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| Prabhupada Letters :: 1974 |
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29 December 2008 29 December, 1974 Bombay Lautoka My dear Vijayadvaja, Please accept my blessings. I am in due receipt of your letter dated nil and have noted the contents carefully. My feeling is that Mr. Punja should be encouraged as much as possible. He can help our movement there a great deal in Fiji. I have written him one letter asking him to take charge of management, handling of money and the registration of the society. I request you to also remain there, work nicely with Mr. Punja and take charge of the preaching, kirtanas, prasadam and book distribution programs. This is actually the work for a brahmacari. If you absorb yourself in this work you will feel very blissful. Keep that center that Subala Maharaja has opened and try to invite as many guests as possible. Make sure to keep yourself and the boys with you in full Krsna Consciousness by following our regulative principles very strictly without fail; chanting 16 rounds, rising early, attending mangala arati, attending classes, eating only Krsna prasadam, etc. In this way the whole atmosphere will become Vaikuntha, no anxiety. Please try to do like this with all sincerity and Krsna will give you all facilities. Please keep me informed of the progress there. I hope this meets you in good health. Your ever well-wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ACBS/ps Labels: Fiji, standard practices letters | 16:48 |23 December 2008 23 December, 1974 Bombay My dear Patita Uddharana, Please accept my blessings. I am in due receipt of your letter dated 11 Dec. 74 and have noted the contents carefully. You should send a copy of that document to me immediately of if Hamsaduta is coming to Bombay you can send it with him. Please keep me informed of the position with Mr. Mody and also of Mr. Kewal Krishan. I hope things are going on well there. I am depending on you as one of my elder disciples to set a nice example for the others to follow. This is very much wanted. You must become ideal in all respects, following all of our principles; rising early, chanting 16 rounds, attending classes, eating only Krsna prasadam, etc. This simple formula will make everything perfect. I hope this meets you in good health. Your ever well-wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ACBS/ps N.B. Received your hand-delivered letter with copy of the surrender and plan. Thank you. Labels: Bhaktivedanta Manor, standard practices letters | 01:28 |21 December 2008 Saturday, 21 December, 1974 Bombay My dear Gopijanavallabha, Please accept my blessings. I am in due receipt of your letter dated Nov. 24, 1974 which was sent to Hong Kong. I think by this time all of your questions in your letter have been answered. I am very anxious to get that building in New York City. Rupanuga has given photographs as well as floor plans in his most recent letter. I like it very much, so I want you to immediately take it. As far as the $300,000 down payment I don't think there will be any difficulty with that. Keep me informed on this matter as the negotiation has already begun. So you along with Rupanuga keep the atmosphere there very pure by holding regular classes, having morning and evening arati and kirtana programs and ensuring that everyone chants their 16 rounds and follows the four regulative principles without fail. And try to increase my book distribution as much as possible. I hope this meets you all in good health. Your ever well-wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ACBS/ps Labels: building, New York, standard practices letters | 11:18 |28 October 2008 31 October, 1974 Bombay My Dear Hrdayananda das Goswami: Please accept my blessings. I am in due receipt of your letter dated September 26, 1974 and have noted the contents. I am very glad to note that you are seeing that the devotees are maintaining the devotional practices. This is the secret to success. Therefore I am stressing it. And, if you also stress it and show yourself as an ideal Vaisnava, then you are my representative in fullness. We are not after titles and designations. Lord Caitanya made it a principle that we must teach by personal example. This is what I have tried to do. So if all of you my disciples do this, then the future of our movement will be glorious. I am glad to note the publishing work you are doing, and I look forward to receiving the books printed. I am pleased that you are personally seeing to the translation how it is done. Actually these books are the foundation stone of our movement. Whatever we are is resting on these books, so far reading them and distributing them. This should be our only motto. Your invitation to visit Mexico and Caracas sounds very nice, and I shall be very pleased to come there. I shall be going to Hawaii sometime in December, and than I can come wherever you like. I hope this meets you in good health. Your ever well wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ACBS/bs Labels: Mexico, standard practices letters | 03:17 |9 May 2008 Thursday, 9 May, 1974 Bombay My dear Gangamayi, Please accept my blessings. I beg to acknowledge receipt of your undated letter. I am glad to hear that you are determined to stay and live in the temple now and that you are becoming very much attached to the Deity worship and very serious about serving the Deity along with Malati Prabhu. I hope your restlessness is finished and that you will remain a faithful servitor in your duties with the Deities. Your comment is well taken that you have little or no knowledge of the politics. So you remain uninvolved and just continue to simply follow the authorities and concentrate on improving the Deity worship. If you chant at least 16 rounds daily and read our books, no contamination can touch us. I hope to see you in the near future at Bhaktivedanta Manor. Your ever well-wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ACBS/sdg Labels: Bhaktivedanta Manor, standard practices letters | 04:33 |1 May 2008 1 May, 1974 Bombay My dear Jaya tirtha, Please accept my blessings. I beg to acknowledge receipt of your letter dated April 16, 1974 and have noted the contents. Concerning how to induce grhasthas to take part in Krsna Consciousness activities rather than in activities of May it is very simple: they should attend the temple program rigidly. Morning arati, classes, sankirtana. We have given houses with the purpose to execute devotional service exactly like the Brahmacaris and sannyasis. Otherwise, why purchase houses near the temple? The whole idea is to live near the temple and take advantage of the temple program. Regarding the apartments, how is the rent being collected and where is it being deposited? Locana das may deposit his contributions with the Mayapur Vrindaban fund for going to the Krsna Balarama temple. Kindly advise the Union Bank to send the