Sep 21, CALGARY, ALBERTA — Once upon a time, some four years ago at ISKCON Sri Sri Radha-Gopinatha Mandira in Toronto, one of the Indian-Canadian devotees, if you please pardon my bodily designation, was giving a lecture to the assembled devotees. In it, he described that the early followers of Srila Prabhupada “easily joined ISKCON because they had no love for their families”. Further, he described that we Westerners have no strong family attachments, and so it is easy for us to leave our families to join ISKCON, and that it is so much more difficult for most Indians because they have natural love for their families. Seems to me that this cheap excuse for failing to surrender to the Lord has gone so far that now it has become a rally cry for those who need excuses for their failure to serve. Instead, they dare to criticize the surrendered souls out of their extreme ignorance and envy.
Today, I again saw this sort of mentality, held by some foolish Indian-body devotees, touched upon briefly in Rocana Prabhu’s article. I, for one, am tired of this insult being thrown out by those who are so attached to their misconceptions as to publicly slander ISKCON men and women. This is definitely a great Vaisnava aparadha, and it is intolerable to me. The reality is that so many of us left even wife and children, what to speak of fathers and mothers behind, despite their anguished protests, and despite it tearing at the fabric of our souls, entirely in the knowledge that we are giving up something so important because Srila Prabhupada wanted us to come to serve Krsna!
They recognized the higher family, and voluntarily made the greatest of sacrifices. They gave their lives in knowledge of their eternal duty to the Lord. They were willing to give their everything for the sake of service. Just as the gopis gave up their family connections for Krsna’s sake, so those thousands of American and Canadian devotees sacrificed their all for Krsna’s behalf. They are the truest of heroes and heroines. It can only be the grossest ignorance and offensive mentality that we should have to hear such insults made towards them.
I am sorry to have to make this point so strongly. Any who disagree should kindly look me up at Tamoharadasa@yahoo.ca, or otherwise state their case to our face.
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