By Sarah Pulliam for The Columbus Dispatch on 19 Jul 2008
MOUNDSVILLE, W.Va. -- Sujoy Bhowmik lives in two worlds.
On most days, he is a pharmacist at a CVS in Columbus. Other days, he is Narottama Das, a devotee of Hare Krishna, who finds peace in West Virginia at the Palace of Gold.
Once a religion whose members gave their life to the movement, the Hare Krishnas today welcome the most devoted people and the casual follower. In the 1970s, many of the members lived in communes. Now many, like Bhowmik, have careers and live outside the movement but are still devoted to their religion.
As sacred tour guide Dina Bandhu Dasa approached Varsana, the legendary home of Lord Krishna’s consort Radharani, dusk was falling; but the festivities were only beginning.
Dina Bandhu is one of the privileged few westerners who know about the annual Phul Bangalas – flower palaces – and Kavi Sanmelans – poetry recitals – demonstrated at Varsana and Nandagram, the village of Krishna’s adoptive father Nanda Maharaja.
Andhra Pradesh [India] Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy said today that, with the oil crisis deepening, the time had come to explore alternative energy sources.
Mr. Reddy released a book entitled "Oil: Final Countdown to a Global Crisis and its Solutions" by ISKCON member Sahadeva Dasa at an impressive function. He said the problem was of even more concern for oil importing countries such as India.
It is interesting that the US and UK style themselves as “liberators” of Iraq. Subtly implied in this euphemistic term is the assumption that we are ourselves already liberated, in a position to bestow our happy state on others. And that is surely a commonly held assumption in the West. We view ourselves as having the most progressive and free societies. But how true is this?
By Dan Pashman for National Public Radio (NPR) on 19 Jul 2008
Rick and Julie Vreeland opened Freedom Hill Farm last year as a place for kids, but quickly found themselves fielding an unexpected request: The people who came wanted to buy raw milk.
In August 2007 the Vreelands began selling raw milk. In that first month they sold 13 gallons of it; last month, they sold more than a thousand.
By Krsnanandini Devi Dasi, Certified Family Life Educator, Director, Grihasta Vision Team (GVT) on 19 Jul 2008
Wouldn’t it be grand if married couples everywhere could have enduring, satisfying relationships, based on spiritual principles? Wouldn’t it be marvelous if all children could grow up in a healthy two-parent home? Such was the goal of most of the attendees of the 12th Annual SmartMarriages conference from July 2-6, 2008 in San Francisco, California.
By Duke Helfand for Los Angeles Times on 19 Jul 2008
Californians, long known for their propensity to buck convention, have apparently done it again: A national survey released Monday revealed that they are less religious and less certain about the existence of God than the nation as a whole.
Residents of the Golden State do not pray as much as people in other parts of the country. They are less inclined to take scripture literally. And they are likelier to embrace "more than one true way" of interpreting their religious teachings.
By Jahnavi Harrison for The Bhaktivedanta Manor Newsletter on 12 Jul 2008
If you ever watch TV, read a newspaper, or listen to the radio, chances are you'll have heard of the term 'carbon footprint' by now. In our increasingly green conscious society, it's the buzzword of the minute, and refers to the impact human activities have on the environment.
More than one million people in Taiwan have pledged to help cut carbon emissions by being a vegetarian. Taiwan's population is about 23 million, and the one million vegetarians would reduce at least 1.5 million tons of carbon emissions in Taiwan in one year.
On June 20th 2008 Gokulananda, a second generation ISKCON member—or gurukuli—died by suicide in Marina Del Rey, California. His death was reported to his family and Gurukuli peers by his girlfriend of five years, Michelle Lemay.
On June 29th, about ten of Gokulananda’s gurukuli peers gathered with other friends to honor his bright spirit and to pray for peace and happiness on his journey.
By Madhur Singh for Time Magazine Online on 12 Jul 2008
The Tirumala temple, in the south Indian city of Tirupathi, is one of Hinduism's holiest shrines. Over 5,000 pilgrims a day visit this city of seven hills, filling Tirumala's coffers with donations and making it India's richest temple. But since 2002, Tirumala has also been generating revenue from a less likely source: carbon credits. For decades, the temple's community kitchen has fed nearly 15,000 people, cooking 30,000 meals a day.
By Kate Benson for The Sydney Morning Herald on 19 Jul 2008
The part of the brain responsible for memory shrinks twice as much in elderly people who have had a limited education, stunted social life or have not kept mentally active since they were teens, a Sydney study has found.
University of NSW researchers followed a group of 60-year-olds over three years and found that those who had been mentally and physically active continually since the age of 13 had a larger hippocampus, the part of the brain that controls short-term memory and navigation skills.
For Americans, the fourth of July is the day they gained independence, a day for celebration, a day for reveling in their patriotism. Spirituality is rarely part of the proceedings.
But this year, the fourth of July seems blessed.
In Washington D.C., ISKCON devotees joined the Independence Day parade, singing the Hare Krishna mantra and pulling Jagannath, Baladeva and Subhadra—deity forms of God—on their classic Ratha Yatra cart.
By Donald G. McNeil Jr. for The New York Times on 19 Jul 2008
If you caught your son burning ants with a magnifying glass, would it bother you less than if you found him torturing a mouse with a soldering iron? How about a snake? How about his sister?
Does Khalid Shaikh Mohammed — the Guantánamo detainee who claims he personally beheaded the reporter Daniel Pearl — deserve the rights he denied Mr. Pearl? Which ones? A painless execution? Exemption from capital punishment? Decent prison conditions? Habeas corpus?
