Being religiously spiritual in a multi-cultural world
Disclaimer: This transcript was generated using AI and may contain occasional errors or inaccuracies.
Hare Krishna. I thank all of you for coming here today afternoon. I'm honored to be here in Scond Lantern.
And today I'll speak on the topic of being being religiously spiritual in a multicultural world. So we live, I'll explain what this title means and how it relates to our life practically. We live today in a multicultural world, especially if we are immigrants living in a country different from where we were born and brought up.
The culture of that country is quite different from the culture in which we were brought up. India itself is a multicultural country. But actually, although there are many different people who have many different ideas of what is worshipable, still within India there is a significant amount of cultural similarities.
So, for example, almost all Indians, especially we talk about followers of the Vedic path, known as Hindus, they have some reverence for the deities. But people from other faith traditions, not only they don't accept the deities, some of them are very averse to the idea of deities. So we may have children who go to schools where they meet other kids who raise questions.
Why do you people worship stones? Or similarly they may worship other, they may get questions, they may be asked questions like this. So a multicultural world is what is the direction in which the whole world is going today where we don't usually live in insular or insulated communities, where we interact with people who share the same understandings or same practices that we have. So this poses many challenges for anyone who is trying to practice a spiritual path or practice any particular path.
So I'll explain the terms and then I'll move forward in the class. Multicultural world is specifically a world in which different people have different cultural practices, some of which may be very different from each other, some of which may be totally contradictory to each other. So now being religiously spiritual in a multicultural world.
So the word spiritual is quite trendy nowadays, but the word religious often has negative connotation to it. People say that, yes, there's a whole huge group of people in North America and Europe who self-identify themselves as SBNR. SBNR is spiritual but not religious.
So they say that, yes, I'm spiritual. And for them, the way they use the words is that spiritual means being open, being open minded, being open to new experiences in life. Yes, I'm also spiritual.
I went there, I had this experience and I'm ready to go to different places to experience different things. We live in a postmodern world where the ultimate barometer of deciding whether something should be done or not is experience. If I experience something and it is good, then great, I'll do it.
If it doesn't feel good, forget it. So experience is definitely important, but experience has to be seen within the context of a broader picture. We'll come to that part a little later.
But the point is the word spiritual is often associated today with experiences. And people feel that, you know, I'm open to experience. I went to this particular monastery.
I went to this abbey. I went to this mountain. I went to this lake.
I felt something which I'd never felt before in my life. I had a spiritual experience. So now, so the word spiritual has positive connotation, which conveys open mindedness to new experiences in life.
Whereas the word religious has a negative connotation. It often implies closed mindedness, fanaticism, intolerance. No, the word religion is associated with the idea that my way is the only way.
This is the only way. And there are some religions who have this idea that their way is the only way. And within that, say, for example, some people quote from the Bible.
And Jesus said that none shall go to the father except through me. Actually, if you go to the original, there is a very important word, alzikl, which means present, at present. None shall go to the father except me at present, at the time when Jesus spoke it.
But anyway, they have this idea that this is the only way. And there are some extremist versions of these religions. You know, if you are not following this way, you are going to go to hell.
And not only are you going to go to hell, we will help you get there faster. So religion is associated with intolerance, violence, terrorism in its extreme versions. And the word religion is often associated with negativity, broadly speaking.
So people say I am spiritual, but not religious. Now, when we are trying to understand and practice the bhakti wisdom of the Bhagavad Gita, another text from the Indian tradition. So then what is our understanding of who we are in this cultural context and how we interact with others? So this, at one level, the separation of religious and spiritual, it's understandable.
As I said, people want to be open minded, not narrow minded. They say I am spiritual, but not religious. However, spiritual is not just an experience.
Spiritual is also meant to be a state of consciousness. Spiritual is also a reality in the sense that there is a spiritual side to our life, which is real. And we can rise ourselves to the spiritual level of consciousness.
And there is a process by which we can rise to the spiritual level of awareness. So to say that I am spiritual, but not religious, if that means that one becomes against religion, then it implies it's like saying I am healthy, but I don't take any medicines. OK, if you're healthy, that's fine.
But if you're sick, you can't just say that, oh, I won't take any medicines, I won't take any treatment, but I'll be healthy. Becoming healthy is not just a matter of wishing good health. One has to follow a process by which one can come to the level of good health.
So there is a sick state, there is a healthy state. And there is a process, there is a treatment by which one can move from the sick state to the healthy state. Similarly, there is material consciousness, there is materialistic living and there is spiritual living.
There are two distinct ways of living. And there is a process by which one can rise from materialistic living to spiritual living. And that process originally is meant to be religion.
The word religion originally did not have any negative connotation. It's only when in the last 50 years or so where religious violence, especially terrorism has become a rampant threat in the world, that the word religion has become associated with negative connotation. So if somebody says, OK, I want to be spiritual, but I won't follow any process to become spiritual, then their idea of being spiritual is not real.
It's simply a theory. It's just imagining I'm spiritual. So one has to follow some process by which one can become spiritual, by which one can raise one's awareness from the material level to the spiritual level.
