kirtan (100)

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Husband and wife Radhe Radhe Devi Dasi and Nandanandana Das, second generation devotees and disciples of Bir Krishna Goswami, are running a series of online kirtan festivals to bring devotees around the world together during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Born in South India, Nandanandana attended Vrindavan Gurukula; while Radhe Radhe was born and raised in Vrindavan and later relocated to Australia to establish the Bhakti Centre on the Gold Coast with her father Jamalarjuna Das.

Before COVID-19, t

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Each year more than 70 lakh people from different parts of the world visit Mayapur, the birthplace of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and headquarter of ISKCON. Over the years Mayapur has evolved as a significant tourist destination of not only West Bengal but the entire world. However this year the global pandemic cast a spell of gloom on the devotees, pilgrims and visitors all over the world who come in search of spiritual enlightenment and submerge in the blissful ocean of Harinam Sankirtan.

After

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KrQcjm3.jpg?profile=RESIZE_584xBy Narada das

ISKCON Festivals UK

(1st July 2020)

Last weekend marked the 50th anniversary of the iconic Glastonbury Music Festival – a renowned feature of the UK cultural scene. This massive event attracts over 250,000 people, hosting live stage performances from the most famous international artists, and is shown worldwide by the BBC.

It’s also a very important event for ISKCON in the UK as the movement’s biggest annual outreach event connecting with the diverse British public.

Devotees have b

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6372530459?profile=RESIZE_400xCorrado cycled over to Allen Gardens, with the mrdunga drum strapped to his back, and waited there for us walkers. This is a new strategy we’re trying. Each night, after our serenade of sorts (musical display at our stairwell facing the public), those on foot will reach a different park, get down on the grass and start chanting away.  Corrado’s lugging the drum by his bicycle saves us time and a burden.

We reached the garden park, which is just across the street from our old temple/ashram, at 18

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By Ekalavya Das

The ISKCON Harinam Sankirtan Ministry was appointed this year by the GBC. The minister is Lokanath Swami. In one of its first initiatives, the Ministry began Kirtan Fest Global, a global brand to promote Kirtan Festivals throughout the world. What better place to start than Mother India?

Kirtan Fest Global organized the Kirtan Fest India Online for ISKCON India from 10th May - 17th May, 2020 from 9 am-9 pm, which was live streamed on Facebook. The event was so popular that th

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I met up with Ajamila at the corner of Wellesley and Sherbourn. We hadn’t seen each other since the lockdown started although the occasional meet by phone. He’s doing well and is singing bhajans on-line.
 
Bhajans are songs expressing devotional sentiments, in this case, to honour Krishna.
 
I had a thought that before long we could possibly sing and play together at this very corner by the library. There is a nice flow of pedestrian traffic, a good intersection for exposing mantras where there
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“How is our existence in the material nature? Very beautiful, very wonderful. [laughter] Full of promises and full of excitement, full of opportunities. But that is the influence of the Lord’s illusory potency. We are suffering, but we consider this suffering condition to be joyful. The reality is this material existence is full of suffering. And the thing is, the more we try to enjoy, the more we end up suffering. Therefore, saintly people in the past, they used to voluntarily accept austeriti

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Kirtan musician, Jahnavi Harrison and popular singer, Willow Smith have teamed up to release a new song entitled ‘Surrender (Krishna Keshava)’. The piece is a rendition of the sacred prayer for protection and shelter purportedly sung by Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu as he walked the length of India. This is a first time collaboration for Jahnavi and Willow, who met last year and share a belief in the power of music to heal, uplift and raise consciousness. ‘We had started it some months back, and ha

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Kirtan Space, an online educational effort that started in 2016, has been revamped and will offer a free ten-week foundational kirtan course on Youtube starting May 25th. 

“During this time, when you may be not working and may be stuck at home, is a good opportunity to learn a new instrument,” says director Balaram Nityananda Das.  

Balaram has been steeped in sacred music, or kirtan, since childhood, studying it while in gurukula in Mayapur, West Bengal, and later spending time with the renow

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Srila Prabhupada mentions in the purport of SB.3.25.25 the importance of devotee association. He explains that devotees should give up the association of materialistic persons and seek the association of devotees; he describes that to understand the pastimes of the Lord, to see the Lord as a person with personal activities and to offer devotional service one should have devotee association. Srila Prabhupada states that devotee association means association with the Lord.

