Planet ISKCON

13-08-2013 Transforming the Heart of Society, Wits University, Johannesburg, South Africa.mp3

From Vinayak Deshpande

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From ppeace4peace

In your last topic which states: If a man finds a hundred dollar bill

on the street that it states if the man finds the person and gives it
back then he is honest and wise" However that makes NO sense
whatsoever as it sounds ridiculous. I think your writer could have
worded it as a Wallet with money in it, INSTEAD of a bill on the
street. My question is: HOW CAN ANYONE KNOW WHO THE MONEY CAME FROM AS
EVERYONE WILL SAY ITS THERES AND HOW CAN A PERSON LIKE YOU STATED FIND
THE PERSON WHO OWNS IT........THIS MAKE RIDICULOUS
SENSE.................I know what your trying to point out, however
not using that kind of a sentence that makes no sense. Hope you know
what I mean.
That sentence used should NEVER be used as there is NO common sense in
it whatsoever.  Namaste.

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Holy Name Meditation Podcast

Avatari Games Team: On Janmastami day we got approval from Apple and have launched our first Lion-Man Avatar game based on Prahlad-Narsimhadeva pastime on the Apple Store Read more ›

Holy Name Meditation Podcast

How exactly is it wrong? If it is wrong, then why does Krishna speak it?

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On asking questions for which we have qualification and the risks of not doing so.

There is a short talk and some sound check, but its kirtan in the Janmastami main tent.

URBAN MEDITATIONS Bhadra has returned from traveling and now is ready to deliver another of his dynamic and insightful workshops. He guarantees wisdom, realisation and laughter all rolled into one. All topped with a wonderful dinner. $8 incl dinner. This Wed 6th Nov. ” Take time-out, to find out more, about you.” Check our facebook [...]

The post BHADRA is back appeared first on The Loft Yoga Lounge Auckland.

Lakshman Poddar: ISKCON Bangkok is managed by GBC (Governing Body Committee). H.H Jayapataka Swami is the GBC, H.H Kavicandra Swami is the co-GBC and H.H B.V.V Narasimha Swami is the regional secretary of Thailand. H.H Vedavyasa Priya Swami also visits and preaches in Thailand. They are all Srila Prabhupada sannayasi disciples and initiating Guru in ISKCON Read more ›

A record number of British Hindus have flocked to one of Europe's largest Krishna temples as part of Janmashtami celebrations this week Read more ›

Quite a few of the Srila Prabhupada disciples who were at our reunion in the Village Hall the day before had turned out. See if you can spot them in the exciting video below Read more ›

50 photos: Harinama during Sri Krishna Janmashtami Festival in Abranovce, Presov, Slovakia Read more ›

Monthly Meeting Minutes of the Boards of Directors for ISKCON New Vrindaban & ECOV - 8/15/13.

ISKCON New Vrindaban (INV) Vision Statement: Founded in 1968, Srila Prabhupada boldly envisions New Vrindaban as a sacred place known worldwide for Cow Protection, Self-Sufficiency, Holy Pilgrimage, Spiritual Education, and, above all, Loving Krishna.

ECOV Mission Statement: ECOV (Earth, Cows, Opportunities & Vrindaban Villages) is dedicated to cow protection, sustainable agriculture, self-sufficiency and simple living — all centered around loving service to Sri Krishna, as envisioned by the ISKCON New Vrindaban Founder-Acharya, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada.

Present from INV: Jaya Krsna, Dayavira, Chaitanya Mangala, Gopisa, Ranaka & Jamuna.

Present from ECOV: Madhava Gosh, Kripamaya, Navin Shyam, Chaitanya Mangala & Ranaka.

Recording Secretary: Laxmi Honest

The first item of discussion was the Palace restoration.  The sub-committee met on 8/9/13 and they decided to send out an international call for a project manager.  Kripamaya suggested that we also contact senior devotees and sanyasis such as Radhanatha Swami for people they may know who are engineers and so forth.  Gopisa mentioned that the Palace front steps renovation project is very hard, heavy work and we really need younger people to do it.  Gopisa has estimates from private contractors ranging from $65,000 to $115,000, not including materials, which would be an additional $25,000.   He expects a response by 8/16 from a company in Pittsburgh and will email the joint boards with updates.

Jaya Krsna then began a discussion regarding the desire of HH Bhakti Raghava Swami to create a Varnashrama Eco-Village at the Old Vrindaban farm.   The proposed community would strive to be self-sufficient. Bhakti Raghava Swami reports that he has already set up such a village in Indonesia which has been very successful. Jaya Krsna will email for review some possible steps toward accomplishing this goal. Madhava Gosh mentioned that ECOV would be willing to offer food bearing trees to the project.  Overall, board members expressed enthusiasm for the project and ideas were exchanged regarding how it might manifest.  It was decided that a “straw vote” would be taken to determine potential future acceptance of the proposal by the two boards.  Both boards voted in favor of the concept.

