Blog

Dated: March 21, 1969

Location: Hawaii

Letter to: Tamala Krsna

My Dear Tamala Krishna,

Please accept my blessings. Your letter dated March 18th by special delivery is in hand and it is so gratifying that you have already saved $600 for the improvement of the temple. So I am very much pleased. Go on working like this and Krishna will give you ample money—there is no scarcity. Regarding the change of altar, you can do it later on, but your making up the feast room you can take care of immediately

Sri Hanuman, a great devotee in the form of a monkey, prays, “Since Lord Sri Ramacandra is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Vasudeva, He is not attached to anything in this material world. He is the most beloved Supersoul of all self-realized souls, and He is their very intimate friend. He is full of all opulences. . . .

“One cannot establish a friendship with the Supreme Lord Ramacandra on the basis of material qualities such as one’s birth in an aristocratic family, one’s personal beauty,

By NItai Gaurasundar Das

ISKCON devotees from France traveled to the Caribbean Islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe this past winter to perform Harinam in the streets. For some of the small towns, this was their first-ever exposure to Bhakti Yoga and chanting of the Holy Name.

The group was led by Jaya Bhakti devi dasi, a disciple of HH Guru Prasad Swami, who spent her own personal pension money to fund the pilgrimage. The harinam group consisted of Prasanatma das- a French Prabhupada disciple

You can feel spring in the air with the sun bright and any hints of snow now on a slow melt. When I step out the door, I know I have choices whether to turn left or right. Today’s choices turn right toward the Annex, the university (U of T), or just plain old Bloor Street, a favourite pedestrian-friendly avenue.

Once I got to the corner of Robert, a man by the name of Dan, 68, saw me and asked a common question, “Are you a monk?”

“Yes, I am. A Krishna monk.”

“I had a friend who worked with me i

By Vasant Pancami Das

Hare Krishna!

Dear Prabhus,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

Ai is the buzzword on everybody’s mind. I decided to use it as a powerful preaching tool. So I worked hard on it and came up with BhaktiAi a system within ChatGPT the most advanced and talked about Ai language model in existence today.
Microsoft has invested 10 billion dollars in the system. I invested time and conversational machine learning intelligence (because I don’t have

We’re spirits inside material bodies. If we do something about our own spiritual life—like find out who we really are and what we’re meant to do—life can only improve. We generally prefer consciousness to unconsciousness, except during surgery. Putting zero effort into finding our true identity and purpose while keeping our bodies and minds pleasantly occupied is like always stopping for gas but never eating. What good is keeping our car’s fuel tank full if we’re starving? How can we have a bal

By Thomas Haribol   

Springtime in New Vrindaban is like stepping into a colorfully painted landscape, and Mother’s Day weekend will unite its beauty with some of our movement’s most talented artists, musicians, writers, and creators in the second annual Vaishnava Arts Festival, May 12-14th, 2023.

Fittingly, the idea for the event came through the creative collaboration of HG Kalakantha Prabhu and HG Anuradha Dasi. “Coming from a background of Waldorf School’s pedagogy, I’m always looking for w

A very enthusiastic marathoner, Nitai Priya, spent hours on restructuring and redesigning a slide presentation for our much-needed Kirtan Standards Workshop. 40 to 50 attendees sat to listen, observe, and interact in this 4-hour seminar on how to approach and deliver the practice we almost like to do dash chant. The themes of this presentation are what our guru, Prabhupada, desired in the realm of sharing mantras, and secondly, inclusivity.

When we say ‘inclusivity’ in the matter of kirtan enga

There have been a number of scientific studies recently that try to analyze if animals have any form of morality. This is obviously complex since it is nigh impossible to get inside the mind of a poor dumb creature and there is always the accusation of anthropomorphizing.

