How can we appreciate good devotees who are offensive about some issues?

Anwser Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
See some devotees have an anti-devotional offensive mentality and we don’t want to get that anti-devotional offensive mentality ourselves. But at the same time we have to appreciate their devotion. How do we do that? I think a lot depends on that devotee’s focus.
Sometimes some devotees have some strong opinions about things but they voice those opinions at appropriate forums. But there are other devotees who have strong opinions and they are like constant campaigners about that. Anyone they meet they just talk only about that.
So that one thing becomes like the mission of their life. Then when we are associating with them it is very difficult to not get dragged into the controversy. It is natural that if somebody feels strongly about something they will want to speak about it.
But still there has to be some regulation. It is like somebody has some managerial grievances and they give Bhagavatam glass and then the Bhagavatam glass becomes a forum for criticizing the management. That is not the right thing to do.
They have some grievances but there are appropriate forums to express that. So if somebody has become almost like a undiscriminating campaigner for a particular cause where associating with them means this is what we will have to hear then we may have to keep a distance from them. Then it will be very difficult you may have to appreciate their devotion from a distance and we keep a distance from them.
But if they are feel strongly about a particular issue but they are also able to keep things in perspective. So if they start talking about that issue and this is the most important thing this is what we should be discussing then they start saying what can we do. But if they understand let’s put this aside then to the extent they are able to that cause is going to be very important for them but if they don’t let themselves be defined by that cause alone then it’s possible that we can appreciate their other side their devotional try to inspire that devotee or encourage or ask questions in a way that they will focus on the non-controversial non-offensive thing.
That’s how we can do our part. But otherwise sometimes some people have to separate themselves from the cause that they have taken up. There are certain causes which are important but bhakti is much bigger than any specific cause.
So it’s important to recognize the bigness of bhakti which is bigger than any particular cause. Does that answer your question? Thank you. So what