The next agenda item was the funding of Gopal’s Garden School.  Ranaka reported that the school will need about $24,000 to cover expenses for the 2013-2014 school year. Both boards reconfirmed their commitment to the school and acknowledged its importance in our continued efforts towards developing a more vibrant community.  In previous years, this funding has been split between INV and ECOV.  At their last meeting ECOV approved $12,000.  Ranaka explained that the funds will not be needed within the next 30 days. Dayavira suggested that INV table the item until the next meeting so that they could discuss how best to fund their portion of the budget.

Next, Gopisa gave an update on the Bahulaban projects. Madhava Gosh asked about the repairs to the roof of the utility building.  Gopisa said that he talked to some workers in regards to patching holes and generally repairing the roof.  He will give a full report at the next meeting.  The demolition of the pink building is complete and the question was raised of whether or not to bury the remaining wood scrap, which still has a small amount of foam adhering to it.  Jamuna had researched the environmental impact of this and reported that the impact would be negligible.  It was proposed that the balance of the wood be buried at a spot in lower Bahulaban.  Both Boards voted in favor of the motion.

Lastly, in a discussion of improving community spirit, Madhava Gosh reiterated the need for additional transparency in management. Board members agreed on the importance of continuing to improve communications.

Thousands of happy devotees partecipated in this significant annual vaishnava event! Read more ›

Sri Krishna Janmastami Celebrations Recorded on Aug 28 2013

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From Kamlesh Khurana P

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From Kanai Krishna P

I heard your answer to a question about Bhagavatam being natural commentary on Vedanta Sutra. There's a famous reference from Garuda Purana which says 'arthoyam brahmasutranam...'(quoted in CC Madhya 25.143-144)This reference speaks of number of verses in Bhagavatam as 18000. Can we say that this reference is certainly speaking of Bhagavatam as we have it(and not pre-edited version written by Vyasadeva)?

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From Kanai Krishna P

In introduction to first canto of SB, Srila Prabhupada speaks of difference between God and Absolute Truth. Can we conclude that 'God' refers to Lord's role in material world and 'Absolute Truth' conveys the idea of Lord in touch with spiritual energy?

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From Kanai Krishna P

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From Parampara Vani P

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“Think outside the box.” That’s a common saying among those who want us to break free from stereotyped thinking.

However, such people don’t know the big box that confines everyone’s thinking. So, even if they think outside some small boxes, their meta-thinking, or the basic framework that undergirds their thinking, remains largely within the big box.

That big box is matter. People’s ambitions and accomplishments are largely confined to the arena of matter. Gita wisdom empowers us to think outside this big box. Its fourteenth chapter delineates three boxes that typically condition people’s thinking. These three boxes are the three modes of material nature that pave the roadways for people’s thinking, feeling, willing, seeing and acting.

What most people call as thinking outside the box simply means moving from thinking within one mode to thinking from within another mode. But overall their thinking remains trapped within the impregnable mega-box of matter. Even when they somehow sometimes think of spirit, they see it as deriving from or depending on matter.

However, Gita wisdom underscores that spiritual reality is an independent glorious reality. And spirit is the arena of the most fulfilling thinking, as the Gita (14.27: sukhasya aikantikasya) indicates. This concluding verse of the Gita’s fourteenth chapter also stresses that Krishna, the all-attractive personal divinity, is the foundation of this spiritual reality (brahmano hi pratistha ‘ham).

When we contemplate on Krishna as the Supreme Absolute Truth, as completely transcendental to matter, that contemplation becomes the gateway for our thinking to break free from the big box of matter. The more we habituate ourselves to thinking about Krishna thus, the more we relish a non-material fulfillment whose variety and intensity far exceeds the boxes of material enjoyment.

Thus does thinking about Krishna comprise the ultimate out-of-the-box thinking.

***

14.27 - And I am the basis of the impersonal Brahman, which is immortal, imperishable and eternal and is the constitutional position of ultimate happiness.

 

Strength

Assiniboia, Saskatchewan

I’m 60 but I feel like I’m 20 these days. I got through a strong headwind today on the road and then a downpour came. I feel just about ready for anything. I take on the sun almost every day, I feel a certain strength.

