Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
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This is the program
bringing you up-to-date news,
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views, discussion
and interesting guests
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speaking on Religious
Liberty in the United States
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and around the world.
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My name is Lincoln Steed,
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editor of Liberty
magazine and my guest
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on this program
Mr. Dr. John Graz,
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world leader for
Religious Liberty
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for the
Seventh-day Adventist Church.
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I'm very happy to
be with you, Lincoln
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It's always a pleasure
to have you on the program,
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this is not the first
nor have the last time.
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Looking at you and
thinking about what we both do
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for Religious
Liberty and remembering
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Liberty magazine, you know,
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I have to say that we
follow some great leaders.
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There's been
people before us that--
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when I was growing up,
they were just heroes to me.
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On Liberty magazine,
there was Roland Hegstad
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and I can remember
just being in rapture
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listening to him
talking about religious freedom
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in the Soviet
Union or the like of
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but people standing
for the faith there.
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Another person that
I see him now and then
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but the memory of him is
just overwhelming is Bert Beach.
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Bert Beach. Your
immediate predecessors.
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Oh, yeah and we worked
ten years together. Yeah.
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Even if he was not
working fulltime, you know,
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that was a privilege for
me to work with him as advisor
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and for religious freedom
and inter church relations
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and it's also a great
pleasure because you know
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being with Bert
it's always an event,
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you know, Bert
is such a presence--
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Great personality. Has
just so presence that when his--
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you know something
happens when he leaves,
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you know, things
are becoming normal.
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But, you know, we
know him personally,
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and I of course
knew Roland Hegstad,
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he has been retired a long
time, not a presence anymore.
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But more than just
the immediate human being
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we know they've
done a great work.
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These are icons in my
view of religious freedom.
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I was happy the other day to
get an advance copy of a book,
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a biography that
Bert Beach, has written,
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laying out some of the great
experiences of his life. Yeah.
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And I could recommend
that some of our viewers
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that have access to
books published by the Review
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and Herald
Publishing Association.
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They should get this book.
It's just recently released.
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It'll be at Adventist camp
meetings in the next few months
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and then after that
in Adventist book stores.
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And I had the privilege
to write the forewords.
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Did you? I didn't notice that.
Yeah, it was great privilege.
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But what's one of
the more memorable things
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that you remember in
this crossover period
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when you're working with Bert?
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You know many things, you know,
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first you know it has
always been a pleasure
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to work with
Bert, to travel with him
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because he has such a presence
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that he makes
things you know different.
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When he attends
a meeting you know
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things are becoming different.
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You can see at first, you know,
he speaks several languages.
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It means he has
never any kind of problem
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to speak Italian,
French, German, Swiss German,
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English, and so on and so on.
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It means that, hey
man, there is someone,
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who is
different, a real diplomat.
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Then also, you know,
and mainly when we have
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a meeting with
other religious leaders,
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you know, he introduced me to
the Christian world communion.
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He was the secretary of
this fabulous group of leaders,
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Christian leaders, which
is a conference, a meeting.
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And he was a
secretary for thirty two years.
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It means he got such
authorities in this group that
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they elected him
elected him year after year.
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And he prepared my
coming and they elected me
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after eight years and I
have been there for ten years.
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It means that I follow
really his traditions there.
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And everyone
recognized that Bert has
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a kind of inerrant
authority and also very precise,
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you know, when we
needed to have a text,
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precise text like a
statement we asked Bert.
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Well he understood
religious liberty viscerally.
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He didn't have
to think about it.
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He lived it. Yeah, exactly.
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And you mentioned all
the languages he knew.
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He was a
diplomat, but in some ways
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he transcended the
form of diplomacy because
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he had become
personal friend with so many
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of these religious
leaders particularly.
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Yeah, year after year
there is a special meeting
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when you have I
talked about the meeting
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of the concerts of the
Christian world communion.
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You meet them after
15 years or 10 years.
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Of course at the end
you're older than them.
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You know the story of
the group better than them.
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And of course you become
a good friend of every one.
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This is the way
we work, you know.
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Every time you
become friend with someone
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you have new doors open
and which was very interesting
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with Bert is, you
know he had the gift
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of being really
a strong Adventist.
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When some people say that
Bert Beach he has done that,
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you know, I can really
be the witness of a man
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who has never been, you know,
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never feel any
shame to be an Adventist.
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He defended the
Adventist Church.
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Just representing
the Adventist Church.
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He represented very well.
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You know, nobody who met him
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could say that who is this guy?
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Is he an Adventist or not?
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They knew that
Bert Beach is here.
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You know, he
will defend his church
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if his church is attacked.
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He will explain things
and he will have always
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a word of humor, you know,
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he had a lot of
humor and people laughed,
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but through that he is
really a strong person.
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When you're leading to something
many more than Adventists
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watch this program, but
I know a lot of long time
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Adventists watched this
program and some of them
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may have expressed
these comments well you know
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that Bert Beach or may
be you or others of us,
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you know, they giving out--
they compromising our views
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meeting with these other
religious leaders and so on.
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I think such people
miss the whole point
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of what Bert and
now what you're doing.
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But this is--it's given that
we're Seventh-day Adventists.
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It's given that
religious freedom means that
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we got to promote
our views and that
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we are not giving
into some one else.
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But we need to have
this dialogue of this
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cooperative spirit
to enhance the shared
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commitment to religious liberty.
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We have always to ask what
is the purpose of this meeting?
