(Clearwisdom.net) In February 1992, two years after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, former East German border guard Ingo Heinrich was tried for killing a young man named Chris Gueffroy as he attempted to flee to freedom in West Berlin. The killing took place before the Berlin Wall fell, but the trial didn't occur until after.
Judge Theodor Seidel told Heinrich that failing to carry out his orders to “shoot to kill” would have been considered a crime at the time, but missing the target would not be. “As a man with a sound mind, at that moment, you had the right to lift your gun up one centimeter. And that’s the responsibility of conscience that you should bear. In this world, conscience is above the law. When there is a conflict between the law and conscience, conscience, not the law, is the highest guiding principle for any action. Respecting life is a principle that should be upheld everywhere.” In the end, Ingo Heinrich was sentenced to 3 ½ years in prison for manslaughter, without bail.
As for an official or a policeman, he is first a human being, then an official or a policeman. The “Heinrich case,” a case exemplifying the “Conscience Highest” principle, is widely known. “Lifting up one centimeter” is a way for humans to resist evil power and to save oneself, a moment where human conscience shines.
This one centimeter is a centimeter for human beings to have a bright future, a centimeter for an individual to overcome a system, and a centimeter to demonstrate human conscience.
In Chinese Communist Party (CCP)-controlled China, the peaceful spiritual practice of Falun Gong continues to be severely persecuted. Falun Gong practitioners in China adhere to their beliefs and try their best to tell people the truth about what is going on with Falun Gong: the truth about the practice, the truth about the persecution, and the truth about Falun Gong's universal principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.
Falun Gong practitioners in China are enduring arrest, imprisonment, fines, sentences, brainwashing, forced labor, and even death. Their lives and rights are not protected under the CCP’s violent, brutal persecution. Yet practitioners continue to adhere to their principles even after a dozen years of persecution.
Every person of sound mind, every person of conscience, can only be shocked after they learn the true facts of the persecution. Practitioners seek to clarify the truth about the persecution because they know that by doing so, they can awaken the true nature and conscience lying inside almost every heart.
Yet there are still many police and government officials in China who continue to relentlessly arrest and torture Falun Gong practitioners because they have sold their souls for personal gains.
There are numerous examples of such officials meeting with karmic retribution. Those who continue to ignore the consequences and willfully persecute Falun Gong shouldn't think that they can do whatever they want because they have not yet met with such retribution.
Good deeds meet with good returns and evil deeds meet with evil returns. This is a law of the universe that has been repeatedly proven in history. If someone has escaped retribution for their misdeeds so far, perhaps it is because gods are giving them the chance to learn the truth and to stop their misdeeds so that they can be saved. If they miss this opportunity, imagine the regret they will feel when it is too late!
In closing, the author is reminded of an American television program called “Garrison’s Guerrillas” he used to watch when he was young. In one scene, as Allied soldiers were escaping, a German soldier tried to shoot, but he could not pull the trigger and kept murmuring, “Cursed gun!” Maybe this German soldier was, in fact, not trying to shoot them, but was, instead, executing his right to that “one centimeter” of conscience.
