ISKCON Navua Center Grand Opening
by: Radhakanta Das, ISKCON Suva News Published: 30 September, 2013
Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu had instructed that his Sankirtan movement be spread across the globe, to each town, city and village. Srila Prabhupada was the first who successfully brought Krishna Consciousness to the Western world after many failed attempts of many scholars. Following the footsteps of Srila Prabhupada, many of his disciples and grand disciples continue to build temples and preaching centers to allow people who are deeply engrossed in material life to be able to understand Lord Krishna and be attracted to his service. Fiji has already been blessed with 3 large temples, one in Lautoka, one in Sigatoka and one in Suva and centers in Rakiraki, Nausori, Labasa, Taveuni and Tavua. Yesterday an addition to this was witnessed after the grand opening of ISKCON Fiji’s newest center – Hare Krishna Center in Navua.
The Center has been constructed after a land was donated to HG Jai Ram Das by a local resident of Navua who had been regularly attending many preaching programs conducted at various places in Navua by HG Jai Ram Das and his son HG Vishvanath Das. Both of them are ISKCON Fiji pioneers and have tremendously contributed to devotee cultivation for years now in Fiji and it is absolutely overwhelming to see their achievement in manifesting a Jaganath temple in Navua stated one of the senior members of ISKCON.
The temple boasts the all attractive forms of Lord Jaganath, Baladev and Subhadra Devi, Srila Prabhupada life size deity, a Sunday feast kitchen, lecture hall, cleaning and washing facility, rooms for accommodation and Lord Jaganath’s lush green gardens and a big car park for the guests. Situated about 10 minutes from the Navua town and just few minutes away from the Queens Highway, the temple is set to attract many devotees and stoppages for pilgrimages states Vishvanath Das. He further adds that Lord Jaganath is very merciful and now the people of Navua can take the full benefit of the center in Navua which will not cost anyone anything. According to him Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu wanted the holy names to be spread in all town and villages and therefore since Fiji’s all major Townships have got magnificent temples now its time to shift the attention to the villages and this one if the first of its attempts.
The program was officiated by HH Bir Krishna Goswami Maharaj who happens to be the Governing Body Commissioner (GBC) for Fiji and was attended by over 1000 devotees from Fiji and abroad. Many senior disciples of Srila Tamala Krishna Goswami Gurudev were present to celebrate the achievement of their god brothers Jairam Das and Vishvanath Das. The program was attended by ISKCON pioneers like HG Bhagwati Mataji and Vasudeva prabhu despite not in very good health who are both Srila Prabhupada’s disciples. Other prominent guests included HG Gitakirti Mataji from ISKCON Sigatoka, HG Radhika Prem Mataji from ISKCON Suva, HG Nanda Kishore Das from ISKCON Lautoka, HG Jagat Purusa Das from ISKCON Rakiraki and Vrindavan Chandra Das from ISKCON Labasa. There were a total of 7 bus full loads of devotees from across the country who traveled to Navua to witness the celebration.
An emotional Vishvanath Das shared his sincere gratitude to his own family including major donors and HG Jaya Jaganath Das ( initiated the same day) who was the first to approach them with donation for the land in Navua to build the center.
Indeed this was a great celebration and achievement for ISKCON Fiji. For more photo’s from the event please visit our Facebook page
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The Holy Name Festival – 12 hour Kirtan
by: Radhakanta Das, ISKCON Suva News Published: 21st August, 2013
The only way to be saved from the fire of material existence is chanting of the holy names says Rupanuga Das the Coordinator for “Holy Name Festival – 12 Hour continuous Kirtan” which was held at the Sri Radha Golokabihari Temple on 18th of August coinciding with the auspicious Pavitropanna ekadasi. The festival, Rupanuga das estimates have brought close to 500 guests and devotees into chanting and glorifying their lordships into intervals without the tempo for bhajans and kirtans breaking for a continuous 12 hours.
The main objective of the festival was to preach and allow our congregational members and others to glorify Lord Krishna by calling out his name ” Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama , Rama Rama Hare Hare. “This is the process for this age and I’m sure everyone who has attended the festival has benefited from chanting and went home satisfied with peace and happiness,” added Rupanuga Das.
