start the process at this point is for me to marry Tierra. What kind of crossroads is this?

My tearful prayer comes back to me, telling me to do the good. It is clear in the mind of my broken heart that doing the good is the only way that it will heal. So I tell her I will, but that it will only be for a couple of years; then, I will divorce her so that we can marry. I am hoping she refuses but know that she won’t.

She is against the whole idea at first, willing to give up on college. But I convince her, neither of us believing it will happen as I said. But we care enough for each other not to say anymore. Although losing her, I am still her protector for now, believing that, by doing this, I can protect her from the likelihood of future harmful events. With each new scholar­ship offer, I try again to be happy for her.

At the same time, things are starting to change between Tierra and me, but I do not share that with Gabriela. The day I enter my marriage with Tierra, with love and a potential future with her, having remained in a plutonic relationship until this day, my engagement with Gabriela is over.

4 – Denial

We have been married just a little over a year now, and with Gabriela heading off to a nearby university, I cannot bear the pain in Tierra’s eyes anymore. She knows that my love is not growing for her, though I wish it were. How can it in my blindness. Were we in Mexico, none of this tragedy would be taking place. My separation from Tierra, which took place this week, is not the end of our marriage, but I fail to convince her.

Yesterday, Tierra came over for some of her things and saw a note that I had on the table. It had three big letters, INS, Immi­gration and Naturalization Service. It was to remind me to call them and make sure that a temporary separation does not stop the citizenship process.

In her blindness though, she accuses me of planning to stop the process, and as I believe, she then goes to Gabriela and convinces her of it. For just now, Tierra came back and screams at me, “Gabriela thinks you deserted her!!” Then she says, “You touched my daughter!!”

“What!? We were planning to get married. We had the names picked out of three children, your grandchildren!! Didn’t she tell you that?”

I watch her trying not to process it, unwilling to remember how old she was when she gave birth to Gabriela, four years younger than Gabriela is now. Perhaps, she cannot remem­ber in her confusion, but it is tearing at her. She leaves in anger and confusion.

Gabriela thinks that I deserted her and out of revenge she didn’t tell Tierra about our engagement. No, there is more to it than that. Oh what Gabriela must have felt when she saw her mother crying, first due to our separation, then due to her believing that I would block their citizenship. Only after that does she find the emotion to feel deserted by me, even betrayed. And then she suffers watching her mother listen as she tells her what she now thinks was true about her relationship with me all along. In her right mind, Gabriela would never believe any of this.

On top of it all, she must have been stricken with fear at the thought of never getting her citizenship, any of her family, made to return to poverty and danger in Mexico. She is right back where she started, thinking there is no one to protect her. But oh how I am trying.

The next day, Gabriela calls me from a hospital. She has attempted suicide. “Tell me where you are, Gabriela, let me help you!!” I plead with her over and over. But she starts accusing me of improper behavior, in what sounds like false memories work­ing from when she was molested in Mexico. Hospital authorities are listening.

No longer aware of the truth, she was unknowingly denying our plans to marry, blindly judging the marriages of her mother and great uncle, blindly judging her own birth. For clearly, the cultural eyes of Mexico in her that sanctified our engagement have been replaced with the worst cultural eyes of the U.S., eyes without any understanding. Those who see with them condemn without reason in mindless anger. This is the enemy I love with the mind of my heart.

There is no way to lose her worse than this. I can easily take my own life now, but something compels me to fight for what I know is true, for what the better eyes of America’s heart see.

5 – The Trial

Awaiting trial, I pray that the jury knows these words: “Do not judge according to appearance, but [according to] the righteous judgment”[3] that is possible when all others are made more important in one’s perspective – so as to get to the truth.

I am losing the first phase, for Gabriela is filled with what her blind heart is telling her about me, a heart once jealous for me but now wrongly feeling betrayed. Without her admission, anything I say will be twisted against me, so I do not take the stand. And since my lawyer seems confident that we can win, I choose not to even tell him about our engage­ment.

