Here we have the Triple Gem. As Rosemary mentioned in the old student's talk, wherever you are you have a type of security which doesn't depend on the outward. Focus your mind on the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Sangha, and you have an inner security. The Dhamma, in particular, is the main thing here because that's the teachings.
Now, if any of you have read or studied a little bit about World War II, and in fact basically any major war and such things, you're going to find that in between all the horror stories and everything, there are some people on the oppressed side who are deeply spiritual and are the leaders in the concentration camps, the leaders in the prison wards, and so on. And they're the ones who can hold things together - because they have a spiritual belief, whether it's Buddhist or not doesn't matter. That spiritual belief is something extra that goes beyond this body, it believes that there's something more that goes beyond just the physical realm that we're looking at.
Granted that's a belief system, but it does prove to help people and this is where the Dhamma, as far as Buddhism goes, is the thing that we're going to hold onto. Now it's not just a belief for the future, but it's also something that supports us in the present moment so that we don't bend our principles, that we actually have such a strong security in this that we won't bend.
Along the line of wars, we have prisoners, even one of the guys who ran for president recently in America, was a prisoner of war and was tortured and this and that, and they wanted him to denounce America and this and that, and of course that's typical stuff, propaganda and everything. And a lot of people, when they're in that position will automatically do it because they don't want the physical pain, but someone else who has a strong conviction will not denounce; in particular in that case, he would not denounce the U.S.A.
Whether that's always good or bad is not what we're discussing here, it's the fact that the person had a conviction, and he was able to stick by it even though he was being tortured, even though he might die, he had a conviction that would not allow him to lie, would not allow him to bend to evil people or whom he interpreted as evil people at the time.
This is a different sort of security that we can have, this is a security that doesn't allow us to bend, that we're going to hold onto principles. The principles, so far as this case goes, are the Dhamma, that we hold onto it so tight, we're not going to let go of it. If somebody comes up to me and starts torturing me and says, "Denounce Buddhism, Denounce Buddhism, become a Christian, Muslim, anything." I think I'd rather die, because understanding the law of Kamma and understanding that I would then be bowing to somebody's pressure and physical pain. The fact is that my body's going to die anyhow whether I'm 52 or 82, and holding onto my principles is a type of security. So this is something that can help people a lot in the letting go of fear and worry and the fact that it is relative, everything is insecure, but this thing we hold onto inside is different.