One year, a mysterious virus spread across a tiny mountain village called Hopeland. Over the course of nine months, roughly half of the villagers were infected with this new illness. Yet, despite its alarmingly high transmission rates, only nine people out of the total village population of 1,300 who contracted it passed away. Most victims recovered in one or two weeks.
Nonetheless, in Hopeland’s tight-knit community, even nine casualties were too much to bear. So, in what began as a noble effort to contain the virus’s spread, the village’s elected council of managers ordered a mass quarantine to protect those people who were most at risk of getting sick.
At first, the villagers happily complied with the enforced period of isolation. Out of compassion for the most vulnerable within their community, the village inhabitants endured the devastating closures of their own businesses, and suffered bravely through emotional distress due to being confined in their homes for months. Many fell into severe poverty from being out of work.
Knowing full well that they couldn’t keep the small independent-minded community under quarantine indefinitely, the village council entered an exclusive contract with a large pharmaceutical company in the neighbouring big city to manufacture a pill that would provide immunity from the virus.
An aggressive media campaign
To the council’s pleasant surprise, the pharmaceutical company had a quick six-month turn around in distributing a pill dubbed by the local presses as the “the miracle.” Bolstered by the company’s own internal research showing the pill’s effectiveness against the virus, the village council set to the task of trying to convince every man, woman and child in the village to take the pill.
And so, paid for with the commoners’ hard-earned money, the council members set off on a public relations campaign in the village’s two newspapers, over the airways of the community radio station and in the schools. At first, the campaign failed, with nearly 50 percent of the community refusing to take the pill. Eventually, the council resorted to heavy-handed tactics by threatening the jobs of any editor, radio personality or teacher who refused to promote the council’s pro-pill stance to their audiences.
Predictably, the effort succeeded and about 80 percent of the villagers lined up to receive the experimental medication. However, a persistent 20 percent of the population held strong to their beliefs that the unknown consequences of taking a medicine hastily brought to market by a company with eyes focused on turning a quick profit was potentially a greater threat to their health than contracting the virus itself.
The dark side of the pill
In the initial phases of the pill’s rollout, the medicine appeared to be both effective and safe. Among those who took the pill, no new deaths from the virus were recorded, and negative side effects from its consumption appeared very minimal.
Within two months, though, a dark side of the pill began to emerge. Far more villagers than what was being reported began coming down with some very severe and worrisome health conditions. These reactions included heart inflammation, debilitating autoimmune disorders and chronic fatigue. It appeared that in their haste to bring the pill to market, the manufacturer severely cut corners in the standard testing phase for the product and neglected to report possible side effects found in their own medical trials.
Just as alarming was the fact that those who took the pill contracted and spread the virus at nearly the exact same rate as those who didn’t!
A new caste system
As word began to spread around the village of the pill’s potentially frightening side effects and weak efficacy, the village council became greatly alarmed that the villagers would learn the truth about the pill, rebel, and demand an end to their power. So, like any manipulative ruling elite, the council members came up with a threefold strategy to prevent such a fate.
The first part of their strategy was to prohibit all community media outlets from reporting anything negative about the pill. The second was to publicly demonize those who refused to take the pill by branding them as “extremists”. Of course, since those who chose to take the pill vastly outnumbered those who didn’t, a new persecuted group in the community was born.
Since those who chose to take the pill vastly outnumbered those who didn’t, a new persecuted group in the community was born.
The final aspect of the council’s strategy was by far the most insidious. In their zealous effort to further derail the anti-pill movement, the village council erected a caste system through withholding basic privileges from those who refused to take the pill. The loss of such basic privileges included dining indoors, gathering in public parks and attending the town’s annual music and art festival. The council’s two chief goals were to ostracize the growing and vocal minority who were against the pill, as well as coerce holdouts into taking it.
Even though the virus now had a less than 1 percent fatality rate (due in part to ever-weakening strains of the illness), the council built upon their newly established caste system by ordering all villagers to attain village ID cards that indicated their pill status. Those with an “X” on their ID card (signifying their resistance to the pill) were denied entry into food supply stores, farmers’ markets and even soup kitchens!
