There are times when significant world events are so few and far between that it can be very difficult to find a subject worthy of editorial comment. At other times, events of great pith and moment occur in such rapid succession that an entire volume of history will some day be required to discuss or to explain them.

At the moment of this writing, the world is in the midst of a series of fast breaking events which, though seemingly unrelated, will certainly have a profound and cumulative effect upon the course of history for at least the next full generation.

The Arabs and the Israelis are at each other’s throat, in an all out set-to, for the fourth time in the past twenty-five years. So far, the war seems to be almost a carbon copy of the three which preceded it, except that this time, in order to avoid any possible stigma as aggressors, the Israelis deliberately awaited a full-scale invasion from both Egypt and Syria before taking action. The inevitable result is, of course, that they now face a somewhat more difficult situation and certainly a longer and more costly war than ever before, both in casualties and in property loss.

The great world hazard inherent in these regularly recurring mini-wars between the Arabs and the Israelis lies in the fact that, politically and militarily, the Soviet Union is completely committed to the success of the Arabs, while the U.S. is equally committed to the survival of

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Israel. The Soviet Union has already begun a massive air lift to replace the weapons lost by the Egyptians and, if the war continues, at some point, the U.S. will certainly begin resupplying the Israelis, which will of course involve the constant danger of serious confrontation between the major world powers.

The most significant comment that can be made on the situation is found in the Understanding work paper on the area of mutual agreement, which follows:

The tragedy and the futility of warfare lie in the fact that it can-not determine the relative merits of the conflicting ideologies, it can only demonstrate the relative fighting abilities of the participants! No matter how violent or prolonged the war, and no matter who may be the victor, there will still have been no approach to a solution of the problems or differences that brought about the fighting. In a few months or a few years, when the contenders have recovered somewhat from their wounds, they will be ready to fight again! The winner usually learns nothing from such encounters, and if the loser learns anything, it will only be how to avoid in the future, the worst of his previous military errors! In every war, both sides suffer far more loss and damage than would have been incurred by either in accepting the principles of the other.

(Although the above words were first written by your editor more than ten years ago, their complete validity has never been so precisely illustrated as in the regularly recurring Arab-Israeli wars. Here are two races which have already fought three wars, IN THE SAME GENERATION, and are now bitterly engaged in a fourth, all without having solved a single one of the problems or resolved any of the differences that brought about the fighting.)

The United Nations, as usual in these affairs, is sitting back waiting to see who will be the winner and the loser in this fourth round of the septennial donnybrook. As soon as the loser becomes obvious, the representatives of those nations which favor the loser, will begin a loud and insistent clamor for a ceasefire and a negotiated settlement. Unless major nations have become involved, the bell will soon sound, ending the fourth round, and the war will return to its quiescent state in which both sides will be busy rearming for round five. (If major nations do become involved, any world citizen who hopes to survive will be well advised to begin digging his personal cave in the nearest hillside.)

One of the more hopeful signs emerging from the world news is that the U.F.O. is again being seen and reported in considerable numbers, all over the U.S. and in other countries. Those who chart U.F.O. cycles, know that these increased appearances occur during almost every world

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crisis, but whether they are looking for some way to remedy the situation, or just waiting around to pick up a few of the survivors, remains to be seen.

THE MASTER’S PERSONALITY

An idea of the Lord’s Personality is most important, for man has changed this idea and has had so many different ideas held up to him, he has lost the true picture of Him. So how may man recognize Him when He does come, when he does not know what to expect?

It is only fair, therefore, that he be given some idea of what He is like and to expect. Possibly it may be as well to tell what not to expect first. Do not expect a saint’s demeanor in His attitude towards any-thing and everything. He is vigorous, powerful in His understanding, quick in His detection of motives and equally quick to expose the false as to accept the true ones. One instinctively trusts Him, loves Him, wants to be led by Him, trust His judgment, trust His ability, trust His knowledge and perception of things.

His manner is kindly, loving or stern as the occasion demands, always just, even if justice demands severity of treatment. He is very simple, true, earnest, direct in all He does and says, never missing a point, never forgetting anything, except what is past and should be forgotten. He is full of compassion, patient of weakness, where true sincere effort is being made to overcome it. He does not dress in any unusual way, He is not feminine as many picture Him. He is a simple, great leader of men who follow Him because they instinctively feel His greatness.

He is tolerant of all false things wherever He finds them-in man or in government, or in beliefs, while He is most tolerant of wrongs committed through ignorance or a wrong conception of truth.

He loves the true, the good, the beautiful wherever He finds them and in whatever form, while He has no tolerance for the false, the evil, the ugly-also wherever He finds them.

He loves beautiful colors, beautiful expressions whether in music or art or literary form or endeavor, while He dislikes crudeness in any form where it should not exist.