I want to tell him everything, but he might not fight as hard if Gabriela keeps denying it. And who knows how long she will be in this state of mind. Even Alondra, who told my lawyer that she would not testify against me, is testifying against me under some kind of pressure. Knowing why both are doing so requires a jury with righteous judgment, and a couple of them are already look­ing at me with mindless anger. If I lose, I will likely spend the rest of my life in prison.

Strangely though, after spending months in jail before the trial, I am actually making peace with this prospect, for I have found my calling, teaching others how to love the enemies of conscience. My broken heart is being healed – by teaching those around me in jail who want to learn about making others more im­portant. I write it in bold letters above the sink in my first cell, love thy enemies.

So when I am sentenced to eighty-one years, yes eighty-one, I feel the very heavy anger of society upon me and God quickly lifting it off. It was just as He did with the world’s dichotomies in me sixteen years ago in Garden Grove.

I devote myself entirely to teaching the principle to any­one who will listen. Why so much time? They judged by appearance. But I knew what I risked the first day Gabriela agreed to marry me. And looking at it all closely, I believe that God saw both of us as justified not guilty, given the things we faced.

Now in prison, I often teach the principle of loving the enemies of conscience by using my own life as an example, without saying it is me. I explain it this way:

“It states that God, in His own image, created the first Adam male and female and told them to multiply.[4] Later, it states that, in Christ, the last Adam,[5] there is neither male nor female[6] but only the new man, a spiritual being with no gender.

“It goes on to say that we ourselves have to ‘put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and…[then warns us not to] form a fore­thought into a desire of the flesh.’[7] This is because we who put on this image are not told to multiply, for without gender in our new self-image, our primary work is spiritual.

“Putting on Christ, my brothers, is first receiving his right­eous­ness in our conscience as a gift,[8] and second, with it, following his example of making others more important. In so doing, we are merely showing our grati­tude to him for being the source of this right­eousness in the pupil of our conscience, for making it possible for us to make all others more important in the mind of our heart.

“That is why we say that without him, we can do nothing.[9] But amazingly, we can do this work even if we do not believe in him because he still works it through us when we choose to do it.

“Now concerning those who put on Christ and do marry, hoping to multiply, Christ did not marry and, thus, left us no example in one of the principal areas of importance to a respect­able life on earth. He had another calling, which began with his own mother not lying with her husband in the case of his birth. This is the only way to keep his birth holy in a world where the mind of the heart has been taken hostage.

“It was all according to God’s plan to give us the knowledge needed to open our real eyes, saying through Paul, ‘so that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all percep­tion’.[10]

“At the time of his death, Jesus was in his early thirties, not too old, if he had lived, to choose, within his culture’s norms, a youthful bride. This was probably the case with Joseph and Mary. It is not discussed openly in some churches today out of fear it will be used by impression­able minds to justify such relation­ships today.

“But in other churches, it is used to help mature impression­able minds, so they can better understand feelings they may already be capable of feeling. It is used to educate them as to whether their culture offers them the choice to put off such relationships. And if it does, such churches wisely encourage them to put these relationships off.

“But also important, in cases where they choose to pursue such relationships without their parents’ permission, armed with some emotional maturity, it is less likely they will do so promis­cuously, and if not promiscuously, that they will be able to distinguish between those who would marry and respect them and those who would do neither.

“Consider Jesus being engaged. Their engagement would have been celebrated publicly as was his parents. And just as Joseph covered for his fiancée when people could not spiritually understand her pregnancy, Jesus would have covered for his fiancée if anything endangered her well-being, even if it meant keeping their engagement secret to do so. None of us doubt whether he would have placed his own life in danger to protect her.

“Now picture any one of us doing that, one who has put on Christ. None of us can do anything without him, so if it is his conscience working in us, we are simply being given the chance to follow his principle while still taking responsibility for our choices.

“Consider the matter of Joseph fleeing with Mary to escape Roman persecution and to protect baby Jesus. In like manner, would not Christ have done anything to care for the mother of his fiancée while protecting his fiancée? Picture any one of us doing so who has put on Christ. Isn’t this just a respectable life on earth?

“The Lord taught us that marriage is sacred and that divorce is acceptable only when there is infidelity.[11] This has a much broader application when seen in regard to Christ’s spiritual marriage to his church of believers. He died for the church and, of course, does not abuse her in any way, the spiritual meaning of infidelity, which goes both ways. The meaning of our not abusing Christ includes keeping his call on us to suffer for those who abuse us, who abuse our marriage to him.

