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WORLD May 26, 2000 VNN5963 Comment on this story 4 More Guru-Kula Kirtan CD's BY RAGHUNATHA ANUDASA USA, May 26 (VNN) — 1) Niel has finished 4 more Guru-kula Kirtan CD's for a total of 9 2) Turley is filing the lawsuit next week. Read letter below. 3) I've been accepted to present ROOPA (VarnaAsrama economics) to The WAVES conference of professors WAVES 4) Giving seminar on ROOPA at Prabhupada Festival in LA 2pm, Sunday 5) ROOPA web page will be up by end of week. **** 1) Neil has finished 4 more Guru-kula Kirtan CD's for a total of 9 There is Mandali's No More Pain. Many of you may remember it from about 8 years ago. The latest is Voices of the Vaisnava Youth which has received great reviews for its charm and sweetness of different bhajan styles from a half dozen guru-kulis: Manjari & Lalita, Maddi, Vik, Mandali, Nandu, Karnam, Chandra and myself; Raghunatha Anudasa. Neil has also completed 2 one-hour kirtans from the 95 Ratha yatra kirtan by Mandali and Gauravani. One of the finest Ratha yatra kirtans in decades. He has 2 more one-hour kirtans from our all night kirtan wherein we fasted all day from food and water and then stayed up all night as part of the nirjala ekadisi fast. The power of the ekadasi observance can be felt in this chanting. There is Gauravani's tape, which has sold out several times. It's unlike any bhajans you've heard so far and mesmerizing. There are 2 one-hour videos of the guru-kula reunion plays, Shiva & Dhaksa-this will make your hairs stand on end and the all time favorite, App. Of Lord Nrishingadev. Short movie skits by Vik follow. If you are interested, contact Neil at poolside8@yahoo.com (Niel) 3755 Watseka Ave #17, LA CA 90034 Or 310 815 9421. If busy -because doing email on-line call 323 969-4727. 1) Turley is filing the lawsuit next week. Read letter below. Subj: Turley Lawsuit Against ISKCON Imminent Date: 5/24/00 8:19:59 AM Hawaiian Standard Time From: ReporterAtLarge@ziplip.com (ReporterAtLarge) Reply-to: ReporterAtLarge@ziplip.com (ReporterAtLarge) Turley Lawsuit Against ISKCON Imminent According to Pam Reeves of the Law Offices of Windle Turley, P.C. (800-692-4025, pamr@wturley.com) the long awaited lawsuit against ISKCON for sexual child abuse in ISKCON's private boarding schools is imminent. She said that it may be filed as early as Tuesday, May 30th, the day after Memorial day. She said that the case will be filed in Dallas, Texas Federal Court, and that the filing is expected to create quite a stir in the media. 40 plaintiffs are participating in the suit at present, but more may be added after the filing, the time limit depending upon how much time the court allows. It may be 90 days, 120 days, or even longer. Most past and present member's of ISKCON's Governing Body Commission (GBC) are expected to be named in the suit, and more may be added after the filing. The GBC is expected to be held accountable for sexual abuse which occurred abroad, as well as abuse that occurred in ISKCON's schools in the United States. Ms. Reeves compared her law firm's strategy to prosecuting an airline company for criminal negligence for a plane crash which took place abroad, but which was caused by neglecting to do maintenance which should have been done in the United States. The American legal system would hold the airline responsible. She also said that her law firm is looking into going after the personal assets of those found to be responsible for the crimes against the plaintiffs, especially if these assets were accumulated while the defendant was a member of ISKCON. Ms. Reeves, speaking from her law firm's headquarters in Dallas, said, "Things are going to get very busy around here." 3) I've been accepted to present ROOPA (VarnaAsrama economics) to The WAVES conference of professors http://www.sunsar.com/WAVES/Default.htm 4) ROOPA web page will be up by end of week. Dear Romesh, You can only imagine the joy you have given me on this day. Presenting ROOPA to your distinguished colleagues on such a historic occasion as the meeting of the finest minds in the Western Academia on the Vedic sciences is a testament to your organizations ability to resurrect these arts in the worlds educational circles and certify its relevancy to the varied interest, developments and lives of the people at large who are pursing its many avenues in ever greater numbers. ROOPA is an extension of this grass roots development of the Vedic understandings cultured in a Western setting. ROOPA show cases the kinds of social economic perspectives to be had from the spiritual premise of the Vedic ideals. To formally present it to your symposium is the final step to documenting and certifying this social dynamic of the Vedic influences on the Western mind, if not its most pressing economic policies. Your conference will formalize the legitimacy of such Vedic perspectives and start its official process of consideration for Vedic based social economic alternatives. More simply said, thank you and thank you again. I like your suggestion to have a Professor such as yourself present ROOPA. This maybe a good addition to my own and feel such a duet may make for a more resounding presentation. I feel compelled to make this presentation for two reasons. For one, because of my versatility in the topic. Secondly, if not more importantly, I feel that such a presentation is the realization of my Guru Maharaja's dream and legacy. AC Bhaktivedhanta Swami, Srila Prabhupada, foretold that his children of his guru-kula education would someday be accepted into the council of the world's most prestigious academic circles to make such a presentation. I feel that today, you