It is hard to express what one feels about Him-the love mixed with joy and reverence, faith in Him, eagerness to serve Him and under His leadership, wonder that His type could exist at all-and this makes one realize He is more than man, though He seems man only when he is with man.

This description may help you somewhat, though no description may ever be complete or perfect. There is only one thing which never fails.

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Those who love Him never fail to recognize Him, though it may take them sometime to adjust their perception to the reality; while those who do not love Him and are not trying to follow Him, will have nothing to do with Him. This has always been so.

AS GIVEN TO F. R. BROOKS

A WORKER’S PRAYER OF THANKS

Dear Lord, help me always to be that happy man whose work and whose play are one. Help me always to enjoy being on the job, so that it is my play. Because I’m stuck with it. What else would I want to do for eight hours at a time, if not work?

There are those who feel sorry for the working man this century, Lord. They figure we’re all alienated from our own labor, and bound to be unhappy. To them I would say, I have questions for you.

“Has work ever been easy? Was it so fascinating to pick cotton, be-fore we had machines and production lines? Who has written an easy poem? Has something ever come out of nothing?”

No, Lord, my work is not easy. But the too easy would not be worth-while. And the hard can be made easier through catching its rhythm. The songs of the workers as they weave and shrink the Scottish tweeds make their work joyous. And that is to the north, in the chill and for-bidding climate of the Hebrides Islands. South, to Africa, the workers chant as they unload cargoes, in their rubber boots.

I, too, have my rhythms. All I ask, Lord, is the least possible noise pollution. Then my spirit is free to fly like a bird, while my hands work on. And for that I’m thankful.

Does this prayer make me sound hopelessly old-fashioned, Lord? I hope that our reward, our pleasure in work, is not becoming obsolete the way some of our products have. I know that song, “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction.” And I am happy to say that it doesn’t fit all of us who work. It would be sad if we had to speak nostalgically of “work like my father used to do,” as we do of “pies like grandmother used to bake.” Because our chief satisfaction may come in proportion to our work and the love we put into it. It is still a bitter bread that is baked without love. So for the sake of the product and of the worker, we thank you for the gift of being able to bake with love.

Yes, Lord, I’m grateful for work because I can’t believe the same satisfactions come out of mere “transactions.” I doubt if even J. Paul Getty feels as repaid in his job as I do on mine, even though his investments reproduce themselves into millions. It is his money that calls to money.

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I doubt, for instance, Lord, that he experiences the pleasure of a per-son waking early enough to see the rising sun turning his love’s hair golden in its rays, “Yellow is the color of my true love’s hair, in the morning, in the morning.” That has got to be considered a working person’s song, to be heard by a working person to be fully appreciated. I doubt, Lord, if he could even enjoy the breakfast I do. My eggs and bacon may not sound as romantic as the Black Forest breakfasts my German grandmother used to tell us about, of ham and cherry brandy. But it tastes just as good to me sitting at home and would be no better if I were on the Riviera. I know too that I will burn up its calories honestly, I thank you for that.

Lord, it doesn’t seem to me that man was born to “toil and trouble” because not to be born to toil would be double trouble. And if we didn’t toil, Lord, if man disappeared and didn’t work, wouldn’t all trace of his civilization disappear in a hundred years or so, covered over by jungle-like vegetation, taken over by insect life?

So, Lord, thank you for the rhythm of work, for the beat and pulse of the universe that I hear in me when I work. May the word work itself never become the dirty four-letter word some people are trying to make it.

My prayer is that I not lose this dream of the universe and its seat in me while I work. May this dream of mine be in a fabric that never fades, never runs, never splits at the seams, rubs thin or frazzles. And may each of us have his work and his dreaming to do, as our inalienable right and our responsibility.

JACQUES C. LEWIS

CHRISTMAS WASN’T ALWAYS MERRY

Christmas got off to a rocky start after the first settlers from Eng-land landed on the New England shore.

Celebration of the anniversary of the birth of Christ in any way, shape or form was a punishable offense for the first few hundred years after the staid, puritanical Pilgrims stepped ashore at Plymouth.

And it wasn’t until 1856 that the Massachusetts legislature got around to declaring the day a legal holiday.

For any of the first settlers to greet another on the street with a cheerful “Merry Christmas” could very well, and often did, result in the arrest of the guilty person.

The ban on the celebration reflected the varying views of the people in England, greatly divided for centuries on the right and wrong of the

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matter.

When the Puritans gained the upper hand in England they stilled what they described as an annual orgy. In 1644, 14 years after Boston was founded, the British Parliament finally published an ordinance calling for the better observance of Christmas.

Some shop-keepers continued to do business on the day, thus incurring the wrath of those who were opposed to Christmas and there were riots as mobs sought to suppress celebrations of any kind and the pros and cons continued for generations.