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What is the
purpose of the meeting?
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You need to meet people
from different religion,
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different phase, people
from government and so on.
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You don't make a selection.
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You know, Jesus met
people from different phase,
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different opinion and so on.
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You have to meet them
to establish your contact
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and to explain to them
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why you're
defending religious freedom?
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Why you believe that
religious freedom is important?
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You know, you
cannot just attack them,
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that's not the good way.
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And sometime
people will say to Bert,
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you know, I saw you.
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You were shaking the
hand of an archbishop
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or protestant leaders and
he said, but you know in--
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in a civilized way this is
the way we say good morning
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to someone when
we have a meeting.
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It means we have to
make a difference between
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a kind of
negotiation and, you know,
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we have no right
to negotiate anything
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and adjust
relations with people.
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And if you're a
Christian you try to have
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good relations with people.
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But you keep, you know,
you keep what you believe.
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You know our
president Ted Wilson said to me
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several times, you
know, make friends...
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make friends without
compromising your faith,
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but make friends,
it's so important.
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We saw Apostle Paul, you know,
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and especially in
Ephesus when he had
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these revolution against him.
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You know, he was
won by official friends
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by some friends who were
working at the government level,
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but he had to make friends too.
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Yeah. I mean-- You
know, and I think Bert
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was very
effective in doing that.
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And I know that some of
his contacts even contingent.
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And I can--I can
remember, you know,
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we visited the
former President of
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the United Nation
Human Rights Committee.
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He became a good friend of
us, very good friend of us,
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and I met him in
November in Geneva last year.
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And I remember, he
asked me what about Bert?
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What Bert is doing?
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And, you know, his
eyes just were like that.
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What about Bert?
What he is doing?
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Because they remember Bert Beach
as a very interesting person,
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you know, someone who
was very free to explain
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what he believed and also
time to time to have a joke.
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They loved very much him.
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Well, number of times
Bert's come to my office.
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He has mentioned that he just
got a letter from one of the--
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I won't name the
individual but their office,
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one of the previous
arch bishops of Canterbury.
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Yeah, yeah. Nothing official
just...keeping in contact.
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I should say, you
know, we met with Bert.
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We met a lot of
these people including
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the archbishop of Canterbury.
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He knew him and but,
you know, all these people
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who met Bert remember him.
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That's interesting
because when you met them
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after you know,
very often they say,
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hey what about
the-- what about--
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I said Bert Beach?
Yeah, what about Bert Beach?
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He was not everywhere.
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And that is where a
fellow Seventh-day Adventist
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I think can be proud
that they are representatives
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of their Church who
are making these contacts
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at all levels of
government and all levels
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of religious
administration around the world,
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not giving away anything.
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In fact promoting like
Paul. You mentioned Paul.
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I think that was a
special role that Paul had
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in contacting government
leaders and some other church,
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that was a different
dynamic back then, you know,
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he was being
handed by the Judias,
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but I think Paul was open enough
to deal with other factions.
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And you know, before
Bert Beach and Bert Beach
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also was very influenced
by someone who was called,
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his name was Dr.
Nussbaum in Europe
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and he was probably
the prince of diplomats.
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And he used to visit
head of state, you know,
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he talked at the United Nation
about the calendar issues.
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He talked with many presidents.
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He was invited-- he was a friend
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of Eleanor Roosevelt and so on.
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And he has influenced
lot of people after him.
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And Bert work
started to work with him
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and he had good memories.
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And it means as you talk, you
know, there are a list of people
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who influenced each
other and we can continue
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the work God has given to us.
00:11:21.12\00:11:23.33
Well, Isaac Newton said
that "we stand on the shoulders
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of those who came before us."
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Well, the figure is a
little hard to comprehend.
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And Bert has also, you know,
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we have spent so
many time together
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and I remember when
he was 70, his wife said,
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Bert you know you used
to say that when you are 70,
00:11:39.48\00:11:45.40
you will be totally
retired because I need you
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to stay here at
home also, have some rest
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and you said
that because you know
00:11:50.95\00:11:52.90
the bishops are retired at 70.
00:11:52.93\00:11:56.30
And when he was
75, his wife said,
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Elaine said to him,
Bert, now you're 75.
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You have to stop and stay home.
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And you said that the
bishop was retired at 70.
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He say, yes, but the
cardinal are retired at 75.
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That was Bert, you know.
00:12:11.90\00:12:13.27
And then wasn't it
played as Republic,
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the rule of finished
at 80, rule from 40 to 80.
00:12:16.44\00:12:20.37
And he still
invited, I should say,
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and there's always an event
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when you can have
Bert Beach in a meeting.
00:12:23.59\00:12:25.56
What did he say about
Moses when he was 120 years,
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his vision wasn't diminished?
00:12:30.46\00:12:31.83
So I think in a good course
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people's energy
can stay with them.
00:12:34.98\00:12:37.27
But I just wanted to take
that little time to remember
00:12:37.30\00:12:40.66
Bert Beach and what he had
done for religious liberty.
00:12:40.69\00:12:43.27
He is still
alive very much alive,
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but you know the
torch has passed to you.
00:12:44.71\00:12:46.48
And I want our viewers to know
that there are powerful leaders
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that are doing great
things for religious liberty
00:12:50.94\00:12:53.31
in our church and of
course in many other forums.
00:12:53.34\00:12:56.89
We will be right
back after a break
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to continue our discussion.
00:12:58.40\00:12:59.77