I hope I didn't offend anyone with the title. I wrote this in response to an article by HH Hridayananda Maharaja.
http://pandavas.wordpress.com/2011/01/02/hridayananda-das-goswamis-new-year-greeting/#comment-497
The title should really be "How can we get more local people to become devotees?" But I thought that wouldn't get as much attention :-)
These are my personal thoughts:
1. Devotees have dis-empowering beliefs based on dependency on an organization (ISKCON). Srila Prabhupada clearly indicated that he wanted his followers to be independently thoughtful and competent. He did not want a society where members have to beg for permission to do anything.
If there are features of the ISKCON society that we do not like, we have opportunity to do some thing about it. Not through campaigning to the GBC or canvassing the mass of devotees, but by taking initiative to do things (even on a small scale) to show that there is a better way.
We can see that many of the positive innovations in ISKCON have come about through small independent projects that have become successful and then influenced the thinking in mainstream ISKCON. HH Bhakti Tirtha Swami, HH Radhanatha Swami and Caru Prabhu in Utah come to mind.
I feel that this quote from Margaret Mead is relevant.
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."
CALL TO ACTION: Individually (or better with a small group of like-minded devotees), do something to help give Krishna consciousness of the locals of the place you live.
Don't wait for the temple to do it, or for a knight on a white horse to ride into town to do it. Take the initiative to do something yourself. You will be amazed at what happens when you just take the first step.
2. Following on from the point above...
All devotees should be trained to be self sufficient "preachers". HH Hrdayananda Maharaja has discussed this previously. "We should be creating leaders not followers".
As we develop our preaching, our objective should not be how many members can I make. It should be how many people can I empower to become spiritually strong preachers.
3. Don't neglect the Indian devotees, they are a great asset... as preachers.
Some devotees only want to preach to Westerners and avoid preaching to Indians. Rather we should preach to anyone who is interested in Krishna consciousness, we should train them how to preach not only to Indians, but also to the general population.
Vaisesika Prabhu is training the Indian devotees in his congregation to distribute books. This is an excellent example of how this can be done.
Imagine what would happen if all the Indian members of our congregations were actively preaching to the general public. It would be massive.
4. Segregation can be good.
I appreciate that if a local comes to a temple full of Indians they might feel out of place. Therefore, having preaching programs that are targeted towards the local people, where culture shock is purposely minimized can be very helpful.
The idea is not to restrict access to programs based on ethnicity, but it is natural for people to preach to people of their own culture. Russians will naturally preach to their Russian friends, Chinese people will naturally preach to their Chinese friends, and Indians will naturally preach to Indians. There is nothing wrong with having preaching programs based around common culture and language; whatever helps people come to Krishna consciousness.
This is a good way to build a strong army of preachers. See point 3.
We have seen that many Indians become devotees through "Indian" preaching or nama hattas.
This is great. It means there are more devotees who can preach to the local people.
http://pandavas.wordpress.com/2011/01/02/hridayananda-das-goswamis-new-year-greeting/#comment-497
The title should really be "How can we get more local people to become devotees?" But I thought that wouldn't get as much attention :-)
These are my personal thoughts:
1. Devotees have dis-empowering beliefs based on dependency on an organization (ISKCON). Srila Prabhupada clearly indicated that he wanted his followers to be independently thoughtful and competent. He did not want a society where members have to beg for permission to do anything.
If there are features of the ISKCON society that we do not like, we have opportunity to do some thing about it. Not through campaigning to the GBC or canvassing the mass of devotees, but by taking initiative to do things (even on a small scale) to show that there is a better way.
We can see that many of the positive innovations in ISKCON have come about through small independent projects that have become successful and then influenced the thinking in mainstream ISKCON. HH Bhakti Tirtha Swami, HH Radhanatha Swami and Caru Prabhu in Utah come to mind.
I feel that this quote from Margaret Mead is relevant.
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."
CALL TO ACTION: Individually (or better with a small group of like-minded devotees), do something to help give Krishna consciousness of the locals of the place you live.
Don't wait for the temple to do it, or for a knight on a white horse to ride into town to do it. Take the initiative to do something yourself. You will be amazed at what happens when you just take the first step.
2. Following on from the point above...
All devotees should be trained to be self sufficient "preachers". HH Hrdayananda Maharaja has discussed this previously. "We should be creating leaders not followers".
As we develop our preaching, our objective should not be how many members can I make. It should be how many people can I empower to become spiritually strong preachers.
3. Don't neglect the Indian devotees, they are a great asset... as preachers.
Some devotees only want to preach to Westerners and avoid preaching to Indians. Rather we should preach to anyone who is interested in Krishna consciousness, we should train them how to preach not only to Indians, but also to the general population.
Vaisesika Prabhu is training the Indian devotees in his congregation to distribute books. This is an excellent example of how this can be done.
Imagine what would happen if all the Indian members of our congregations were actively preaching to the general public. It would be massive.
4. Segregation can be good.
I appreciate that if a local comes to a temple full of Indians they might feel out of place. Therefore, having preaching programs that are targeted towards the local people, where culture shock is purposely minimized can be very helpful.
The idea is not to restrict access to programs based on ethnicity, but it is natural for people to preach to people of their own culture. Russians will naturally preach to their Russian friends, Chinese people will naturally preach to their Chinese friends, and Indians will naturally preach to Indians. There is nothing wrong with having preaching programs based around common culture and language; whatever helps people come to Krishna consciousness.
This is a good way to build a strong army of preachers. See point 3.
We have seen that many Indians become devotees through "Indian" preaching or nama hattas.
This is great. It means there are more devotees who can preach to the local people.