There was a clash over the holiday on the first Christmas day in the history of New England. Gov. William Bradford urged the Pilgrims to remain at work. Some did and others objected so the governor finally decided it would be all right if the celebrations were held indoors and not on the streets.

The Massachusetts penalty remained in effect until 1681. Sixteen years after a commission recommended in 1665 that the colonial Christmas penalty, in conflict with the law of England, should be repealed.

From that time on Christmas began to assert itself more and more. The real revival of Christmas coincided with the great number of immigrants who began to pour into the American colonies. The immigrants brought their own customs with them and kept Christmas here as they did in Germany, France, Italy, Sweden and dozens of other foreign nations from which they fled.

Slowly, but relentlessly, the influence of the new Americans brought about a decline of political and religious bitterness.

In 1836 Alabama became the first state to make Christmas a legal holiday, about 20 years before Massachusetts decided the day should be legalized.

From then on the people of the Eastern Seaboard made up for lost time, especially in Boston.

The 19th Century was 30 years old when what is believed to have been the nation’s first Christmas tree glowed in a Boston window. It was in the home of Charles Follen, a political refugee from Germany, who was teaching at Harvard University at the time.

Follen’s neighbors took up the custom and it spread across the city and later across the nation.

Sixty years later Arthur Shurtleff for the first time placed a candle in the window of his Beacon Hill home and soon the windows across the country became lighted at Christmas.

Louis Prang, another German political refugee, printed Boston’s first Christmas cards in 1874, thus launching a vast industry of the present day.

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Philip Brooks, who became Episcopal bishop of Massachusetts, com-posed the poem “0 Little Town of Bethlehem” after visiting the Holy Land.

Another clergyman, Edward H. Sears of Boston wrote the lyrics for “It Came Upon the Midnight Clear.”

By JAMES O’HARA

Copley News Service

THE WORLD SOUL AND EVOLUTION

“As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.”

The universe is infinite. If it has no outer boundary it can have no inner boundary. If it has no outer boundary all things are equally the center of the universe. Each one of us is a center of the manifestation of cosmic energy. As consciousness grows the entity becomes more and more responsible for the creation of the universe in which it lives. Each one of us is responsible for the creation of the universe in which we live.

As a man thinks Auschwitz, hunger, poverty, fear, pain, and violence he manifests these things and experiences them in his life. As a man thinks beauty, energy, upliftment, good works, holiness, and love he manifests and experiences these in his life. The former contributes negative energy to the World Soul while the latter contributes positive energy to the World Soul.

The greater the positive energy of the world soul the greater will be its influence for positive creativity in the force it exerts on the beings who have not themselves reached a level of consciousness great enough to understand this principle of positive thought, self control, and consciousness seeking to be attuned with the Divine to apply it. It is of prime importance then to the positive, creative, upliftment of the evolution of the race to contribute as much of this uplifting energy to the World Soul as possible. This means that the consciously evolving individual has the responsibility to uplift his thoughts to achieve not only his own highest positive creative potential but to thus aid in the development of the race as well.

Such development cannot take place in the mind which constantly dwells on the “ills” it perceives. This only tends to drag down the energy level of the entity and to perpetuate the very negative things it abhors by continuing to give energy to the image. Deprive the negative image of the sustaining energy of the mind which holds it and it will disappear. The race mind which holds the images of poverty, fear and war will not be changed by material means. Disease is not ended by at-tacking the symptoms. Disease ends when the image of it is rooted

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from the mind.

The most effective means an individual has to effect positive change is to perfect his image of himself, of mankind, of the earth, and to live a life in accord with the inner image of creative, positive, uplifting energy flow. In this way he will make his greatest contribution. Through his attunement with the divine he will uplift and perfect his own evolution and he will contribute positive energy to the World Soul, the collective karmic energy of the earth.

To the degree that a positive world soul is created by conscious entities who control their own destiny the evolution of unconscious entities (both men and animals), who draw their instincts from the energy of the world soul, will develop along positive creative lines and achieve a positive creative consciousness. To the degree that the entity is at-tuned to the uplifting force of the Divine, the degree to which he opens his heart to the expressive flow of the Divine-the source of all energy-he will be uplifted and uplifting.

MARGO GROSS

JAVANESE GIFT: 16,000 COCONUTS

(We share with you this article on Gifts, as given in the Valley News of Lebanon, N. H., November 22, 1972.)

Looking in store windows at Christmas time, you’d think that the art of gift-giving had reached its peak.

It may have in terms of the sheer variety of fascinating gifts available to Christmas shoppers. But in terms of the etiquette and ritual of gift-giving, we’ve got a long way to go.

For example, among some Javanese tribes, a common gift is 16,000 coconuts. Exactly 10,000 of them ripe and exactly 6,000 green. Giving 9,999 ripe coconuts would be a breach of etiquette.

