Websites from the ISKCON Universe
Work is essential for survival, as the Gita acknowledges. When work becomes the sole definer of our self-identity and self-worth, it degenerates to an indulgence, even an addictive indulgence.
In Czech, the whole month of December was relatively warm. But just when Kadamba Kanana Swami was to arrive, it started to snow! An overlay of snow has a certain touch of romanticism (especially from behind a window) however to travel about in it, is not the greatest experience. Moreover, Maharaj prefers warm weather…
Maharaj arrived in Prague on Tuesday, 12 January, and he immediately set-off on a 350 km journey to the Bhakti Yoga Centre in a village called Studenka, where he spent three days. He was accompanied by about twelve devotees and at the Bhakti Yoga Centre, there are eight devotees staying permanently. Maharaj’s visit there was very exciting. He gave morning and afternoon lectures, led wonderful kirtans, met with devotees and went out for walks in nature.
On Friday afternoon, Maharaj moved on to Nava Nandagram. The temple boasts the biggest temple room in the Czech Republic and it was crowded with devotees from around the country and various corners of Europe. At the evening program on Friday, Maharaj first led a long kirtan for the pleasure of Sri Sri Krsna Balarama, Gandharvika Giridhari, Laksmi Nrsimha, Gaura-Nitai and all present vaisnavas.
In his lecture, he mentioned how Krsna does not take away the suffering of the material world from our lives but instead, he fills the emptiness in our hearts which gives us inspiration and then suffering becomes insignificant! Thereafter, devotees asked various questions regarding finding balance in life. He answered all these questions with one common answer and published “A solution of Kadamba Kanana Swami” which was as follows, “Just simply add more Krsna! The more Krsna we add, the more life will be balanced. If we are asking questions regarding balance, it means that we are not satisfied. But when we add Krsna, we will be satisfied and everything will be in balance. Just add more Krsna at every moment – when you are worshipping the Deities or driving a car, alone or as a couple, when you are painting or playing the electric guitar… and the balance will be there.”
A nice surprise was an unplanned lecture on Saturday morning, where Maharaj mentioned that we are servants of Krsna not only on a part-time basis but full-time, and that we have to give preference to Krsna over anything else. We have to be determined to continue in our service despite whatever happens, in any circumstances, and if we do so, we will be those who survive!
Before noon that day, Maharaj set-off to Harinam Mandir in Prague. He was travelling in a Skoda and was followed by another two cars of the same brand, which is often the object of Maharaj’s jokes when he is in Czech! Harinam Mandir is a preaching centre in downtown of the Czech capital and it is well known for being nice and warm. This was noted by Maharaj as he mentioned that the best heaters are bodies and in Harinam Mandir, it was really jam-packed that some devotees had to stand in the corridor!
The Sunday morning lecture was given at the temple in Luzce as part of an initiation ceremony. Bhaktin Karin is now Kavita Devi Dasi. The lecture was based on Srimad Bhagavatam 2.3.13 and dealt with the twenty-six qualities of a devotee. The typical Sunday afternoon program consisted of ecstatic kirtan, lecture and feast with a full-house in attendance.
On Monday, Maharaj had planned to take rest but he suddenly changed his mind and he left for Amsterdam. What more to add – the time with Maharaj was filled with amazing moments that you never wanted to end. Videos and mp3 from lectures and kirtans will be published soon! Visit Flickr to see all the photos.
By Sri Chaitanya Chandra Das Once when Pandavas, great devotees of Lord were in exile they were extremely thirsty while nomadic in the forest. Yudhistir asked his brothers to search some lake nearby. When after long time they didn’t return he himself went in search of them. No sooner he found them near a lake in unconscious state than a supernatural voice resonated, “Your brothers didn’t care to answer my questions before drinking water from my lake hence their current state. If you too don’t answer you will follow them.” Yudhistir nodded solemnly. One of the many questions asked by the supernatural voice was “What is most astonishing thing in this world?” Yudhistir impeccably replied “One sees death everywhere around but he thinks he is an exception. This is most astonishing.” Continue reading "Art of living is to master art of Dying
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By Mathura Lilesvari Devi Dasi
Hundreds of devotees dancing down on one of the busiest streets in Kuala Lumpur was probably one of the best ways to kick start ISKCON’s 50th Anniversary in Malaysia, a country which Prabhupada referred to when speaking of Candan wood. Then known as Malaya, Malaysia had the good fortune of having Srila Prabhupada’s feet touch its soil in 1971.
