In our attempt to reach out to the people in the smaller communities surrounding Houston, a practitioner arranged a workshop with the librarian in Anahuac, Texas. Then she contacted the Mayor's office to request a proclamation of Falun Dafa Day to help attract interest. The City Clerk said they could not grant a proclamation until a representative from our "firm" had appeared at a city council meeting to make a short presentation formally requesting one. Then they sent a letter to that effect.

We scheduled a meeting and prepared plenty of material including the tri-fold blue fliers and a 12-page information packet we compiled from Dafa websites. Our presentation lasted about 10 minutes and focused on 2 points: First, we were asking for the proclamation because we were planning to hold an introductory seminar in their town and thought that a proclamation would be a good way to encourage participation. Second, we pointed out that a proclamation was one way that Anahuac could express concern for human rights and help support the practitioners in China.

As we were talking, they were leafing the booklet paying particular attention to the list of previous proclamations and the persecution exhibits we had included. They were clearly very moved by the latter. They were very eager to support human rights for the Chinese practitioners. After our short talk, there were really no questions.

After a short discussion about how to phrase the proclamation, the Council voted unanimously in favor of it. We thanked them of course, and then sat down to observe democracy in action. In this City Council meeting the freely elected representatives of the citizens carefully discussed the various measures that came before them and then decided in favor or against them by majority vote.

As we stood up to leave about an hour later, they all waved, thanked us for coming, and said goodbye. We couldn't help but think about the contrast between the course of events in this small Texas City and what would probably happen in a similar situation these days in China. We felt joyful for the decision these kind-hearted people had made and renewed our determination to transmit this opportunity to many more communities.

January 9, 2001