Or how about 800 head of cattle? That’s a present some African tribes are fond of. Not 799 and not 801, but exactly 800.

The anthropologists who have observed these foreign customs would probably view some of our gift-giving practices here at home as rituals. Take gift-wrapping. Not many people would dream of presenting an unwrapped gift.

In some places, gift-giving works to equalize wealth and prevent any one man or group of men from amassing too much wealth and power. Reciprocity is at the core of gift-giving. You may only expect a smile or “thank you.” Reciprocity, among the Kwakiutl Indians of Vancouver Island, was a completely different story. When you got a gift, you were expected to reciprocate with something of considerably more value or you lost face.

DECEMBER 1973 9

These Indians developed their concept of reciprocity to a fantastic degree in ceremonies called “potlatches.”

Would you believe 15,000 blankets made from cedar bark? How about six canoes big enough to carry 50 or 60 men on the open sea? Incredible as it sounds those are the kinds of gifts that changed hands in some potlatches. The whole idea was to shame the other fellow by giving him more than he could possibly return.

According to the anthropologists, gift-giving is probably as old as man. Probably the cave men and women did it. Gift-giving, say the experts, has a terrific social importance. Giving gifts is a way of renewing the social bond, the basic links between people.

Even the potlatch functioned that way, according to the experts. It’s something to think about when you are doing your Christmas shopping.

THE AREA OF MUTUAL AGREEMENT

This is the fifth of the prize winning essays submitted in our recent contest for proposals to be considered by an international Congress “to determine the areas of mutual agreement in the social sciences.” It was written by Carl Pernigotti of Klamath Falls, Oregon.

1. Resolved: that it is better that all mankind should have a standard nutritional diet than to have hunger and gluttony.

2. Resolved: that it is better that all mankind should have socialized medicine than to have people suffering and dying needlessly in fear or from lack of funds.

3. Resolved: that it is better that all mankind ignore the imperfections of this life than to give thought form to imperfections thus giving them birth.

4. Resolved: that it is better that all mankind should use sex only as an expression of love than as an expression of lust.

5. Resolved: that it is better that all men should not be allowed to marry until able to support their wife than propagating money stress upon the home, statistics proving that this is the primary cause for divorce.

6. Resolved: that it is better that all parents should have children only if they want them and can afford the responsibility of them than to be burdened.

7. Resolved: that it is better that all mankind have one universal language than to create misunderstandings at a basic level.

8. Resolved: that it is better that all mankind have a universal monetary system and set Standard of Values than to have the present manipulation of said in business.

9. Resolved: that it is better that all mankind does away with all

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advertising, requiring the product to sell itself than to have advertising sell the product.

10. Resolved: that it is better to have “our” world than to have a man’s world or a woman’s world.

WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING

About Christmas

(By Louis Cassels, UPI Religion Writer)

Christmas is a holiday which the early Church took over from the pagans. Some Christians feel the time may have come to give it back to the pagans.

Their viewpoint is expressed by Fr. Peter J. Riga who points out that the celebration of Christmas (Christ’s Mass) originated in the fourth Century A. D., when the Church Christianized a pagan Roman feast associated with the winter solstice.

The Church fathers of that time did not think that Dec. 25 was the actual birth date of Jesus. It is obvious from the gospels that Jesus must have been born in late summer or early autumn – that being the only season when Palestinian shepherds are accustomed to graze their flocks by night.

For centuries, Christmas remained a minor feast day on the Church calendar. But as Christianity spread northward through Europe, its coincidence with pagan winter carnivals made it an increasingly popular holiday.

But, Riga says, modern commercialization has “destroyed not only the religious basis of this feast, but also the human warmth and merriness that grew up around it.”

We are purportedly celebrating at Christmas the birth of a poor man who devoted his life to the unselfish service of others. “Yet we mark the event by spending enormous sums on gluttonous celebrations, with a materialism which would make the Roman pagans look austere, by comparison,” he said.

Riga proposes that Christians surrender Christmas entirely to the hucksters and find another date – such as Epihany Jan. 6 to celebrate the birth of Christ with due reverence and with no gift-giving.

This argument must have considerable appeal to anyone who has seen how very difficult it is for a modern family, however hard it tries, to keep any religious flavor in its Christmas celebration.

DECEMBER 1973 11

But there is something else that needs to be said on this subject. Despite all its commercial and pagan aspects, Christmas remains a season when human beings go out of their way to be nice to each other. And in every act of human kindness, in every gesture of love, the spirit of Jesus Christ is honored whether his name is invoked or not.

For it was precisely this that Jesus came into the world to teach us.

“A new commandment I give unto you,” he told his disciples: “That you love one another.”

That’s what Christmas is all about – loving one another. To wish some-one a Merry Christmas – if he really means it – is just another way of saying, “I love you.”