One can direct one's love from the worldly objects to the spiritual source of everything. So whatever process one may follow, that will be one's religion. So religion is what? It's not just a set of rituals.
Rituals may be involved in religion. They are involved. But the point is, religion is a means by which one can raise one's consciousness from the material level to the spiritual level.
However, many people forget this purpose of religion. And then religion simply becomes a part of their materialistic way of living. So once a person went to God and he said, God, I've taken this lottery ticket.
You know, it's worth one lakh in India, one lakh rupees. So if I win this lottery ticket, I'll give you 50,000 in charity. So he waited eagerly, prayed very eagerly and waited eagerly.
Finally, when the winners were declared, he had won. But he had got 50,000. So he went to the temple and he prayed, Oh God, you're so clever.
You took your share before me. So the idea is just as when we do business, the people try to take as much as possible from the other while giving as little as possible to the other. So that's what the customer tries to do.
That's what often the seller tries to do. So when religion becomes just co-opted into the materialistic worldview, then it becomes simply like a business. It loses, it becomes completely divorced from its spiritual purpose.
And then it can become not only simply materialistic, it can become a tool for emotional manipulation, a tool for fomenting hatred, a tool for instigating violence. That is when people divorce religion from its purpose. The purpose is to raise one's consciousness from the material level to the spiritual level.
Whatever practices we do, they are meant to spiritualize our consciousness. But if we forget that, then religion can be misappropriated for whatever purposes one wants. So people have their own ideas, people have their own ideologies and religion becomes simply co-opted for fulfilling their ambitions, their thirst for power, their anger against the world.
So this way religion becomes narrow-minded, religion becomes sometimes a source of, sometimes used as a tool for violence against others. So now when we have, in our tradition we have Bhaktivinod Thakur who is one of the prominent Acharyas and he gives a very insightful statement about how we should live in a multicultural world. He says that if we go to a place where God is being worshipped in a way different from what we are familiar with, in a different form of God, in a different mode of worship, what should be our response? He says we should stay there in a reverential mode, reverential mode, thinking that the same Lord whom I am worshipping is so kind that he has manifested himself in this different way to attract this different group of people.
So rather than saying this is their religion, this is our religion, we see the common purpose of elevating people to spiritual consciousness. Like say if we consider a mountain, so the peak of the mountain is spiritual consciousness. The bottom of the mountain is material consciousness.
Now the purpose is to go up the mountain. Now there may be different ways to go up the mountain and the important thing is to rise up the mountain. So we see Bhaktivedanta Thakur is saying yes, there is God who has manifested himself in this different form, is accepting worship in this different medium and this my same Lord is so merciful that he has manifested himself in this way and therefore by seeing his mercifulness, my devotion to the Lord who is manifesting, to the Lord whom I worship is increasing.
So he is saying that when we see someone, someone say a Christian doing mass, a Muslim doing namaz, we see that the same one Supreme Lord has manifested, is receiving worship from people in this way. So rather than feeling insecure, rather than feeling any kind of antipathy, you see that yes, that's the Lord, see God, religions are meant for God. God is not meant for religion.
Krishna is very clear in the Bhagavad Gita. He says dharma, Krishna says there are many dharmas, give up those dharmas and focus on the ultimate purpose of dharma. What is that? So religion is meant for God.
God is not meant for religion. That means what? Different religions are like different paths by which one can rise up to God. There are different paths to climb up the mountain.
So the paths are meant to reach up to the peak. So religions are meant for God. God is not meant for religion.
That means God is not the monopoly. of any religious tradition. God is far bigger than the religions that we devote to him, the religions by which we approach him.
So any religion that claims a monopoly on God, that religion is actually limiting the unlimited. God is unlimited. And to say that that unlimited God is accessible only through this path, that is to limit the unlimited.
And that is unreasonable. Why should God, why should God, why should some religion have monopoly on God? So this idea of exclusivism, we have exclusive rights to God. Nobody, sometimes there is a cricket match being broadcast and say some channels, exclusively on ESPN, exclusively on this channel.
Nobody else can broadcast this. God is not like that. He is exclusively broadcast through one religion.
Now God is the God of everyone. sarva yonishu kaunteya mūrtaya sambhavanti athāsāṁ brahma māryaṁ ahaṁ bīja-pratāpitām Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita in 14.4 that all living beings are my children. I am the seed giving father of all living beings.
What to speak of talking about one religion? Krishna does not restrict himself even to one species, not even humans. All living beings he is saying. So there is the exclusive idea, which says that all religions are just the same.
Exclusive idea is that our religion is the only way. It's very narrow minded. Some people, if you consider a pendulum, this exclusivism is like one extreme of the pendulum.
And some people go to the other extreme. That is pluralism. And they say all paths are right.
Whichever path appeals to you, you follow that. At one level this seems broad minded. And we should be broad minded.
