Recently, thanks to the pervasive presence of Vaisesika Dasa, ISKCON’s Minister of Book Distribution, the devotees of ISKCON London Sankirtan brought an unusual surge of spiritual energy to the streets of London on the grand day of the Monthly Sankirtan Festival (MSF).

This devotional, inspiring, and encouraging spirit was further enhanced by the presence of Nirakula Devi Dasi, who commemorated every devotee’s endeavor.

Sankirtan warriors from the Bhaktivedanta Manor and ISKCON London Soho Radha Krishna Temple united with one heart and purpose as they charged towards the streets of central London. The mission was bold and spiritually significant — the sacred distribution of Srimad Bhagavatam and the echo of the Holy Names on the street, to every soul we meet.

This MSF is a powerful declaration of intent as devotees came together in full support of the Bhadra Campaign’s ambitious goal of distributing 100,008 Bhagavatam sets, while ISKCON London embraces our very own, humble and personal offering of 600 sets to honor 60 years of ISKCON.

Read more: https://iskconnews.org/london-devotees-unite-for-bhadra-campaign-book-distribution/

By Kulavati Krishnapriya Devi Dasi, 

Sankirtanamrita: The Nectar of Sri Krsna Sankirtana, the newly released book by Navina Nirada Dasa, published by the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust (BBT), has been acclaimed across the ISKCON world as a landmark contribution to Vaishnava literature. Blending memoir, philosophy, and practical guidance, it offers a deeply personal exploration of sankirtana, which is the sacred mission of sharing Krishna consciousness through transcendental literature from nearly four decades of lived dedication.

His journey began in 1984, when he joined ISKCON in Zurich at just 15 and soon became one of the leading book distributors. He has since traveled extensively around the world, served as ISKCON’s Minister of Book Distribution, trained thousands in preaching and leadership, founded the Vaishnava Academy in Mayapur, and was the first devotee to earn his Bhaktivedanta degree from the Mayapur Institute. He started a spiritual center in San Francisco and continues to teach, mentor, and personally distribute books, thereby embodying the message of his work.

Read more: https://iskconnews.org/book-review-sankirtanamrita-the-nectar-of-sri-krsna-sankirtana/

B.g. Lecture 1969:

Devotee: Prabhupāda? Does Lord Jesus Christ appear in the spiritual sky with the body he manifested on the earth?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Otherwise how there can be resurrection? Ordinary body cannot be resurrected. He appeared in his spiritual body, certainly. Jesus Christ told, if I remember, that “Lord, excuse these persons,” who were crucifying him. Is it not? He knew that “These rascals, they are killing me, but… They are offending certainly. So they do not know that I cannot be killed, but they are thinking that they are killing.” You see?

But that was offensive, therefore he begged Lord to be excused because God cannot excuse to the offenders of the devotee. He can excuse one who is offender to God, but if somebody is offender to the devotee, God never excuses. Therefore he prayed for them.

That is devotee’s qualification. He prays for everyone, even of his enemy. And he could not be killed. That he knew. But those rascals, they thought they were killing Jesus Christ.

Source: https://ramaiswami.com/srila-prabhupada-on-jesus-christ-3/

A former student of psychology traces his life, from childhood to now from looking up to others to looking into himself.

On June 17, 1959, with summer vacation just a few days away, I walked onto my grammar school playground in a lighthearted mood. Just then my best friend Billy rushed over to me with wide eyes. Did you hear the news?!”

“What news?”

“This morning Superman killed himself! He shot himself in the head with a luger!”

At first I thought Billy was kidding, but soon I noticed that everyone in the yard was talking about the story George Reeves, TV’s Superman, had committed suicide. II couldn’t believe it. A hero how could a hero do that? I couldn’t believe it. A hero how could a hero do that?

As Emerson said, “It is natural to believe in great men.” And in his book, The Hero, American Style, Marshall William Fishwick remarks that “people are ineffective without leaders. The search for paragons is inherent in human nature.” In an article inToday’s Health magazine, social critic Marya Mannes goes a little further. She says, “Unless we have some image of human greatness, of human excellence, to build on, we shall find it difficult to be animated by great dreams. We will be only moles burrowing in the darkness.”

For its part, modern psychology calls its equivalent of the hero or paragon the “ego ideal.” A person forms his ego ideal by picking out traits of parents, friends, and others in the society at large. Researchers are quick to point out that healthy models make for healthy people, while sick models, like Hitlers and Stalins, make for sick people and a sick world.

Social commentators are concerned about today’s shortage of inspiring, healthy models. “Where Have All the Heroes Gone?” asks Edward Hoagland in The New York Times Magazine, and U.S. News & World Report talks about “The Vanishing Hero.” So perhaps I was right, back there on the school playground, in feeling I’d been let down.

By the time I’d entered high school, most fictional heroes struck me as cardboard characters. I had to pass them by. Now, political leaders, past and present, replaced them. Then, in my freshman year of college, in 1965, the Watergate mood hit me early.

On the afternoon when Georgetown University played host to some members of Congress, I was one of the first students to trot up the steps of Harlan Hall. My mind was filled with anticipation. I wanted to get involved in government; it seemed a good way to work with people. During my first few months at school, I’d absorbed as much as I could of the theory and history of government, and now came a bonus the chance to talk with the people who were making the history I was studying.

As I stood on the thick red carpet, the university’s past presidents stared down at me from their portraits on the old wood walls. Even their grave faces couldn’t douse my enthusiasm. In less than forty minutes I’d be sharing the room with the country’s leaders.

While I was thinking this way, a congressman dressed in a blue blazer bounded up the steps and walked hurriedly across the room. Several friends and I approached him and started asking questions, but he seemed totally intent on wherever he was going. He never slowed down.

“Boys,” he said, “I’m a Johnson Democrat. That answers all your questions. Now, where’s the bar?”

As we stood there openmouthed, the congressman glided past us and ordered a bourbon on the rocks,

My other brushes with politicians only reinforced this first bruised impression. With the world so much in need of unity and cooperation, I felt turned off by so much small-mindedness. It all seemed like a cheating, losing game, and I didn’t want to play it. So after my sophomore year I opted for a change psychology.

At least psychology could tell you something about what was going on inside people. What surprised me was that all this inside knowledge of human nature just seemed to turn psychologists into pessimists. I’ll never forget the day when one of my best professors, Dr. M., compared human beings to lemmings.

“The lemming is a peculiar breed of rat that lives in Scandanavia,” said Dr. M. in his usual intense way. “Every so often it seems to happen without any rhyme or reason one lemming starts running frantically across the countryside. This ‘running fever’ spreads to the other rats, and soon a kind of mass hysteria infects them. For months and months they migrate, only to reach the coastline and a dead end.

” ‘Dead end’ that’s really what it is. Without hesitating, the lead lemming leaps into the sea, and all the rest follow him. The few that survive produce some more, and then they go through the suicide sequence all over again.

“Maybe we’re like the lemmings. World Wars I and II, Vietnam, the Middle East,… World War III it’s a frightening thought, but if you look at our record,… maybe that’s the best we can do.”

In his book Motivation and Personality, psychologist Abraham Maslow talked about this kind of thinking. He chided not only psychologists but also many others in the intellectual community for denying “the possibility of improving human nature and society, or of discovering intrinsic human values, or of being life-loving in general.” During my college days I empathized with Maslow’s criticisms. Yet even more appealing to me were his positive insights about human potential.

Early in his career, Maslow had become disgusted with modern psychology’s obsession for studying mental disease. He felt that the study of sick and crippled persons could only produce a sick and crippled psychology. Maslow reversed this trend by researching the dynamics of health. He wrote,

If we want to know the possibilities for spiritual growth, or moral development in human beings, then I maintain that we can learn most by studying our most moral, ethical, or saintly people.

Maslow’s research reached its height in his description of the fully healthy or “self-actualized” person. In Towards a Psychology of Being, he wrote, “In these healthy people we find duty and pleasure to be the same thing, as is also work and play, self-interest and altruism.” In an earlier essay he had pointed out,

For such people virtue is its own reward…. They spontaneously tend to do right because that is what they want to do, what they need to do, what they enjoy, and what they will continue to enjoy.

The self-actualized displayed clearer perception of reality, more openness to experience, greater spontaneity, and a firmer sense of identity. They also possessed greater creativity, treated different kinds of people equally, and had a greater ability to love. They valued justice, simplicity, beauty, individuality, joy, and honesty.

