Suresh Das: How I see Krishna Balaram Mandir

Suresh Das, Feb 19, LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA — Dear Gurukrpa Prabhu, I thought more about what you said today – that I am just an “envious, disgruntled devotee”. Prabhu, you are haunted by your past experiences in Vietnam, whereas I am haunted by my bad experiences with ISKCON. I have been ripped off and disappointed many, many times by the devotees, both in the past, as well as at present.

My hell is surely not as great as your hell from Vietnam. I know of many devotees though who, based on their past unhappy experiences with ISKCON, as well as their inability to feel adequate benefits from Krishna Consciousness, ended up on drugs or alcohol as well, attempting to cover up their problems. I have taken the vow not take intoxicants ever again, at least no more drugs in this lifetime.

If I could make the entire bad devotee memories stop though, break free from my past and feel happy again; or at least feel some mental peace, I would gladly accept any solution. It has been a long time since I have had a truly profound or joyful experience as a devotee, or deeply positive experiences with ISKCON, strong enough to forgive the past. I feel there may be many devotees that may be surprised and shocked how really long it may take to become pure devotees, or at least feel some of the promised benefits of Krishna Consciousness. For many of the devotees of today, Krishna Consciousness may be nothing more than just a theoretical experience and belief system.

Your idea that I should just come to Vrndavan and associate with saintly persons to solve my problems just doesn’t seem that practical to me though. First, as an example, the Krishna Balaram Temple represents to me the place where Srila Prabhupada was poisoned to death and murdered by the GBC. Then the problem is finding an actual, genuine saintly person, especially in our society – do you know any? I have been daily chanting Hare Krishna for some 39 years now, waiting for something to happen. It isn’t that easy Prabhu to make progress. It doesn’t mean I am giving up, but it just isn’t as simple as you say.

I went back into the Sampradaya Sun editorial archive to try to figure out why I might be so envious of you and angry with you personally, especially enough to cause me to write about you. I want you to know I am not an investigative reporter, or looking for ways to smear your reputation. I heard things about you by accident, and thought I would share with readers here some of the apparent truths about your past. If you see yourself as just an ordinary devotee in the sea of the devotees, then there are many with problems similar to yours, so you are not alone – you deserve support and sympathy from the devotees for anything you might be going through. At the same time, if you feel you deserve to be honored for who you are and what you have done in the past serving ISKCON, as well as placed on a higher platform than the other devotees, then there may be problems due to what you might be presently doing in your life. If you say you are a Srila Prabhupada disciple, then you have to teach others by your own personal example, and that means following the “rules”.

Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur stated that a Vaishnava is happy when others rise higher than him; whereas a non-devotee is happy to see others go down. I remembered back when I first met you in the San Francisco Temple, on Valencia Street, around 1973-74. You and Yasodanandana Swami were young, fiery, newly-minted sannyasis back then. I remembered how much you had busted my chops and how hard you were on the other devotees, as well as me back then, coming off as superior to us because you “kept your poker in your pants”. Honestly, I always felt that was a really ridiculous statement on your part.

Other sannyasis treated us in a similarly harsh way as well, such as Hridayananda Swami. I have always believed ISKCON’s sannyasis used intimidation techniques and lies to keep the brahmacaris celibate as long as possible, so we would continue collecting money for ISKCON, and not enter householder life. They especially lied to us about the devotee women in our society. I remember being told, for example, that as soon as we got married, our devotee wives would remove their masks and reveal the actual witches that they were. I felt really ridiculous when I got married, after serving 6 years as a brahmacari in ISKCON, waiting and waiting, week-after-week for my devotee wife to take off her mask.

That’s why I had to laugh when your daughter told me you were having problems with drugs, and of course you were no longer a sannyasi, but married with a daughter. I felt you had really met with your comeuppance. I felt sorry today though, that I didn’t really listen more to your thoughts and Sankirtan experiences, so I went back into the Sampradaya Sun archives and read your “Message from Gurukrpa” to listen to your story, and to appreciate more what you had felt and experienced in your Herculean efforts to raise $60,000 for Srila Prabhupada.

