When Toronto practitioners hosted Peace and Compassion Day on November 03, quite a number of senators sent their greetings and support to Falun Gong practitioners. Among them were A. Raynell Andreychuk, Marisa Ferretti Barth and Lucie Pépin.
Here is the original letter written by Senator Lucie Pépin.
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Dear Friends of Falun Dafa:
I am very pleased to send you this message for your Peace and Compassion Day. I would have liked to be there in person, but other commitments have made it impossible. Nonetheless, I am with you in spirit to celebrate Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance, which are the fundamental characteristics of the association of volunteers that is the Falun Dafa.
These three virtues are essential to living in harmony with our selves and with our fellow humans, regardless of the society in which we live. Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance are also the foundation of Peace, the Peace you are honouring today.
Without this peace, there is no point in trying to build something viable. Without this peace, hoping for prosperity is nothing more than a futile intention. To paraphrase Jean de la Fontaine, this peace is the source of all good things.
We will never achieve this essential peace by trying to destroy each other, cultivating mutual hatred, or favouring repression over dialogue. We must be more in tune with the compassion that lies within every human being and guides our actions. We owe it to ourselves to be more cognisant of this human value that urges us to understand and share the pain of others. It is only by trying to get closer to others that we will get to know them and better respect them.
Dear friends, I could not end this message without encouraging you to continue your efforts to create a better, more tolerant world that promotes Peace. I truly believe that it is by embodying our differences and coming together around what we have in commoná--namely being part of one human raceá--á that we will achieve this dialogue of cultures and create the universal civilization that Léopold Sédar Senghor, a poet and academic, ceaselessly praised.
Happy Peace and Compassion Day!
Respectfully yours,
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Senator Lucie Pépin