The more I read about self-actualization, the more I liked it. But there was one hitch. Maslow didn’t know how the self-actualized got that way:

We simply do not have available today enough reliable knowledge to proceed to the construction of the One Good World. We do not even have enough knowledge to teach individuals how to love each other.

I still wanted self-actualization, but naturally I didn’t know how to get there either.

By this time I was in my senior year. Most of my classmates (even those who shared my feelings) kept themselves busy by applying to graduate schools or jockeying for a job. I could have forgotten my predicament that way and buried myself in some institutional cubbyhole, but something inside me refused to allow it. “You can’t fool yourself. You’ll never be happy by doing that.” With mixed emotions, I kept to that conclusion.

In other words, in so many ways this was a frightening decision to make. There were so many nagging questions. “Will I become an oddball and cut myself off from my family and friends?” “How will I support myself?” “Will I get into something worthwhile, or will I just wind up getting nowhere fast?”

At the same time, I knew that something was missing, from my life and from the lives of most people. I wanted to ferret out that “something.”

Searching

I climbed the stairs out of the dungeonlike subway, not far from the West Village. It was October 16, 1969. After jogging four blocks, I arrived at 735 Spring Street. I tried to open the door, but it was bolted shut. I rang the bell, and soon someone was peering through the peephole. “What’s your name?” said the muffled voice. I replied (as I’d been instructed), “Danny the Red.” The door creaked open, and a smiling brunette with glasses and a collegiate sweater greeted me. Behind her stood three men with baseball bats. She continued the interrogation.

“Who sent you?”

“I met Mark Folsom up at Columbia, and he suggested that I come down and check things out.”

At the mention of “Mark” the three men dispersed and the girl’s smile widened.

“Good. My name’s Andrea. Let me introduce you to Ted Gold.”

Blotched mimeograph paper, crumpled coffee cups, pop bottles, and hundreds of crushed cigarette butts littered the brick floor of Ted Gold’s office. The walls were plastered with posters of the revolutionary masses and the pantheon of armed struggle Lenin, Mao, Castro, and Che Guevara. Ted Gold himself had reddish hair, thick glasses, and an energetic though ruffled air about him.

“What do you know about communism?” he asked. No pleasantries.

“Just what I’ve learned in college and from a few books I’ve read.”

Gold’s line of vision sank to the floor, then honed back in on me.

“Communism means violent revolution,” he said. “There’s no redeeming value in this capitalistic society none.”

“None?”

“None! Insurance, welfare, social security these are all stopgap measures designed to tranquilize the masses and prevent them from rising up and smashing their oppressors. There’s nothing of value in this society-NOTHING! Our job is clear. We must tear this rotten structure down brick by brick until nothing can stop the revolution.”

Since the main purpose of my visit was to hear about the radical movement’s vision of the perfect society, I asked, “After you’ve torn everything down, what will you replace it with?”

Gold fidgeted. It appeared I’d asked the wrong question.

“We don’t have time to worry about things like that. All we have to do is rip this society apart. What happens after the revolution will take care of itself.”

“That’s all you can tell me?”

“So you’ll help us tear it down?”

“I don’t know. Let me think about it.”

He didn’t care for my answer, and I hadn’t cared for his. Since he wouldn’t or couldn’t tell me any more, I left.

Almost five months later, on March 7, 1970, a headline in the New York Times read, “Townhouse Razed by Blast and Fire; Man’s Body Found.” The firemen theorized that a gas leak had triggered the blast, but the man’s body was too disfigured for immediate identification. Then, two days later, the Times ran Ted Gold’s picture and tagged him as the disaster’s victim. Familiar with Gold’s radical background, the police decided to keep sifting through the debris. Finally, on March 11, the Times front page said, “Bombs, Dynamite, and Woman’s Body Found in Ruins of 11th St. Townhouse.” According to Chief Inspector Albert Seedment, “The people in the house were obviously putting together the component parts of a bomb, and they did something wrong.”

For two years I’d been searching for a workable solution to the problematic life I saw all around me but without much success. I was beginning to sense that, though billed as a haven of peace and love, the so-called counterculture harbored about as much narrow-mindedness as there was anywhere else.

The first real light appeared in the spring of 1971, when I started investigating Eastern meditation. The descriptions of enlightened meditators closely matched Maslow’s ideal of the self-actualized person, and there was a practical way to get there.

The cultural difference didn’t really bother me much. Although I wasn’t a very religious person, I’d sometimes thought, “I don’t know what truth is, and I don’t care if a red, white, black, yellow, or brown man speaks it or if it comes from the north, south, east, or west. All I know is, I want it.”

From the start, I sensed the power of turning inward, the power of meditation. At one and the same time, I was becoming more aware of my inner self and more aware of the people and events around me. Yet I noticed that many spiritualists, including big teachers, became not so much self-realized as self-serving.

For instance, after you had gained a little spiritual power, the next step the “in” thing to do was to admit that you were really God, posing for now as a mere mortal. It got to be sort of dizzying, meeting all these yogis who were actually God. Then gradually it began to make sense. If you were God you could pretty much get what you wanted. God doesn’t have to ask twice. But, to be fair, these divine debauchees provided some of the best comedy I’d ever seen.

For example, one day during the summer of 1972, at a green-lawned country retreat, I was sitting in on a verbal meditation. The Great One said, in a sonorous voice, “Feel that you are that same power that has manifested innumerable suns, moons, and stars…. Feel yourself creating and maintaining innumerable … owwwwWWWWW!!” All at once a severe toothache jolted the Great One’s jaw. The meditation seemed to be ending a little sooner than the supreme will had ordained, but perhaps toothaches were just a divine entertainment. His other pastimes included phobias for mosquitoes, airplanes, and death. And, to make matters worse, the Great One was in constant anxiety about whether the United States government would grant him immigration status.

Nonetheless, I stayed convinced that meditation could awaken the self. All I had to do was find a way to practice it purely. I carried on as well as I could. Then, one day in the spring of 1973, I was walking through the Port Authority Bus Terminal, on 40th Street, to catch a Greyhound to the Catskill Mountains. The noise level at the terminal was high hundreds of arriving and departing buses, honking taxicabs, and bustling travelers.

Suddenly, above the tumult, I heard a woman’s voice call out, “Hey, yogi!”

I stopped dead in my tracks. You didn’t have to be clairvoyant to tell that I was interested in yoga and meditation. My white pants and Indian shirt were giveaways. Still, I couldn’t help thinking, “Who cares about yoga in the Port Authority?” I turned around and saw a smiling young American woman dressed in an Indian sari. She had a travel bag across her shoulder.

“Hare Krsna,” she said, folding her hands together in a traditional, prayerlike greeting.

“Hare Krsna,” I replied.

“My name’s Daiva Sakti. What’s yours?”

“Daniel.”

During our pleasant conversation, I told her that two years ago I’d married a girl who also meditated.

“Do you have any children?”

“Yes, a baby boy named Maitreya.”

When Daiva Sakti heard that name, her face lit up in near ecstasy.

“Maitreya!” she said, reaching into her travel bag. “Have a look at this book. It’s about the great Vedic sage Maitreya.”

“Maitreya was a Vedic sage? But don’t the Buddhists consider him to be the coming Buddha [enlightened one]?”

Daiva Sakti smiled. “Twenty-five hundred years before Lord Buddha appeared, the sage Maitreya lived in India, and this book has his teachings.”

This revelation whetted my curiosity so much that I offered to buy the book. I handed her a ten-dollar bill, said “Thank you,” and rushed off to catch my bus. As soon as I’d settled into my recliner, I absorbed myself in reading. This book was so attractive that it took me only three days to finish.

To my delight, the book told about the irrationality of trying to be God. “God is conscious of everything past, present, and future, and also of each and every corner of His manifestations, both material and spiritual.” But as for the ordinary person, he “does not even know what is happening within his own personal body. He eats his food but does not know how this food is transformed into energy or how it sustains the body.”

The author. His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, recommended bhakti-yoga (unselfish loving service) as the sure cure for all forms of egotism. My college friends and I had joked that newspaper headlines should herald the big ego as public enemy number one. Now the idea of conquering the big ego by bhakti-yoga captivated my mind. Srila Prabhupada said that this service attitude was “dormant in everyone … the natural inclination of every living being,… the highest perfection in life.”

I recalled how I’d enrolled in college with the idea of landing a job in public service. All my life I’d been serving someone or something my parents, my teachers, my friends (even my car). Srila Prabhupada pointed out how big businessmen had to serve their customers and the president had to serve his country. It seemed that no matter what I did, it would be some sort of service. And, as Srila Prabhupada said, you could reach the ultimate state of consciousness by directing your service toward the complete whole, or Krsna.