Merry Christmasl

UFOs INTERNATIONAL

A South American Report

(from LA NACION, September 23, 1971)

Bahia Blanca. Flying objects have been observed near Tres Arroyos and Colonel Dorrego.

In Tres Arroyos the presence of a luminous object was observed by several people on last Tuesday at 10:00 p.m. The object was going towards the west where it turned towards the north. Neither the degree nor the shape could be definitely established, but the witnesses say it was circular and about four meters in diameter.

In Colonel Dorrego young Osvaldo d’Annuncio, 19, an employee at the cooperative at Gil declared that he was walking along the road when he saw one or several objects. These came down in a neighboring field and their descent was accompanied by a loud explosion. At once his arms were paralyzed and his face, arms, and hands burnt, although he did not lose consciousness. The objects passed over a hill not far from him and then flew away, taking on a blue colour. At the moment of their departure, he stressed, a very strong gale like wind shook the neighborhood, and all that remained was a sort of mist, his lesions and a few acres of fields showing traces of fire. He then went to Bahia Blanca to see a doctor who said that his burns were light, the kind you get when too long exposed to the sun, his hands were purple like bruised and from his elbows down to his fingers he was affected by a kind of paralysis.

The village of Gil, about 8 km. from Colonel Dorrego, has also been the scene of a former sighting. A resident of this place while driving in a car was suddenly surprised by a UFO after which, as he declared, he was paralyzed and the motor of his car stopped.

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Skywatch at Katoomba

(Reports by Barry Taylor, UFOIC member and Vice President of UFORPA, NSW, as given in the UFOIC NEWSLETTER, Sydney, Australia, No. 38, April-May 1973.)

A Katoomba couple contacted us saying that they have witnessed many UFO sightings, mainly concentrated over the last three months and insisted that we come to visit them. So nine members of our group headed west for a suspected cold Skywatch at Katoomba. When we arrived we were greeted by a very excited couple who immediately showed us the area where they had witnessed many aerial phenomena in the past. Our attention was immediately drawn to a row of four yellowish-white lights suspended over the Plateau, overlooking Went-worth Falls and Burragorang Valley from what must be the best vantage point in the area. We could see that these four lights were suspended above the plateau and were not part of a road or buildings. This was the fourth night that these lights were seen hovering there.

I immediately set up my camera with a 1200mm telephoto lens and proceeded to snap photographs. I also placed one of Dr. Herbisen-Evans FRAS Spectrum grating slides over the camera lens hoping to capture the colour spectrum of these strange looking lights. The four lights were also observed through powerful binoculars and appeared to be rectangular lights and their formation appeared to be from an object which was curved or round. We immediately named these lights “from a mothership” purely for reference. Reference points were taken in relation to the mothership for observation at first light, suspecting they might still be from a high building.

On either side of the four lights at times a single light was seen slowly approaching, then stopping, then returning to its original position, this also being white. The windows of the so-called mothership would occasionally flare up one at a time, then die down to their original brightness. Further to the right over the Burrogorang Plateau where there is only virgin bushland and unpopulated we observed a number of very bright yellowish-white lights, which would flare up very bright, then die down and eventually go out. These were single lights one at a time, but there were many observed at different parts along the top or above the plateau. Our host has been through the area where the lights were and said there were neither roads nor homes in that area.

When dawn broke we could not see the four lights, they were stationary all night but at first light they just went out, but we could see that this row of lights was definitely not a building but was something suspended in the air with no visible support. What it was we do not know.

I have photographs of the single lights, and an interesting point about them is that they have the same colours as one of the USA recognized

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UFO photographs taken by the astronauts, with white to yellow in the centre, orange to red towards the edges, with a point of green on the top edge. So it was worthwhile bearing the 32′ temperature at Katoomba, not only for the photographs, but also the warm hospitality of these two people who had many more fascinating sightings to tell us.

World report

UFO Class at College

(Columbus Dispatch, Sept. 21, 1973)

BARNESVILLE, Ga. (UPI) Bruce Henne admits that when people talk about unidentified flying objects (UFO) it’s usually met with “a scream of laughter.”

But the psychology instructor is so serious about UFO that he intends to teach a class on the subject at Gordon Junior College next month.

“It seems like an appropriate time,” said the 32-year-old Michigan native. “I think a lot of people in this area want an explanation. Maybe we can give them some conception . . . so they won’t be as afraid.”

Recently a resident of Griffin, Ga., reported seeing a golden, egg-shaped metallic object descend to earth and disappear in a cloud of steam. It was one of numerous reported sightings in the South during the past few weeks.

“An awful lot of what is being reported is either misidentified conventional objects or atmospheric phenomena,” Henne said.

But other unexplainable items are anthropologists operating in our atmosphere and observing us. They are anthropologists because they seem to have an interest in our culture.”

