If my child is very sick, how can my spirituality help me?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
So let me see if I understand the question. Suppose a devotee has a child.
Who is. Very sick. And by surgery may be saved.
Then should that devotee. Just be in the hospital. Be by the child.
And fully try the surgery. To save the child. The situation is that the surgery is not possible till.
Some steps are taken. So it is a matter of. There needs to be some effort.
To do that surgery. Just being very personal. It is a secret from my son.
He has got a rare genetic condition. I am like. Once it is in materiality.
And spirituality. Mostly materiality. It feels like there is a material solution.
For this problem. And. I am very conflicted.
In my own personal situation. I am not sure. What should be my ethical.
What is my ethical answer. Should we be going outside for. Material support.
And inside for. Spiritual support. Okay.
So if. If there is. A lot of background work required.
Till the surgery can be done. And it requires time to eventually. Come to the level of the surgery.
Should we prepare ourselves. For doing the surgery for our son. So in this particular situation.
If we. We spoke to scientists. And they said.
If we are able to start research on this. There is a cure that has happened for blindness. There is a cure that is possible.
For this particular condition. Should I be trying to pursue this particular cure. For this particular situation.
Or should it be that. Okay. It is a bit hard.
I understand. So if there is a particular disease. For which there is no cure right now.
But maybe a cure will be developed. And can we put in a lot of resources. For the development of a cure.
Or should we. Just let nature take its course. And we focus more on spiritual side.
Am I understanding the question right now. Could I say. Not a lot of effort.
A little bit of effort. See. There is.
A very important. Principle. Of responsibility.
That. Is. Often.
Minimized. Or neglected. When we focus too much.
When we focus too much on. Attachment or devotion or renunciation. See.
At one level. Someone could say that. Okay.
Family life is entanglement. And ultimately we have to renounce family life. Am I audible behind? Okay.
Family life is entanglement. I have to renounce family life ultimately. So now.
When Sita was abducted by Ravana. Ram could have said ultimately I have to renounce family life. Ravana has taken Sita away.
Let him take her away. He didn’t do that. Why is that? Because as a husband.
It is his duty to protect his wife. So we cannot. In the sense we cannot neglect our responsibilities.
In the name of spirituality. Spirituality is about. Doing our responsibility.
With a spiritual motivation. Seeing our family members. As.
As. People who have been. Souls who have been interested in our care by Krishna.
And we have to do. Our best to care for them. At all levels.
At the level of the body. At the level of the mind. And at the level of the soul.
So. If a little effort can be put. For caring for someone.
Definitely that effort should be put. At the same time. We should not invest all our hopes.
At the material level alone. Prayer should also be there. And we can also try to benefit.
Our loved ones. Spiritually in whatever way we can. So.
We don’t see. Krishna as acting. Only through spirit.
Say Krishna acts through chanting of the holy names. Krishna. The same Krishna can act through medicine also.
So Krishna is not restricted. To the realm that is only directly. In the past I used to think.
That okay. Ayurvedic medicine is traditional. It is good.
Allopathic medicine is modern. It is more intrusionary or whatever. But.
It is ultimately. Allopathic medicine has a potency. Where is that potency coming from? It is coming from Krishna.
No need for this. I am quite okay. Thank you.
So. It is coming from Krishna. So.
We have to see Krishna’s actions through everywhere. Prabhupada writes in 7th chapter. Purport that.
Jurisdiction of Krishna consciousness. Extends everywhere. As devotees.
We see Krishna’s actions. Krishna’s scope of action. Is everywhere.
So. Without knowing the further details. I cannot give a specific answer.
But I can give another example. In Mumbai. We have.
A hospital run by devotees. Bhaktivedanta Hospital. And there one of the founders of that.
Hospital is a doctor. He. He has.
His wife had cancer. And she recovered from cancer. And then she had a daughter.
And when they had a daughter. She went through some. Prenatal problems.
And when she was born. Terrible health. Prognosis was gloomy.
She was delivered before for a few days. And. She was constantly crying.
And the doctors told that. No matter. What we do.
She will not live for very long. And she will not live for very long. And whatever life she will have.
That will be quite painful. Now this devotee. He is himself a doctor.
Senior counselor in Radha Gopinath Temple. And. He is a doctor.
But there is no medical cure available at that time. So. He and his family.
His whole life was disrupted. Constant pain and constant agony. So.
He went. And met a spiritual master. His name was Radhamath Maharaj.
And Radhamath Maharaj. Talked with them. They explained what all had happened.
So Maharaj told them that. You have two choices. You can see.
That everything happens by chance. And you have just been unlucky by chance. Or.
Everything happens by plan. And there is some plan of Krishna. So both.
Vishwarooptu and his wife. They looked at each other and said. Yes Maharaj we believe that Krishna has a plan.
But they are just not able to understand. What Krishna’s plan is. So then.
Maharaj told them that. So Vishwarooptu himself told me the story. So Maharaj told them that.
Now in life. We all. Our purpose in life as devotees.
Is to learn selfless love. And to learn selfless service. Even any service that we do in life.
There is always some amount of selfishness associated with it. The love of a mother for a child. Love of parents for children.
That is among the most selfless loves. But even there. There is some selfishness.
Oh my son or my daughter will become big. Will become famous. And then that will add to my glory.
There is some selfishness associated with it. If we want to become purified. We need to develop selflessness.
So Maharaj said that. This child. This daughter.
She will never grow up. She will never become famous. The normal joys that a parent gets.