I was able to pick up the logic of practically everything Srila Prabhupada wrote. His students, who were making Krsna consciousness available in such hectic places as the bus terminal, also impressed me. Nonetheless, my experiences with counterfeit groups made me reluctant to get involved. It was only after several months of thinking and reading Krsna conscious books that I decided, in the winter of 1973, to check into this process more closely.

Practicing Krsna Consciousness

According to the ancient Vedic literature (which the Krsna consciousness movement publishes, in English) your personality depends on the kind of sound you hear. Loving, truthful, spiritual sound creates a loving, truthful, spiritual personality; self-motivated, materialistic sound creates a self-motivated, materialistic personality. When I thought about it, I realized that perhaps I’d never heard a spiritual sound in my life.

Hare Krsna Hare Krsna Krsna Krsna Hare Hare
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare

Generally, spiritual sound is called mantra. Man means “mind,” and tra means “release.” A mantra, then, is a sound vibration that can release the mind from self-centered, material thought processes. Chanting mantras was nothing new to me; for more than four years I had chanted all kinds of mantras. Yet chanting the Hare Krsna mantra Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare/ Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare-gave me astonishing results. I wanted to cleanse and refresh my mind and heart, and chanting Hare Krsna was like taking a shower on the inside.

Also, I observed how the benefits of chanting Hare Krsna carried over into the everyday lives of other chanters. And my own experience was similar to that of my friend Howard Resnick, who said, “I didn’t follow any particular leader. I just saw that chanting Hare Krsna was a bona fide process, and that people who practiced it were becoming happy.”

After I started chanting, my personality started developing rapidly. Having chanters as friends helped. Instead of wasting time in small talk, they were thinking about “Who am I?” and “What’s the best thing I can do with my life?” The all-embracing scope of Krsna consciousness especially pleased me.

At least seven years earlier, I’d seen how pettiness and the party spirit cause most of the world’s conflicts. Now, by chanting I experienced each person as part of a harmonious whole (God). Deep inside I felt the same as everyone else, and at the same time completely unique. I felt more united with other people, and, paradoxically, more of an individual. Instead of being at loggerheads, in Krsna consciousness the group and individual enhanced each other. And I saw that simply by chanting, thousands of people were realizing this ideal in their own lives.

Already, I’d found that almost every theme sounded by progressive thinkers (like Maslow) came in for full development in the techniques and literature of Krsna consciousness. I wanted to share my realizations, so I started lecturing about Krsna consciousness in grammar schools, high schools, and colleges. At first, many of the listeners had their doubts, but after an explanation, the majority found Krsna conscious methods and goals agreeable. Many teachers told me that their students had reacted with more interest to my presentation than to any other class in the semester. Gradually I realized that I was touching upon that missing “something” I’d felt the need for during my own college years.

I asked many teachers to assess the current student mood. They said, almost without exception, that the students of the mid-1970s had turned apathetic. Apparently the questioning, questing spirit of the ’60s had gone away. But how could anyone blame the students? Who could they look to unstable movie and TV stars, unprincipled politicians, unsure teachers, self-destructive revolutionaries, self-indulgent saviors? Old or new, the heroes were tarnished. Still, when I talked with the students about the pleasure of spiritual living, glimmers of excitement played on their faces.

By 1975 I was ready to fill out my personal observations about Krsna consciousness with scientific evidence. Psychology seemed like a natural approach to take, so I invited several psychologists with no prior experience of Krsna consciousness to study the effects of chanting Hare Krsna. The findings of Drs. Allen Gerson and Ronald Huff, along with interviews I conducted, confirmed my impression that chanting produces a state of human health that modern psychology is just beginning to imagine.

Here are some highlights of the research. Dr. Gerson, a practicing clinical psychologist who also specializes in psychological testing, reports that chanters “are more keenly aware and have sharper mental cognitions.” Richard Arthur, an instructor of English at Rutgers University, brought to mind Maslow’s self-actualized person when he told me, “Chanting makes me more aware of what to do and what not to do. And now, I naturally feel happy about doing the right thing.”

In addition, the psychologists found chanters brimming with self-confidence. Art director Nathan Zakheim affirmed to me, “After years of being a closed-in person and trying to protect myself from experiences, now I’m really different. Chanting makes me so exuberant that I sail through situations that used to stymie me.” Dr. Gerson notes that chanters are seldom if ever bored, but “are always in a state of discovery that allows them to see things more vividly.”

Also, Dr. Gerson detected that chanting promotes creativity in all spheres of life. “I’m astounded,” he said, “with the percentage of creative people among chanters.” Daniel Clark, a thirty-five-year old filmmaker who has been chanting Hare Krsna for ten years, told me how chanting affected his creativity. Clark said, “Before I started chanting, I thought myself limited to films, but now I see that I have a talent for writing, lecturing, acting. You can do anything, in a sense. You don’t become a superman, but all your hang-ups go away. Then you find that your capabilities as a spiritual person are very great.”

Robert Grant, a successful young publishing executive, says that chanting even improves business aptitude. “Now I’m doing all kinds of things management, publishing, working with artists things I’ve never done or displayed any skill for. I find that chanting Hare Krsna gives me the insight on how to do it.”

As housewives like Mrs. Stephanie Lindberg have found, chanting inspires people to give their daily routines a creative touch. Mrs. Lindberg related to me, “Now my mind is bubbling with new ideas. By chanting I experience a freedom that makes my life more creative and stimulates me to use my talents in ways I never thought of before.” Mr. Grant reported a similar feeling to me when he said, “I feel some connection with God that makes me do things in a spontaneous, joyful, uninhibited way.” It’s interesting to note how these experiences recall those of the ancient sages. In the Srimad-Bhagavatam Dhruva Maharaja delights, “Krsna, You have enlivened all my sleeping senses my hands, legs, ears, touch sensation, life force, and especially my speech.”

The psychologists verify that chanters enjoy a strong sense of identity and uniqueness. Dr. Ronald Huff (a clinician with an extensive background in bio-feedback) notes “greater individuality in the way chanters relate to the external experience, indicating greater uniqueness.” After more than fifty case studies, Dr. Gerson concludes, “Chanters have a clear sense of identity. They know who they are in relationship to the universe, where they’re going, and how they can improve themselves and the world around them.”

A secretary, Heather Payne, disclosed to me that chanting allows her “to overcome any prejudices I may have felt toward people.” Here, both psychologists score the Krsna conscious process highly. Says Dr. Gerson, “The democratic character structure [the ability to treat people fairly] comes through strongly in chanters.”

With this greater tolerance, chanters naturally have more ability to love. Richard Arthur told me that in his better moments of chanting, “I relate to people on the basis of love, and I can feel them pick up on it.” Judy Guarino, an illustrator in her early thirties, remarked, “I experience affection for people I’ve never known before. Now I’m able to be a better friend.” According to Dr. Huff, “Parents who chant enjoy more expressions of mature and meaningful affection with their children.” Dr. Gerson describes chanters as “open, friendly, warm, and outgoing as a group, as well as individually.”

In fact, chanters report that their love approaches what Daniel Clark called “cosmic a love of the whole world with all its human beings, animals, and plants, and ultimately for God.”

So research shows chanting the Hare Krsna mantra to be a scientific, effective means for liberating human potential. Chanting works for men and women, young and old, rich and poor, black and white. Oriental and Westerner. Also, as the record demonstrates, chanting has brought people self-realization for thousands of years.

What’s been so convincing for me is that whereas other processes always turned stale, the Krsna conscious experience keeps getting fresher and fresher. Every other process I tried seemed to yield results at first, but I always reached a point where I couldn’t or wouldn’t go any further.

In Krsna consciousness the progress has been steady without any signs of stopping. Krsna consciousness has given me a deep feeling of self-satisfaction and contentment. Often I check my progress, and it always amazes me how well my body, my emotions, my mind, my intelligence, my soul, all of me feels about chanting Hare Krsna.

If you find something good, you want to share it. And Krsna consciousness is the best thing I’ve found. Of course, as Srila Prabhupada says, it’s inevitable for mankind to evolve to higher consciousness. Yet, as he also says,

Why do others have to wait for thousands and thousands of years to attain these heights? Why not give them the information immediately in a systematic way, so that they may save time and energy?

That makes sense to me. And, as progressive thinkers past and present have discovered, giving yourself to this kind of work is sheer pleasure.

Source: http://www.dandavats.com/?p=100349

Discovering Spiritual Knowledge

There is a general perception that the modeling industry is far from goodness and that it has been vulgarized. In your Instagram profile, you expressed gratitude to a number of people and shared that your path was different. Could you please tell us more about that?