I sense that you are trying to revive the past spirit of Sankirtan and bring back the happy, fired-up times we enjoyed in the early days of ISKCON, during Srila Prabhupada’s presence. Times have changed though Prabhu, and so have the needs of the devotees of today. Like I have stated, the average rank-and-file devotee has been left with practically nothing for their past efforts. The elite of ISKCON have taken and enjoyed for themselves virtually all the spoils in the Sankirtan war effort. That is not to say there aren’t many sincere devotees who have worked tirelessly for years in the background, as well as at the highest levels, to sincerely and purely spread the Sankirtan Movement.

You will not be able to command respect from any of the devotees of today, no matter what you might have accomplished in the past. Most of what you did benefited those who are thousands of miles away, while local temples lie today crumbling, and in disrepair. You will have to earn the respect of today’s devotees. This time you will have to do much more to improve the lives of ordinary devotees if you want to be successful in your revival mission. You are going to find out that there are many disgruntled devotees inside and outside of ISKCON, who have been burned many times by ISKCON, and who may feel ISKCON has done very little to improve their personal lives. They will not accept a post-dated check from you, as Srila Prabhupada used to like to say.

Comments

  1. Acchedya das says:

    ALL GLORIES TO SRILA PRABHPADA…
    Dear Suresh Prabhu, i think you speak out what many devotee feel deep down in there heart.
    We all got burnt out by this bogusfake Iskcon. This wy we all have to establish again the real orginal Iskcon that Prabhupada wanted !
    Yes we can…yes, but only if we work together.
    We have to look to the Bangalore projekt,since they are in the frontlinie at the moment, we have to cooperate with them and learn and work with them together, otherwise alone we are helpless, thats for sure, follow the great man means follow the best plan to re-establish the real Iskcon,like in Bangalore-dham. Thats the way i think Srila Prabhpada planted it for us.
    Lets come & work together and to please Srila Prabhupada and his bhaktivedanta mission.
    Thats by the way Acchedya’s vision

  2. Most Fallen Soul Muthuraj says:

    Jai Srila Prabhupada!!! My dear lord Srila Prabhupada, Please help us to bring back the glory of ISKCON as you wanted it to be always!!!

  3. Sri Mukunda dasa says:

    The Glory of ISKCON will be outside of ISKCON. ISKCON is finished. They only attract Sychophants, not devotees. they are the INternational Society of the Cheaters and Cheated. Bogus gurus and bogus disciples, that’s all. If you want the glory of Iskcon past, you have to recreate it in your own home.

  4. abhaya carana seva das says:

    pamho agtACBSP

    What actually caused devotees to go into pieces was when being kept like chained up rowers on a Roman galley. These poor slaves were rowing till they were dead. No hope of further development.
    Folks like Gurukripa new it, if some of his men collapsed they got a kick to come off the ship. No opportunity for rank&file to develop, move up, become established as senior Vaishnava. Nothing of that sort.

    Prabhupada wanted farms, that we buy land, open restaurants, intelligent projects according place and circumstance. Thats what folks like Gurukripa hated like anything.
    They only wanted one thing, that we go out all day and in the evening bring the money, year after year. Permanent condition. As soon someone buckled under stress – was burned out – he/she was kicked out, never mind if this was a brahmin initiated devotee.

    Someone of the rank&file figured to get married? That was a sacking. “Go get a job, buy a presentable farm, have your wife happy and pay us 50% of your income.”

    Before, these devotees were told to break off school and professional education and were in this condition to only go out and collect for many, many years. Were fully dependent, “to live in the temple”. But suddenly they were told, you have to move out and work for the karmis to earn enough money to maintain your family.

    So this was all pretty much exploiting people like cannon fodder and at one point, kick them out. In this way thousands of devotees were pushed back into karmi life. For Gurukripa, a short laugh.

    The real identity of the soul is of course in the spiritual world it doesn’t belong to this world where fiskcon devotees are getting now their false ego smashed because they are cheating – therefore they get cheated.

    It takes time to be situated in the real iskcon of Srila Prabhupada who wanted that all his followers to remain within the movement and to flourish, become situated as educated Vaishnavas and having fulfilled life as Gaudiya Vaishnavas. Not end up being exploited like a stupid ass.

    At present iskcon leaders still go on to accumulate bad karma by not surrendering to the real iskcon – to the OWNER, Srila Prabhupada – but it will be very soon because almost all of them got defeated, sitting in wheelchairs, are dead, etc.

    ys

    a.c seva das

    haribol

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