But we shouldn't be so broad minded that our brains fall out. Isn't it? Now to say, if we consider religion as a path up the mountain to reach to the top of the mountain, from material consciousness to spiritual consciousness. Now, is it that all paths are going to take us to the top of the mountain? There will be a hundred different paths that will take us in different directions.
So we have to see the fruit. Are people rising to spiritual consciousness? Or are they simply becoming more and more materialistic? They are simply becoming more and more self-centered. If they are simply becoming more and more self-righteous, then they are not really following the path which takes them to God.
So to give another example, if somebody says that, say religion offers us knowledge about God, it offers us process by which we can develop love for God. So knowledge of God can be like different knowledges, different systems of knowledge. There may be an engineering college, say which gives university, which gives knowledge of engineering.
Which is a well-known university over here in Toronto? Toronto University. Okay, so that's Toronto University. Then if somebody says, some student of Toronto University says that, only if you get an engineering degree from Toronto University, that is a valid engineering degree.
All other degrees are bogus. Who gave Toronto University monopoly on engineering? So that is exclusivism. But somebody goes to the other extreme and says, every building everywhere is an engineering university.
With any building you go and just sit there for four years, you get an engineering degree. That is ridiculous. So to say that all paths are right, we have to say, okay, those paths may help a particular person in a particular way.
And that is good if it's helping. But to say that, it's not that any path that anyone is following is necessarily taking them to God. We have to see whether it's raising people's consciousness.
Whether it's taking people towards a more selfless, a more spiritual, a less materialistic way of living. So there are objective criteria. bhakti pareeshaanubhava viraktiranyatraja Bhakti is a universe.
Bhakti essentially means devotion. So devotion to God is a universal experience which saintly people across religious traditions have had. Now what is the test that somebody, so there may be a Christian who may experience bhakti in their Christian practices.
There may be a Muslim, there are many Sufi saints who were very devoted to the absolute. So bhakti is a cross-cultural universal spiritual experience. But what is the test that there is bhakti? Bhakti, there is an internal symptom and there is an external symptom.
The internal symptom is bhakti pareeshaanubhava. Anubhava is experience. Paraeesha.
Eesha is the supreme Lord. Para is one who is transcendental. That Lord who cannot be perceived with our senses, we experience him through the process of bhakti.
Bhakti, so it's not that when we go in front of the deities and we touch the deities. It's not that necessarily we feel some electric current flowing through our body. But actually if we approach the deities with a devotional frame of mind, we will feel sanctified.
We will feel purified. We will have an inner experience of God. So pareeshaanubhava, the inner experience of God that happens.
What is the result of that? How can I know? Anybody can say I saw God, I experienced God. The result is viraktir anyatra ca. One becomes detached from other worldly experiences.
Especially materialistic, anti-devotional, immoral kind of experiences. So the experience of God is so fulfilling that one feels I'm not going to crave and slave to get all these worldly pleasures that are being glamorized. So this, this is the test.
If somebody is experiencing God, then their life should be transformed. If they were materialistic earlier, at least from that level of materialism, they need to have risen to a higher level of spirituality. Spirituality means less chasing up to material pleasures, living more selflessly, living for something higher than impulsive worldly pleasures.
There is exclusivism which says this is the only way. There is pluralism which says all ways are right. The Bhagavad Gita's understanding is neither exclusivism nor pluralism.
It is inclusivism, like the balanced state of a pendulum. Inclusivism means that we understand that there is ultimately one path. And different people are at different levels on that path.
Different people are at different levels on the same path. Krishna doesn't say my way is the only way. He says all people are on my path.
Different people are experiencing different things. They are attracted by different things. And whatever they are experiencing, based on that, they are either moving towards God or they are moving away from God.
Actually Prabhupada in lecture says that if a person is alcoholic and if that alcoholic is not able to give up alcohol, then while drinking wine if that person thinks, Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita that the taste of water is Krishna, that I am the taste of water. And if he says actually the taste of wine is Krishna. If a person thinks like this, Prabhupada says one day that person will become a great devotee.
Prabhupada is not saying by drinking wine one will become a great devotee. He is saying by thinking of Krishna. You know sometimes we see there are so many different kinds of mania.
Say in India there is cricket mania. So in America there is baseball mania. What is it in Canada? Ice hockey? Ice hockey is a mania over here.
So now if we are not caught in that mania, what are you so excited about? What are you so mad about? What is there to be so? So people literally give up everything. Sometimes they watch a match, they go through all kinds of troubles to meet a hero. Whatever it is.
Extreme lengths of tapasya people do to try to do something which they are infatuated with. Now what makes them do that? Actually it is Krishna explains in the Bhagavad Gita that whatever is attractive in this world, it manifests a spark of Krishna's splendor. yad yad vibhuti mad sattvaṁ śrīma dūrjitaṁ eva vā tattva devā vadacchatvaṁ mamadejo aṁśa sambhavaṁ So he says everything attractive manifests a spark of Krishna's splendor.
So if somebody is attracted to ice hockey, they are finding a spark of Krishna's all-attractiveness in ice hockey. Somebody is attracted to wine, they are finding a spark of Krishna's all-attractiveness in wine. Somebody is attracted to reading.