I agree that modeling is far from goodness. At the same time, I think it all depends on a person. If you see the negative in everything, then you will be surrounded by the negative. Similarly, if you see positivity in everything, then you will be surrounded by the positive. That is number one. Number two, spiritual practice plays a big role. Since I discovered it, my surrounding has changed dramatically. In the same manner, my work clientele has changed as well. I started attracting vegetarians, people who were interested in spirituality, and spiritually practicing people. As you can see, everything depends on us. If we know how to think and act right, then we can survive even in this kind of environment. I do not consider my work to be bad. Good things exist everywhere, and I do my best to maximize them. However, I cannot say that I want to be a model for the rest of my life. Actually, I have much more exciting plans for the future.

You travel a lot and meet a lot of people, do you think they are interested in any philosophy? Do you get to talk to them about anything?

Absolutely! That is yet another reason why I love my work, as it gives me multiple opportunities for preaching.  When you are simply out there with a japa bag, everybody wants to come up to you, and that is a good reason for a half an hour conversation! What’s this bag? What are beads? What is japa? The last trip to Hanjoy, China turned out to be very special. Many people became interested in karma: how it is created, how to avoid bad karma, and how to improve one’s karma. I was so happy to tell them about that! While I am still new to this and there are many things I do not know, it is so cool when you know an answer to a particular question. That is how I get to preach while I am out traveling. At the same time, there are people who refuse to accept this philosophy, but I do not force them to be engaged in a conversation, because it is our personal business – to accept or not accept it.

An estimated 20,000 visitors gathered on March 28–29 at the Sri Sri Radha Krishna Temple near Spanish Fork, Utah, for the temple’s 30th annual Holi Festival of Colors, the largest Color Festival in North America.

When the Festival first began almost three decades ago, it was regarded as the “unofficial spring break event” for Brigham Young University students, another icon in Utah Valley, with an enrollment of over 35,000. “Now festival goers are about 50% young people and 50% young families,” Caru Das, one of the founders of the Spanish Fork Temple, noted. Several dozen llamas, peacocks, a koi lake with a waterfall,  and exotic birds at the property are also big draws for families year-round. 

Throughout the weekend, clouds of brightly colored powder filled the air as festivalgoers joined in the traditional countdowns and celebrated Holi’s message of unity, renewal, and spiritual joy. Families, students, and visitors of many backgrounds gathered on the temple hill to sing, dance, and participate in the celebration, which has become a beloved annual tradition in the region.

Caru described the festival as an opportunity to bring people together while sharing the culture and spiritual teachings of Krishna consciousness. Along with the vibrant festivities, visitors were invited to tour the temple grounds, learn about the meaning of Holi in the Vaishnava tradition, and hear presentations on themes of peace, love, and community.

One news outlet, The Wasatch Journal, quoted a Festival guest as saying, “It was collective effervescence.”

Among those attending was Salem Mayor Cristy Simons, who thanked Caru Das for the invitation. Mayor Simons joined him in leading the noon color throw on Saturday, describing the festival as a Salem area tradition celebrating peace, love, and community. Also attending and leading the 1 pm Color Throw was Utah County Commissioner Amelia Powers Gardner, who commented that we are all “Better Together.”

Read more: https://iskconnews.org/thousands-gather-for-30th-annual-holi-festival-in-spanish-fork/

A new initiative titled “Young Minds, Timeless Wisdom” is offering an 8-week online Bhagavad-gita course for youth aged 10 to 19, beginning April 11, 2026. The program is designed to present the teachings of the Bhagavad-gita in a practical and relatable format, helping young people develop clarity, discipline, and emotional resilience in today’s fast-paced environment. The course will be conducted live on Zoom every Saturday at 11:00 AM EST and is open to participants from all backgrounds.

The course is guided by Shubha Vilas Govinda Das, who brings years of experience in teaching Bhagavad-gita and Bhakti-yoga to diverse audiences, including youth and families. With a background in both professional leadership and spiritual education, he has conducted workshops, courses, and retreats focused on applying Vedic wisdom in everyday life. His teaching approach emphasizes simplicity, relatability, and real-life application of philosophical principles.

The program has been developed in response to a growing need among parents and educators to provide value-based guidance to young people. With increasing exposure to digital distractions, academic pressure, and social challenges, many youth struggle with focus, decision-making, and emotional balance. The Bhagavad-gita, a foundational text of Vedic wisdom, offers time-tested insights that can help address these challenges when presented in an accessible way.

Read more: https://iskconnews.org/young-minds-timeless-wisdom-course-for-youth-begins-april-11/

From Back to Godhead

Lord Krishna says in the Bhagavad-gita (13.2–3):

“This body, O son of Kunti, is called the field, and one who knows this body is called the knower of the field.”

“O scion of Bharata, you should understand that I am also the knower in all bodies, and to understand this body and its knower is called knowledge. That is My opinion.”

In these verses Krishna says that in every body there exist two knowers – the primary occupant and Krishna Himself. As a knower of my body, I am aware of the activities and experiences within it. And along with me, Krishna is also aware of my activities and experiences. Although this philosophy sounds simple, its implications are deep and often overlooked.

I have a PhD in cell biology and have been researching the subject of consciousness and its relation to the mind. The above verses intrigued me, and I wondered how they were related to our experiences of the world. In my research I came across a concept that provided valuable insights – the concept of subjective experience. 

I am an individual with my own likes and dislikes. My individuality, with its preferences, applies to all sectors of my life, to every single activity I do, be it in regard to my eating or clothing or colors or car – the list is endless. It applies to my emotions as well. The things that make me happy, sad, exhilarated, or angry differ from what makes others feel the way they feel. Individuals are unique, and their preferences are different. Indeed, we see discord in relationships – between spouses, between lovers, between parents and children – because each member of the relationship cannot fully understand the other person’s preferences and may have a hard time accepting those preferences even when they are stated. I’ve had heated arguments with my parents or my husband over trivial matters simply because we could neither understand nor accept our differences in preferences.

Why are there so many differences in preferences among people? Are they desirable? Would life not be easier without any differences?

It has taken me a long time to find suitable answers to these questions. In my reading of the literature in consciousness research, I was struck with the concept of subjective experience. Any experience a person has is totally subjective because it is personal, qualitative, and unique to that person. No one else can understand what another person is experiencing, and no words can explain the experience. For example, when I see a red ball, I alone have access to the experience of the redness of the ball. I may try to explain what I am seeing, but no one else can see the color I am seeing. Each person perceives red according to his or her own field of knowledge – i.e., their senses and mental interpretation. People may be seeing the same shade or a different shade, but there is no way to decipher what each person is seeing. 

Consider the bitter gourd. Some people develop a liking for this bitter vegetable; others, myself included, never do. Why does this difference exist? It is because our preferences develop based on our experience of the flavor. Everyone perceives flavor within their field of knowledge; no one has access to the flavor being experienced by another person.

This uniqueness and subjectivity applies to every sensory experience we have: seeing, smelling, tasting, hearing, or touching. It is also applicable to all internal sensations, such as hunger, pain, and thoughts, and to all emotions, such as fear or love. We all have access to these experiences only within our field of knowledge, and have no access to the experiences within someone else’s field of knowledge.

The Fully Cognizant One

The Bhagavad-gita, however, tells us that there is one person who is fully cognizant of all our experiences. That person is Krishna. In sharp contrast to the soul’s limited knowledge, Krishna’s knowledge is unlimited, and He is the knower of all fields. He knows what each person experiences when seeing a red ball or tasting bitter gourd or feeling love, anger, or anxiety. Being the source of everything (aham sarvasya prabhavah, Gita 10.8) and the all-knowing person, Krishna is fully aware of everything we experience or feel.   

Why does Krishna have access to everything an embodied soul experiences? He says in the Bhagavad-gita (7.4),

“Earth, water, fire, air, ether, mind, intelligence and false ego – all together these eight constitute My separated material energies.” Everything within the creation is Krishna’s energy, whether it is the color red or bitter gourd or anything else. Our body and senses are also His energy. Thus both the senses and their sense objects are energies of Krishna. In fact, the experiences emerging from their interaction are also His energy. How then is it possible for us to have any experience without His knowing about it?