There is a growing body of evidence to support his theory, he said, while conceding that it is difficult to substantiate it.

UFO Blinked at Him

(Columbus Dispatch, Sept. 24, 1973)

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (UPI)-An unidentified flying object blinked its spotlights twice Sunday night, then disappeared into the darkness with a whirring noise, according to Shelby County Sheriff’s Deputy P. L. Pilalas.

Pilalas said he and his partner, J. 0. Davis, were driving on U.S. 70 just east of Memphis when they saw the craft hovering overhead. Two bright spotlights were shining beams straight forward from the craft’s

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altitude of 500 to 1,000 feet, he said, and two red lights were glowing at the extremities of the craft.

“We couldn’t see the craft itself, but only its lights,” he said.

“I flashed my spotlight on the vehicle which appeared to be traveling with us at about 15 m.p.h.”

Federal Aviation Administration officials at Memphis International Airport said they could detect no crafts in the area on their radar screens and had no record of any flights that were supposed to be in the area.

“We let our blue light (on the police car) shine twice and then stopped,” Pilalas said. “The vehicle then flashed its white beams twice and then both the white lights and red lights went out.

“It just disappeared. It made a whirring-type noise for about 30 seconds to a minute, then it was gone.”

At least three other UFO sightings were reported in the Memphis area late Sunday night and early Monday.

The South’s Saucer Seige

(San Francisco [Calif.] Examiner, Oct. 5, 1973)

CAPE GIRARDEAU (Mo.)-UPI -A physics professor investigating a reported attack on a truck driver by an unidentified flying object said today that the victim’s eyeglasses were damaged by internal heat from an unknown source.

In the latest of a series of recent UFO sightings in southeastern Missouri, Eddie Webb, 45, of Greenville, said he was blinded for several hours after the incident. He is recovering his vision, but intends to visit an eye specialist in St. Louis.

Webb said he was driving a tractor-trailer rig about dawn Wednesday when he saw a bright light or aluminum object in the air behind him, “coming up real fast.”

He awakened his wife, Velma, who was asleep in the cab, he said, but she didn’t see anything.

“Then I stuck my head out the window and a large ball of fire struck me in the face,” Webb said. “My glasses fell off and I couldn’t see. But I got the truck stopped.”

Mrs. Webb said her husband screamed, “Oh, my God I’m burned!!

DECEMBER 1973 15

can’t see!”

One of the lenses of his glasses reportedly fell out of the plastic frame, which was warped. Mrs. Webb, who serves as a relief driver, drove him to a hospital.

Sgt. Ed Wright of the Highway Patrol took Webb’s glasses to Dr. Harley Rutledge, head of the Southeast Missouri State University physics department, for an analysis.

Rutledge, who has been working for six months to attempt to identify reported mysterious flying objects, said he put the glasses under a microscope and “it appeared they were heated internally.

“The plastic apparently got hot and the mold came to the surface. The heat warped the plastic, causing the lens to fall out.”

Rutledge said he plans more tests on the glasses. He said there appears to be “some residue which we hope to put through some chemical tests.” Meanwhile in Tupelo, Miss., police reported for the third consecutive night the sighting of what they called multicolored UFOs yesterday.

The Lee County sheriff’s office said two deputies told of seeing brightly lighted objects and that similar reports had come from sheriff’s departments in neighboring Pontotoc and Itawamba counties.

Sun Energy

(Daily Courier, Grants Pass, Ore., Sept. 8, 1973)

SPACE CENTER, Houston (AP)-The massive solar flares photo-graphed by the Skylab 2 astronauts raise the question: How can this great energy source be harnessed for use on power-short earth?

Alan L. Bean, Dr. Owen K. Garriott and Jack R. Lousma on Friday observed the largest sun eruption of 1973, and scientists on the ground produced these mind-boggling figures:

It was 10 times the size of the earth and equal to the power of more than 100 million atomic bombs. The energy generated was enough to supply the electrical power needs of the world for half a million years.

It would supply the total energy needs of the earth, including such things as automobile and industrial engines, for 5,000 years or more. “It’s a big daddy,” said Skylab 2 commander Bean as he and his crew-mates aimed their $121.1-million array of eight telescopes at the thermonuclear explosion and the radiation it spewed into space.

In recent years, considerable research, especially in the United States, has been devoted to finding a means of tapping the sun’s energy. The research resulted in the solar cells that convert the sun’s rays to electricity to operate the Skylab station and most unmanned space satellites. Christmas is a gift from heaven above, Christmas is Peace, Christmas is Love.

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He’s Seen One

(Medford [Ore.] Mail Tribune, Sept. 16, 1973)

STATESBORO, Ga. (UPI)-Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter said Thurs-day he and a group of friends were coming out of a dinner meeting one night several years ago, when they saw a big, shining light in the shape of a flying saucer hovering overhead.

