By Madhava Smullen
The Mantra Lounge in Philadelphia, known for its book distribution, has been reaching out to people during the COVID-19 pandemic by feeding the homeless and others in need.
“When the pandemic began in Spring last year, we saw people start to lose their jobs pretty quickly, and remembered Srila Prabhupada’s instruction that no one within a ten-mile radius of any ISKCON center should go hungry,” says Mangal-Arti Dasi, president of the Mantra Lounge in Fishtown and affiliated Titiksava Karunika Ashram in West Philadelphia.
Devotees had already been feeding university students on campus at Temple, Drexel, West Chester and Rowan universities every week. Now they wanted to help families who were struggling.
“I would see some of the people we had been sharing Krishna consciousness with, and they hadn’t eaten anything all day,” Mangal-Arti says. “Sometimes they would go on fasts for ten or fifteen days, and tell me, ‘Oh, I’m doing a cleanse.’ But when you really got to know them, you learned they just didn’t have the money to eat three square meals.”
Read more: https://iskconnews.org/philadelphias-mantra-lounge-feeds-the-needy-during-pandemic,7677/
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