It was on the 2nd of January and the devotees were all prepared to bring in the year with the great Jagannath parade, Ratha Yatra 2016.
Guest of honour, YB Datuk Seri Dr. S. Subramaniam, Minister of Health Malaysia, spoke very highly of ISKCON and was proud to be part of the festival. Other chief guests were Regional Secretary – HG Simheswara dasa, HH Bhakti Vrajendranandana Swami – President of ISKCON Malaysia, HH Janananda Goswami, HG Prabhavishnu Prabhu and YB Senator Dato’ Dr. Loga Bala Mohan (HG Loka Bandhu Gauranga dasa JPS) – Deputy Minister of Federal Territories.
Under the expert guidance of Temple President – HG Kripa Sindhu Krishna das and Festivals Organizing Chairman – HG Siddhi Sadhana Das, the congregation worked together in putting the festival for the pleasure of Their Lordships.
Many tourists and passers-by joined the devotees and danced to the tunes of the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra with joy. The main tent where the chariot of Their Lordships Sri Sri Jagannatha Baladeva and Subadhra arrived was smack in the middle of the road. This provided the opportunity for everyone driving or walking pass the main road to catch a glimpse of the Lord. It was a street festival that engaged with the public effectively. Thousands heard the holy names.
Prasadam was served to more than 3000 guests.
The post Nama-sankirtana (Part 2) appeared first on SivaramaSwami.com.
Substance and Shadow (Video)
Citisakti Mataji interviewed and challenged HH Sivarama Swami on the authority of the Vedas and personal form of God. It was a great discussion and appreciated by many devotees who were present at the program.
Watch it here: https://goo.gl/Zv4Zol
January 22. ISKCON 50 – S.Prabhupada Daily Meditations.
Satsvarupa dasa Goswami: Snowstorm in New York City. January 22, 1966. While Srila Prabhupada prayed to receive Radha-Krishna in New York, a snowstorm hit the City. That morning, Srila Prabhupada, who had perhaps never before seen snow, woke and thought that someone had whitewashed the side of the building next door. Not until he went outside did he discover it was snow. The temperature was ten degrees. The City went into a state of emergency, but Prabhupada continued his daily walks. Now he had to walk through heavy snow, only a thin dhoti beneath his overcoat, his head covered with his “swami hat.” The main roads were cleared, but many sidewalks were covered with snow. Along the strip of park dividing Broadway, the gusting winds piled snowbanks to shoulder height and buried the benches. The Broadway kiosks, plastered with layers of posters and notices, were now plastered with additional layers of snow and ice. But despite the weather, New Yorkers still walked their dogs, the pets now wearing raincoats and mackinaws. Such pampering by American dog owners left Prabhupada with a feeling of surprised amusement. As he approached West End Avenue, he found the doormen blowing whistles to signal taxis as usual, but also scattering salt to melt the ice and create safe sidewalks in front of the buildings. In Riverside Park, the benches, pathways and trees were glazed with ice and gave off a shimmering reflection from the sky.
To read the entire article click here: http://www.dandavats.com/?p=20490&page=4
The post Daily Darshan : January 22nd, 2016 appeared first on Mayapur.com.
Aspiring To Take Shelter Of Lotus Feet Of Krishna-Dinabhandhu Prabhu 2016 01 12 SB 10 73 15
Snowstorm in New York City
The superstructures of all three domes of ISKCON’s upcoming flagship temple – the Temple of the Vedic Planetarium in Mayapur, West Bengal – have been completed, and finishing work is now underway. At its highest point, the temple will stand 113 meters (370 feet) tall, higher than the Taj Mahal and St. Paul’s Cathedral in London.
Dr. Dr Chetna Kang (Cit Shakti Dasi) interviewed and challenged Sivarama Swami on the authority of the Vedas and personal form of God at a Pandava Seni Alumni program in the UK.
Gita verse-by-verse study Podcast
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The post Gita 08.28 – Yogi gets what other paths offer and gets more too appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.
