The Virgin Mary and I - Part I: CA until December 5th 2006
It is hard to explain how I was driven to the Catholic teaching. Actually, I was attending a Gnostic church, which is related with Mary Magdalene. It was the beginning of Summer of last year, I made a vow to Mary Magdalene and started to attend the church. Meanwhile, I was interested to learn about the Californian Missions. I was studying anthropology and wanted to know about the rolls of the missions as their history contains the Native Americans in their area. It was Friday in the first week of September last year when I visited the Mission Camel and kneed down to pray at the alter for Our Lady of Bethlehem. That was my first time I prayed in a church and also it was the first time I prayed for a Christian figure. Learning that John Paul II made private prayer to that statue from the engraved stone tile, I decided to to try if I could pray like other religious people. I prayed to Our Lady of Bethlehem for a peaceful solution of the discrimination at the university. Since there was a practice of wedding going on in the main area of the church, and I was not sure if I could concentrate on my praying. To my surprise, someone playing pipe organ helped me to focus on my praying.
On Saturday, the next day I visited the Mission Camel, I drove to the Mission San Jose. At that time, I did not know its patron saint is St. Joseph, the spouse of Virgin Mary. I purchased a small rosary for souvenir. To be honest, I did not know what rosary is for. I just purchased as I liked its size and shape.
Middle of last September, I visited Mission Santa Cruz. My intention was to know about Our Lady of Querretaro, which figure is in Mission Camel. As I was learning about gnosticism and Holy Sophia in the church, I wanted to study about other figures related with Holy Sophia. In Spanish, “querre” means vessel. I was trying to find the roots of that figure in the CA Missions. In the Santa Cruz Mission, I saw a large painting of Our Lady of Guadalupe. It was the elderly woman at the cashier who explained me about the history of Our Lady of Guadalupe and how her figure is popular in the CA Missions. At my first sight, I liked the painting, as her dress is elegantly decorated with native designs and her face shows mysterious smile. I liked her posture and the way she was painted. I purchased a pendant with her figure on it as well as the one with St. Frances, the patron saint of animals, for my bird.
One week later, the gnostic church had a celebration for St. Frances' day. To know about St. Frances, I purchased 2 books about him at a local used book store. This happened before the day of his feast.
October 16th last year, I was sent to a mental hospital on my way to my classroom. I was handcuffed by the university police officers at the anthropology department office. It happened when I saw the department chairwoman standing in front of my night class and asked me to visit her office for small conversation. The director of the counseling service wrote the document for the transportation but she did the diagnosis without seeing me. At the first hospital, the African American security officer took my rosary away for my safety, but they arrowed me to keep the pendant of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
At morning of October 17th, the day after I was imprisoned in the emergency medical unit, the EPS came and put me in the carrier and strapped me and transported to a hospital in another city. There I hard their plan of killing me by “medication.” As I could make a contact with the director of equal opportunity service at school, they changed their plan of killing as it seemed obvious in the circumstance. In the second hospital, I was raped while I was asleep by heavy doze of sleeping pills. It seemed they filmed that event as some interns from the university I was attending talked about the characteristics of my body in the hospital. During the hospital staying, I never tried to take off the pendant as it seemed only thing I could pray for.
I talked with the psychiatrist and agreed to not taking action on students' discrimination on me. Also, I agreed to stop the investigation by the equal opportunity service on campus. The psychiatrist knew my parents coming from Japan on next Wednesday and asked me to stay in the hospital. I had no idea why I had to stay there – waking up in morning with pain in abdomen and bleeding as well as frequent nasal bleeding. I am not a toy for the students or the professors.
During next week, my parents came and was taken as hostages by the gang stalkers. They made a plan of killing them and make me as the prime suspect, so that I visited the Capital building, four hours from the city I lived, for the purpose of both making alibis and submitting the evidences of discrimination to the governor.
My parents were mind-controlled while I was looking for a way to change the situation. However, submitting the evidence made them to think I am useful for them. Actually, I tried to agree to marry with the professor who wanted to take me to Canada, which she has citizenship from her previous marriage. Actually, I thought that going to a French speaking country with the professor who played my body while I was imprisoned in the hospital seemed a good solution. At least, I could focus on my study of Mary Magdalene there and taking the rape and discrimination as a part of my destiny to follow the path like Mary Magdalene.
However, the professor betrayed me and she decided to marry with another professor in the department. And then I found the gang stalkers started to harass me again wherever I went. This time, I was followed by the government officials. Nowhere to go, I parked my car near Santa Cruz Mission at night and wrote poems to spend time and prayed Our Lady of Guadalupe as I was doing so in the days in the hospital.
Being threaten to be shot, I tried to drive down to San Diego and started to my pilgrimage to the California Missions. It was 28th November I drove down to San Diego. Then I spent time in the Missions for seeking sanctuary. Yes, no where is safe for the victim of gang stalkers. But, I prayed to the patron saints of each Missions and prayed for Our Lady of Guadalupe. All missions except the one in Sonoma have her figure. I was told that my candle offerings will be removed from the church by them, but I did so in everywhere if I found an opportunity. On of the mission locates inside of army base, I did not hesitated to go in as I felt I must finish visiting all of them.
Because there was a concert going on, I was unable to go in to Mission San Rafael.
I finished visiting the last one in the day before I went back to my country. It was about 3:30pm I could reach the one in Sonoma. It was almost miracle to finish it as I had no idea how long it would take nor the estimation of days it takes. I visited two or three missions per day and it happened. Probably I am few of the people ever visited all missions and cried out in each of them. If Mary Magdalene was tower of religious strength, I learned how to strengthen my faith by following the path of Jesus Christ, being mocked and discriminated by the people.