Under the threat of termination, the village council also mandated that all people who were employed with the village administration (roughly 40 percent of all workers) had to take the pill. The village council codified into law what came to be known as the “exclusion laws.” These laws were carried out in addition to an open campaign by village “public safety deputies” to censor and detain vocal anti-pill leaders. In less than 30 days of enforcing these new punitive measures, 22 peaceful leaders of the opposition were jailed for no other crime than daring to speak their own minds freely.
Saint Ananda and eternal truth
Meanwhile, a well-known saint happened to be passing through Hopeland during her annual pilgrimage. As was her custom, Saint Ananda took a two-day respite from her nearly 1,000-mile journey on foot over the majestic ranges.
Within her first hour in the village, she could sense that something was terribly off. At each dining establishment she walked by, the wandering saint saw large signs painted in bold red lettering that said, “For Pill Patrons Only!” Having never heard of the virus or the controversy surrounding the pill, the holy woman was further puzzled when the owners of each one of those establishments turned her away. Many of those same owners had even been her longtime devotees!
Growing hungry after a long time on her feet, Saint Ananda took out her alms cup and decided to beg for food in the village centre, as she was accustomed to doing. But upon arriving there, the holy woman was taken aback by what she saw. Hundreds of destitute hungry beggars lined the cobblestone streets, with begging cups in their hands. These men and women (she soon learned) had all been let go from their jobs for refusing to take the pill. Tears rolled down the saint’s eyes as she felt the immense suffering these courageous men and women were feeling.
Not wanting to compete with them for food, Saint Ananda continued her walk until she arrived at a decrepit old building at the edge of town. As she approached the structure, she heard piercing cries for help. It was a jail, and locked inside were all the leaders of the anti-pill resistance!
Saint Ananda felt waves of great compassion for the prisoners’ predicament and resolved to help them. So, the next day at dawn, this wise and divinely tuned pilgrim gathered as many villagers as she could find and, inspired by her own personal hero Mahatma Gandhi, led them on a silent two-mile walk to the jail. By the time they arrived at that vile fortress, nearly two-thirds of the villagers had gathered to hear the revered holy woman speak. Predictably, all the village council members were also there, and they looked on with great consternation as the crowd continued to grow in numbers.
Greeting the audience of 1500, Saint Ananda flashed them an adoring smile and bowed to them. The crowd reciprocated by chanting several sacred mantras back to her. The saint then cleared her throat and spoke:
“My beloved children of God, I gather you all here today to speak truth from my heart about an unsettling chain of events that has befallen this community. It appears to me that fear and intolerance have reared their ugly heads in this otherwise beautiful spiritual community. In the name of safety, you’ve ostracized, silenced and imprisoned a significant minority of your own brothers and sisters for making a very difficult personal choice that runs counter to your leaders’ opinions. Shame on your leaders for spearheading a divisive and oppressive program that runs contrary to the will of our Creator. And shame on those of you commoners who’ve supported these misguided policies through your own unwillingness to speak out.”
Saint Ananda paused for a long moment, to allow the crowd to reflect on her words, and then continued:
“But despite your own transgressions, know that the Omnipresent One (of whom everyone here is a part) always forgives and never stops loving you.”
The inspiring holy woman than fell silent and motioned for the crowd to follow her on foot to where the jail was located. The people faithfully followed the revered sage to the edge of town, in a spirit of unity that spoke to the depths of their souls. When they arrived at the jail, Saint Ananda bowed again to the large crowd of villagers, and sat down on the ground in front of the dreadful prison in a cross-legged position.
As the crowd heard agonizing screams for help from inside the jail, the pilgrim saint closed her eyes and began repeating an inaudible mantra to herself as she quickly fell into a deep meditation.
Within seconds, shouts of wonder erupted from the villagers as they witnessed a truly miraculous event! A luminous white light began enveloping the entire jail, until it suddenly disappeared into thin air. All the prisoners were now standing in the open air where the jail had just been. The prisoners were as struck with wonder as the dazzled crowd who bore witness to the miracle.
As the now-disgraced village council members retreated quietly away, amid this divine commotion, the villagers excitedly mobbed the former prisoners with hugs, kisses and words of affection. With her work now complete, Saint Ananda rose to her feet, bowed to her beloved devotees once more and turned and walked away to continue her pilgrimage for eternal truth.
«LECTURA RELACIONADA» THE SEEKER AND THE SERPENT SAGE: 3 days on the path to enlightenment»
imágenes: Depositphotos