Just to test my physical prowess, I challenged one of those straw bales commonly found on the side of the highway. They are cylindrical in shape with about 5 foot length in size lying sideways. I attempted to roll one which I succeeded in doing in 2003. This time I could budge and even roll it back and forth a trite, but not actually push and roll it forward. Oh well, I never claimed to be Superman or Hanuman for that matter. I’m not invincible but feeling physically well.

Just to make Daruka and I feel even better in spirit and in body someone by the name of Joy from the Assiniboia Times, a weekly, came for a few photos to put in her upcoming article. For our physical wellbeing she handed us a bag of ripe tomatoes from her garden, now that’s love. We have yet to see just how much more nutritionally set we will be after consuming those nutritionally rich love balls we call tomatoes.

Joy was great, she remembers the Hare Krishnas from the Beatles and hippie days. She had seen the Fab Four live in Seattle and Portland in her teens. Yes, the places were packed with screaming girls, and she admitted being one of them. There’s incredible strength demonstrated in the sound of a screaming damsel, and I mean no disrespect here.

Strength has many sources. Like tomatoes, herbs and greens provide much. For dinner, Daruka and I were invited to the home of a family in Assiniboia where we also settled for the night. Before walking up the steps to their house, I noticed their garden replete with veggies and herbs, one of which was fresh coriander, also known as cilantro. The green is a powerful mouth stimulator. It garnishes many food items so well. It’s supposed to be good for the eyes. Mouth watering, yummy.

I took it upon myself to ask our host if I could gather some for the meal, and they were totally cool with it. This green-wonder, with its potencies got sprinkled on all our delicious food which happened to be a grainless meal.

That strong meal, strong sleep, then strong walk. Where does strength come from? From God.

37 KM

This year the gurukula has started a school lunch program under direction from Mother Padma of Kalachandji’s Restaurant. Working closely with a dietitian and a cook, M. Padma created a menu that the children thought was super tasty, while the parents were very pleased with the nutrition that their sometimes picky eaters were receiving. The students are receiving a hot, tasty plate of prasadam and learning new food tastes, while still enjoying classics.  The menu even has a vegan version for our vegan students!

So everyone may try his best, that’s all. The public may take or not take, it doesn’t matter. And if you are, want to please the public, public says that “You dance naked, I will be very happy with you, I’ll give you [support].” So I’ll have to do that. Then what is the use of making a spiritual master? Public, they have got their whims, how to become pleased. So we are to follow all these things? We have to follow our instruction of the spiritual master.

 

Lord Balarama’s Appearance Day brings a smile to the faces of the gurukula students at TKG Academy. Hearing, learning, remembering the heroic pastimes of Lord Krsna’s older brother makes the children’s eyes grow wide with awe and wonder, while the sweeter pastimes make them giggle with delight.

Parents and students bring special sweets and savories. The older students take extra care with Lord Baladeva as they carefully fix his crown upon his head and give him offerings as he sits beside his sister and brother, while the younger students hand make their own offerings of love.

Later, the children gather out back and how do they celebrate Balarama jayanti? Texas style! A pinata stuffed with honey sticks. Each student takes a swing while their friends stand to side cheering them on and when the honey falls… laughter ringing as the students clamor towards the prize.

balarama jayanti ki! Jaya!

Mahadevi Dasi: Just came back from AJA Annada Ekadasi Vrndavana Parikrama by ricsa; my health does not permit walking and still be able to do some service when I get back. It was so enlivening to hear many groups of Brijabasi ladies in brightly colored sarees singing Brij bhajans.. Read more ›

There are now 2.5 million people unemployed in the UK. Those at least are the official figures. Over 7% of the workforce. It’s become a job in itself just looking for a job. Even the most qualified find it hard with one in ten graduates still failing to find a job a full year after graduating.

Economists and politicians will point to a host of possible causes, perhaps one main reason for labour not working might be our ‘labour saving’ technologies. My spiritual teacher Srila Prabhupada once said, “You have created a machine that can do the work of fifty men and now those fifty men are unemployed. Is this progress?”

Well, that’s how most of us see it. I guess it depends upon your paradigm. If you believe life to be about bodily enjoyment then you will likely view work as a bit of a problem. You want to free up time to relax and do things you enjoy, which is not usually work. Then there is the all important profit motive. If a machine is cheaper than manpower then that manpower will find itself added to the jobless stats. And so it is that a great welter of machinery has come into being, along with an equally huge mass of idle persons.

But has it made us happier? This is surely the critical question. For those in the dole queues the answer is not likely to be yes. ‘Unemployment depression’ is a recognised condition. And where work is scarce many of us are forced to do jobs we detest; again hardly a formula for a happy life or indeed a better society. Mark Twain observed that “the fellows who groan and sweat under the weary load of toil they bear never can hope to do anything great. How can they when their souls are in a ferment of revolt against the employment of their hands and brains? The product of slavery, intellectual or physical, can never be great.”

