Author Archives: Madhava Smullen

New Orleans is known for its seafood and meat dishes, but the Good Karma Café – only the city’s second vegan eatery – is giving people a taste for prasadam, and could change hearts in the process.

A new bhakta director and youth preacher at ISKCON Juhu, Mumbai has been taking new devotees and their parents on spiritual retreats together. The results? Deeper relationships, and unfavorable parents becoming favorable to Krishna consciousn…

Dovetailing the fall pumpkin obsession in a Krishna conscious way, devotees drew 300 tourists to New Vrajadhama for their autumn Pumpkin Festival on October 14th. On this day the temple and altar were decorated with beautifully painted pumpki…

Good communication brings about a healthy relationship, as ISKCON’s Governing Body Comission and ISKCON guru Hridayananda Das Goswami found this month. Hridayananda Maharaja’s Krishna West project began in 2013. But due to ill hea…

An innovative new project called “Go Matsya” has instigated fast growth in distribution of full sets of Srila Prabhupada’s Srimad-Bhagavatam, and the idea is catching on around the world. BBT Trustee and Sankirtan Strategist…

Beloved kirtaniya and Prabhupada disciple Agnideva Das is in a stable but serious condition in an Australian hospital, with a lung infection and low oxygen levels.

Kevin Wu, a Youtube star with over 300 million views on his “KevJumba” channel, has been left feeling spiritually uplifted after following and filming sankirtan devotee Madhava Puri Das on book distribution. Wu met Madhava Puri wh…

On Friday September 15th, Bhaktimarga Swami, “The Walking Monk,” crossed the finish-line for his 3,550-mile walk across the USA in San Francisco, beneath shining blue skies and rolling white clouds. It had been two years since he …

After a long journey, a full-fledged ISKCON temple is finally set to launch in Las Vegas, receiving its grand opening from April 26th to 28th, 2018, culminating on Nrsimha Chaturdasi.

The event showed how far ISKCON farms have come in networking and working together particularly over the last decade, with conferences now regularly organized in four continents by the GBC Ministry of Agriculture and Cow Protection.  Bec…

As natural disaster after natural disaster continues to pummel the Americas, an 8.1 magnitude earthquake struck the Southwestern Mexican state of Oaxaca on September 9th. This was followed quickly by a 7.1 quake on September 19th in Mexi…

Devotees in Puerto Rico are safe after Hurricane Maria. However, the U.S. territory’s only temple, in mountainous Gurabo, has been “almost completely destroyed.”

A multi-talented musician, Havi Das – a Srila Prabhupada disciple – is a  highly successful pop and traditional artist in his native Venezuela as well as throughout South America. He grew up listening to Venezuelan folk, Afro…

Coming to the U.S. for the first time, Indradyumna Swami’s ‘Discover India’ tour began with a resounding success, performing to a receptive audience of over 500 people at the Newburgh Armory Unity Center in New York on Septe…

800 devotees from Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Ukraine, Belarus and Russia got to immerse themselves in Krishna consciousness in one of the most gorgeous natural settings in the world this August. They were attending the 17th ann…

In Alachua, North Central Florida, devotees of New Raman Reti – the largest ISKCON community in the Western World – braced themselves for a Category 1 or 2 hurricane, rarely seen so far inland.

Like many ISKCON programs today, the University of Southern California’s Bhakti Club drew mainly people with an Indian background who were already familiar with the tennets of Krishna consciousness. But a new rebranding and a broader vi…

Regal Cinemas will show the documentary film Hare Krishna!, about the life and teachings of ISKCON Founder Srila Prabhupada, as a one-off event screening in over eighty cities across the United States. The screening will be held at 7pm in all…

New community president Yadunandana Swami, who formerly served as principal in Belgium’s Bhaktivedanta College, had seen many families leave Spain over the years due to lack of spiritual education for their children.

Hurricane Harvey has caused major destruction in Houston and throughout Texas in the last several days. 21 trillion gallons of rain fell on the Houston area, causing 51 inches of flooding in the worst hit places. Thirty to forty thousand home…

New Vraja Dhama is perfect for the main event – devotees on the 660-acre farm have had decades of experience and grow their own vegetables, fruits, and grains. They also care for cows and have their own waste water treatment system and …

Renowned comic book artist Dheeraj Verma, who has worked with Dark Horse Comics and Marvel Comics in the US on titles such as Night of the Living Dead, Transformers, Dracula and Iron Man is now set to release a graphic novel about the Mahabha…

Brinda Raval, 21, is offering an inspirational example of how young ISKCON devotees can engage with today’s global concerns. “I’m very interested in social justice issues, and how as a devotee and a spiritual person I can us…

“Our goal is to become steadfast in our Krishna consciousness and in our lives, so that we can one day successfully run the Hare Krishna Movement.”

Today’s Paramahamaster is a special Janmastami comic! “Paramahamster” follows an enthusiastic devotee as he navigates a 9 – 5 work day in the corporate world. Please check back weekly for new episodes!

Inner Voice Productions has announced a Moscow screening of the film “Hare Krishna!” next week, on August 16th, Srila Prabhupada’s Appearance Day, and again on August 20th. 

On Thursday August 10th, a golden Sudarshan Chakra, weighing 1,400 kilograms (3,086 lbs), was installed on the Planetarium Wing dome of ISKCON’s under-construction Temple of the Vedic Planetarium in Mayapur, West Bengal.

Over 200 devotees and congregation packed excitedly into their new temple in Glastonbury, Connecticut on Sunday August 6th to celebrate its soft opening with the Balarama Jayanti festival. 

Members in New Raman Reti, Florida — ISKCON’s largest community in the Western World — are launching an ambitious attempt to unlock its full potential.

Fifty complete newcomers to Krishna consciousness packed out a recent seminar on “Conscious Living” at the Bhakti Yoga Center in Panama City recently.

At a recent event to launch the new #SheMustCount campaign, guests including Hollywood stars sponsored 30 girls to attend Vrindavan’s Sandipani Muni School and raised $75,000.

While some ISKCON Rathayatras attract mostly an internal devotee audience, the recent 18th “Festival de la India” in the Central American country of Panama drew largely local Panamanians. Only 10% of the crowd in attendance were d…

For decades, Bada Hari has been singing kirtan, teaching others, and mentoring young devotees. And for the past five years, he has been touring non-stop with Indradyumna Swami, averaging 13 countries a year and trying to serve people by conne…

The sannyasa ashram, or renounced order, is extremely influential in ISKCON. A high percentage of the society’s Governing Body Commission (GBC) members are sannyasis; while the majority of ISKCON’s initiating gurus are too. Yet a …

On June 23rd, Indradyumna Swami, kirtan singer Bada Haridas, Sita Charana Dasi from Macedonia and Saci Sundari Dasi from Bulgaria appeared on two prime time television programs in Skopje, Macedonia. One of the programs was in the morning, at …

The website, created by developer and second-generation devotee Krishna Kirtan Das, is designed to help devotees search, locate, contact and see the current status of all Srila Prabhupada disciples world-wide. The website is also publishing t…

Artists at all levels who want to connect with their creative and devotional sides, and experience bhakti through art, are welcome to attend the upcoming Transcendental Art Seminar at Bhaktivedanta College, Radhadesh. Running from August 21st…

Most editions of the epic devotional classic the Ramayana that you pick up will give a major focus only on the male characters, such as Rama, Lakshman and Hanuman. Author Vrinda Sheth, whose book Queen of the Elements – the second in he…