When discussing certain topics – like the answer to the essential question, “Where do I come from?” – I have a few times heard senior disciples of Śrīla Prabhupāda suggest that Prabhupāda told us things that are different from what Śrī Jīva Goswāmī told us. If asked how Prabhupāda could teach something different from what he was taught, they explain that he could do so because Krishna directly gave him this new information. If asked which version we should accept and adopt, they explain that it is our duty as followers of Śrīla Prabhupāda to accept only his opinion, and reject the opinion of the previous ācārya.
I can accept that Prabhupāda may have known more than his gurus, or better understood how to explain certain things to the people he was teaching, because this is not unprecedented and doesn’t go against the fundamental principle of guru paramparā. (For example: Śuka is glorified as being even more capable of fully revealing the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam than his father and guru, Vyāsa.) However that’s not exactly what is being suggested in the above scenario. What is being suggested there is that Prabhupāda can contradict his gurus’ conclusions – because Krishna told him to.
I disagree. First of all, it goes against everything I learned from Prabhupāda about guru paramparā. Secondly, it definitely seems unrealistic that Prabhupāda received fundamental information from Krishna that contradicts what his own guru received from Krishna, what Śrīla Bhaktivinoda received from Krishna, and especially what the founders of Gauḍīya Siddhānta – Śrī Rūpa, Sanātana, and Jīva Goswāmīs – received from Krishna. Did Krishna change his mind about reality recently?
When I find Prabhupāda saying something that seems to contradict his gurus, I have two options:
(a) conclude that Prabhupāda doesn’t purely represent his guru-paramparā.
(b) conclude that I misunderstood Prabhupāda.
Everyone will surely agree that b is a whole lot more likely than a. Especially since so many of the quotes brought out from Prabhupāda are not even from his books, but are from far more contextually-sensitive recordings, conversations and letters to very specific individuals, at very specific times, in very specific circumstances – making it very easy to misunderstand Prabhupāda.
But somehow a lot of senior devotees seem to insist that they understand Prabhupāda correctly, even though their understanding paints an absolutely unacceptable picture of Prabhupāda as someone who does not represent his own gurus on fundamental principles like the answer to the question, “Where do I come from?”
To insist on interpreting Prabhupāda’s statements in a way that would put them at odds with Śrī Jīva and the Goswāmīs is an inadvertent insult to Śrīla Prabhupāda, because it indirectly says, “he doesn’t purely represent the Six Goswāmīs. He has different opinions.”
I wish more people would adopt this point of view and “choose option b,” desisting from insisting that Prabhupāda has a “second opinion” on tattva. Because that insistence means he doesn’t represent his guru-paramparā and therefore isn’t a bona-fide guru. Insisting that Prabhupāda could reach a different conclusion from an absolutely essential ācārya like Śrī Jīva Goswāmī inadvertently turns out to be an insult to the most important and compassionate Vaiṣṇava in our contemporary world: A.C. Bhaktivedānta Swāmī, because it indirectly says, “he doesn’t purely represent the Six Goswāmīs.”
This causes such a problem for everyone.
There are infinite possible ways to illustrate, explain, clarify, and apply a tattva, but there are never multiple, contradictory versions of a tattva. If we think there are two versions of tattva to choose from, we are wrong.
In guru pamaparā there are never “two opinions” on any fundamental subject. There is one opinion, with infinite ways of expressing, explaining and applying that opinion. If someone has an opinion different from the opinion of Bhāgavata Purāṇa as explained by Śrī Jīva, that person is simply not a representative of Śrī Jīva’s Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava school. Maybe their opinion is brilliant, maybe its ridiculous, that’s unsure. What is sure is that, if it differs from the opinion of the Six Goswāmīs it is not a gauḍīya vaiṣṇava opinion.
There are infinite possible ways to represent, illustrate, explain, clarify, and apply a siddhānta (a philosophical conclusion), but there cannot be two contradictory siddhāntas in the same school.
If we think there are two to choose from, we are wrong.
Vraja Kishor das
Hare Krishna dear Jayapataka Swami,
Please accept our obeisances in the dust of your lotus feet.
All glories to Srila Prabhupada!
It is a letter from the Russian team of the Temple of the Vedic Planetarium construction project.
We are grateful to you for engaging us in fulfilling Srila Prabhupada’s personal desire – construction of the magnificent Temple of the Golden Age! Please accept our efforts as an offering.