From taking care of a child. You are not going to get this. So Krishna has sent this daughter in your life.
To teach you. The virtue of selfless love. In loving her.
You will have to learn to be selfless. So if you see this daughter. As Krishna has specially sent in your life.
Then you can see. That everything that you do for your daughter. Krishna is accepting.
Through her. And Vishwapur told me. Just that one meeting.
Completely changed their perspective. Before that they were thinking. Oh they were counselors.
They were preachers. They had so many services they were doing. But now so many of their direct temple services.
But Maharshi said. This is the way Krishna wants you to serve her. And then they started observing.
They started thinking. That now. Whatever.
Every soul who is born in this world. Comes with some karma. And then the soul in this world.
Acts in a particular way. Which can either add to the karma. Or which can eliminate the karma.
So now this soul who has come in this world. She is not going to do anything. She is going to add to the karma.
And if we can use spiritual vibrations. We can use spiritual impressions. Then we can actually prepare this soul.
To become liberated from eternal existence. And then. They saw that.
Whenever devotees would come to meet. They would pray for that. That girl.
She was surrounded by spiritual vibrations. Not just the family. But the community.
Came together. In desiring. Praying for the good of that child.
She had an older sister. So this younger baby would always be crying. And then they noticed.
That anytime she would hear birds chirping. The baby would become. Become silent.
And become happy. So the older sister. She thought my sister is crying all the time.
So she went to a nearby national park. And there early morning. She would go.
And she would hear the sound of birds chirping. And she would imitate that. And she would come and imitate those sounds for her sister.
And sister would start smiling. And just by doing that. She would do it every day.
For many months and years. And she developed such a beautiful voice. Now she has become one of the.
Best kirtan singers. In the whole community over there. She in fact made.
Audio CDs and DVDs of her kirtan. So she would never have put in that effort. And.
So. Science and technology. It can reach into the body.
And cure the body. But spirituality can go deep into the heart. And although.
Her. The baby’s pain was there. But still she felt the love.
And that’s why when a mother would be there. Although she would be crying. The crying would be lesser.
And the sister would be singing. The crying would be lesser. And in that way.
Although science had no solution. Spirituality offered a solution. Not in terms of removing the problem.
But in terms of tolerating the problem. So the important thing is. That from the story.
We shouldn’t see the attempt. To get medical care. As something separate from spirituality.
That is also. A part of our. Spiritual service to our family members.
There is some. In terms of analysis. We should understand.
Something is spiritual. Something is material. For example.
We come to the temple. We chant the holy names. We come for satsang.
This is spiritual. And then we have our job. We have career.
We have family. We have our relatives. That is material.
So in terms of analysis. We need this kind of analysis. So that.
We do give some time. Some quality time. For directly spiritual activities.
But having done that. We should not think. That our spiritual side.
Ends with the temple. Or our spiritual side. Ends with the directly spiritual activities.
No. From the directly spiritual activities. We get the spiritual orientation.
We get the spiritual motivation. And we infuse our entire life. With that spiritual motivation.
So. If we. If you have a sick son.
Somehow this is a plan of Krishna. It has not happened by chance. And it is not that.
Rather than seeing this. As something negative. Krishna has got some plan.
By which. I can render some service to Krishna. Your service to Krishna is not just going to the temple.
And doing directly devotional activities. Yes they are important. Because.
If we just. Whatever our material responsibilities are. If we just focus only on them.
Gradually they will start seeming like a burden. They will drain our energy. So we need to replenish ourselves.
By connecting ourselves with Krishna. But once we have connected ourselves with Krishna. We shouldn’t just minimize.
Our family responsibilities. Or our job. Or whatever it is.
Thinking this is all material and important. No that is also a way we can serve Krishna. Krishna says.
Krishna says in 18th chapter. 46 verses. It is that Supreme Lord.
From whom everything has come. And that Supreme Lord. Who pervades everything.
Him we can serve through our work. That means. Krishna is not just in the temple.
Krishna is not just in the spiritual world. Krishna is present. In the heart of your son also.
Krishna is present in your heart. So when we are serving. So when we are serving our family members.
We are actually. Serving Krishna. According to whatever situation we are in right now.
So don’t see it as separate. Now how much effort to put in. We should definitely put in effort.
And. Maybe we can consult. Somebody who is expert in that field.
Maybe some devotee doctor. Because sometimes. It may also happen that.
Our desire for healing a child. Is naturally very strong. But some people may expect.
And just send us on a wild goose chase. Where there is actually no cure available. And people just do this.
So we also have to have some. Hard eyed realism. In terms of.
Not getting befooled or exploited. So how much effort to put in. See that as a. As a. Practical decision.
Practical in terms of. What is realistically possible. Don’t make that as a. As a spiritual issue.
Spiritually. As a matter of principle. We should do all that we can.
For taking care of our loved ones. At the same time. We shouldn’t think that.
Just this material alone is the solution. In the Bhagavatam it is stated that. The body is like a tree.
The body is like a tree. And dharma. And mukti.
Is the fruit that comes from the tree of the body. But. The tree cannot give its fruit.
If it is not alive. The tree has to be alive. So that it can give the fruit.
So similarly the Bhagavatam says that. For us to get even spiritual growth. From our body.
We have to take care of our body. And similarly for your son. At this stage the free will is not much.
The spiritual growth of the son. Primarily depends on the parents. Yeah.
I just had a question. Between the two. Which is more important? Humanity or spirituality?