Roman

I can give you some background. I hope it's helpful. I was living in China about 20 years ago and working at a college. One of my students practiced Falun Dafa - the meditation and Qigong exercises and the beliefs based on the School of Buddhism.

Communist regime actually gave awards to Falun Dafa because it was decreasing China's healthcare costs. It was the most popular Qigong system in China. I saw people practicing in parks.

It's just that when the communist party found that there were more people doing this (70-100 million) than were members of the communist party (65 million), several leaders got scared. This was around the time I was living there. The regime began to malign the group and then persecute them - beating them up, putting them in jail, torturing them, killing.

So, a small group of them who are accomplished (perhaps you disagree, but they really are) in arts created the dance and music company that became Shen Yun.

Because I lived in China and saw how terrified the people are to stand up for what's right, I give Shen Yun big props for what they do.

I've seen the performance before. In that last scene, the Buddha comes to rescue all of humanity, not just the Falun Dafa people.

This group is actually chipping away at the armor of the biggest cult in the world - the Chinese Communist Party.