The subject is important to many people because there seems to be various beliefs with vested interests in the interpretations. For instance, Charles Darwin believed that animals expressed morality and that what we understand a

Coco is a lovable dog proudly owned by an also lovable household couple who hosted this evening's ‘Gita Chat.’ While we conducted our discussion, Coco seemed to bark occasionally and spontaneously at times when it was just right, as if to confirm profound statements made. He is 3 1/2 years of age, full of energy, and moved about from participant to participant, who were all just sitting in the Lotus position (well, most of them). He is well behaved, like the people in asana formation, and was l

The disappearance of Srila Ramanujacarya. I will speak a little bit on his relationship with Mayapur dham. He visited Puri with his disciples. He was conquering the whole of India with his philosophy visistadvaita-vada. He was conquering and at that time he was in Puri and he was questioning the pundits that the system of worship recommended in Kali Yuga is pancaratrika worship but you all are using vaidiki worship because vaidiki worship, tantric worship. Pancaratriki worship is slightly in be

I’ve been in Germany for a few weeks visiting my family and was trying to sell some books this past week while I had some time off from family visits. In the town where I was, it seemed to be quite difficult to distribute a lot of books to the many hard-wired Germans. A lot of people didn’t speak much German or English, and many other fundraisers besides me were also on the streets. So I was meditating on something Devamrita Swami told me once — I should just think, “I could meet one person who

Perhaps we are the only society who is proclaiming, “Here is God, Krishna. Take it.” We are the only society in the whole world. Otherwise they are all misled, all misled.

Others may cooperate or not cooperate; we don’t mind. But we cannot change our policy. Our policy is, “Krishna says, ‘I am the Supreme.’ ” We must declare throughout the whole world that Krishna is the Supreme. Krishna says, mattah parataram nanyat kincid asti dhananjaya. (Gita 7.7) [“O conqueror of wealth (Arjuna), there is

“Give Peace A Chance” and “Hare Krishna” go viral on European radio once again.

John Lennon’s pacifist anthem again this Friday sounded throughout Europe on the airways. At the request of Berlin Public Radio, around 160 public radio stations from 28 European countries simultaneously played “Give Peace a Chance”, the song Lennon composed in 1969 against the Vietnam War.

The song, recorded in room 1742 on June 1, 1969, had its obvious starting point in Lennon’s response to war. These words haunte

Much has been explored about physical sound.
Let us now delve into some divine aspects of this element.

Sound is caused by energy emitted in the form of a vibration resulting in hearing sensation. The amplitude (volume) and frequency (pitch) of the sound wave depends on what the source is and the amount of energy supplied outwards. Sound needs a medium to travel such as gases, liquids or solids and travels faster through solid objects because the molecules pack more tightly and don’t have to mo

On the bank of the Ganges, a young devotee of Krsna showed a 
death-bound king the way to immortality.

King Pariksit was cursed to die within seven days. Yet he took it all as Krsna's will, and at once he went to the Ganges to fast till the fatal moment. On hearing the news, great sages came from all over the universe to witness his passing.

"Please tell me," the king asked, " what is the duty of one who is about to die?"

Before the sages came to any consensus, a sixteen-year-old boy arrived, a

Whenever it's a stroll in the city and I notice a new embarrassing box come up (which is called a building), I get disappointed. I see these structures as challenges to nature's landscape. They block the sun, the moon, trees. Many, or most contemporary edifices are simply an eyesore. Tombstones look better.

Just south of our ashram on Avenue Road, A new residential structure will be coming up. It will be ugly. It will be square. Developers make big profit on square units. Every square inch coun

Hare Krishna,

In the last blog we read how there is a Television in our heart. Today we will read how to switch on that television and see God face to face as well in our heart.

Why everyone can not see God face to face?

Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa’s name, fame, pastimes, etc., cannot be understood by material senses. Only to one who is engaged in pure devotional service under proper guidance is He revealed. In the Brahma-saṁhitā (5.38) it is stated, premāñjana-cchurita-bhakti-vilocanena santaḥ sadaiva hṛda

The Story of the First Krishna Deity in ISKCON Two of Srila Prabhupada’s early disciples discover Krishna while shopping for bells in New York City.

When Srila Prabhupada arrived in New York City in September 1965, he felt deep separation from Vrindavan and the major deities there “My Lords, Govindaji, Gopinath, and Radha Damodar,” as he noted in his diary. After seven months of mixed results, he opened his first temple on the Lower East Side. Centers soon opened in San Francisco, Montreal, Los