Keep reading, keep reading, keep reading. In reading books, they are finding a spark of Krishna's all-attractiveness. So everything attractive comes from Krishna.
But everything attractive doesn't take us to Krishna. Everything attractive in the taste of wine, it comes from Krishna. But the taste of wine intoxicates us.
It actually immerses us more and more in materialistic consciousness. And so everything attractive comes from Krishna, but everything attractive doesn't take us to Krishna. So when we are practicing spirituality, as I said, the Krishna consciousness, is it spiritual or is it religious? People say, I want to be spiritual, not religious.
Is Krishna consciousness spiritual or is it religious? It is actually religiously spiritual. What it means religiously spiritual is, in principle, Krishna consciousness is universal. Actually Prabhupada was asked, now what do you think about Jesus Christ? Prabhupada said, He is our Guru.
He said that if someone has so much love for God, that they are ready to lay down their life for the sake of God, that is an exalted level of love of God. And we worship such a person as our Guru. So Prabhupada, so in that sense, there is an open-mindedness associated with spirituality.
There are many different paths by which God can be approached. But at the same time, we just don't say that there are many paths. We also very diligently follow our path.
So, as I said, religion is the process to rise from material consciousness to spiritual consciousness. So we are religiously spiritual. Spiritual, we accept the open-mindedness of spirituality.
At the same time, we are focused on our path. And this focus is what brings about transformation. Somebody can follow, somebody is sick, they may take Ayurvedic, allopathic treatment.
Somebody else may take Ayurvedic treatment. Somebody else may take homeopathic treatment. Somebody else may take naturopathic treatment.
The point is not which treatment you take. The point is whether you are getting cured. And if we are to get cured, whichever treatment we are following, we need to follow it diligently.
So, for example, initially Prabhupada was once in New York. At that time, a young man after a class asked, Swamiji, your philosophy sounds like that of the Buddha. So Prabhupada turned to him and said, Do you follow Buddha? No, Swamiji.
What's it? Follow Buddha. Follow Jesus. Follow Krishna.
Follow someone. Don't just talk. The idea is, what does it mean, don't just talk? If we just analyze, this treatment is like this, this treatment is like this, this treatment is like this.
Analysis of treatment is not going to cure us. Applying the treatment, taking the treatment is what is going to cure us. And now it's not that all treatments are good.
Some treatments may be handed out by quacks. So, if the treatment is not good, we'll also come to know that. At times this treatment is not working.
So, if we just keep talking, we never arrive at any transformation in our life. We don't rise to spiritual consciousness. So we are religiously spiritual in the sense that we actually follow our path diligently.
We accept that there are different treatments. But this is the treatment that we are working for us and that we will make it work. We'll follow it diligently.
Now, there will be some people simplistically say all religions are the same. Now, all religions are not the same. All religions ultimately have the same purpose.
They have the same purpose, but in process, there are differences. In process, there are differences. So, if we focus too much on the differences in the process, we may feel there is no similarity.
But at the same time, we can't neglect the differences that are there in process. So, for example, how do we understand these differences? Say, consider that there are traffic rules in the world. Now, the purpose of traffic rules is smooth and safe traveling.
So, this is a common purpose. But are all traffic rules all over the world the same? No. In some countries, we travel on the left.
Some countries, we travel on the right. So, here, in those countries where we travel on the left, if we travel on the right, we'll get into trouble. So, here, the traffic rules are not just different, they are opposite.
And although the rules are opposite, the purpose is the same. So, if you simply see the rules, you will say, what is this? It doesn't make sense. See the purpose, you will realize.
There is the opposite rules, but same purpose. So, this principle is what explains the differences in different religions. They have different processes.
And different people follow those processes with different understandings. So, for example, I'll conclude with an analysis of T T version and then we can have some question answers. So, if you consider T T version, in many religions, especially the religions of the world can be broadly divided into two categories.
I have a whole series of seminars on Krishna consciousness and world religions and analyzed various religions over there. The two broad categories are, there are the Abrahamic religions and there are the Dharmic religions. The Abrahamic religions are Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
They focus primarily on certain historical events as defining moments for their religious tradition. So, they all trace their lineage to Abraham who was one of the prominent prophets. And from that time onward, these religions had a conception of who is the Messiah, who will come.
And Moses came. So, the followers of Moses came to be known as Jews. And after that the Messiah was predicted.
And when Jesus came, some people accepted him as the Messiah. So, those who accepted him as the Messiah became Christians. Now, later on, Muhammad came.
And some people accepted Muhammad as the Messiah. So, those who accepted Muhammad as the Messiah became Muslims. And this was going on, one after another, after another.
So, Muhammad decided that this is the end of all business. Muhammad said, I am the seal of all prophets. After this, no more prophets.
So, the Abrahamic religions fall in one category. And then the Dharmic religions. The Dharmic religions, they are based primarily on Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism and Sikhism.