That our experiences are fully known to Krishna implies there is nothing we have that is hidden from Him. Does that not sound like a breach of privacy? Contrary to being a breach, it tells us something very significant about our relationship with Krishna. If Krishna is aware of all our experiences, then He is the only person who knows us fully, inside out. Literally. He knows our experiences, likes, dislikes, preferences. He knows how we feel in love, pain, hunger, and thirst. He is fully cognizant of our thoughts and desires. How does that make you feel? Each one of us has been looking everywhere for a friend with whom we can share everything. Only Krishna can be that best and dearmost friend. And we each have a unique, private, and confidential relationship with Him.

The goal of bhakti-yoga is to revive this relationship and be united with Him without any inhibitions. All living entities are individuals, and chief among us all is Krishna, the maintainer of all others. The Katha Upanishad (2.2.13) states, nityo nityanam cetanash cetananam eko bahunam yo vidadhati kaman: “There is one supreme eternal entity among all eternal entities and one supreme conscious entity among all conscious entities. The ‘one’ is supplying the needs of everyone else.”

Variety in Krishna’s Creation

Furthermore, we tiny souls can never become Krishna. Our knowledge is limited and will always remain so. Which means we can never truly understand what another person is tasting, smelling, seeing, feeling, liking, thinking, and so on. Each one of us has access only to the experiences within our field of knowledge, and these experiences dictate our preferences, likes, dislikes, and so on. On account of this, it is no surprise that people have widely different preferences and misunderstand each other, which sometimes ends up in terrorism, violence, and wars. But when understood properly, these differences are not a drawback. They are special mercy from Krishna because every single soul in His creation is different and can offer Him a unique service. Surely Krishna has not failed to amaze us at every step of His creation.

Life sometimes appears to us like a labyrinth. One has to make the right choice each time the passage bifurcates. A labyrinth is an irregular structure, with many passages, hard to find way through or about… So are some choices in life…

That was the case of Arjuna, the great devotee-warrior from Bhagavad-gita, who saw himself faced with a decisive battle. Anyone who ever found himself or herself in front of an important life-choice, to a greater or lesser degree, can relate to the experience of Arjuna. Arjuna had to choose between fighting the battle and bringing righteousness back to the world, or withdrawing to the forest, to live the life of a hermit. Both options seemed valid and acceptable to the culture Arjuna lived in. Still, only one choice was right in those circumstances, at that moment in time.

In a labyrinth-like situation, what would make us go on with our goals? What would cause us to continue pursuing our purposes in a structure one is not sure one can go through, nor what is awaiting ahead? It must be something one feels with all their being. Only such a thing can give vital force: courage, resourcefulness, strength in the heart…

Arjuna was a warrior, a ksatriya. A warrior is so by intrinsic quality, not by external denomination. For him, to desert an important battle and take the path of a hermit in the forest would have been artificial. Artificial things don’t match one’s internal quality or genuine predisposition. So, they deprive one from the strength coming from within. Without this internal force, any goal, material or spiritual, would be hard to pursue in the long run.

Still, Arjuna denies the confrontation, throws away his bow and declares he would rather live by begging than engage in this ghastly war. Krishna tells him he is in illusion. A long process begins at this point, in which Krishna imparts real knowledge to Arjuna.

Of course, the question can be raised if it is enough to have this strong desire? It is indeed absolutely necessary, but it seems not to be enough. There is a legend about a labyrinth and a hero who ventures to enter it, because it is a real need in the world for him to do it. Beside his resolute determination, the hero gets something more: a thread meant to help him not to lose the way. It is given to him by someone who knew the main points about the labyrinth. A gift of knowledge to keep him fixed on his goal. The question may be raised: with such strong initial determination, was he not already fixed on his goal? Well, he was in a labyrinth, in the middle of intricacies. So many elements were there to sabotage him, to waste his resources without any benefit. Like in certain situations which appear in life. Situations in which one may be subjected to feelings of weakness, confusion, grief. Hard moments when one needs help to clear one’s mind.

If this could happen to a devotee personality like Arjuna, it definitely can happen to any of us! After all, Bhagavad-gita is spoken for us all.

Arjuna’s confusion was about his duty: should he perform his ksatriya dharma to fight, or should he avoid a war which announced itself to be overwhelming? Like all great heroes of mankind, Arjuna was faced with a terrible dilemma. This crisis marks the beginning of their quest for knowledge, because they are desperately in need of some answers. After giving up the pride of finding all the answers by themselves, they receive the needed help in the form of a person or a book of knowledge.

At this point, it all starts. Not by addressing their problem, but with the understanding of the world, of the nature of things, which gives them a larger perspective. In this way, their dilemma is seen as a part of the whole. Arjuna had the unique chance to have the Absolute Truth Himself, Krishna, to impart this knowledge to him.

So, Krishna begins to deal with Arjuna’s burning problem by encouraging him to search into the nature of the soul, to realize its imperishable quality, and the sense of identity it gives to a person, regardless of the changes in the body.

Realizing that a person’s everlasting identity is the soul, Arjuna gets a first element of order in the chaos of his situation. He understands that both he and the material world belong to the energy of the Supreme Lord. The difference is that he is the superior energy, while the material elements are the inferior energy. Without the touch of the superior energy, the living entities, nothing can grow in the material world. So, his action makes a difference!

“Not by merely abstaining from work can one achieve freedom from reaction, nor by renunciation alone can one attain perfection”, Krishna says (Bg. 3.4). In this way, Krishna urges Arjuna to see things in their proper perspective, that is to avoid unhealthy extremes. He wants him to become neither dry, nor cheap in his approach.

Furthermore, it is said to Arjuna that the combination of the material nature and the spiritual nature is brought about by the Supreme Lord, who is therefore the controller of both. He is the Energetic mastering His energies. In the service of their master, the Supreme Lord, both energies fulfill their goal: the material elements are spiritualized, as iron put into fire takes up the qualities of the fire. While the souls, the living entities, are placed into their constitutional position. Outside the devotional service to the Supreme, the souls, although spiritual in nature, are so minute that they can get conditioned and be caught in the intricacies of the material world.

The tendency to easily slip into a sideway is another feature of a labyrinth. There are so many sideways there, they look so similar to the main way, that one can almost unknowingly slide in one of them. Like us. We take a decision, we start pursuing it, and after some time we begin losing ourselves in justifications, confusion… Our mind seems to be a labyrinth.

This was illustrated in Arjuna’s case when his determination to fight the war, the one that initially brought him to the battlefield, was broken just before he was to start fighting. Lots of arguments burst into his mind justifying his abandon of his dharma. In other words, justifying his sliding in the mode of ignorance, the one in which a person does not see things as they are.

Under the influence of this mode of darkness, one has every chance to choose a wrong course of action, out of delusion, indolence, madness, or even utter foolishness, which is said to be the ultimate result of the mode of ignorance. Krishna, imparting the spiritual vision to Arjuna, tells him that, in order not to be misdirected in life, one has to learn the science of activities in terms of the three modes of nature: goodness, passion and ignorance. Only then he can understand in which position he is actually situated, and how his spiritual spark is bound by a certain mode of nature. Becoming aware of the risks associated with the mode of ignorance, one can take to education for development of the mode of goodness. In this mode of goodness one is illuminated by knowledge and becomes sober, knowing things as they are.

Although he had so many doubts, Arjuna was, the same time, open to receiving this spiritual knowledge, by learning from the proper person, the Supreme Lord, who is transcendental to the modes.

So, Krishna pointed out to Arjuna that renunciation of the prescribed duty for a ksatriya, fighting, out of illusion and lack of right understanding, is renunciation in the mode of ignorance, which deprives one’s life of any meaning. He definitely did not want to lead a futile life!

To Arjuna’s initial argument that he is afraid of performing fruitive activities by performing his dharma, Krishna answers that this renunciation would be in the mode of passion. It disregards the fact that certain results of work are promoting Krishna consciousness and should not be given up.

If the mode of ignorance renders one purposeless, the mode of passion leads to no elevation. Arjuna was a person who abhorred degradation and who was keen to elevate himself in life.

It is only in the mode of goodness that one starts to see what to give up and what not to give up, what is favourable to the devotional service and what is unfavorable to the devotional service to the Supreme Lord. In order to guide us through this “labyrinth” of possible decisions, Krishna speaks to us Bhagavad-gita. The spiritual process described in Bhagavad-gita is not one of just artificial repression of the senses, but one of making the mind strong by the determination born of proper intelligence.

For that, Arjuna had not only to listen to the right knowledge, but to also realize with all his heart that fighting the battle was the most important thing.

Arjuna’s refusal to fight was actually due to his considering himself the absolute doer of his actions. He was forgetting that the Supreme Personality of Godhead was the ultimate master and sanctioner of everything, and He was there present instructing Arjuna to fight. This is the forgetfulness of the conditioned soul, as Srila Prabhupada points out.

