Va. victims lived lives of spirituality

MEDIA GENERAL NEWS SERVICE
Published: November 29, 2008

Alan Scherr's decades of commitment to spirituality and simple living earned him recognition as an inspiring teacher of astrology, self-awareness and meditation.

Scherr, 58, described his life as a "challenging . . . solitary journey." That journey led him to Mumbai, India, where he and his daughter Naomi, 13, were among more than 150 people killed by terrorists in attacks that began Wednesday.

Scherr was a 12-year resident at the Synchronicity Foundation, a spiritual group based in Nelson County that promotes a high-tech form of meditation.

"He was an extremely valued member of Synchronicity," Vice President Bobbie Garvey said of Scherr, formerly a professor at the University of Maryland. The decades-long devotee to meditation was a spokesman for the group and edited its books.

Scherr joined Synchronicity in 1996 when his daughter was 2 months old. She was home-schooled, finished the eighth grade a year early, scored 92 percent on her Secondary School Admission Test and had planned to apply to the Emma Willard School in Troy, N.Y., to attend high school.

"She was a shining star, absolutely brilliant" and sociable, Garvey said.

In India, Naomi had been working on an essay to accompany her application to the boarding school, had her nose pierced, obtained shawls and Indian garb, scheduled massages and was enjoying her pilgrimage, Garvey said.

The Scherrs were with a Synchronicity group at the Oberoi Hotel in Mumbai when it was attacked. Master Charles Cannon, the group's founder and spiritual leader, led a group of 16 Americans, including seven from Nelson County; seven Australians; and four Canadians on a trip to India that began Nov. 14.

Master Charles remains in India, where he escaped the attacks by spending 45 hours locked in his hotel room. Four other Synchronicity members in the cafe were wounded. They were due back Monday.

"This was like a pilgrimage," Garvey said. The group was taking day trips from Mumbai, meditating and visiting religious communities.

Scherr's wife, Kia, is with her mother and two older sons (Naomi's half brothers) in Florida. She is also a member of Synchronicity.

According to a 2000 essay that Alan Scherr published on Realization.org, he became acquainted with Cannon after 25 years of diligent meditation. "It is pleasure almost to the point of unbearable ecstasy," he wrote upon meeting the mystic, a former actor who is a disciple of a prominent Indian spiritual guru, The Washington Post reported.

In a June 2007 story in the Charlottesville Daily Progress, Cannon and Scherr recounted the frequent appearance of an apparition at the group's sanctuary. "Sometimes there's a visual phenomenon, but that's not as common as other experiences I've had, which would be a sense of very deep stillness when I'm at the site," Scherr said.

Such stillness was not always in Scherr's life. He wrote of living a "journey to hell and back" while making an "attempt at keeping up the facade of my life as a suburban householder" before joining Synchronicity in 1996. That was the same year he filed for bankruptcy in Maryland, according to federal court records.

Joining the community left him "flying high."

"The miracle of this life," he wrote, "continues to unfold for me on [a] daily basis."
Tony Gonzalez of The (Waynesboro) News Virginian, Scott Marshall of The Nelson County Times and David Ress of The Times-Dispatch contributed to this report.