These focus, they also have historical events, but their focus is on Dharma, on timeless principles, on understanding the order of the universe and harmonizing with that order. So, Dharma refers basically, Dharma has many different meanings. There is a whole book called, there is a whole book of Mimamsaka Sutra, which leads to the question, Athato Dharma Jijnasa.
What is Dharma? And there are more than 100 definitions of Dharma given in different books. But Dharma essentially means, not just religion, not just duty, it essentially means the innate order in nature and how we can harmonize with that innate order. So, in the Dharmic religions, within the Dharmic religions also there are some differences, but there are many similarities.
But within the Dharmic religions and the Abrahamic religions, there are substantial differences. And one of the major differences is an attitude towards deity worship. So, in the Dharmic religions, there is an understanding that absolute truth has an impersonal pervasive aspect.
Absolute truth also has a personal aspect. And that personal aspect manifests as the deity. So, when we worship the deity, we are actually worshipping the Supreme Lord, who is manifesting.
However, in the Abrahamic religions, there is, although the mention of God, there is no clear description of who God is. There is a famous picture, which Michelangelo has drawn on the roof of the Sistine Chapel. And it depicts Adam, the primeval man, reaching out to God.
And so he is reaching out and God is depicted as an old man with a white beard. Now, if you look at that depiction, actually in that particular painting, Adam looks more attractive than God. So, there is, this is not to disrespect the conception of God, that is there in the Abrahamic religions, we are talking about not the conception of God, we are talking about the depiction of God.
So, there is no clear description of how God is. And because there is no clear description of how God is, within those traditions, if any image of God is made, that is based on imagination, that is not based on revelation, that is based on imagination, that is based on concoction. And there is, when Moses had gone up the hill to get a message from God and he got the Ten Commandments at that time.
So, during that time, it is said, his followers whom he had rescued from slavery in Egypt, at that time they took all their gold and they made it into a calf and they started worshipping the golden calf. And this is given. So, when Moses came back, he says, what is this? There is a true God who has saved you and who has rescued you through so many difficulties, by performing so many miracles.
And you, just when a little laxity was there, you started worshipping this calf. So, this is a false God. The worship that is meant for the true God, it is going to this image.
And he destroyed that image. And from that time, there is this tradition within the Abrahamic religion of aggressively attacking and destroying any depictions of God. That is there because they don't have any revolution about the depiction of God.
So, any depiction that is made, that will be based on imagination. And they feel that imaginary depiction will be like a competitor to God. Instead of worshipping God, they are worshipping something else.
And to ensure that worship goes only to God, not to any competitor, that imaginary form, that particular depiction that is there, that should be destroyed. So, right from the Old Testament, which is the sacred book of the Jews, down to the Quran, which is the sacred book of the Muslims, there are many descriptions of destruction of images. And this destruction is often talked about in celebratory tones.
In this way, as soon as the king conquered a particular kingdom, he destroyed all the false God that will be worshipped over there. So, there is a strong antipathy to the worship of any images. Now, we have to understand that people coming from that particular tradition, they have severe conceptual and cultural blocks, because of which they just can't appreciate.
Now, within our tradition, what is the understanding? That God is unlimited. There is no denying that. At the same time, the unlimitedness of God does not limit us in approaching Him.
That is the understanding. God is unlimited, but He does not make His unlimitedness as a limitation for us to approach Him. Now, Prabhupada says, you know, God is everywhere.
But how do we worship Him everywhere? The sky is everywhere. How do we worship the sky? Sometimes people say, God is everywhere. What is the need to come to a temple? Actually, yes, God is everywhere.
But then, you know, water is everywhere as water vapour. If I am thirsty, can I just hang out my tongue? Can I drink water? Can I quench my thirst like that? No, I can't. All the water is present everywhere as water vapour.
If I want water, I need to go to a place where water is accessible. So that water which is present as water vapour, it forms clouds, it rains. The rains flow through rivers.
They come through pipes to our houses where there are taps. We turn on the tap. That's where we get water.
Similarly, God is present everywhere, but He is not accessible everywhere for us. Therefore, we need to go to places where He is accessible. And that all-pervasive God, He is unlimited, but He is not that God.
God who is unlimited is not limited by His unlimitedness. The unlimited God is not limited by His unlimitedness. That means that if He wants, He can choose to manifest in a limited form.
Although He is unlimited, His unlimitedness is at His service. It doesn't control Him. That's like what I mean by that is some people are very tall.
Now when they are very tall, at one level, their height is impressive. But then sometimes they are just stuck with that height. If certain entrances are not so tall, they have to watch their head.
So they are stuck with their tall height. God is never stuck with His unlimitedness. So for Him, His unlimitedness is a feature which is under His control.
His unlimitedness is not a feature that controls Him. He is not stuck with His unlimitedness. That means that although He is unlimited, He can choose to manifest in a limited form if He wants to.
So that unlimited Lord manifests as the deity. When He manifests as the deity, He still remains unlimited. He has unlimited potency, but for giving us access to Him, He manifests in a limited form.
So we know the past time of Mother Yashoda. She heard the rumor that Krishna has eaten mud. She told Krishna, open your mouth.
