Finding Krishna in Uganda
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| Written by Devapriyo Das |
| Wednesday, 10 February 2010 17:18 |
 Seated on purple cushions, eyes closed, the air filled with burning incense, we intone “Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna-Krishna, Hare-Hare; Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama-Rama, Hare-Hare”.
After 13 minutes of non-stop chanting, I find each phrase merging with the next, like the prayer beads in my hands form a circle on a string without ending or beginning. “God loves us; that is why he has given us everything,” says Lavanga Das, the priest in-charge of Uganda’s ISKCON temple on Dewinton Road, Kampala. Dressed in saffron robes, with white markings on his forehead, he urges us “to serve God without expectations, whether he is giving us malaria, bankruptcy, or poverty. We should not go to God with a shopping list.” ISKCON (International Society for Krishna Consciousness) was founded in 1966 by His Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada and is headquartered in Mayapur village, near Calcutta, India. It draws spiritual sustenance from the Bhagavad Gita (Song of the Blessed One), a most sacred Hindu scripture. ISKCON is non-sectarian, non-proselytising, and conducts numerous charitable activities, its latest being to send volunteers and food aid to earthquake-ravaged Haiti. “Krishna means God, literally,” Das observes. “So ISKCON is the society for making people God-conscious.” ISKCON Kampala was established in 1982 and has over 2,000 followers today. It runs a centre that hosts a temple, and a purely vegetarian restaurant whose revenues, along with donations, help fund ISKCON’s charitable work in Uganda. When I visit the centre on a Sunday afternoon, about 20 Ugandans, Indians and Europeans are reading from the Gita. Today’s lesson is about ridding ourselves of envy and discovering the most confidential knowledge of God. We read from the Sanskrit text (transcribed and translated into English). A simple lunch of vegetables, lentils and boiled rice, follows. The devotees take turns to serve and wash the dishes. Devotion Mukesh Shukla, a devotee and prominent Kampala businessman, says that ISKCON provides humanity a platform to connect and helps him become a better person. This emphasis on practical self-realisation has helped ISKCON attract millions of devotees globally, including Africa, where faiths jostle each other for space in the crowded market-place of the soul. Lavanga Das himself is a native Kenyan, and despite growing up in the world of nyama choma, was drawn to ISKCON’s practice of vegetarianism. He, like other devotees, was baptised on joining ISKCON with a name that spells his devotion to God. There are married priests, and those like Lavanga Das who chose celibacy. “Immediately you get married, whether you like it or not, your mind has to be diverted to how to maintain the family,” he remarks. His celibacy allows him to concentrate on the four pillars of the faith, which are: being merciful (including not killing animals), austerity, faithfulness in marriage and being truthful. “We have to understand that although we have different bodies, races, cultures, languages… we are not this body which we think we are,” Das explains. “We are atman (soul). This body, that we think is important, is dead matter. It is only living when the soul is in the body… we teach people the importance of the soul.” Echoing his spiritual teachers, he says the world has lost its way because humanity is obsessed with material concerns, and is drawn into a web of maya (illusion). Thus, it is the priest’s duty to teach humanity the five subject matters of the Gita. These include understanding the relationship between God and man; understanding the relationship between body and soul; understanding nature; understanding time while acknowledging we cannot control it, and finally, understanding Karma or deeds, which can be good or bad, but knowing we will benefit or suffer from our actions. Moreover, we must accept that we are all subject to the earthly miseries of birth, disease, old age and death. Salvation “If your day has come, and you have to die through an earthquake, it has to happen,” Das continues. “Even if you are lying down peacefully in State House, and you die there – it is all death.” People may blame God for such tragedy, but the Gita teaches that God does things for a reason. http://www.observer.ug/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=7154&Itemid=71 // <