“I don’t laugh at people any more when they say they’ve seen UFO’s,” he said, “because I’ve seen one myself.”

There have been a rash of UFO reports across the South in recent weeks. The most recent two came from Chattanooga, Tenn., where two Hamilton County policemen and a security officer for a motel said they watched a UFO early Thursday.

Carpets of Green

(South American Digest, Sept. 18, 1973)

With the approach of Spring, the South African Chamber of Mines is preparing to intensify its work of creating a carpet of greenery over dusty old mine dumps and slimes dams, an undertaking that costs the mining industry more than R500 000 a year, and results in covering about 500 000 hectares of waste dumps each year, writes Carel Birkby in the Sunday Times.

Along the Witwatersrand, between Randofontein and Nigel alone, there are 100 sand dumps and 250 slimes dams. The reclamation task is immense.

Mr. Gordon Grange, technical adviser to the Chamber of Mines, said: “The gold mines are doing their part in cleaning up the Witwatersrand and bringing back the veld and nature to the centre of Johannesburg.

“In the mid-1960s attempts to mothball the dumps in plastics, resins and bitumen failed because these coatings proved vulnerable to hail, weathering and the sharp hooves of cattle.

“About 1 500 experiments were conducted, and it became clear that, if properly treated, the slimes and sand would support plant life. “Insect, bird, reptile and animal life moves quickly on to the mine dams and dumps as soon as the vegetation begins to grow.

♦ ♦ ♦

Give us, 0 God, the vision which can see Thy Love in the world, in spite of human failure. Give us the faith to trust Thy Goodness, in spite of our ignorance and weakness. Give us the knowledge that we may continue to pray with understanding hearts, and show us what each one of us can do to set forward the coming of the day of universal peace. Amen.

FIRST PRAYER FROM SPACE APOLLO 8

CHRISTMAS EVE, 1968

DECEMBER 1973 17

Book reviews

The Lazy Man’s Guide to Enlightenment

(THE LAZY MANS GUIDE TO ENLIGHTENMENT, by Thaddeus Golas. Published by The Seed Center, 162 University Ave., Palo Alto, Ca. 94301, $1.50.)

Thaddeus Golas begins chapter one with a simple and basic view of the Universe; ” . . . and the rest of the book discusses our lives from that viewpoint,” covering such areas as space-matter-energy relationships, love, fear, time, reality and illusion, and space beings.

His basic view of the universe is that: “We are equal beings and the universe is our relations with each other. The universe is made of one kind of entity: each one is alive, each determines the course of his own existence … Every particle in every atom is a live being.”

“The basic function of each being is expanding and contracting. Expanded beings are permeative; contracted beings are dense and impermeative … When we are completely expanded we have a feeling of total awareness, of being one with all life . . . To the degree that he is contracted, a being is unable to be in the same space with others, so contraction is felt as fear, pain, unconsciousness, ignorance, hatred, evil … he is a mass particle.”

Golas refreshed me with his discussion of our lives from this view-point. Here are a few of his extrapolations:

Love: “Love is the action of being in the same space with other beings . . . “

Different Plane of Existence with differing densities: “The more we withdraw from loving other beings, the more of a ‘physical’ world we will contend with . . . the more we open up to our brothers and sisters, the less solid the world becomes.”

The ‘Golden Rule’: “One of the necessary laws for our relations as equal beings is this: What you say goes-but only for you and those who agree with you . . . It is precisely your unlimited power to control your experience that hangs you up. How much compassion and forgiveness do you want for yourself? Give it to others.”

18 UNDERSTANDING

Time: ” . . . When we are completely expanded, the time is always now . . . the faster you are vibrating, and the more messages you get back from your environment, the slower events will appear to be happening, and the more you will feel you are in control.”

Space Beings, unseen helpers: “You’re never alone-there are many (equal, live) beings aware of you at all times, loving you, ready to make you feel it whenever you are ready to open up to it, taking care to see that you don’t get in too deep, encouraging you to love yourself.”

Humility and Pride: “While we have enough humility and pride to act on the knowledge that we exist in an infinite harmony, that we are neither greater nor lesser than any others, we can enjoy exquisite spiritual wealth and pleasures.”

Golas’s basic concept and extrapolations invite the reader to re-view his environment, relationships, ideas, and choices from a new vantage point. Here are a few re-views that come to mind:

1. These equal live beings in various groupings must influence each other throughout the universe, be they in planets, stars, space human bodies, or any other form. Is astrology the beginning of a study of their mutual influences?

2. If these equal live beings (particles) can join or leave a group and rejoin later after moving about, then teleportation, astral travel, clairvoyance, and reincarnation might be the results.

3. Eternal life is affirmed from Golas’s viewpoint; there are no un-live beings; and death is but the breakup of temporary groupings.

