Dear ISKCON,

Dear ISKCON,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

I don't want to take on a huge topic in this letter, but let me make a few

partial statements. Maybe later I can add them. You, dear institution, are

such a complex entity that there is little I can say that everyone will

accept as fact. I know your history, especially of the early days, and

that's always fun to describe. Prabhupada compared your birth to the

appearance of Lord Varaha from Lord Brahma's nostril. He was small and then

grew quickly. You first appeared in Srila Prabhupada's mind and then grew

quickly in America, attracting dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of

young men and women, Prabhupada was the magnet that drew us-Prabhupada with

his Hare Krsna mantra, krsna-prasadam, and knowledge of Krsna. It's safe to

say, therefore, that you are a spiritual entity. Lord Krsna has appeared in

you just as much as He has appeared in His other forms in Kali-yuga. The

complexity comes when we start describing the wrongs that have occurred in

ISKCON in the name of ISKCON. Are you, ISKCON, Vaikuntha or even a sample of

Vaikuntha? Some say that the original ISKCON, Prabhupada's movement, no

longer exists. They think we are left with only a corrupt outer shell.

Others say that whoever criticizes ISKCON is a demon. In other words, some

equate you with the Krsna consciousness movement, the flow of Lord

Caitanya's sankirtana, and that you will always remain victorious despite

all appearances to the contrary. Others don't agree. They say that you are

not the representative of pure Krsna consciousness, but an

institutionalized, GBC-governed entity that moves along from year to year

veering sometimes to the left and sometimes to the right, but not often

resolving its problems. I said at the beginning of this letter that I wasn't

going to bite off more than I could chew and try to cut through the various

opinions. What's prompting me to write this letter today is that I just

received a letter in which someone attempted to describe my own relationship

with ISKCON. This person said that I seem to have major disagreements with

the authorities of this movement. The letter implied that if I actually

followed my own inclinations, I might leave ISKCON entirely. The person who

wrote this letter is himself disgusted with ISKCON and has left in search of

better association. That letter makes me want to address my own connection

to you, ISKCON, Prabhupada's movement. First, I do believe that you are

still Prabhupada's movement. I don't think that I am just playing it safe in

my lack of criticism of this movement. The person who wrote me criticized me

for being apathetic toward the wrongs in ISKCON and suggested that if I were

a real witness in truth, I would speak out against those wrongs. I have

included a response to that: let me correct my own wrongs. That includes not

getting entangled in what I may see as wrong behaviour of ISKCON. It's a

quiet method of reform; it's nonpolitical, and it's what I can do best. You

are still Prabhupada's movement. I don't think the saying "ISKCON, with all

thy faults, I love thee" is outmoded. If I can say it deeply despite the

wrongs and by being persistently loyal, then it's the best position I can

take. What are these wrongs? You know the charges. We went wrong in drastic

ways after Srila Prabhupada's disappearance. The top leadership gets the

blame for that. Some say there has been no reform of the basic wrong

attitudes which drive devotees away--manipulative power-hungry leaders,

branding as heretics devotees who have differing opinions, offending Gaudiya

Vaisnavas from other camps, and so on. ISKCON, with all they faults I love

thee. I have seen and felt how beautiful it is to be in a temple, gathering

together with your members to see the Deities at mangala arati, or at an

afternoon arati with only a few devotees present and late sunlight streaming

through the window. I've seen the preaching drive in your members as they

risk their lives to distribute Prabhupada's books and maintain you in

unsettled places in this material world. Sentimental? You could say so, but

such a skeptic would think that devotion to Krsna was sentimental. Remember

that sensational "true crime" book, Monkey on a Stick? The thing that

horrified an ISKCON member on looking through that book was how they had

distorted the quality of ISKCON life. The authors had distorted the facts

and were even often mistaken. They did have the police records-who killed

whom, who misappropriated funds, who misled devotees, who fell down--but

even in those cases, their description of what it was like for the average

temple devotee was bogus and based on no experience. The author couldn't see

into the devotees' hearts and he couldn't understand Krsna's statement that

even if a devotee commits abominable behavior, he is still rightly situated.

They don't know how precious and rare it is for someone in this world to

render sincere service to Srila Prabhupada and Krsna in this movement. It's

true that one can render sincere service to Krsna and it is probably

possible to render service to Prabhupada outside of ISKCON. But if it can be

done outside of ISKCON, why can't it be done inside ISKCON? If there are

sincere persons both within and without ISKCON, then I choose to be within.

That's where Prabhupada wants me to be as far as I know. If ISKCON were

devoid of sincere devotees and has actually become corrupt, then who could

follow it and say that it was what Prabhupada wanted? But I would be very,

very afraid of deciding that ISKCON was so corrupt that Prabhupada would no

longer want me to serve here. When I meet up with Prabhupada again, how can

I say "But Prabhupada, I thought ISKCON was completely bogus and that we

should leave?" His voice echoes in his mind: "Who said? Who is that rascal?"

I admit that I fail to face up to all of ISKCON's faults. I feel too

protective and loyal. I don't want to make waves. Besides, it's not my

nature to find faults and then proclaim them. People who live in glass

houses shouldn't throw stones. I am guilty of not being an all-out reformer,

and thus I'm implicated in ISKCON's wrongs by default. I also admit to

failing in the second half of the expression, "ISKCON, with all thy faults-I

love thee". If I loved you, ISKCON, I would be more active and would try to

make myself a more worthy member. If I loved you more, I would see the

spiritual world in the movement as it exists in this confederation of

temples, the ISKCON that publishes Back to Godhead magazine, the ISKCON that

goes on Navadvipa and Vrindavana parikrama, and yes, the ISKCON that blows

its own horn, sometimes in a superficial way, in the ISKCON World Review.

The ISKCON of the businessman devotee cashing in on the market of devotional

items, the ISKCON that also sells pure bhakti. Many, many ISKCON devotees

love Srila Prabhupada and serve him with their body, mind, and words. I

don't think that this can be matched anywhere else in the world. That is

what attracts me and binds me to ISKCON. One devotee was telling me how her

co-workers discovered that she was a Hare Krsna. She told them that she

sometimes meditates by chanting mantras. One of her colleagues queried her

further, "What mantras do you chant?" She took a chance, smiled, and said,

"Hare Krsna Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare,/ Hare Rama Hare Rama, Rama

Rama, Hare Hare." Her associate exclaimed, "You mean you are with those

people who drive around singing from a truck?" (He was referring to the

flatbed truck the New York devotees use to perform harinama.) The devotee

blurted out, "Yes, the very ones!" George Harrison said something similar

when he aligned himself with the devotees. He said that when it is time to

be counted, he would prefer to stand with the devotees rather than with the

nondevotees. I think like that to, that I want to be counted among the very

ones, the Prabhupada fanatics, the devotees with all their faults-of ISKCON.

"ISKCON, with all thy faults, please accept me."

EXTRACT FROM CHURNING THE MILK OCEAN, circa 1993, by Satsvarupa Maharaja