“He also taught us about the exception5 of doing good on the Sabbath, even though it breaks the Sabbath under the law of God,[12] Moses’ teaching. This law places the Sabbath command­ment above the marital one, so why wouldn’t we use marriage to do good for another, one who is under potential threat of great harm if we do not?

And when the law of God is used against us for doing such good and we suffer the abuse, we are choosing not to abuse him and thus strengthen our marriage to him under the law of Christ. Picture any one of us using marriage to do such good through his conscience in them.

“Christ’s teaching to make all others more important puts us in situations to do so. In every case, it is his conscience working in the mind of our heart. Thus, he said, ‘When you have done all the [things] that have been com­manded you, say, “We are unworthy servants. We have done that which we were bound to do [out of gratitude for having your con­science in us to keep the principle of doing good].”’[13] ”

6 – Relief from the Court

Today, I will see Gabriela and Tierra. After seven years of incarceration, I have won an appeal on technical grounds and am back in court. As soon as I step into the court­room, my eyes go straight to them. They are already fixated on me with no expression. But I know that aside from what they think happened, they are good people and I have forgiven them, as I hope they have forgiven me for anyway that I offended them.

Attempting to smile, I am instead overwhelmed with pain and want to shout out to Gabriela, haven’t you remem­bered yet, how could you just forget about me? I feel my face harden but don’t want it to.

Judging me by appearance now probably only proves to her that I deserted her, or worse, never planned to marry her. This must be why she still doesn’t tell the district attor­ney about our engagement. She is talking to her again during these procedures and could possibly get my sentence reduced. But others have told me that they used me to get their citizenship. They too are judging by appear­ance and cannot see the good that I see in them. But I do know that, for now, they do not know what they are doing.

Rather than go to trial again, we reach an agreement and the court gives me some relief anyway. My sentence is reduced to forty-two years. With time spent and good time, I could be out in less than fifteen years. The agreement also stipulates that I meet with Gabriela for a brief moment to confess my guilt and apolo­gize. All I focus on is the fact that I am finally getting a chance to say something to her.

Remember, I have been in prison with God’s grace – due to suffering while being innocent.6 By that grace and the kindness shown to me by some in prison, I have been able to work on a book about the principle, assisted tirelessly by the younger of my two sisters and her husband. On more than one occasion, she also made calls to administra­tors that saved my life.

The door opens and I step out of the little cell I have been waiting in for thirty minutes. She is standing feet away with the district attorney, my appeal attorney, and a guard. Our eyes lock. After stuttering over some words to get myself focused, I say clearly, “I am so sorry for all the suffering I have caused you. I really thought we were going to get married.”

Her body jerks intensely a couple of times. I feel it in mine. Quickly, the district attorney cuts in and says, “Ok, ok,” ushering her out. Moments later, from within my closed cell, I hear Gabriela let out a horrifying scream and start sobbing loudly. It pierces my heart. But it also gives me hope that she finally remembers.

Although hurting, I suddenly have that same peace I had in Garden Grove again. This suffering has not been in vain. But that does not mean I expect to hear from her or plan to write her or see her when I get out. For I already saw her slip away before college. No, it simply gives meaning to the love we had before that and the dream we shared between two cultures.

Sitting in this little cell, it is hard for me to believe that one day I may teach the principle outside these walls. Those who have not read my account of what happened will instantly judge me and so the cycle will begin. I will love them anyway and explain what happened, but like those who read it and still do not believe me, to them I will say, “Then, let me teach you how to love me as an enemy, and then you will find that I am not.”

7 – Sixty-Seven Years Old

I am sixty-seven. Time has not stopped. I’ve been out of prison four years, three of which were under parole, so I have been completely free from the state correction system for only one year.

Time has not stopped for me individually but neither has world-time restarted since the Holocaust. For without the needed conscience between nations to restart it, history is in the process of repeating itself now, at least the hatred openly expressed as an acceptable standard for many.

