from Prema Candra Das – Ukraine, Kiev

Dear Srila Gurudeva,

Please accept my humble obeisances, all glories to Srila Prabhupada, all glories to the devotional service to the lotus feet of Sri Krishna.

Srila Gurudeva, thank you for letting me join your transcendental student team. I can’t even think of a better coach for myself in this spiritual competition called bhakti-yoga. I’m still not lucky enough to be under your personal, loving and strict guidance at the Polish tour or Woodstock. I am only reading about these great events in the life of Vaisnavas. And this reading is pure nectar, for the scale of such a preaching activity certainly gives great satisfaction to Srila Prabhupada and to the whole guru-parampara.

Srila Prabhupada was saying that the most recent instruction is the most important. Therefore I meditate on the request of His Divine Grace: “If you really want to satisfy me, learn to cooperate with each other.” In this age of conflicts, cooperation is perhaps the most difficult thing, even in a spiritual organization with the highest goal and the sweetest process of achieving it. And one could think, why shall we have all these discords and conflicts, disputes and misunderstandings, why not just sit down and chant a couple of hours together. But congregational chanting also does not work if there is no trusting relation between the Vaisnavas. My mentor said: “The problem of the society is the strong personalities, individualists joining it. Everyone wants to solve problems and make his own business. One performs service well, but on his own. That discourages me, since I`m such an individualist. Moreover I’m very young and inexperienced in any field and therefore I make many mistakes.

I read the book of His Holiness Bhakti Tirtha Swami “The Beggar. Volume 1” and his thoughts about the society, that Srila Prabhupada built so eagerly, and I felt so much hurt. He says: “My Dear Lord, what a fool I am. What austerities should I perform for You? All aspects of life on this planet are in turmoil. Materialists are fiercely eager for sensual pleasure, ready to pay any price for it. Spiritual leaders are not much better than ordinary hypocrites, living their lives in contradiction to the professed principles and examples of the great prophets. Among Vaisnavas, the bond of love and cooperation is hardly stronger. Our communities of devotees have created such a circus, that the Krishna Consciousness movement that You founded not so long ago has already been destroyed. All over the world people, who are called to help us, hate us and devotees, who are trained to serve You, suffer from their own carelessness, confusion and anger. I am afraid, my dear Lord, that everything will go to pieces if you do not intervene divinely.”

Of course, many of us still have strong material desires and ambitions. The six enemies, led by envy, are constantly oppressing us. And the duty of each devotee (and mine, first of all) to invest as consciously and more diligently as possible in building love relationships, which will help us to withstand the onslaught of the age of Kali.

And as for me, you Srila Gurudeva, are the example of a leader, under whose gracious protection many devotees from all over the world can cooperate and succeed in that. Everyone follows the leader. And thanks to your inexhaustible desire to satisfy Srila Prabhupada again and again, you have become an ideal team player. In order to do this, you have obtained the best qualities of a devotee, such as modesty, striving for simplicity, unquenchable enthusiasm, shrewd mind, prudence, and most importantly, readiness to pay due attention to everyone.

While meditating and reflecting on this, I pray to you, my dear spiritual master, for the highest mercy. This society, this way of life and way of thinking is the best that could happen in my worthless life. The devotees literally picked me up, like a stray dog, when I just killed my precious time wandering along the Black Sea coast in Ukraine. They put a taste for exalted life into my heart, transformed me and ultimately helped to get acquainted to you, my eternal spiritual master. I can never repay this debt, and all I can do or should do is to try to make this world a little brighter by inciting life in the hearts of devotees and in my heart so that holy names can be heard everywhere, in every house, city and village, on the seas and oceans, large and small rivers (that was a prayer of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada). And I ask you, Srila Gurudeva, to give me the strength to give up my mean emotions and thoughts and to learn to love devotees and myself (my soul) and the Lord entirely. Teach me to be a team player in mission of Srila Prabhupada.

Trying to serve you, Prema Candra Das