For 2015, we collected and transferred to a bank account in Mayapur over USD 160,000. This money was collected by many different ways. Particularly, we invited donors to pay for square feet and bricks. They paid for 300 square feet, 37 Nrisimhadeva bricks, 54 Mahaprabhu bricks, 12 Radha-Madhava bricks and one silver coin. We hold talks about the New Temple at many big festivals, did promotions on the Internet, as well as presentations in different cities.
We are asking for your blessings to be able to collect at least double the amount we did this year, in 2016 for Srila Prabhupada’s pleasure.
Thank you for bestowing upon us such a mercy to participate in this way in the New Temple construction.
Your servants from ToVP Russian Team
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Podcast:
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The post Dasha Mula Tattva 4 – Hari is the Absolute Truth concealed and revealed in the Vedas appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.
Podcast:
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The post Dasha Mula Tattva 3 – Understanding the necessity and focus of Vedic knowledge appeared first on The Spiritual Scientist.
Substance & Shadow https://youtu.be/47SwKs6rm_M
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Meet Bhrigupati Prabhu!
H.G. Bhrigupati Prabhu spent over 40 years in ISKCON distributing Srila Prabhupada’s books. He has distributed 2,000,000 books and has been the top distributor in North America for numerous years. In 2005 at the Gaura Purnima Festival in Mayapur, he was awarded the Global Excellence Award for book distribution. He is currently the Sankirtan leader for Los Angeles, California. He regularly gives classes on the philosophy of Srimad Bhagavatam and Bhagavad Gita.
“Best Ever” ISKCON North American Leaders Meetings Highlight ISKCON 50!
Many of the more than sixty temple presidents and GBCs attending this year’s ISKCON North American Leaders Meetings called the event “the best ever.” This was largely owing to the upbeat mood brought about by ISKCON’s 50th anniversary, increasing book distribution successes, and the inspiring association at the meetings. “It was very, very positive and full of proactive presentations,” says GBC and ISKCON Communications Director Anuttama Das. “The focus was on how so many wonderful things have been accomplished over the past fifty years, and yet there’s so much more to do to try to expand Prabhupada’s movement and fulfill his vision.” The meetings, which were held from January 14th to 16th and were the first to take place at the newly opened mandir in Houston, Texas, began with a keynote address by academic and author Yogesvara Das (Joshua M. Greene).
Read more: http://goo.gl/qPGCxK
Kadamba Kanana Swami visited Cape Town from 18-30 December. Below are recordings of lectures and kirtans from the various programs.
Download ALL the files by clicking here.
KKS_CPT_20Dec2015_CC_Madhya_1.47
KKS_CPT_20Dec2015_SnanaYatra_Kirtan_Abhisek
KKS_CPT_20Dec2015_SnanaYatra_JayaRadhaMadhava
KKS_CPT_20Dec2015_SnanaYatra_Lecture
KKS_CPT_20Dec2015_SnanaYatra_Kirtan
KKS_CPT_22Dec2015_Evening_Kirtan
KKS_CPT_22Dec2015_EveningLecture_The_Glories_of_Lord_Jagannatha
KKS_CPT_24Dec2015_EveningLecture_CC_Madhya_Ch12
KKS_CPT_24Dec2015_Evening_Kirtan
KKS_CPT_25Dec2015_HouseProgram_Kirtan
KKS_CPT_25Dec2015_HouseProgram_Lecture
KKS_CPT_27Dec2015_Inititation_Lecture
KKS_CPT_27Dec2015_SundayFeast_Lecture
The post Thursday kirtan at Manor (Part 2) appeared first on SivaramaSwami.com.
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A video by the "Vedic Way".
Bhakti Raghava Swami talks bout the importance of the Varnashrama College.
A statuette of Lord Hanuman is among few items that US President Barack Obama always carries in his pocket and seeks inspiration.
by Jennifer Scheper Hughes, James Kyung-Jin Lee, Amanda Lucia, and S. Romi Mukherjee
Practicing religion in public
This is an excerpt of an article from Boom Winter 2015, Vol 5, No 4. The full article is available here for subscribers only. Not a subscriber? Click here to change that.
