While we often hear statements like “absolute power corrupts absolutely,” we need to hear more positive reinforcing statements that help us to realize that enlightened organizations can, and do, spawn and inspire individual initiative. The cries of the antis are often about the very things that disturb us all, namely a rising corporate dictatorship in America and the world. Srila Prabhupada was a great champion of individual initiative, but at the same time he was the “CEO” of ISKCON, and desired that it become an an inspiration for its members and followers, and not something to further close our minds.

Even though most devotees understand the material world is not the place for right-thinking, civilized humans to live, we still fear and dread dying, even though we hope to reach a better destination afterward.

A Judeo-Christian proverb says: “the only sin is not loving God enough. “Srila Prabhupada has told us many times that sin is acting against the laws of God. If, as Bhatki-tirtha Maharaja has written, “God’s mercy is greater than God’s law,” then not learning to love Krsna can be considered the original sin (papa in Sanskrit means `sin’). In one lecture, Srila Prabhupada says pinning a flower in the hair instead of offering it to Krsna is papa (lecture in Mumbai on SB3.16.28 on 15 January 1975).

Just by seeing shaven-headed, sari-clad, tilak bearing devotees can begin to convince people that there is a goal greater than sense gratification — beyond sex and money. HH Hridayananda Swami puts this beautifully in his purport to 11.2.30. He writes: “But if even only briefly or accidentally they hear hari-katha, topics of Krsna, in the association of pure devotees of the Lord, their propensity to suffer in material existence will slacken. When one sees liberated persons, hears about Krsna from them, remembers their saintly behavior and so on, one’s tendency to bind himself in the illusion of sense gratification is diminished, and he becomes eager to serve the Supreme Lord.”

A recent New York Times article speaks of the growing economy of India. In many ways this is good news for exponents of Krishna consciousness, because it presents more opportunities and ways to spread Lord Caitanya’s movement. One of the downsides is that the parikrama path around Vrindavana is now almost entirely bricked and paved over.

Srila Prabhupada?s lectures in London in 1973 were particularly philosophical and strong. Many colonialists (or at least, former colonialists ? India had been ruled by England for many years) were in the audience. In a way, Srila Prabhupada was throwing down the gauntlet before India?s former rulers.

Krishna consciousness is like a razor’s edge. The proverb often quoted by Srila Prabhupada states, “Suci haya muci haya yadi Krsna bhaje, muci haya suci haya yadi Krsna tvaje?everyone can become a devotee and anyone can fall.” Here’s an excerpt from a Srila Prabhupada lecture in Boston on 26 December 1969: “So Vrndavana dasa Thakura says, muci haya suci haya. A cobbler, muci, can become a suci, yadi krsna bhaje, if he’s Krsna conscious. That’s all. If he’s Krsna conscious, never mind he is a cobbler, he becomes immediately brahmana. Muci haya suci haya yadi krsna bhaje. suci haya muci haya yadi krsna tyaje. And even if he’s born in a brahmana family, if he gives up Krsna consciousness, he’s immediately cobbler. So don’t lose this opportunity. Always remember Krsna, Krsna, Krsna. (laughter) Don’t become cobbler.”

In San Francisco, at the end of a class in the temple in 1967, Syamasundara asked Srila Prabhupada how the universe was created from sound. Srila Prabhupada immediately clapped his hands loudly, then straight afterwards asked Syamasundara, “Now do you understand?” Syamasundara looked at Srila Prabhupada and quietly said, “Yes.”

Once Srila Prabhupada was asked why Jesus manifested fish along with bread to starving peasants. Srila Prabhupada replied that Jesus Christ could eat the whole world, so why should we be concerned that he manifested and maybe even ate a few fish? He also said this about Jesus Christ after a Bhagavad-gita lecture in January 1969, in Los Angeles. First a devotee asked him, “Prabhupada, does Lord Jesus Christ appear in the spiritual sky with the body he manifested on the earth?” He answered, “Yes. Otherwise how there can be resurrection? Ordinary body cannot be resurrected. He appeared in his spiritual body, certainly. Jesus Christ told, if I remember, that ‘Lord, excuse these persons,’ who were crucifying him. Is it not? He knew that ‘These rascals, they are killing me, but… They are offending certainly. So they do not know that I cannot be killed, but they are thinking that they are killing.’ You see? But that was offensive, therefore he begged Lord to be excused because God cannot excuse to the offenders of the devotee. He can excuse one who is offender to God, but if somebody is offender to the devotee, God never excuses. Therefore he prayed for them. That is devotee’s qualification. He prays for everyone, even of his enemy. And he could not be killed. That he knew. But those rascals, they thought they were killing Jesus Christ.”

The ad industry glories youth to the point that people tend to think it is a core value. And the mirage continues, the illusion pervades. Srila Prabhupada once brilliantly remarked that only Krsna consciousness can stop death.