It is not only the direct misery of having no work or work you hate that is problematic; there is also the question of how to support those millions of out of work people. It certainly doesn’t make for easy economics. Still more social issues arise from the old idiom that an ‘idle mind is the devil’s playground’. With increasing numbers of unengaged and bored young persons hanging around on our streets, trouble is sure to follow. Especially when they become desperate for the cash they cannot earn.

The Vedic paradigm works on the assumption that human life has a higher spiritual purpose; that we are meant for self realisation. Actual happiness is derived from this direction, from inner contact with the spiritual, rather than from external sense pleasure. With such a paradigm and its attendant culture there is far less need to advance technology in order to increase material comfort. Those who are happy within themselves are less concerned with their worldly situation. Srila Prabhupada called this ‘simple living and high thinking.’

The simple life of Vedic society means one closer to the land; an agrarian lifestyle where most people grow their own food within local economies. We can easily produce everything we need in this way. The basic requirements of the body are analysed as eating, sleeping, mating and security, and these can be obtained without excessive hard work. Prabhupada would often point out that the animals have no industry and technology but still they obtain all the same necessities as us simply by nature’s arrangement. Life used to be like that everywhere, with everything produced more or less locally by local farms and traders. In many parts of rural India still one will find such a lifestyle where people hardly travel beyond the few villages in their immediate locality. And they certainly seem happy enough.

But human society is fast moving away from this kind of life. Local economies are being swallowed in the engulfing tide of globalisation. Great corporations and conglomerates are producing all our necessities, as well as a whole heap of not so necessaries, and all we can do is try to get a job with them so we can get the money to buy all that stuff. We find ourselves completely at their mercy in so many ways, dependent on fragile infrastructures and supply chains, along with volatile market forces controlled by cash hungry investors.

All this so called progress over the centuries has been driven by the belief that we can somehow improve our material sense pleasure. Atheism and a failure of religion to give people a real spiritual taste lies at its heart. It has been the march of ‘civilisation’ which Prabhupada simply dismissed as “sophisticated animal life”. Virtually all human endeavour now is about advancing material facilities. The idea that life is meant for self and God realisation is all but gone, along with the wonderful experience of pure spiritual happiness, far superior to any worldly joy. But only when we rediscover this spiritual pleasure can we reverse the materialistic trend that appears headed for disaster.

And it surely does seem that disaster looms. Unemployment with its attendant difficulties is just one of many social problems we have created. A host of environmental issues coming out of our new technologies now threaten our happy lifestyle, which is anyway not that happy with those pesky depression figures heading ever upward. In the UK, child and mental health service caseloads have risen over 40% over the last three years. One in ten 1 – 15 year olds has a mental health disorder and the UK has one of the highest levels of self harm in Europe. This has contributed to more and more alcohol and substance abuse and dependence. In Britain this alone costs around £39 billion per year. Then there is global poverty and starvation due to one side of the world exploiting the other for its resources. Meanwhile, in the bloated and spoiled developed world another burgeoning problem is family breakdown. In its report ‘Every Family Matters’, the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) stated that one in three children born in the UK today will experience parental divorce. Which of course leads to so many other issues. And so it goes.

There is a crisis on our streets. In a recent speech to the Charities Parliament, the chairman of the CSJ, Iain Duncan-Smith said, “You are working in communities without hope. It is not that they have even known hope and had it taken away. Rather, the people in the communities you work with are quite literally without hope: they are hopeless.”

Prabhupada once said that in modern society we first of all put ourselves into anxiety and then we struggle to get out of it. “That is your heroism”, he said.

In a properly functioning Vedic society, examples of which are now very hard to locate, everyone is engaged according to their particular qualities, doing what they enjoy and can do well. There is no jostling for promotion and ever increasing salaries. People are satisfied due to their spiritual practise and they understand life’s goal, which is not ephemeral material pleasure and security, but eternal spiritual happiness. A house built upon rock rather than sand, as one Jesus Christ advised a long time ago.

It is a simple formula. Krishna says in the Bhagavad-gita, “Grow food, worship me and work for my pleasure. Thus you will be happy in this life and the next.” It is time we put it to the test.

"Please know that by chanting the holy name all anarthas will be removed. When our heart is cleansed from all this anartha dust, the form, qualities and pastimes of the Lord will automatically manifest themselves on the clear mirror of the purified heart. All this will be understood clearly when the coverings are removed from our heart. But it is important that you make special effort to avoid the offenses so that the holy name can come through purely and gives you all the perfections."

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