California is experiencing a proliferation of public religious celebrations like never before. Processions spill onto city streets. Altars summoning the spirits of the dead are erected at busy intersections. Bands of pilgrims crisscross the state as they make their sacred journeys to holy lands within our very borders. Images of gods and saints, raised aloft by devotees, now claim the urban skyline as their most natural and obvious backdrop. Mantras, chants, and songs of praise, in a cacophony of languages, summon the sacred into our public space and into our life in common. At these festivals, we pray together after a fashion—an unlikely collection of Californians from different places, different faiths—different backgrounds joined for a fleeting moment by the unity of purpose of a shared ritual. The so-called secular cities and towns of California are made sacred by these multiethnic and multifaith public performances.
The authors of this essay are part of an eclectic group of researchers, students and professors, artists, filmmakers, and journalists. We have spent the better part of three years participating in these public events; we have attended dozens of religious festivals. We have thrown colors at Holi with those who have inherited Hindu traditions and those who have adopted them in the United States. We have processed in the streets of downtown Los Angeles with Peruvian immigrants as they sway to and fro under the heavy weight of their penitential andas. We have wept at altars for the dead on Día de los Muertos. We have joined aging internees on their annual pilgrimage to Manzanar, the Japanese internment camp, where we braced against the harsh winds and dust to chant, dance, and pray for forgiveness for us all.
It’s not just that the spirits cannot be contained in buildings—from tent revivals to solemn masses celebrated in sports stadiums, religious practice has brought the faithful out of doors—but that they prefer to encounter us in town centers, in public parks, open-air settings, and city streets. Across the state, Californians participate in all kinds of public rituals under the sun: rituals of re-enchantment and blessing, rituals of repair, rituals of sober ecstasy. Due in part to their public nature, almost every one of these open-air celebrations is a cross-cultural encounter as we look to each other’s cultures, each other’s religions, especially each other’s gods and spirits to discover our shared identity and our shared future as Californians. Perhaps it is through these experiences that the fears and anxieties generated by the inevitability of a truly multiethnic state are confronted and resolved.
Even as these and many other similar festivals simultaneously represent the irruption and interruption of the sacred in the public sphere, these festivals reflect the multireligious character of immigration. What propels us to put ourselves into these shared religious experiences, to throw ourselves into these festivals of spirits, especially when so often we join to celebrate religious cultures other than our own? The public religious festival has become the central nexus for the celebration of ethnic, cultural, and collective identity—identities that demand representation even in so-called secular public spaces. The festival requires that the participants step outside of their day-to-day lives, and venture into the fields of Radha and Krishna’s love play, the realm of the dead, the remembrance of the past, penance for historical sin, and the ecstasies of devotional singing. When the festival is in the open, in public, the shared act of devotion is what binds, not necessarily the shared belief.
These public rituals say something about the pursuit of belonging in California, and in the United States, within an increasingly diverse and multicultural landscape. Those who participate together as intimate strangers are often seeking only a temporary affiliation, perhaps a place for a moment to engage one another beyond the context of the marketplace. In sharing in these religious and cross-cultural experiences, we become enmeshed in the complicated and vibrant diversity of California, up close and personal, as physical as the bodies we encounter there. These collective public celebrations imagine a new kind of citizenship in a way that can assuage our multiculturalist anxieties. By participating in other religious and cultural realities, we break from the mundane and open up the possibility of enchantment. It is the unknown of the festival that beckons to outsiders—the potential for the experience of the ephemeral, the surreal, the transcendent.
Children throw colors at Holi. Photograph by Mario L. Iñiguez.
The Hindu Festival of Colors: Throwing Colors with Hare Krishnas in Los Angeles
Tens of thousands of young adults, mostly in their teens and twenties, clamor toward the stage at the spring Festival of Colors in Los Angeles. From a panoply of backgrounds and cultures and beliefs (or no belief at all), they gather to celebrate Holi, to reenact the colorful play of Radha and Krishna, the supreme Hindu expressions of divinity and the enchanters of the world. Radha and Krishna’s love play is relived and remembered in the crowd’s joyful “playing of colors.” As they throw brilliant, chalky handfuls of the multicolored Holi powder at each other, attendees become disguised in vibrant colors—differences of age, race, and ethnicity, their previous identities, erased. Play that begins in streaks of rainbow effervescence soon turns everyone a purplish brown blend of the colored powders.
