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Sabhapati had tried to arrange a meeting between Srila Prabhupada and the State Minister for Social Welfare. The Minister was unavailable, but had agreed to send someone in his place. After a light Ekadasi breakfast, Srila Prabhupada was visited by the director of research from the same government department.

Mr. Moore, a balding, immaculately-dressed man in his late fifties, listened politely as Prabhupada chose to carefully point out the defects in modern society, and their obvious roots in Godlessness. The main defect, he explained, was the absence of social structure. He gave divorce as an example. Over some slight difference of opinion, the husband and wife separate and the family is plunged into chaos. Prabhupada noted how his disciple Brahmananda had come from such a broken home. Previously his father was a good businessman with a very nice family and good income, but over a disagreement his parents had divorced, the children were scattered, business closed, and the father and mother had both remarried. According to Canakya Pandit, Prabhupada noted, disagreement between husband and wife should not be taken seriously. "Let them fight for some time, they will stop automatically."

Prabhupada's pointing out the flaws of divorce was certainly timely. Australia was on the verge of passing its Family Law Bill, whereby divorce could take place solely on the grounds of "irretrievable breakdown", after twelve months separation.

To illustrate just how far off the track modern society had strayed, Prabhupada chose to give a fascinating description of turn-of-the-century Indian society. Previously, he said, drinking was very restricted. Any man who drank alcohol was not respected, but rather was rejected from the society of gentlemen. Similarly, if one desired to eat meat, he was considered a third-class man. One would have to go and secretly find some Muslim cook outside of the local neighbourhood to taste meat. And women were kept so strictly under the vigilance of the parents, that if the girl went out of the house one night, no one would ever marry her.

"We have seen all these things in our childhood, but now these things are slackened. Jawaharlal Nehru, our late Prime Minister, introduced the divorce law, and now the society is in a chaotic condition."

Mr. Moore agreed that things were less than perfect, but wondered how things could change, since modern society "wanted to stay the way it was".

"So people should be trained up," Prabhupada suggested.

Mr. Moore asked how.

"We are advocating that illicit sex is sinful. Our first condition is that one must give up these four things: illicit sex, meat-eating, intoxication and gambling. This is my first condition before accepting [a disciple]."

Mr. Moore fidgeted nervously on his chair. "But only a small percentage would be able to put this into practice."

Prabhupada agreed. "Even if a small percentage of ideal men are there in society, one per cent, at least people will think 'Oh, here is ideal', and the other 99 per cent will see and follow."

He gave a clear example. "There are so many stars in the sky, but there is only one moon. In percentage the moon is nothing -- if we take a percentage of the stars, the moon is nothing. But the one moon is more important than all the nonsense stars." As Prabhupada said "nonsense stars", he brushed away some imaginary stars with such a striking aristocratic movement of his hand that everyone in the room laughed. "Let there be one moon, that is sufficient. There is no need of percentage."

As the conversation progressed, Mr. Moore asked Srila Prabhupada a hypothetical question: What would be his course of action if a thief broke into the temple to steal something?

Prabhupada raised his eyebrows. "If a thief came we would punish him. A thief should be punished."

"What if he breaks in because he's hungry?" asked Mr. Moore.

Prabhupada was emphatic. "We say everyone, come and eat. Why he should remain hungry? We invite everyone, come here, eat, no charge. We don't charge. Why he should remain hungry? Let us increase this program. All hungry men of Melbourne city, come here, you take your eating sumptuously."

As Prabhupada said, "Come here", he gestured as if all the hungry men were actually standing at the door. "We invite -- come on. Why you should remain hungry?" With another subtle, but striking, movement of his hand, he sat the hungry men of Melbourne down.

If the government assisted, Prabhupada added, then he could feed Melbourne's hungry unlimitedly. "The government should take the standard formula from us: we say that you chant Hare Krsna, eat here sumptuously, live here comfortably, and you will become peaceful. It is guaranteed. If anyone, even a madman, agrees to take these three principles, that let him chant the Hare Krsna mantra, take whatever nice foodstuff we prepare, and live peacefully. He will be peaceful. Without peace you cannot be happy. But if you manufacture your own way, you will never be successful.

"If you approve of this method, you can co-operate in so many ways. We are prepared to convince you of the first-class nature of this movement. You are one of the leaders of the society. If the leaders of the society become compassionate with our movement, others will automatically follow."

Cont'd


- From "The Great Transcendental Adventure" by HG Kurma Prabhu