Still, Arjuna could regain his memory by hearing Krishna’s words with an attentive mind. When our mind slips during chanting and hearing, it happens to slide to everyday activities,

which don’t have their place during the time of chanting and reading. Although these activities have their place in our daily schedules, under the influence of the lower modes, the mind tends to extend them into the time which is not meant for them. In the end, when the mind becomes totally focused on petty activities, it is rendered crippled and it can not see things as they are anymore. It does not recognize real goals from superficial ones. Real goals are those which, when performed, make us feel life has meaning. They always bring connection to something higher, sacred.

Arjuna sensed that Krishna’s words bring meaning, while previously it was none, only confusion and a vacant heart. They filled an empty place and Arjuna gave his voluntary attention to them, being interested to know all about the subject matter. It was through this attentive hearing that Krishna’s words really entered his heart and dispelled the forgetfulness there, by replacing it with a conscious mind, aware of the goal of life through sacred knowledge.

So, he became ready to fulfill Krishna’s plan through the occupation born of his own nature. This conclusion is there not only for Arjuna, but it can address all people of all times, regardless they are in front of a battle or not, or whatever circumstances they may be in. Like a ball of thread in a confusing maze, Bhagavad-gita can guide us through the labyrinth of this world, as well as through the mysterious labyrinth of our own mind.

Aware of the meaning of his action, Arjuna surrendered to Krishna’s plan, picked up his glorious Gandiva bow and started the battle of Kurukshetra.

Source: http://www.dandavats.com/?p=89094

Excerpt from the Bhagavad-Gita As it Is 7.7:

Chapter 7: Knowledge of the Absolute

TEXT 7

mattah parataram nanyat
kincid asti dhananjaya
mayi sarvam idam protam
sutre mani-gana iva

SYNONYMS
mattah—beyond Myself; parataram—superior; na—not; anyat—anything else; kincit—something; asti—there is;dhananjaya—O conquerer of wealth;mayi—in Me; sarvam—all that be; idam—which we see; protam—strung; sutre—on a thread; mani-ganah—pearls; iva—likened.

TRANSLATION

O conquerer of wealth [Arjuna], there is no Truth superior to Me. Everything rests upon Me, as pearls are strung on a thread.

PURPORT

There is a common controversy over whether the Supreme Absolute Truth is personal or impersonal. As far as Bhagavad-gita is concerned, the Absolute Truth is the Personality of Godhead Sri Krsna, and this is confirmed in every step. In this verse, in particular, it is stressed that the Absolute Truth is a person. That the Personality of Godhead is the Supreme Absolute Truth is also the affirmation of the Brahma-samhita: isvarah paramah krsnah sac-cid-ananda-vigrahah; that is, the Supreme Absolute Truth Personality of Godhead is Lord Krsna, who is the primeval Lord, the reservoir of all pleasure, Govinda, and the eternal form of complete bliss and knowledge. These authorities leave no doubt that the Absolute Truth is the Supreme Person, the cause of all causes. The impersonalist, however, argues on the strength of the Vedic version given in the Svetasvatara Upanisad:

tato yad uttarataram tad arupam anamayam ya etad vidur amrtas te bhavanti athetare duhkham evapi yanti.

“In the material world Brahma, the primeval living entity within the universe, is understood to be the supreme amongst the demigods, human beings and lower animals. But beyond Brahma there is the Transcendence who has no material form and is free from all material contaminations. Anyone who can know Him also becomes transcendental, but those who do not know Him suffer the miseries of the material world.”The impersonalist puts more stress on the word arupam. But this arupam is not impersonal. It indicates the transcendental form of eternity, bliss and knowledge as described in the Brahma-samhita quoted above.

Other verses in the Svetasvatara Upanisad substantiate this as follows:

vedaham etam purusam mahantam aditya-varnam tamasah parastat
tam eva vidvan amrta iha bhavati nanyah pantha vidyate ayanaya
yasmat param naparam asti kincid yasmannaniyo na jyayo ‘sti kincit“

I know that Supreme Personality of Godhead who is transcendental to all material conceptions of darkness. Only he who knows Him can transcend the bonds of birth and death. There is no way for liberation other than this knowledge of that Supreme Person.“There is no truth superior to that Supreme Person because He is the supermost. He is smaller than the smallest, and He is greater than the greatest. He is situated as a silent tree, and He illumines the transcendental sky, and as a tree spreads its roots, He spreads His extensive energies.”From these verses one concludes that the Supreme Absolute Truth is the Supreme Personality of Godhead who is all-pervading by His multi-energies, both material and spiritual.

Source: http://www.dandavats.com/?p=29440

Interview with HG Satyanarayana Prabhu, a direct disciple of Srila Prabhupada, personally initiated in 1972, whose life’s mission was given to him by his spiritual master. As the Director of the BBT for the Far East and Middle East, he carries Prabhupada’s message to every corner of the world, including the Middle East and Vrindavan. With profound and even mystical experiences with Srila Prabhupada, Satyanarayana Prabhu will share his insights into the miraculous spread of Krishna consciousness and inspire us all to take action.

Source: https://www.dandavats.com/?p=117162

By Nitai Madhav Das,

As part of the ISKCON 60–50 global celebrations, and in alignment with the objective of increasing Śrīla Prabhupāda consciousness across the Society, the Śrīla Prabhupāda Introductory Course (SPIC) is being presented by the ICC 60–50 Education Committee. Based on the BBT publication Śrīla Prabhupāda: The Messenger of the Supreme Lord, this course is designed to gently guide participants toward a deeper, more personal appreciation of A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, fostering a meaningful connection to his life, teachings, and mission.

By the end of the course, students become familiar with the significant events in Śrīla Prabhupāda’s life, develop a deeper appreciation for his struggles in establishing and expanding the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, and gain clarity on how to understand, appreciate, and carry forward his mood and mission. The course also seeks to inspire participants to imbibe the ideals of Śrīla Prabhupāda’s life and character within their own devotional journey.

SPIC offers a structured eight-lesson overview supported by well-developed resources, including lesson plans, presentations, and guided readings. Participants engage in pre-class study and structured reflection, making the experience both systematic and enriching. The course emphasizes thoughtful facilitation, enabling learning to deepen into realization. Special focus is placed on creating an interactive environment where participants can reflect, discuss, and internalize key lessons in meaningful ways.

Read more: https://iskconnews.org/iskcon-60-50-launches-online-srila-prabhupada-study-course/

By Mohan Lila Das, 

ISKCON Naperville, in partnership with Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh (HSS), hosted an interfaith gathering on March 24, 2026, as part of the monthly meeting of the Naperville Interfaith Leaders Association (NILA). This session was dedicated to fostering a deeper understanding of Hinduism and strengthening interfaith relationships within the community.

The event brought together leaders and representatives from a wide range of faith traditions, including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Sikhism, and various other faiths, reflecting the rich spiritual diversity of the Naperville area.

As part of the program, participants were given a guided tour of the ISKCON Naperville temple. They learned about the life and contributions of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada, the Founder-Acharya of ISKCON. Guests were also introduced to ISKCON’s foundational scriptures, the Bhagavad-gita and the Srimad Bhagavatam, gaining insight into their teachings and relevance.

Attendees also had the opportunity to take darshan of Sri Sri Radha Shyamasundar and experience the temple’s devotional atmosphere firsthand.

The program also featured an educational session on Hinduism conducted by representatives from HSS. This session included an interactive exhibition showcasing key aspects of Hindu philosophy, culture, and traditions through informative displays and posters.

Read more: https://iskconnews.org/iskcon-naperville-hosts-interfaith-gathering-in-collaboration-with-hss/

The desire to see God, to touch God, to talk to God is in itself probably the strongest argument for His existence; besides the logic and evidences from the scriptures, this direct experience is very significant indeed. Bringing Deity Worship from the insiders circle of elderly pujari-priests and making it part of the congregational development is probably the only way it may become part of the positive future for many places in ISKCON. While everyone hankers for direct experience of God in person, it is rarely attained, even for great souls like Sri Narada of Srimad-Bhagavatam, what to speak of the beginners like us. Yet Srila Prabhupada and the acaryas place the arcana, or Deity Worship, in the realm of service opportunities for neophytes. It is true that the worship of God in His deity form may attract neophytes, but it will also promote us to the next level of advancement, if done properly. Thus expanding the scope of Deity worship is a direct preaching, especially if done in an attitude of care and encouragement to the aspiring devotees. The “proof of the pudding is in the tasting” (sometimes misquoted as “proof is in the pudding”, which is not true..) and the practical experience of God via processes of bhakti-yoga provides that conclusive personal proof of His existence, yet the arcana process of tasting requires and demands the community expansion to survive these days.