have offered to fulfill this prophecy, a legacy in the making for 3 decades. By the same token, a supporting review by a Professor will make the partnership of the guru-kula education and that of the western world complete and the ideas themselves academically sound. I will accept your recommendation, but had to share with you the significance of your offer so you can better appreciate my own excitement. Thank you again and look forward to your reply, Yours most sincerely, Raghunatha Anudasa In a message dated 5/16/00 4:09:17 AM Hawaiian Standard Time, diwanr@rpi.edu writes: << Raghunatha Anudasa ji, Nameste. Many thanks for your kind note and three additional e-mails. I will gladly read the material you have sent and wonder if you may like to present it at the Waves Conference. If so please do let me know. In case you feel you can't attend the meeting but would like one of us to present some of your ideas, it may be possible to do so. Since you have written a lot and since it is somewhat deeper material, reading will take some time so that I will respond to you in due course. With kind regards and Om Shanti. r >> The following is an anecdote on Varna Asrama and ROOPA. Dear Tadiyaseva, Your question, "is the social confusion because of the disorder of class?" It's the disorder of Dharma that has caused our social confusion. Dharma loosely translates as religion, but can be more accurately described as the intrinsic quality of any given thing; sweetness for sugar, heat and light for fire are examples. The dharma of a Brahmin, priest or teacher, is truth and knowledge and the healing arts. For a Ksatriya, leader; its protection, justice and redistribution of wealth to the virtuous and week. For a Vaisya, businessman; protection of earth and cow, food production and commerce for the good of society. For Sundra, blue color worker; it's the tailoring of elements of earth, water, fire, air, either-sound (as in music and entertainment) etc into greater value for social consumption. A society of ADHARMA or irreligion is where the: Brahmin disseminates fiction, falsehood, speculation and unhealthy lifestyles; where the ksatriyas arrange wealth for the powerful and sinful at the expense of the virtuous and helpless; where the vaisya kills the cow, destroys the earth and starves society of food, resources and commerce; and where the sudra transforms the raw elements into products of no value or social harm. It's where the mother does not give birth to life, but takes life of her unborn; where the honor of motherhood is condemned in the name of humor or greater social cause while abandoned motherhood is as routine as honored; where a man's care and honor of wife and loved ones is dishonored and exploited for others; where parents don't instill character, skill and care for family and community in their children, but contempt; where children are made to act and look like adults and adults like children; where woman only survive by acting as men and where men's self expression is only found by acting as a woman; where the fertile are stopped from having children while the infertile are artificially made to bare them; where the act of love is the final contempt of one's disdain; where the tropical paradise of the sinless is pillaged into desert for a desert built into a paradise of sin where self-sufficiency is plundered for the subsidy of dependency; where works adding values to raw materials by way of production and manufacturing is given little; while acts of war, sports and entertainment that produce nothing are treated as Gods; where life-long work performed for well-being, family and friends is given away to family, friends and personal well being bartered for short-lived careers; where the pride of occupation, loyalty to community and legacy of family is traded in for the lottery of the modern celebrityship; where religion is sacrilegious to the social norm and the social norm is sacrilegious; where decency such as chastity or sobriety are treated as dubious and all that is devious seen as decent; where virtue is a social out-case while the depraved are treated as social virtues where arts of beauty, grandeur and goodness are disdained while works inspiring confusion, fear and resentment are proclaimed where food of nutrition, life energy and invigoration is discredited over foods that steals ones energy and takes our life; where the healing arts are replaced by "medicines" that kill; where the harmony of Mother Nature is replaced by the harms of a modern world; where the laws of nature are replaced by the laws of man; where all that is good is separated from the glory of God and God blamed for all that is bad; where the miracles of God are replaced by the menace of science; where the divinity of our spirit is replaced with the soul of a primate; where humans act as animals or "programmed" as machines while animals are bred and machines designed to mimic humans; and where the supremacy of the Lord is replaced by a supreme court and lords of men. All of this is done in the name of economic pursuits. ROOPA replaces all such justifications with the Economics of Love. This, my friend, is the difference between the varna-asrama system and the modern world. One is in man's recognition of God; the other, replacing God with man. The modern world has taken this exploitation of man to its greatest expression. Varna Asrama Dharma is love of God taken to its greatest social expression. This is the vision and choice Prabhupada offers us. Which do you choose? And so say you. Raghunatha Anudasa Comment on this story  Contact VNN about this storySend this story to a friend
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