The challenge for many is like that which the pivotal genera­tion of a migrating family faces – reconciling contradictory feel­ings. In this case, the challenge is to deal with such feelings when going from a nonpluralistic view of culture to a pluralistic one, which makes us see some as enemies of conscience who are not. Without the principle, we are unable to fully unite against the open expression of hatred from nonpluralistic viewpoints.

One of the things I learned during parole is that it is not enough that I do not think like a criminal. I have to know how criminals think to know the criminally-minded steps they take in advance, so that I can avoid giving the appearance of taking those steps. For someone who does not think like a criminal, that is not so easy. It cost me five weeks in county jail for a violation of my parole.

As we know, a criminal mind is trained to look for ways of committing a crime without getting caught, but that takes a par­ticular talent for seeing how others see them to deceive them. Learning how this works just to avoid the appearance of doing it can come against one of the teachings of Christ: “Do not be children in [your] minds (phrén) but be babes in the worth­less­ness [of thinking or doing evil]. In [your] minds (phrén), be mature (téleios) [to recognize worthlessness].”[14]

Once a week for these three years, I had to attend a sex offender’s program. If the phrase sex offender triggered a highly judgmental reaction in you, you are using a blind spot in your cultural eyes. If you recog­nized such a reaction but it was not triggered in you, you are aware of the blind spot but do not use it to judge by appearance.

During the first six months of this program, I always stopped for lunch before meetings at a McDonald’s a couple blocks away. They were repaving the parking area and adding a playground on the other side of the building, but they provided a way for customers to enter. I didn’t pay much attention to any of it. It did not register as anything of concern, for I was minding my own business, just there to eat before meetings, not thinking like a criminal.

Once the improvements were completed though, I got picked up for break­ing my parole condition of visiting an establishment where children gather, even if it is outside the establish­ment. I don’t question the condition. It is to protect children. But I always ate on the other side of the restaurant in the back, where the play­ground is not even visible. I was a babe in the worthlessness of thinking or doing evil. I was hoping for a warning.

I tried to explain, but it didn’t matter. I was wrong. However, three years of polygraph tests during parole showed that I had no thoughts of violating any of my conditions. But this violation proved that I did not need to have a thought about violating a condition to violate it. I am grateful for God’s grace in me during parole also.

Fortunately, it was my only violation, for after that I quickly learned how to think like an educated, non-crim­inally-minded parolee, while remaining a babe in the worthlessness of thinking or doing evil. I do everything I can to relieve the con­cerns of anyone who may think that I have criminal intent, any whatso­ever. But when a highly judgmental reaction is triggered in someone, it produces mindless anger or fear, the same working from the hatred now openly expressed as an acceptable standard. Without the principle, they have no way of coming out of it permanently.

Another period when history repeated itself with this standard was in Salem in 1692 (“America’s Hidden Stories”, 2019). Suffering from some type of hysteria or simply lying to protect themselves from a cult-like mentality in their community, a group of girls blamed their problems on innocent people and got them hanged. They were young girls with that natural look of purity, girls who outwitted the religious elders in charge, who tried to get to the truth but had no understanding of righteous judgment. One thing led to another until the open expression of hatred became an acceptable standard – because they judged by appear­ance, including the mere appearance of words.

Having escaped the oppression of appearance-judgment in Europe, they were part of the new settlers of our soon-to-be nation. But they had not yet disciplined7 themselves either, lacking the knowledge needed to develop the pupil of their conscience. They had not opened their eyes to see how, in the heart, love covers all sin[15]  – so that we can judge with righteous judgment. The love that makes all others more important8 goes beyond appear­ances and even actual offenses to find the blindness behind them.

In social media, we are experiencing such blindness every day, but busy ourselves with anything to distract ourselves away from what we know to be wrong, but do not know what to do about it. Did not know what to do about it. 

Resources

“America’s Hidden Stories: Salem’s Secrets”, 2019 Series, www.SmithsonianChannel.com.