It is relevant for devo

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In Vrindavan, on September 13, 1975, Srila Prabhupada spoke on Srimad-Bhagavatam 6.2.11:

na niskrtair uditair brahma-vadibhis
tatha visuddhyaty aghavan vratadibhih
yatha harer nama-padair udahrtais
tad uttamasloka-gunopalambhakam

“By following the Vedic ritualistic ceremonies or undergoing atonement, sinful men do not become as purified as by chanting once the holy name of Lord Hari. Although ritualistic atonement may free one from sinful reactions, it does not awaken devotional service, unlike

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By Acarya dasa, Ritudeep dasa, Damodarleela dasa, and Radhavallabha dasa

(respective padayatra leaders)

All-India Padayatra

Just as the AIP reached Mahuva, a large town on the Arabian Sea coast in the Bhavnagar District of Gujarat, the Indian Government announced a three-week lockdown to inhibit the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus in the community. Initially, as people became aware that we are travelling all over India they were reluctant to provide us with anywhere to stay. The residents sa

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From Back to Godhead

By His Divine Grace A.C.B. Swami Prabhupada

Chivalrous leaders guided by wise, Self controlled ministers will ensure the development of a peaceful society.

Amongst the human beings, the king is the representative of Krishna because Krishna is the maintainer of the universe, and the kings, who are appointed on account of their godly qualifications, are maintainers of their kingdoms. Kings like Maharaja Yudhisthira, Maharaja Parikshit and Lord Rama were all highly righteous k

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Srila Narottama dasa Thakura says, samsara-visanale, divanisi hiya jvale, judaite na kainu upaya: “We are always suffering from material pangs, and our hearts are burning, but we cannot find any way out of it.” The materialistic person can also be called a tapasvi, which means someone who is always suffering from material pains. One can get rid of all these material pains only when he takes shelter of the chanting of the Hare Krsna mantra. This is also explained by Narottama dasa Thakura: golok

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By Madhava Smullen
 

Gaura Mandali, a new Kirtan Academy for children – with plans to introduce adult classes soon – has launched in the New Raman Reti ISKCON community in Alachua, Florida.

The project’s director and, so far, sole teacher Thakura Das, grew up in a setting perfect for meditating on the Holy Names, and had a strong attraction to kirtan from early on.

Born and raised on the Nova Gokula farm in Brazil, simple living and high thinking was the norm for Thakura.

“My dad was the cow

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By Madhava Smullen

From letters Srila Prabhupada wrote to his disciples, we know that he envisioned New Vrindaban as, among other things, a holy place of pilgrimage in North America, where devotees could gather for spiritual education.

Progress in realizing that vision has gone from strength to strength in recent times. New Vrindaban’s accommodation in its Palace Lodge, cabins, and temple guestwing have been beautifully remodeled, including several rooms with ensuite bathrooms. The recently

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3973439420?profile=RESIZE_710xIt has come! It has come! After a whole year Sri Navadvipa Parikrama has come once again inviting all devotees to enter its prema filled islands.

Around 6 am, in the hazy morning of the 26th , vaishnavas and vaishnavis from all walks of life and of multifarious cultural and ethnical backgrounds gather at the Sri Yogapith.

The first of many kirtans to come began startling the hearts of all with vibrant earnestness, humility and courage. “Jiv jago Jiv Jago”

The procession of Gaura bhaktas headed

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Cambodia, a small country between Thailand and Vietnam, has a population of about sixteen million people. Kala Das has regularly visited this land for the last ten years to share Krishna consciousness with people. He is a great source of inspiration for those few devotees who stay there on a regular basis.

“Kirtan is 2020 Vision for Cambodia“ was organized to bring people’s attention to the local programs so that they can become involved in devotional service to the Lord. The beautiful festival

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By Madhava Smullen

Back in 2009, when devotees in Radhadesh, Belgium held a small kirtan weekend with Sivarama Swami and Madhava, just 100 people attended. It was a similarly intimate group the next year, when festival coordinator Manu Magnin, then 19 years old, took over the organizing and invited his second generation friends.

Then things skyrocketed. By 2011, 300 people were attending, and by 2013, around 600. Now Radhadesh Mellows is one of the biggest kirtan festivals in the world. This

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Any Colour You Like by Jagabandhu das

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My earliest memories of religion in this life are of my father (my first guru) teaching me about the Great Spirit worshiped by American Indians (“Wakan-Tanka” Who also undergoes quadruple expansion just like the all pervading yet personal Vasudev). He also taught me that I should be respectful of other people’s beliefs irrespective of race and creed. And never look down upon anyone. Ever.

Even though his mother, my paternal grandmother was a devout Baptist (my maternal grandmother was a devout

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