The Dalai Lama . . .

. . . concludes his little handbook on compassion with these words: “We do not need to become religious, nor do we need to believe in an ideology. All that is necessary is for each of us to develop our good human qualities.”

And that was the way of the Peace Pilgrim . . .

. . . affiliated with no church or religion, she simply let her life flow out from her own inner knowing. So that is how, on January 1, 1953, she came to leave Los Angeles on foot with only the clothes on her back. For almost thirty years she walked until given shelter and fasted until given food, sharing her own inner peace with all who asked.

She chose this way because at one point, she saw with her inner eye a map of the United States; and herself in a blue tunic, walking. And she felt her heart leap for joy. So gradually she developed the idea in discussion with family and friends, made a test walk through the Appalachian Mountains, until finally she felt all was in readiness. In all, eventually she walked across North America seven times.

“She has been called a prophet, a mystic, a saint, and a person who walked her talk. Her message was not new, but practicing it was . . . . Hearing her message was like hearing any one of the world’s great religions. Those who were Christian were sure she preached the beliefs of Jesus Christ. Those who were Jewish, felt she represented the way of Yahweh. Buddhists, Bahais and Jains were sure she spoke their religions. And those who were Muslim were certain that she preached the teachings of Islam.”

Marta Daniels, in

NOTABLE AMERICAN WOMEN

Harvard University Press, 2005

Her message was . . .

. . . “This is the way of peace; overcome evil with good, and falsehood with truth, and hatred with love.”

The morning after she completed her first crossing coast to coast, she awakened from her night’s sleep in a railroad station in New York City. And there she heard an indescribably beautiful voice, speaking words of encouragement; “YOU ARE MY BELOVED DAUGHTER, IN WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED.”

For me, she has a way of making the most esoteric concepts very easy to understand. Her simple words can resonate like a mantram. She says we have a higher nature and a lower nature, and with our free will we can simply choose to live up to our highest light. And, as we live up to the highest light we have, more light will be given to us. And then, once we really choose to live from our Higher Self, we become truly powerful. I take great comfort from words like these . . .

    “A few really dedicated people can offset the ill effects of masses of out-of-harmony people, so we who work for peace must not falter.”

And this turns out to be one of those universal truths found in all religions.

She believed each of us has a unique calling . . .

. . . and that all could live just as close as she to their own inner knowing. And so she described how her own inner ‘diamond’ came to emerge. This booklet, STEPS TOWARD INNER PEACE, can be obtained from the Friends of Peace Pilgrim, below.

Then after almost thirty years of traveling ‘on foot and on faith,’ she began mentioning to a few friends that a change was coming in her pilgrimage. So one morning in 1981, she spoke of seeing many angels around the man who was to drive her to a speaking engagement. But she and her friend never arrived. And the auto accident in which they both died. . . their ‘transition to a freer life’ . . . left both the Peace Pilgrim’s legs broken . . . needed no more.

And her pilgrimage? . . .

. . . In 1982, when a few of her friends gathered to remember her, they compiled her wisdom, her letters and her talks, into a book. That book, entitled simply PEACE PILGRIM, is available from the Friends of Peace Pilgrim by calling 203-926-1581, or online at www.peacepilgrim.org.

No charge is ever levied for these books and tapes. This remarkable work is carried on through many small donations, and by volunteers who share their time because they believe in her message. I myself volunteered with the Friends of Peace Pilgrim for a couple of months in 1997, and I saw how donations that people send all go directly into printing and disseminating her universal message.

Thus her pilgrimage now continues in the books and tapes that go out worldwide to all who ask . . . with a very special niche in our prisons.

In love with Him, my soul

Lives the subtlest of passions,

Lives like a gypsy

Each day a different house,

Each night under the stars.

                                    Rumi

Third: SUFISM

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