(Clearwisdom.net) On March 13 and 14, Falun Gong practitioners in Kansas participated in St. Patrick's Day parades in two cities.
On Saturday, March 13, over 100 groups participated in the annual St. Patrick's parade in North Kansas City. This is the first time that Falun Gong practitioners joined this parade, which was attended by thousands of people.
The Falun Gong procession was led by two practitioners with a banner reading "Falun Dafa: Truthfulness Compassion Tolerance" and followed by the decorated float. Four practitioners stood on the float to demonstrate the exercises, while other practitioners distributed fliers along the way. Wherever the Falun Gong float arrived, the serene and solemn music moved people's hearts. Inside the large pink lotus flower, two little practitioners sat with their legs crossed in lotus position demonstrating the meditation exercise, while two Western practitioners demonstrated the standing exercises. The peaceful movements attracted a lot of attention, and cheers and applause followed the team. The practitioners distributing the fliers had a busy time. Many little children stretched out their hands long before the practitioners came to them. After they got the flier, they ran quickly back to their parents and handed the flier to them. Some people ran a long way to catch a practitioner for a flier. The practitioners patiently answered their questions and talked about Falun Dafa, the persecution in China, and the popularity of Dafa around the world.
On Sunday March 14, practitioners participated in another grand parade in Shawnee City. Before the parade started, many candidates running for government office came to greet the participating teams. When they passed our team, they happily accepted our truth-clarifying materials and listened to our brief introduction.
When one police officer passed our team, he introduced himself to us as a candidate running for police chief in Johnson County. He told us a story from his own experience. A few years ago, he was a police officer in a nearby city. Once, the city organized a large-scale street market event, which Falun Gong practitioners applied to attend. The city council discussed if they should allow Falun Gong to participate, and due to the false accusations and propaganda from the Chinese Embassy and Consulates, some council members wanted to reject the application. So the mayor asked this officer to investigate Falun Gong. He searched Falun Dafa websites and carefully read and did research. His conclusion was that Falun Dafa is good, so the city council approved our application. The officer also phoned the local FBI office. The FBI officer listened to his words and also confirmed that the Jiang group's persecution of Falun Dafa is wrong.
After these two days of activities, many practitioners wrote down their experiences to share with each other. We believe we will do better in the future.