The Festival of Colors in Southern California attracts only small numbers of Indian Hindus. The organizers of the event are Hare Krishnas, affiliated with the various temples of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, or ISKCON. The Hare Krishnas have had a long and fraught history in the American countercultural movement. Once the poster children for 1960s white hippie sojourns into Indian mysticism, the group became enmeshed in scandal in the 1970s and 1980s, and then became a major source of religious engagement for Indian Hindus living in diaspora.
The Festival of Colors is the brainchild of the guru Caru Das, a Hare Krishna devotee and the founder of a large Krishna community in Spanish Fork, Utah. As the organizer and producer of the festival, his purpose is to change the trend—to reach beyond the traditional Indian community and try something new among new audiences. Caru Das has created an event that is popular with teens and promoted as “good clean fun,” but he never forgets that its primary purpose is to introduce new souls to Krishna consciousness.
When asked, the majority of attendees at the Festival of Colors say that they are there for the fun of throwing colors. But there are many ways to enjoy a Saturday afternoon, and sweating colored powder in the hot LA sun is only one of them. In the murky, colored mist of the orchestrated hourly color throws, the audience of largely non-Hindu teens have their first experience of Hindu ritual and belief. In simple terms that a young California audience will understand, the festival introduces Hindu and Buddhist ideas, practices, and worldviews—all laced with universalistic ideals of peace, love, and unity. The Festival of Colors motions to Hindu religious practices as emblematic of indigenous roots and ancient wisdom. These sentiments echo those of Swami Vivekananda, who famously preached to American audiences in 1896: “When the Occident wants to learn about the spirit, about God, about the soul, about the meaning and the mystery of this universe, he must sit at the feet of the Orient to learn.”
Photograph by Mario L. Iñiguez.
Traditional temple Hinduism is not what these eager and open young people are experiencing. The Festival of Colors in Los Angeles is more like an ISKCON-inspired evangelical tent revival than any mainstream Hindu practice. Amidst color throws and playful revelry, the guru Caru Das takes the stage to focus the frenetic and playful energy of the crowd with the mahamantra, the central devotional chant of the Hare Krishnas: “Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare!” Caru Das actively proselytizes while playing directly to the desires and social proclivities of teens and young adults.
With music, yoga, food, and a playful atmosphere, the Festival of Colors is a brilliant marketing venture that attempts to erase the fraught political history of the Hare Krishnas and bring them back into the mainstream. There, they hope to vie for a position as the representatives par excellence of modern global Hinduism. Under the clever disguise of colored powders, the Festival of Colors represents the new proselytizing successes of ISKCON.
From the stage, Caru Das bellows to the excited crowd:
The Absolute is non-different from His name! So if you spend this day by singing and dancing the various names of the Absolute, you will be associating with the most wise, the most determined power in the universe. And that power will rub off on you and you will make better decisions and you will be in a better place in the future than you would have had you not tapped into this extra power.. . .
To reinforce his point, the guru jubilantly exhorts the crowd to repeat once again: “Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare.. . . ” Many in the throng are chanting along exuberantly, but others are socializing with their friends and taking selfies of their wildly colorful bodies to post on social media. But to Caru Das, the spiritual impact of the mantra works like fire—it burns whether you believe it will or not.
Many of the more than sixty temple presidents and GBCs attending this year’s ISKCON North American Leaders Meetings called the event “the best ever.” This was largely owing to the upbeat mood brought about by ISKCON’s 50th anniversary, increasing book distribution successes, and the inspiring association at the meetings.
The post Daily Darshan : January 21st, 2016 appeared first on Mayapur.com.
Krishna! (3 min video)
A short video filmed at the Hare Krishna (ISKCON) Temple in Murwillumbah, NSW while i was up in Queensland, Australia a while ago on my way to Coolangatta airport. Lovely place, and even though i only got a chance to spend a short time there, it was calming and great.
Video filmed and edited by JD Lakhiani.
Narration by HH Devamitra Swami during his speech captured at Hare krishna Temple, Melbourne initiation Ceremony in November 2015.