Below you can read along as you listen to the audio.
The demons cannot understand that the God can be a person. That is demoniac. They cannot... Because they cannot understand, the difficulty is a demon tries to understand God, comparing with himself.
Dr. Frog, that the story of Dr. Frog. Dr. Frog is trying to understand Atlantic Ocean comparing with his three-feet well, that's all. When he is informed that there is Atlantic Ocean, he's simply comparing with his limited space. It may be four feet, or it may be five feet, it may be ten feet, because he is within the three feet. His friend informed, "Oh, I have seen a reservoir of water, vast water." So that vastness, he is just conjecturing, "How much the vastness may be? My well is three feet, it may be four feet, five feet," now he is going on. But he may go on millions of millions of feet it is still it is greater. That is another thing. Therefore, atheistic persons, demons, they think in their own way that God, Krishna may be like this, Krishna may be like this, Krishna may be like this. Generally they think that Krishna are I. How they say? Krishna is not great. They do not believe that God is great. He thinks that God is as good as I am, I am also God. This is demonic.
Krishna Dasa, an ISKCON youth from Moscow, died on March 20, in Mayapur, India. He was twenty years old. The day before the Gaura Purnima festival, Krishna Dasa and his friends had taken a boat out into the Ganga, and were playing, swimming and diving from it. Krishna Dasa is reported to have been dragged under by the current, although details are sketchy at present.
All glories to the chanting of Śrī Kṛṣṇa’s Holy Names!,
Which easily extinguishes saṁsāra’s blazing flames
By polishing the lust-encrusted mirror of the heart.
That chanting is the waxing moon that knows the secret art
Of causing the white lotus of good fortune to unfurl
Its petals far and wide throughout this bleak and blighted world.
Of transcendental knowledge, which will take us to life’s goal,
The chanting of the name of Kṛṣṇa is the life and soul.
The ocean of ecstatic bliss floods far beyond its bounds
Wherever Kṛṣṇa’s merciful and mystic Name resounds.
Indeed, whenever Kṛṣṇa’s Names are sung in congregation,
At every step one tastes a joy that knows no limitation.
So hear with great attention as I earnestly proclaim,
Just bathe your consciousness by chanting Kṛṣṇa’s Holy Name!
By transcendental potency that Name will surely bless
You with pure love for Kṛṣṇa and the end of all distress.
“Kṛṣṇa,” “Govinda,” and “Keśava,” too—
Your Names have no end, and in each of them You
Have invested Your potencies, leaving none out.
Whenever we want, we can chant them without
The slightest restriction of time or of place.
O Lord, who can fathom Your infinite grace?
Yet I am so wretched, devoid of all shame,
That I haven’t developed a taste for Your Name.
3) tṛṇād api sunīcena
taror api sahiṣṇunā
amāninā mānadena
kīrtanīyaḥ sadā hariḥ
More humble than a blade of grass, more tol’rant than a tree,
To think “All praise belongs to others, none belongs to me”—
These qualities attract the Lord to bless one with the power
To chant His Name incessantly until the final hour.
4) na dhanaṁ na janaṁ na sundarīṁ
kavitāṁ vā jagadīśa kāmaye
mama janmani jamanīśvare
bhavatād bhaktir ahaitukī tvayi
Wealth and women, followers, the fruits of mundane piety,
Liberation from this world of limitless anxiety—
For Me, O Lord, such common goals have not the slightest worth:
Let Me serve You purely now and in each future birth.
Your servant for eternity, I lost My true identity
And fell into this horrid sea of birth and death, O Lord.
O Nanda’s son, please hear My plea: By Your sweet grace consider Me
A speck of dust upon Your lotus feet forevermore.
Tears streaming from My eyes, My voice choked with bliss,
The hairs upon My body standing up in happiness—
When will all these signs of rapture decorate My limbs
As I chant your Holy Name, the monarch of all hymns?
7) yugāyitaṁ nimeṣeṇa
cakṣuṣā prāvṛṣāyitam
śūnyāyitaṁ jagat sarvaṁ
govinda-viraheṇa me
Every moment drags on for a million years or more;
From the rain clouds of My eyes the tears in torrents pour;
This whole creation’s nothing but a vast and joyless void—
O Govinda! By Your absence I am being destroyed!
8) āśliṣya vā pāda-ratāṁ pinaṣṭu mām
adarśanān marma-hatāṁ karotu vā
yathā tathā vā vidadhātu lampaṭo
mat-prāṇa-nāthas tu sa eva nāparaḥ
Let Mādhava embrace this maid who’s fallen at His feet,
Or let Him trample Me, or My most ardent hopes defeat
By never giving Me a chance to see Him anywhere,
Thus shattering My heart and plunging Me into despair.
You see, He is a reckless libertine and not a saint;
So let Him act in any way He likes, without restraint.
Yet though His cruel and crooked ways may cause Me constant woe,
Kṛṣṇa is the only Lord My heart shall ever know.
[Benediction verse by Śrīla Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja (Cc Antya 20.65)]
These eight essential verses Lord Caitanya wrote to teach
The practice and the goal of chanting Kṛṣṇa’s Holy Name.
Day by day, whoever chants or hears this hymn will reach
A little closer to perfection, spotless Kṛṣṇa-prem.
By Sri Nandanandana Dasa (Stephen Knapp) for www.stephen-knapp.com on 9 Jan 2008
As of late, in the year 2007, the idea of whether Lord Rama exists or not has been called into question, by no less than some of the politicians in India. So it is a wonder how such persons can be accepted as leaders of the people of India who should be concerned with preserving and protecting the culture of the country.