One of the participants at the festival Mr. Ravi describes the event as timely and very useful to ignite love of Godhead into our hearts. Ravi who himself is an ardent devotee and a pleasant singer worked with Rupanuga Das to personally supervise sound system and quality of acoustics in order for devotees to enjoy soothing bhajans and kritans for continious 12 hours.Guests were treated with hot meals prepared at the temple for breakfast, lunch and dinner which included ekdashi prasad, fruit juices, salads etc. Rupanuga Das felt it was his Guru Maharaj’s blessing, Srila Prabhupada’s desire and devotees overwhelming support that contributed to the success of the event. He attributed the success of the event towards the ISKCON Suva devotees who came out in numbers at various times to participate and help. It hasn’t been confirmed by ISKCON Suva if it will become an annual event however optimism is high following a grand success to the first one says Rupanuga Das.
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Staying Healthy, Fit and Happy – A presentation on being healthy, wealthy and wise by HH Bir Krishna Goswami Maharaj
by Radhakanta Das , ISKCON Suva News Published : 12 April 2013
The residents of Suva were yesterday given an interesting talk, a scientific presentation on human health, diet control and trying to live a happy, healthy and a useful life in Krishna Consciousness by HH Bir Krishna Maharaj who felt that people generally tend to eat anything they come across even while being a vegetarian so long as they are not eating meat, fish or eggs. He began his presentation with an introduction of the various food constituents taken during meals describing their resultant effects in the body on excessive consumption. The seminar was attended by medical practitioners, students and people engaged in many other various professions. The program was held at the ISKCON Suva multi-purpose Hall with more than 50 participants across all ages. There were 4 overseas participants who are currently traveling with Maharaj.
Citing scientific research being conducted in Germany, United States and Japan backing up his presentation with statistics and data, Maharaj appealed to the participants for undertaking significant importance towards a much improved, healtheir, balanced and nutritious diet and minimize unhealthy eating habits such as excessive consumption of Milk and milk products, salt, sugar, white flour and processed food including white rice.
The whole presentation was based on being health conscious with several incitements on nutrition, physical exercise and life style diseases such as diabetes. This according to Maharaj was absolutely necessary for devotees to remain fit, healthy and strong to execute devotional service. He recommended participants to drink lots of clean water, avoid white sugar in foods and drinks, take less salt, exercise regularly, avoid sitting at work stations or in front on television set for long hours, having a good rest ( sleep), breathing lots of fresh air, take high in vitamin foods such as tomatoes, local rice etc and cut down on cheese, paneer, oil, ghee and other similar food items that may cause problems to health.
He stressed that although some food may be very palatable to eat as well healthy but anything eaten in excessive amount will cause problems to health. He concluded with a comment that he wanted devotees to look and stay happy in Krishna Consciousness.
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Repeka Nasiko
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Fiji Times
THE Hare Krishna Society yesterday provided free lunches to schools in Nadi and Lautoka with the assistance of the DISMAC office and the Ministry of Education. The group has spent the past two weeks distributing more than 25,000 plates of food to flood-affected schools, villages and settlements. Hare Krishna Society flood relief co-ordinator Dr Rajesh Maharaj said they began their food relief to schools after they
received information regarding affected students from the Save the Children Fiji. “We were told some of the students were unable to attend classes because their parents could not provide them lunch.”
Dr Maharaj said they didn’t want students missing out on classes just because they could not be provided lunch. “We will be doing this for them for the next five weeks,” he said. Dr Maharaj urged interested individuals or businesses to help them provide relief to the flood victims. “We will only be able to extend our support if people donate food supplies to us, so I just want to ask the public to help us continue our relief efforts,” he said. Dr Maharaj said he could be reached through mobile number 9926 349.
Yesterday, the group provided lunches to students of Ratu Navula Secondary, Nadi Sangam Primary, Nadi Sangam College, Drasa Primary, Drasa Secondary and Saru MGM Primary. Thousands of students and their families were left with little to nothing after torrential rain and flooding destroyed their belongings.
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