While attending the Srila Prabhupada on Deity Worship ILS seminar in Mayapur this year a question was asked by the facilitator on the possible strategy for Deity Worship in ISKCON for decades to come. Times do change, and those who joined in the ’80s may notice a change of direction or even a decline in arcana standard. Yet it is exactly the way one deals with the difficulties that provides one with a possible and a positive answer. Increasing community participation is not only inline with Srila Prabhupada’s instructions it is also a strategic development in arcana, considering the movement he started becomes more and more based in congregation.

When concluding this Sunday feast video presentation, that was showed an hour-long feature film of our yatra in the late ’90s, I put the question to the congregation and asked for volunteers to take up the evening services to the Deities during the week. I was really pleased with a positive response. When given a chance to see and serve the Lord directly, devotees usually do not resent. Only an hour or two after-work is an affordable option for many householder devotees or even students. It provides one with an opportunity of a lifetime and a way to become more qualified. A senior pujari, who has been living outside of the temple for some 18 years, also came forward to offer a part of the evening programme, another Prabhupada disciple already offered a day during the week. These are very positive and encouraging news, and I can only hope that devotees will take it up more and more, considering that the evening schedule was custom tailored to suit the needs of the congregation, to make it more manageable and compact.

Would you not want to have a direct sensual perception of God? Is it not an attractive proposal? Why not take a break from daily routine and material role? Besides being able to hear His name (nama) and His glories (sastra-pramana), worshiping His form (rupa) is probably the quickest and most affordable way, for a beginner, to proceed in the process of pleasing God. Nothing may come close to the constant absorption of an advanced devotee, yet even for neophytes like us, even an evening or an hour a week can provide an opportunity and the blessings of purification. I would like to ask Vasnavas to bless the efforts of congregational involvement in the Deity worship, as with everything else in this imperfect world, the most difficult of tasks will become possible with the blessings of the devotees of the Lord; so please bless these five congregational devotees who started their part time involvement this week in the Belfast temple; and please pray that even a neophyte will be given a chance to experience the blissful transcendent form, rupa, of God by direct perception, or at least get a glimpse and meditation on His mercy.

(Attached: Krishna sundari Dasi performing arati to Radha-Madhava dressed in Holi-style outfit) 

Source: http://www.dandavats.com/?p=84975

The Deep Ecology movement is rooted in the conclusions of Professors Lynn White and Arne Naess. By the late 1960s, Prof White, a historian and university president who had studied the development of technology from medieval times to the present, published “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis”. In that influential article, he identified society’s mentality of anthropocentrism (human-centrism) as the root cause of the ecologic crisis. Shortly after that, Prof Naess, philosopher and environmentalist, coined the term “deep ecology”. Similar to White, deep ecologists are those who see the need for a change in mentality, philosophy, or morality with regard to nature. They actively promote a nature-centric worldview. Shallow ecologists are those who wish to correct environmental problems, but without giving up the anthropocentric relationship with nature that the deep ecologists so adamantly oppose.

Vedic culture, which thrived in India thousands of years ago, came to experience similar tensions regarding society’s relationship with nature. Over time, many who followed the Vedas developed an anthropocentric view of life. Early on, they had been more nature-centric, being part of an agrarian society and worshiping the higher powers in order to synchronize humanity’s interests with those of nature and the Supreme Lord. Nevertheless, they gradually became more concerned with human interests, albeit in a less selfish and more natural manner than today’s exploiters of the environment. In reaction to the degradation of Vedic culture, several reform movements emerged. Some of them extracted overlooked themes in Vedic culture and reprioritized them, while others rejected the Vedic literature and its social applications in favor of a more complete doctrinal and social overhaul. Of particular concern to most of these movements was animal slaughter. According to the Vedic tradition, the priests could sacrifice animals, which would then be elevated in their next births. However, over time, the sacrifices became ineffective; the priests no longer possessed the mystical power to synchronize the needs of humans, animals, and plants, with those of the higher powers, the gods. In other words, the priests and their patrons performed sacrifices for selfish ends. The ritual killing of animals no longer mitigated sin, but heaped sins on humanity.

Several movements that were concerned with such violence and exploitation of nature broke with Vedic tradition, and out of those Buddhism and Jainism survived and flourished. Both established a non-violent perception of the world. Such a perception diminished the previous human-centric tendencies, and ceded more rights to nature.

Even prior to these movements, others emerged that did not reject the Vedas or Vedic social structure. However, they put aside the Vedas in favor of their corollaries, the Upanishads. They retired the Vedas, not because of any fault in them, but due to the people. The influence of time had caused them to become greedy, selfish, and unable to apply the Vedas properly. Foremost among these ancient reform movements was that of Krishna, whom his followers consider either an avatar of Vishnu or the original source of Vishnu. He presented His teachings in the Bhagavad-gita, “Song of God”, which has become the basis for most of Hinduism.

Krishna’s Gita retains a perspective on the Vedas, and yet focuses on the yoga tradition as well as Vedanta (essence of the Vedas), whose philosophy was established by the Upanishads and Vedanta Sutras. Based on these doctrines, Krishna extracts at least three themes that directly relate to deep ecology. First is the concept of the individual soul distinct from the body. Second is the universal soul spread throughout creation. Third is yajna (sacrifice), which formed the socio-economic basis of Vedic society. Indirectly related to deep ecology, He discusses knowledge or epistemology, karma (human action), analysis of the psychophysical and metaphysical elements of the world, and humanity’s relation to the Supreme. Putting these aside, however, the first three topics are particularly relevant to ecology. In His discussion of soul, universal soul, and sacrifice, all within the context of yoga, He rejects the anthropocentric view of the world.

He begins His teaching in the Gita by establishing the nature of the soul. In contrast to those who had been misusing the concept of soul to kill animals, He explained that a person should act selflessly in the knowledge that he or she is soul, not the body. In this way, His instructions on the soul encouraged simple living and detachment from the world, not exploitation of it. In addition, He urged performance of actions, based on one’s identity as soul, within a yogic perspective. One of the goals of yoga is to control selfish desires, and in so doing, to see all beings, including animals and plants, as equal souls.

In the sacrifices of the Vedic culture, a yogic theme had existed. However, it had been minimized, and Krishna revived it. He presented yajna (sacrifice) as indispensable and interdependent with yoga and karma (action). He echoed the Vedas by saying that the gods (demigods) supply the necessities of life and one who does not offer a portion in return is a thief. The result of His teaching is that the structure of Vedic society and economy remains, but with a yogic (unselfish, non-exploitative, equal-seeing) perspective. In this way, He redefined Vedic yajna, a pantheistic practice that had degraded into selfish anthropocentrism. His yajna became a devotional, spiritual, intellectual, or altruistic practice that removes human-centrism and replaces it with yogic selflessness, which is consistent with the spirit of the Vedas.

The concept of the universal soul is another important part of the Vedas, and, along with the individual soul, Krishna emphasized this worldview. A recurring theme in the Vedas is that humanity is an integral part of or one with the total environment. For example, parts of the Vedas extol the pervasiveness of fire and the sun. In this context, priests offered some Vedic sacrifices to the universal soul, Vaishvanara, which is also a name for the sun. In addition, they placed their offerings into the fire (Agni), who is not just a localized flame, but also a deity who is a pervasive representative of the gods, and who consumes offerings on their behalf. The concept of the universal soul is one of the great, mystical aspects of Vedic culture. In His Gita, Krishna emphasizes everyone’s relationship with the Supreme Soul, whom He describes as the dear friend in each person’s heart, and the enjoyer of sacrifices. A goal of yoga is to turn one’s attention inward toward the universal soul, away from selfish exploitation of the world.

Many great thinkers have wrestled with humanity’s complex relationship with nature, which includes its inescapable exploitation and destruction. Humans do not exist separate from nature, including its plants, animals, inanimate objects, and the gods, or their processes like the wind, sun energy, rain, seasonal cycles, and so on. Humans often delight in nature’s gifts, but do not like to reciprocate with her; they do not mind being violent toward nature, but do not appreciate her violence toward them. Deep Ecology recognizes these tensions, and encourages a moral response.