He opened the mouth. Krishna said, open your mouth. What did she see? The whole universe over there.
Now if we open our kid's mouth, we won't see any universe over there. So what happens is, he saw the whole universe and not only saw the whole universe, she saw in that universe, Mother Yashoda looking at Krishna's mouth. You understand what is happening? So Krishna, even when Krishna is in the universe, the universe is still in Krishna.
That is God's unlimitedness. That He can have a limited form and still remain unlimited. Not that God's unlimitedness means that He cannot have a limited form.
He can manifest in a limited form. So the Deity is the Lord's merciful manifestation by which He becomes accessible to us. And by worshipping Him, we can move closer to Krishna.
And we will see for ourselves and we will see for others. There have been throughout history, thousands and millions of people who have devoted themselves to the Deity and they have experienced elevation of consciousness. They have become purified.
They have become attracted towards the Lord. So skeptics may say that, oh this deity worship, it is, this part of your image worship, that is actually, is all false gods. So they have this understanding, some religious extremists in the Abrahamic religions, they have the understanding that there is one true God and anything else that is worshipped, that is actually not God, that is a false God.
A false God means it's a devil. The devil who is manifesting to take you away from the true God. So not only do they consider the deity, the images to be not God, they consider them to be forms of the devil.
And that's why they become very violent against it sometimes. But somebody may say, oh, this is satanic, this is devilish. But it is, if they are just objective enough, then they will find what is the reality.
One doctor, one patient is saying, you know, the treatment you are taking is wrong, it's wrong, wrong. Prescription you are given is wrong. You should not worship forms, stone images.
They are saying this prescription is wrong. But what is the actual result? Prescription wrong, patient cured. Patient cured means you see that by the worship of the deities, people's hearts are being transformed.
People become pure, people become selfless, people become godly. I'll conclude with one incident. There are devotees who work at interfaith levels.
So there is a devotee who treats me like a close friend. So he had gone for, he had started some interfaith dialogue with Christians and he had invited this Christian professor to come and stay in the temple and he had organized some lectures for him. And so he had studied interfaith, so he knew about Bhagavad Gita.
He spoke on the Bhagavad Gita quite well. And then he had organized a program in the university. He stayed for one week.
At the end of that week, when he was going, he asked him, how was your experience staying in the temple? He said, it was very challenging. Normally if you invite a guest and the guest says, well going, it's a very challenging experience staying here. What do you mean? What do you mean by that? He said, actually, every morning, when I would come to the temple to attend Yaya Arati, he was also a religious person, not a professor but a religious person.
He said, I can see obviously the devotion. The devotion with which you pray, with which you worship, with which you sing, with which you dance. The devotion is so obvious.
He said that, for me, I had been taught to believe that this worship is satanic worship. These are all false gods. But actually by interacting, by experiencing, it's very challenging for my understanding of my faith.
It is not that he stopped being a Christian or he became Hare Krishna. But just his experiences, his perceptions expanded. Recognize that the whole idea that my faith is the only way and my understanding is the, everything is the exclusively correct understanding.
That is inadequate. So now this is not that we are trying to give a pat on our own back, you know, just see how good we are. No, it is his honesty that he admitted it.
You know, I had come with this conception. But by seeing your devotion, actually I feel illumined. So we also can sometimes become very narrow minded.
My way is the only way. Everyone else is going to, everyone else is wrong. It's not like that.
Now there are thoughtful people in every tradition. Rather than labeling any particular religious tradition as good or bad, we understand that the Bhagavad Gita talks about the three modes of materialism. The sattva guna, rajo guna, tamoguna.
People in sattva guna, in the mode of goodness, there is contemplation before action. That is the characteristic of goodness. In passion, there is action before contemplation.
They do it. Why do you do that? And in ignorance, there is neither contemplation nor action. There is simply illusion.
They just do whatever they feel like doing without properly thinking. Whatever the impulses drive them to do. So now, this side of, there is goodness, passion, ignorance in all religions.
There are thoughtful Christians and there are thoughtless Christians. Fanatical Christians. There are thoughtful Hindus, there are fanatical Hindus.
So rather than dividing people as per their religious affiliations, we approach them at the level of consciousness. So the process of bhakti is meant to elevate people's consciousness. And if we practice our bhakti enthusiastically, our consciousness will get elevated.
And if our consciousness gets elevated, then that is the strongest testimony that we can offer. If people, when Sri Prabhupada was asked, how can we know, what is the defining characteristic of your disciples? How can we know your disciples? Prabhupada said, they are perfect gentlemen. They are perfect ladies and gentlemen.
Prabhupada did not say at that time, oh, they always chant Hare Krishna. They dance on the streets. All that is part of our worship.
But what is the result that should happen? We do our worship. The result should be that our consciousness should get elevated. Cultured people, they behave in a proper way.
So if people see that transformation within us, then initially they will be critical. What are you worshipping? This is a strange group of people. If our children, they meet other children from other traditions, they may mock, they may ridicule.