monthly interest to ISKCON Mayapur Vrindaban Trust Fund. I still don't know how many installments they have sent or how quickly they are getting the money to the Punjab National Bank in Vrindaban. As for grhastha worshiping Gaura Nitai deities that is only for those who live far away from the temple and cannot attend. Otherwise such worship is redundant: there is already deity worship going on in the temple and they should attend the aratriks, not install their own deities. The household community in Los Angeles or any of our temples is not meant to be independent from the temple program. The impression of Lord Caitanya's feet which you brought from India may be kept in a picture, not that it is worshiped as a deity. Keep it as a picture. I will look forward to your regular reports. I know you have multifarious and complicated affairs to manage in our Los Angeles Center, and I know you are doing your best there. Just pray to Krsna to give you intelligence how to manage it all. The most important thing is that we must be ideal Krsna Conscious persons, and then we can attract others. This means chanting, reading my books, going on sankirtana, following the regulative principles and worshiping the deity. Whoever takes part in these things, no matter what he has done of sinful activities before, will automatically advance in spiritual realization. This is the simple process and if we follow it we will become ideal. Otherwise, they will become victims of women and wealth. Your ever well-wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ACBS/sdg Labels: grhastha, Los Angeles, management, standard practices letters | 09:38 |29 April 2008 29 April, 1974 Bombay Dear Bhurijana, Please accept my blessings. I beg to acknowledge receipt of your letter of April 21st and I thank you very much. It is very good news for me that you are stressing regulative temple life in your new quarters in Hong Kong. The regulative principles are designed to take us gradually to the platform of spontaneous love of Krsna, which is the perfection of human life. Those who think they have already attained such perfection and give up the regulative principles are called sahajiya, or those who take things cheaply and simply imitate. This early rising, holding classes, going out regularly for sankirtana, worshiping the deity are the very substance of devotional life. You will certainly by your sincere devotional example attract more and more sincere Chinese boys and girls to Krsna Consciousness. Even if, due to family ties, they cannot move in the temple, try to engage them as much as possible in translating work, sankirtana, reading, and at least coming to the temple to take prasadam. I understand you have a new address but you have not described the actual situation. Try to send pictures if you can. How much is the rent? What kind of temple construction are you referring to? Please give my thanks to your good wife Jagatarini for working with the childrens' classes. I am very very proud of you both as you have given up everything and gone to a far away part of the world just on my order to carry out the will of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, that the chanting of the Holy Name be heard in every town and village. Of course I will be very eager to see the new Chinese publication. Please go on with it, and send me something as soon as it is published. Your ever well-wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ACBS/sdg Labels: Hong Kong, sahajiya, standard practices letters | 22:30 |7 April 2008 7 April, 1974 Bombay Dear Puranjana, Please accept my blessings. I beg to acknowledge receipt of your letter dated March 3, 1974 and I have noted the contents carefully. Because of the critical condition of affairs at Bhaktivedanta Manor and Bury Place London, and the inability of present managers to work out a solution together, I have asked Hamsaduta to go there immediately and take charge of the situation. It is not good that things have deteriorated to such a stage as you describe in your letter, but let us try to rectify and save the situation. I myself will be traveling to Paris in the second week of May, for a tour of European cities, and I will meet with Hamsaduta then as well as other leaders, and we will make a decision for the permanent leadership of the centers. For the time being work with Hamsaduta and stop the bickering and conflicting camps. You must work hard to absolve the debts you have massed so we will not lose our standing there. If everyone is strictly chanting at least 16 rounds daily and reading the books and observing the regulative principles then management will be at our finger's end, and there will be no difficulty in maintaining Krsna Consciousness. Your ever well-wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami ACBS/sdg Labels: Bhaktivedanta Manor, management, standard practices letters | 21:06 |3 March 2008 3 March, 1974 Mayapur Dear Mahadeva, Please accept my blessings. I beg to acknowledge receipt of your letter which has been hand delivered to me here in our temple. We will present our program at Bhaktivedanta Manor exactly in the line of Lord Caitanya, by kirtana, prasadam distribution and speaking from Bhagavad-gita. We cannot deviate even an inch in order to attract the followers of the ecology philosophy or any other materialistic, utopian movement. You say you know a number of influential leaders of this group, but what is the use of knowing them, since you yourself found them deficient and left them? Our ideal Vedic community will attract everyone on its own merit, and we shall be glad to welcome and accept everyone who comes without our compromising in order to attract them. As far as your plan to convince Prince Charles, heir to the throne, about Krsna Consciousness, this is another utopian idea. Do not work at it. I request you to live with your Godbrothers as a regular brahmacari and prosecute our standard practices for spreading Krsna Consciousness by book distribution, distribution of prasadam and preaching to interested people. I think you should stay in India. Our Mayapur temple is better than any temple in the U.S. and Europe, and everyone is appreciating it as very gorgeous. So there is a full program here and I request you to take on duties here and do not go wandering around. I have heard of the report of your stealing from the temples, and Mukunda has requested that you do not go back there. Therefore I recommend as the best thing that you make a fresh start and stay here in India where there is such a great need. You English boys have good facility here, not having the visa trouble that the U.S. devotees have, so take advantage of this and cooperate with me in this way. That is my request. Your ever well-wisher, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Labels: distubance, Mayapur, standard practices letters | 13:20 | |
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