Watch it here: https://goo.gl/XBtVGY
Mantras and Yantras from Bygone Ages (Album with photos)
Indradyumna Swami: Mesmerized by the old houses of the brahmans we visited outside of Udupi the other day, we returned to learn more. In one home we were fascinated to find Vedic mantras, in the form of colorful yantras, painted on walls throughout the house. The beautiful designs, with their ancient inscriptions, bring prosperity, protection and blessings of the Lord. In other homes we saw articles of all descriptions from bygone ages. It was a day spent walking back through time
Find them here: https://goo.gl/bVjCdP
Question:What is the purpose of marriage as viewed by ISKCON? Answer by Romapada Swami: The purpose of marriage is to provide an opportunity for all the members in the family to properly support one another to peacefully practice and grow in their Krishna Consciousness. In Vedic scriptures, the institution of marriage is referred to as an “ashram” or a sacred place of purification. Marriage provides much opportunity for this as it involves rising above one’s own personal attachments/issues and serving the other members of the family with devotion and detachment. This is not easy (many married devotees will attest for this) but it is so by design to help devotees grow and become more pure in their Krsna Consciousness. Thus, marriage, if properly approached, is an amazing opportunity offered to the conditioned soul to shed its false ego and become more advanced in Krsna Consciousness and cultivate devotional qualities like patience, determination, chastity, faith etc. The key to making this all happen is a strong relationship of service and inquiry with a bonafide spiritual master, as well as those who closely guide one’s spiritual life.
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| 2015 TOVP Highlights – A Message from Ambarisa Prabhu |
 Dear Donors and Friends of the TOVP Project in Sridham Mayapur,
2015 has been another banner year for the TOVP both for construction under the leadership of Sadbhuja prabhu, and fundraising under the leadership of Radha Jivan and Braja Vilas prabhus. Some of the construction highlights are as follows …
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| TOVP Universal Chandelier Video Presentation |
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The Temple of the Vedic Planetarium is named as such because within its main dome it will house a 3-dimensional, moving model of the universe according to the Vedic scriptures. This explanation describes the planetary systems and all the universal contents to be in the shape of an incredible chandelier. |
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By Purushottam Nitai Das Imagine if a message suddenly flashes on the sky: “Due to a technical fault the supply of oxygen will remain unavailable for some time all over the world. Next update about the issue in another hour”. What would happen to us? There won’t be just utter chaos but soon the earth will become a graveyard. Not even vultures and jackals would be alive to feast on the dead bodies. But has it ever happened? Never. Can it happen in future? Sceptics and agnostics may say, “Yes”. But it has never happened in millions of years and so will never happen ever because Lord’s creation is flawless and his day to day management is perfect. Continue reading "Krishna’s service temporarily unavailable!
→ Dandavats"
Glimpses to the past of Krishna conscious India (Album with photos)
Indradyumna Swami: Yesterday we visited several ancient temples near Udupi. We also took the opportunity to visit centuries old houses of Brahmans who serve in such temples. We were amazed by many of the artifacts and paintings we saw in those homes.
Find them here: https://goo.gl/ELjYwL
January 21. ISKCON 50 – S.Prabhupada Daily Meditations.
Satsvarupa dasa Goswami: Correspondence with Bon Maharaja. January 21, 1966 Srila Prabhupada received Bon Maharaja’s reply. Two weeks before, Prabhupada had written to his godbrother, the Director of the Institute of Oriental Philosophy in Vrindavana, that he had found a place for a temple in New York and that he wanted to install deities of Radha and Krishna. In his reply, Bon Maharaja quoted price estimates for fourteen-inch brass deities of Radha-Krishna, but he also warned that to begin deity worship would be a heavy responsibility. Srila Prabhupada responded: I think that after the temple has started, some men, even from America, may be available, as I have seen they have at the Ramakrishna Mission, as well as in so many Yoga societies. So I am trying to open a temple here because Srila Prabhupada (Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati) wanted it. Prabhupada also requested Bon Maharaja’s assistance in getting the Government to sanction release of the money he felt Padampat Singhania would donate. He mentioned that he had carried on an extensive personal correspondence with the Vice-President of India, Dr. Radhakrishnan, who was also known to Bon Maharaja. Tell him that it is not an ordinary temple of worship, but an international institution for God consciousness based on the Srimad-Bhagavatam.
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24hr Kirtan_Baladev Prabhu Vrindavan
Correspondence with Bon Maharaja