End Notes

1-The Scriptures state that Word is the “only-begotten”[16] and “the first-born among many brethren”,[17] but also that he is “the first-born of all creation”,[18] a symbolic reference to Adam, the first Adam, from whom Name made “every nation of men”.[19] So when Name states, “Israel [is] My son, My first-born [nation-name],”[20] He is symbolically referring to Word as Israel the man and the nation. It refers to both in a substantive way also since Word is the life of everyone who comes into this world,[21] which extends to nations. Thus, whatever is done to or for any of us, it is done to or for Word first.

Then, Name says, “You [are] My servant, Israel, whom, in you, I will glorify Myself,”[22] Israel’s response is, “I labored for [the] emptiness [of their deception]; I spent my strength for [the] formless and vain [lie of their deception]; surely my mishpot [will form (ayt)] Yahweh [Name in them] and my reward [is to form (ayt)] my Elohim [Word, in them].”[23]

And then, referring to Israel “His people”,[24] it states, “Yahweh [Name] will go before you, and the Elohim of Israel [Word] will be your rear guard. ‘Behold, My servant will act wisely; he will be high and lifted up, and greatly exalted. Just as many were astonished over you [Israel in the Holocaust], so his [Word’s] appearance [was] marred [on the cross, symbolically or literally or both, depending on one’s beliefs] more than any man and his form more than the sons of Adam.’”[25]

Just as the world was astonished over how the people Israel were marred in the Holocaust, it was astonished over how Word was marred earlier on the cross. Isaiah foresaw it in word-visions given to him. When revealing it, he used symbolism he knew would not be understood at first, saying in the next verse, “Thus, he will sprinkle many nations [with his blood]; because of him, kings will shut their mouth, for that which was not numbered for them [the millions in the Holocaust], they saw, and that which they did not hear [their cries] made them understand themselves [that we are all elohim in the world-image].”[26] 

2-We see through these eyes not with them, even though their opacity prevents us from seeing through their images if that is all we are using. The nogah eyes cannot see light embodied in dark­ness, but under the mishpot, that is exactly what is happening. When we remove the nogah light reflecting off these nogah bodies, we see, with Word’s light, that they are lightless bodies embodying our light-folds. 

This state of darkness exists only in these pupils and nowhere else because these pupils cannot see the living light, a light which removes the illusion of all darkness everywhere. We believe, though, that this state of darkness exists outside of our pupils and, thus, do not realize that even the dark­ness in these pupils is embodying the living light permeating them.

3-Gabriela is a feminine form of Gabriel, which in Hebrew means ‘geber of El’, ‘man of God [Name]’. But geber fundamentally means ‘strong one’, which should be used since Gabriel refers to an angel in the New Testament.

4-Celibacy is actually quite common for those of a certain spiritual order. They were once called Nazarites[27] under the teachings of Moses. Adapted to Word’s teachings, they do not make themselves known, as he mentioned regarding fasting.[28] But he was ultimately referring to the spiritual fasting that Isaiah taught[29] – extended to loving one’s enemies. This is the practice of self-denial to serve others in need – especially those who do not make others more important. 

To keep their spiritual fast, they do whatever is necessary to help others, ultimately in their spiritual needs. It also works under the teaching that says – become like another in appearance to help them, knowing that they must see you like them before they can trust you to help.[30] 

5-Moses taught the Isra­elites not to marry outside of their people but did so himself.[31] The law of God [Name] states that a murderer shall be killed, but Name spared David.[32] And saying that he did not come to do away with the law but to fulfill it,[33] Word healed on the Sabbath, breaking the law. These examples are misunderstood by those who misuse the truth that no one is above the law.[34]

“The con­science has many levels and the mind works on all of them, unsuccessfully with childish thinking, concluding that these individuals alone were exceptions, or successfully with mature thinking, concluding that it is the situations that are excep­tions. For under the teaching of piety, it states that Word ‘was justified in Spirit’,[35] indicating that a good greater than what these eyes can see was accomplished, despite the appearance of wrongdoing. And the teaching instructs us to discipline ourselves for the purpose of piety.[36]

“Afterall, he did give us a new commandment, to love others the way he did[37] – to make all others more important. And that sometimes includes actions that appear wrong, but, when seen spiritually, are justified. Having legal-age laws for marriage is the right of every country, set by their own ethical standards, sometimes influ­enced by economic factors. But when breaking the law to accomplish a greater good, is one justified in Spirit in what constitutes an exception?