But if our children see this, whatever practices we are doing, it's made us better human beings. My parents care for me. And other children, often their parents, materialistic culture, what happens is that there is so much self-centeredness that people really don't care for each other.
So the test of our devotion ultimately is we become attracted to Krishna, we love Krishna. But intermediately in this world, the test of our devotion is in terms of our behavior. So actions, as they say, speak louder than words.
And sometimes the actions speak so loudly that we can't hear the words. Somebody says, why are you smoking? You should not smoke. That's just useless, that kind of speaking.
So if our spiritual practices, our practices that lead to transformation, then initially people may mock, people may deride, people may neglect, people may criticize. But over a period of time, people will say, you know, what you're saying doesn't, what you, your philosophy doesn't make sense, but I like you. You're a nice person.
If people just appreciate a devotee, that is a significant step forward in their spiritual life. Because they are appreciating a devotee. That is called ajnana-sukrti.
And who knows, by that, one day they will themselves take to the path of Krishna consciousness. So our, how to live religiously, how to be religiously spiritual in a multicultural world, we understand that God is bigger than us. And we follow our path to him diligently.
And the diligence of our path is seen in our behavior with others. So especially if we are behaving like gentlemen and ladies, then people will become attracted. And then they will raise their consciousness, whether it is by this path or by another path.
Prabhupada was so inclusive, he said that we have not come here to convert Christians to Hindus. If a Christian becomes a better Christian by interacting with a devotee, that is also the success of a devotee. And by interacting with a devotee, if we become inspired to become better devotees, that is also a success.
So if we keep this universal purpose of raising human consciousness, and we understand the specific process we are following for raising human consciousness, our consciousness, we can reconcile both focus with broad-mindedness. We are focused in following what we follow, but we are broad-minded in accommodating what other people follow. I will summarize.
I spoke today about being religiously spiritual in a multicultural world. With the world shrinking through technology, through interactions, through people immigrating, we interact with far many different cultures than what people did in the past. And this can be sometimes challenging for our practices.
So to avoid feeling, becoming either aggressive towards others or becoming unduly defensive about ourselves, we need a proper philosophical understanding of how to live in a multicultural world. And people want to be spiritual because they feel that is open-minded. They don't want to be religious because they feel religion is narrow-minded.
But the spiritual is a state of consciousness. It is not just an experience. There are experiences we may have, but those experiences need to transform us in such a way that that spiritual experience gradually changes to a spiritual state of consciousness.
And for that purpose, a process is required to rise from the current material consciousness to spiritual consciousness. The process that we follow is religion. So spiritual consciousness is at the top of the mountain.
Material consciousness is at the bottom of the mountain. There can be different paths to go up the mountain. And similarly, there are different religions.
Now, those who say that our religion is the only way to God, they are limiting the unlimited. God is not the monopoly of any religion. Religions are meant for God.
God is not meant for religion. So exclusivism is obviously indefensible. At the same time, the other extreme, pluralism, to say that all paths are right, an uncritical, sentimental acceptance of all paths is like saying all buildings are engineering colleges.
We have to see what is the learning happening, what is the transformation happening. So the Bhagavad Gita doesn't accept pluralism or exclusivism. It is inclusivism.
There is one path and multiple levels on that path. So what does the level mean? It means the level of consciousness. How selfless, how spiritual, how non-materialistic people are becoming.
Bhakti is a universal spiritual experience of the human heart's attraction to the divine. And its inner test is, the inner characteristic is that we experience that God who cannot be experienced through our senses. The outer test is that we become detached.
Detached from craving and slaving for anti-devotional, immoral, worldly pleasures. And while practicing, while we interact with people from other faith traditions, we see that rather than becoming, we can see that the same one God is attracting them in this way. How merciful that God is.
Let me become devoted to the God in my way. So different people can have different treatments. Important thing is, are they getting cured? And all religions are not same.
All religions have a same purpose. So the traffic rules can be different, even opposite. But the same purpose is smooth and safe traffic.
Like that, some religions may have widely different practices, even opposite practices. And yet, they may have the same purpose of raising human consciousness. So as an example of opposite practices, I gave deity worship.
In the Abrahamic religions, because there is no explicit depiction of God, there is only imagination. And that imaginary depiction can come in competition with the true God. Therefore, there is strong antipathy against deity worship.
So Moses destroyed the image of the golden cow. And from that time, in the Abrahamic religions, people have been aggressively against any kind of image worship. In the Vedic tradition, on the other hand, we understand that the unlimited is not limited by one's unlimitedness.
So Krishna is unlimited, but His unlimitedness is under His control. And He can choose to manifest in a limited form to give us access to Him. That's how He manifests as the deity.
And if we sincerely, devotionally worship the deity, then we'll find ourselves becoming more spiritualized. Those who criticize, this is worship of false gods. If they honestly interact, then we'll find that what they are saying is prescription wrong, the patient cured.
Person has risen to spiritual consciousness. So just as interacting with genuine practitioners of another tradition can be challenging for one's own narrow-minded ideas. So similarly, we understand that in all religions, there are people who are in goodness, passion, ignorance.