Over time, worldviews yield in some degree to the greed of humans. Indeed, as millennia have gone by, some greedy people also infiltrated Krishna’s movement, Vaishnavism. In order to address this problem, five-hundred years ago another great reformer, Sri Caitanya, again tried to purge the impure elements from individuals and society by further simplifying sacrifice, and re-emphasizing the theo-centric or Krishna-centric way of life. In doing so, He embraced trees, taught animals to chant Krishna’s name, worshiped the holy rivers, and generally taught his followers to see Krishna in all things. He reaffirmed the Gita teaching that everything belongs to the Supreme Lord, and those who see otherwise are in illusion. Today, most Vaishnavas make efforts to lead a theo-centric life. They struggle to remember that they are souls who are equal to the plants and animals, and that they are not their bodies, with the associated desires to exploit and kill the Lord’s nature. They try to remember that the universal soul or Supreme Soul is their friend who is in their hearts and who with love beckons them to turn away from violence and exploitation.

Recent Vaishnava sages, like Prabhupada and his predecessors, envisioned the great contributions that the Vaishnava and genuine Vedic perspectives can make in a world of selfishness. They became Vaishnava activists and requested their followers to practice Krishna-centrism, which includes a non-anthropocentric relationship with His nature. Moreover, they urged their followers to propagate that view. There are more than half a billion Vaishnavas around the world. By Krishna’s grace and that of His divine nature, their struggles to have a deep ecological impact in the world will be successful.

Source: http://www.dandavats.com/?p=85357

There were three poor men who always desired great riches. One day a special delivery man handed to each poor man an envelope and informed each man, that within the envelope is a great fortune.

The first poor man did not think very much of the envelope, thinking it to be junkmail, he tossed it on a pile of similar mails that was supposed to make him a millionaire, or win a special prize, sweepstakes etc.

The second poor man opened the envelope and found a golden card. Thinking it to be real gold, he rushed to jewellery store to ascertain the card’s carat or value. The jeweler took one look at the card and began to laugh at the poor man. He remarked that it was just a plastic card, amused at the poor man’s foolishness. The poor man felt cheated and threw the card away.

The third poor man opened the envelope and found the same gold card. He inspected it carefully and humbly asked the delivery man to explain the significance of the mail. He also found within the envelope a note informing him that this was the prize for a competition he (and the other poor men) entered some time ago. He listened intently to the delivery man, understanding that this was no ordinary delivery boy, but an educated gentleman. The delivery man explained that this competition was sponsored by a charitable benefactor, who handpicked each poor man’s name. The prize was a credit card which did not require repayment with and no credit limit. However it was only to be used at selected businesses. He thanked the delivery man profusely and bid him farewell. The poor man understanding his fortunate position began to utilize the credit card to become a very wealthy man.

Krishna consciousness is the most valuable treasure in all existence. In this analogy, the first poor man displays the situation of someone who has received Krishna (or God) conscious literature, an invitation to a Temple of the Lord, or even someone who has heard the ancient wisdom in bona fide disciplic succession. Although receiving Krishna consciousness, he/she thinks the treasure of devotion to God to be another fanatical religious cult or pointless philosophy- thus he/she never applies the eternal science of bhakti-yoga.

The second poor man is like someone who has taken to the process of Krishna consciousness but is unable to grasp its actual value, nor is this person able to utilize the divine process successfully. This person may chant Krishna’s transcendental name daily, read regularly and may even be formally initiated as a devotee. However when faced with a vast array of material tribulations, he/she may doubt the efficacy of the practice. This person may even feel cheated at some point and discard the priceless boon of devotional service to God. The jeweler represents people who ridicule devotees’ devotional activities, but who are also ignorant of the true wealth of devotion. Such people, the so-called intelligentsia maybe very respected by these ‘poor’ devotees- but they cannot help one to understand how to effectively utilize Krishna consciousness to transform one’s life positively and progressively. Such association will actually steal the gift of eternal bliss from the neophyte devotee.

The third poor man shows the example of a person who understands the value of Krishna consciousness and knows how to practice it effectively by following the science as it is under the guidance of eminent spiritual scientists. The third poor man humbly asked for some guidance from the delivery man. We naturally need guidance in material life, what to speak of spiritual life which is a completely different dimension- thus we should humbly approach the pure devotee(s). However that does not mean he blindly accepted whatever the delivery man said; he judged him to be a respectable person from what he heard. Our past masters inform us that we should not try to see a saintly devotee, since we have no such vision, rather we should hear from the devotee. If such a devotee is bona fide, then his/her words will make an impression onto our consciousness if we are sincere. The delivery man did not deviate from the note; similarly the spiritual master’s message never deviates from the bona fide scriptures, but presents it as he/she received it from his/her spiritual master. The actual test of the spiritual master and his/her guidance is if the application of the master’s instructions produces realization, or attachment to Krishna. Our Srila Prabhupada has displayed the potency of Krishna consciousness in recent history. He indelibly awakened genuine spirituality in the hearts of many sincere souls by his exact guidance. He was very fond of explaining that one knows a tree by its fruits. So if by the association of a person, one becomes attracted to the Supreme, then one can understand that such association is the best. When understands the fortune of such association, then one can really utilize Krishna consciousness. It is by the mercy of the spiritual master that one can understand bhakti and how to apply it effectively. However this understanding does not produce the fruit or bhakti unless there is application of the principles by the disciple. The prize was delivered on behalf of the charitable benefactor by the delivery man, similarly Krishna is the ultimate benefactor for all living beings and out of causeless compassion for His unfortunate children’s cries for happiness- He sends His dear sons, messengers and servants to give the greatest fortune for the living entity- God consciousness.

The bona fide disciple may have material problems but understands that material life is the actual problem and to try to remedy it by material means is foolish. He/she understands that application of spiritual technologies of bhakti yoga is the solution to all problems. This is performed maturely, with the understanding of one’s individual capacity to practice Krishna consciousness and progress gradually. Beyond the cessasation of material suffering; he/she relishes the taste of true spiritual life. The fundamental difference between this person and the former person is that this person possesses the understanding of his/her constitutional relationship to God and His devotees, the material world, and all living entities (or sambandha jnana- which begins theoretically). When one serves in this understanding (the proper process or abidheya), one begins to realize the Truth gradually which is directly perceived within the practioner, until one achieves the goal of life- pure love of God (or prayojana). Even the Supreme Lord, who is the ultimate controller, becomes completely controlled by pristine pure love of His bona fide devotee. There is no wealth equal to or greater than this.

Source: http://www.dandavats.com/?p=5217

Sri Vamsi Thakura appeared in the home of Sri Madhava dasa. His mother’s name was Srimati Candrakala Devi. Vamsi Vadana is the incarnation of Sri Krsna’s flute.

On the day of his birth Mahaprabhu was present in the house of Sri Madhava das, along with Sri Advaita Acarya. Madhava was very devoted to Mahaprabhu and Prabhu was also very affectionate to him and his son Vamsi. Vamsi das was present at Navadwipa when Acarya Prabhu came there.

Vamsi was engaged in the service of Visnupriya and was the receptacle of her unlimited mercy. One time Visnupriya devi and Vamsi Thakura decided to give up taking food and water, there not being any point in maintaining their bodies which were so racked with the pain of separation from Mahaprabhu.

Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, however, didn’t approve of this and manifested Himself before them. Then He requested them not to behave so rashly, and then instructed them both to worship His Deity form in order to mitigate their feelings of separation.

After Visnupriya’s disappearance Vamsivadana brought this Deity of Mahaprabhu from Mayapura to Kulia. This Deity of Mahaprabhu is very beautiful and is still being worshipped in the present town of Navadwip. The name of the temple and Deity is Dhameswara. It is said that the name Vamsi Vadana is carved into the underneath of the base of the Deity.

Source: https://ramaiswami.com/vamsivadana-thakura-appearance/

What does Mayapur look like through the eyes of someone who has dedicated their life to devotion?

In this heartfelt and insightful journey, we explore the spiritual heart of Mayapur from the perspective of a sadhu — not just as a sacred destination, but as a living, breathing dham filled with divine presence, history, and deep spiritual emotion.

Through personal reflections, memories, and realizations, this video reveals:

 The true essence of Mayapur beyond the temples and architecture
 The mood of devotion that defines daily life here
 Hidden spiritual gems only a practitioner can perceive
 Lessons for pilgrims and seekers visiting this holy place

Mayapur is not just a place on the map — it is an experience of consciousness. Through the eyes of a sadhu, we begin to understand its deeper meaning, its mercy, and its transformative power.

Whether you’ve visited Mayapur before or dream of going one day, this video will help you see it in a completely new light.

Source: https://www.dandavats.com/?p=117477