“The answer lies in what each country considers a righteous or ethical life to be on earth. The main consid­eration is whether we see ourselves as gender beings with a spirit or spiritual beings with a gender, the first Adam or the last Adam, respectively. Is there social stagnation or social evolution?

6-“For this [is the meaning of] grace: if for the sake of God’s [Name’s] conscience, anyone endures grief, suffering unjustly. For what credit [is it] if sinning and being struck down, you endure? But if doing good and suffering, you endure, this [is the meaning of] grace before God [Name]. 

“For unto this, you have been called because Christ [Word] also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in his footsteps, who did not commit sin, nor was deceit found in his mouth, who, being reviled, did not revile in return, suffering, did not threaten. He gave [himself] over, however, to the One who judges justly [Name], who bore our sins himself in his body [Word’s] on the cross, so that, having died to sin, we might live to righteousness, by whose wounds, you have been healed.”[38] 

7-“All discipline for the moment seems not to be pleas­ur­able, but painful. Yet, to those who have been trained by it [recogniz­ing how we are blinded is usually only possible during the tribulation of discipline, for when we are desper­ate for relief, we turn to only that which works to free us, even if training is necessary],

“Afterward, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness [that comes from loving others, particularly enemies through the mishpot of the truth][39]…[for] solid food is mature (téleios) [manifesta­tions (of Word in everyone, which can be seen only with the law of light)], which, because of the possession [in the mind of our heart, in both triggered and untriggered forms], have the senses trained laid bare [to use our law-of-Christ [Word] pupils] for discern­ing both beautiful and worthless [visions of Word in others, perceived and misperceived, respec­tively, in order to gate our bodily eternity with His omni-soul][40]…

“[So] do not judge anything before [its] time [otherwise, it will not be righteous judgment], until the Lord [Name] comes [in our conscience], who will both bring to light the hidden [blindness] of the darkness and make manifest the volitions of the hearts. And then the praise will come into being from God [Name] for each [person for being an elohim in Word, not for anything we do in blindness].”[41]  

8-Peter said, “above all, have fervent love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins.”[42] Perhaps, follow­ers have been blessed so long with such love for one another that they have lost touch with those outside. Peter was not talking about all sins, for lesser love cannot cover sin committed against greater love in one’s own conscience.

Word said, “her sins, which are many [but did not include failing to love one’s enemies, and her prostitution was not a greater sin than this failure], have been forgiven, for she loved much [Word would not have said this if she did not love her enemies]. But he who is forgiven little [because he does not consider his failure to love his enemies a great sin or sin at all, so he only asks forgiveness for his other sins, which results in little forgiveness] loves little [never learning to love his enemies, the only way to love much].”[43]

Consider this teaching of Word also: “No one has greater love than this, that one lays down his soul for his friends (philos). You are my friends if you do what I command you.”[44] How do we understand a friendship that requires one side to do whatever the other commands? And he laid down his soul for everyone but then seemed to limit the greatest love of this act to doing so for his friends. Was he excluding himself, meaning that no one among us has greater love? Consider it applied to him also, working through us.

Loving his enemies, he knows that it includes those he will later call his friends. He knows that whenever they receive his act of love for them in their hearts, they will love him and do what his love commands of them, creating the mutual love between philos-friends. To his disciples at that time, he said afterwards, “I have called you friends because all things I have heard from my Father I have made known to you,”[45] which he would not have done had they not done what love had commanded of them up to that point.

He knew that, when able, they would later lay down their souls for their friends, including yet-to-be friends, present enemies. As for those who never receive it in their heart and thus never become friends, we can rest assure in these words: Name “is the Savior of all men, especially of believers.”[46]

Working through Word, Name is also the Savior of those who never receive His love directly but receive it according to how He works in their el-elohe-names, where they are superseded friends. Their consciousness of knowing that we all live to Him and all else that is true comes from Word, so when they are blinded to any of it, their consciousness is superseded by Word’s so everything remains transparent in their el-elohe-names.

Saying that those who do not believe in him should believe in his works, he surely included the work of philos-friends, the will of Name, the will of life.