4. As we carry a recollection of our experiences as parts of many groupings and circumstances, don’t we assemble within any new grouping or body a “collective unconscious” and “race memory”?

Golas also tells us of our potential. We are but channels of spiritual joy, and to continue to have it we need only be open channels … if we have the light coming over our shoulders, shining through us, we will see the beauty of others, we will be open to the light coming through all forms, and know the glory of Creation. And I say it often: “Thank you, brothers and sisters, for letting my consciousness be in this place.”

BILL STEVENS

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Dear Understanding, Inc.:

Last week here at the British Columbia Penitentiary, we were given a very interesting lecture by a member of the Vancouver Area Flying Saucer Club, on the subject of UFOs. I asked Herbert D. Clark, the President of the club, if he could provide us with some reading material on

DECEMBER 1973 19

the phenomena, and he gave me your address, suggesting I write to you for a greater variety of material. A few of us here, have become interested in UFOs and we would appreciate very much any literature you could send us on the subject.

Thank you,

Lindsay Taylor #7219

Box 150, B. C. Pen.

New Westminster, B. C. Canada

(May we suggest that UFO Publications also send sample literature to the group.)

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Not Too Late

There is still time to take advantage of our Annual Christmas Gift Rate on subscriptions to the Understanding Magazine-10 issues for $2.00.

Do remember your family, friends, local library, merchants, and any-one else interested in promoting a better world through understanding. A gift card will be sent with the December issue. Thank you!

Our President on the Road

Ever since July, Dr. Daniel W. Fry, President of Understanding, Inc. has been on the move. He has spent time in Arizona, lectured in Alaska, Vancouver, Canada, Texas and Florida, and way points.

He is expected in Merlin for the Annual Business Meeting of Understanding, October 20 and 21, after which he lectures, first for the Inglewood

20 UNDERSTANDING

Unit #15, in Los Angeles, and then at the Understandorama, sponsored by Mrs. Esther Ellsworth of the San Bernardino Unit #71. Your reporter has not yet heard the schedules for November and December (we go to press October 15th), but we know Dr. Fry will continue spreading the principles of “a better understanding among all peoples of earth, and of those not of earth.”

Unit Lectures

The news bulletin from Unit #37 of Buffalo, New York reports on a recent Unit lecture, given by Rev. Gladys L. Rehac. Rev. Rehac is a professional astrologer who teaches “self-development through use of the natal horoscope.” Her subject was: Human Understanding through Astrology.

UFO Chairman, Norman Weis, once again “gave a report from his bountiful well of resources.”

A recent news report from Unit #15 of Inglewood California, tells of a lecture by Mrs. Mai Whiteside, teacher and authority on the subject of dreams and dream therapy. Her lecture was entitled: Understanding Dreams, and included interesting illustrations of answers revealed by dreams.

CLASSIFIED DEPARTMENT

6c per word per insertion; 3 or more insertions same copy, 5c per word.

THE LIFE SOURCE, Its very detail open to view in FUNDAMENTALS OF THOUGHT, by L. Ron Hubbard. Send $3.00 to: Book Store U, Founding Church of Scientology, 1812 19th St. N.W., Washington, D.C. 20009.

EDITING AND TYPESETTING for individuals, publishers, printers, and organizations. Very reasonable rates. Latest IBM computer typesetting equipment. Over 20 years experience in publications as Production Supervisor and Senior Editor. Query Wanna Walker, 13880 Highway 66, Ashland, Or. 97520 about your book manuscript, your organization’s publication, “job-shop” work.

NEW FROM SS&S PUBLICATIONS: SPACEDUST – New and startling UFO and space stories which are not likely to have been read anywhere before. Special bonus story by Gray Barker. Illustrated, Price: $1. 95. Large 8’% x 11 format. Mail orders to: Gene Duplantier, Dept. UN, 17 Shetland St., Willowdale. Ontario, Canada M2M 1 X5 (Personal and bank money orders 25c additional to cover bank charges.)

YEAR BOOKS AVAILABLE

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1968-1969-1970-1971

Are now available in convenient Yearbooks.

Price: $2.00 per volume, plus 25c for handling.

Issues 1960 through 1967 at $1.00 per volume, plus 25c handling.

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SEASON’S GREETINGS

From

The Editor and Staff

Understanding Magazine

May Your Christmas

Be Merry

And

The New Year Bring Joy

Through Understanding

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Understanding Volume 18 Number 10

A POINT IN HISTORY

THE MASTER’S PERSONALITY

A WORKER’S PRAYER OF THANKS

CHRISTMAS WASN’T ALWAYS MERRY

THE WORLD SOUL AND EVOLUTION

JAVANESE GIFT: 16,000 COCONUTS

THE AREA OF MUTUAL AGREEMENT

WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING

UFOs INTERNATIONAL

World report

Book reviews

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

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