The test of our devotion, it's not that we have to aggressively proselytize, nor do we have to defensively be insecure. We just be who we are, practice diligently. And our practices, if they make us into gentlemen and ladies, then that good behavior is what will bring peace and will eventually bring attraction.
That people will also be inspired to rise to higher spiritual consciousness. Thank you very much. Hare Krishna.
If somebody doesn't go to a church or temple, how can we interact with them? There has been a lot of abuse that has happened in the religion. And of course, abuse has happened because of atheism also. The USSR and China were officially atheistic.
The number of people who were killed in state-administered violence is actually three times more than the number of people who were killed in all forms of religious violence including World War I and World War II. The point is that there is a lot of negative press, negative propaganda associated with religion. Many people prefer to be atheistic.
So if actually more than atheistic, there is a whole idea called apathism. Apathism means I just don't care. I'm apathetic about whatever all this is.
So for such people, if they are interested in a rational discussion, then we can talk about universal principles. We can talk about how consciousness just cannot be explained materialistically. We can explain how the explainability of science requires an explanation.
Science explains nature, but why is it able to explain nature? Its explainability requires an explanation. Basically, there are rational ways in which we can present universal spiritual principles to them. So for them, if we present specific cultural details, present Krishna as God, they will be put off.
But if we present universal spiritual principles that make sense rationally, then they can become attracted. More importantly, as I said again, if people see that our spiritual practices, whatever they are, they make us better human beings. What is it that makes you tick? They will become more open at that time.
There are some people who are not going to be interested. So we just keep a distance from them. For others, we can find out, even if they are not interested in religion, they all may have some openness towards something spiritual.
If they are interested in experiential spirituality, then we can try to present, we can try to give them books about Krishna consciousness that focus on the experiential aspect. A major way in which outreach is happening in today's world is through memoirs, through autobiographies. Because people are not interested.
If this is the truth, people don't accept it. This is what you should do. Get lost.
People don't accept that. But this is what works for you. Oh, it works? Please tell me how it works.
So the idea is that there is so much chaos and confusion that people want to know if something works for you. But as soon as you make it dogmatic, this is the way it is. This is what you should do.
And people are alienated. So if a couple comes and says to a group of young couples, we have been happily married for the last 30 years. Young couples, how did you do it? Yes, we want to know about it.
But if that same couple comes and says we have been happily married for the last 30 years and we believe that divorce is a sin against God. Anyone who is divorced is condemned. Say, you are condemned.
Get lost. So we have to present Krishna consciousness in a non-dogmatic, experiential way. This is what has worked for me.
There are many devotees who are writing in that genre. When we present it that way, then even such people can become attracted. Does that answer your question? Any other questions? This should not be the last question, by the way.
Our children at school, when they are exposed to other kids with different religions, they always ask, what is your religion? So how should our kids explain that to them in a simple language? So if other kids ask our kids, what is your religion? How should we explain it in a simple language? See, there is what is called as the fundamental identity and the functional identity. The Sanskrit words are vyavaharik and parmarthik. So Prabhupada often stressed the parmarthik.
We are not Indians. We are not men. We are not women.
We are not young. We are not old. We are not Hindus.
We are not Muslims. We are not Christians. We are souls who are devotees of God.
So the transcendental identity is important. That is fundamental. At the same time, we also have a functional identity in this world.
See, Vrindavan is a part of the spiritual world. So Vrindavan doesn't exist in the material world. But if we had to put it on the map of the world somewhere, we can't put it in Pakistan.
We can't put it in China. Vrindavan will be put in the map of India. Similarly, if we have to map our identity in the religious map of this world, we can't put it in Christianity or Islam.
We put it in Hinduism. So the way it's called communications, they have official statement that we are Gaudiya Vaishnavas, which is a monotheistic tradition within the broad family of traditions known as Hinduism. So we can say we are Hindus.
But people often associate Hindus with polytheists or impersonalists. So we qualify that. So from the functional point of view, we obviously identify ourselves as Hindus.
But we explain that our philosophy is universal. It does not get restricted by religious sectarianism. So that's the official statement.
We are practitioners of Gaudiya Vaishnavism, which is a monotheistic tradition within the family of traditions that is today known as Hinduism. That's how we can answer the question. It's a little complicated for kids to tell.
But all that we can say is that we are Hindus. But within that we can say that we believe in one God. So Hinduism is in public imagination, especially in the West, it is associated with all kinds of weird things.
So if we use that designation for functional purposes, but then we move on and we make it very clear what our stress is. Some people just say we are Hare Krishnas, which is also fine. But then people may ask what religion we belong to.
We can always say that we are Krishnas or Hare Krishnas. We follow the Bhagavad Gita and we practice Bhakti Yoga. These are three designations which are quite universal.
We are Hare Krishnas, we follow Bhagavad Gita, we practice Bhakti Yoga. But if somebody insists on categorizing, identification within the religious categories of this world, you can always say that we are monotheists within the Hindu tradition. Thank you very much.
Hare Krishna. The books are displayed there. Please have a look.