By Dr. Ausra Maldeikiene
When I’m really happy, I cry: happiness is somewhere deep in the throat and it is excited by hope and light-carrying tears. Then, on March 11, 1990, I waited with tears in my eyes while watching television until late evening. Then, right after I heard the words proclaiming Lithuania’s Independence, sipped a glass of cognac – I remember that we had no champagne at home, and we all wanted the freedom to raise the glass of the most precious drink possible. True, the tears of this transparent, absolute happiness, which brings freedom, were not the only ones. There were two more memorable events. Later, I cried when looking at the national flag appearing in the Gediminas Tower after years of occupation. For years I did not believe that
this would happen and when I saw this, the tears flowed on my cheeks and did not end there.
The next time I was crying was on Vilnius Street when I first saw the dancing people of the Krishna consciousness movement. I saw how the Soviets fed them into psychiatrists simply because they read “no” books and did not want to turn into a Soviet monstrous communist man. And when I first saw on the street the colourful white, saffron-tone dressed and lovingly looking, singing, dancing, people who distributed meals made by themselves and so pure of God’s name, I understood freedom and respect for the choice of man had really come. Yes, it came and will stay with us. So it’s symbolic that I started the March 11th celebration yesterday, watching a documentary film by a wonderful director John Griesser, “Hare Krsna! Mantra, Movement and Swami, who started everything. ” It is a movie about a man named Srila Prabhupada who, having left his home in India in the ’70s, took a cargo ship to New York while having no money in his pocket and over the next decade he conquered the world, with “Hare Krsna”, along with his followers and they sang with The Beatles at the top of their absolute glory. He was with those who respected the spirit, and not the money, proclaiming that matter is always overcome by the spirit and firmly believed in the soul.
I have never concealed that I am a practicing Catholic, who thinks day by day, and how Christ lives in my life. I know that for many really ritualistic believers in Lithuania, such a question seems to be a small, at least blasphemous, but it is the real question of every believer, not just a baptized Christian. And in my body and soul I hear that now in Lithuania, Christ fighting with hypocrisy and lies, gradually grey desolation colouring our streets, holidays, speeches and thoughts. On Friday I watched the “Tartuffo” The absolute literary masterpiece of Moliere has transformed the life of Lithuania’s life into an absolutely bright image, while Giedrius Savickas celebrates and hypocritical Tartuffo is the prototype of many elite people in the country. I want very much and everyday I pray that I would not give up and I would not raise another one that is needed by those who are powerful, influential and wealthy. May God help me not to go into another Tartuffo form. Who is bound by the March 11 movement of Krishna Consciousness and Tartuffo? These three phenomena of very different epochs, cultures and religions are united by the unstoppable invitation of the human soul to freedom, hope and faith, so that we can kill lies, despair and hypocrisy. With our great celebration, people of all nationalities, confessions and attitudes. From March 11th the dawn will always be here.
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