Pariprashnena — Q&A Archive

Child abuse taken aside, I think our movement regretably still does not pay much attention to raising future generations of Vaishnavas.

If we had spent on our children just 1/10 of what we have spent on preaching starting in the early 1970s, we would have had a huge number of young 2nd and 3rd generation devotees filling our temples. Instead, we have empty temples that cant support themselves without seeking help from the Indian congregation.

Sad but true: children were never a priority in our movement and it is only fair that by and large they abandoned our society.

It is hard to understand how child abuse would not happen in a religious organizations. I you are honest you would know that majority of people in religious organizations are pretenders or plain crazy. Prabhupada clearly asked to keep crazy people away from the temple. But the good thing that ISKCON handled the process rather in a way that leaves Catholics learning and wishing they had done the same as early as we did. At least we should know that there are plenty of crazy people in a "dress of devotees exploiting Prabhupadas movement". That we should know well. Well if you can keep faith despite it that certainly creates faith in me.

[quote][cite] jsmith:[/cite]As you know this topic can be a source of loss of faith for newcomers. When I first started visiting the temple I didnt have any idea about the abuse. But then when I discovered it online it really shook my faith in Krishna Consciousness and still bothers me at times today. How are we supposed to see such situations without losing faith?[/quote]

I am quite a newcomer myself, so my view of this is very limited. But I cant say that knowing about the scandals ever actually affected my faith. I have tended to perceive the unease I feel about the scandals as a push to clean up my part of the deal, to work on my own understanding and practice, to take more responsibility for my spiritual life. I think it is this realization of how much more I yet need to do, how great my lacks are that is so overwhelming, not the scandals.

were the guys who abused ..homo or hetero ??/

Thanks for the comments so far. I also had some realizations about this issue when reading the following verse and purport in Bhagavad Gita As It Is last night (the previous verses are also relavent to this topic). After reading this, it has given me faith that everything is in fact in Prabhupadas books, people just have to read them intelligently and be honest with themselves about their impurities. Although Prabhupada was a pure devotee, he never claimed to be omniscient. If the people who committed the abuses were sincere, they should have revealed their impurities to Prabhupada and been properly engaged as householders to "gradually cleanse" themselves rather than "pretending" to be pure and causing such a disturbance to the innocent:

BG 3.8
TRANSLATION

Perform your prescribed duty, for doing so is better than not working. One cannot even maintain ones physical body without work.

PURPORT

There are many pseudo meditators who misrepresent themselves as belonging to high parentage, and great professional men who falsely pose that they have sacrificed everything for the sake of advancement in spiritual life. Lord Kruc0u803 su803 nu803 a did not want Arjuna to become a pretender. Rather, the Lord desired that Arjuna perform his prescribed duties as set forth for ksu803 atriyas. Arjuna was a householder and a military general, and therefore it was better for him to remain as such and perform his religious duties as prescribed for the householder ksu803 atriya. Such activities gradually cleanse the heart of a mundane man and free him from material contamination. So-called renunciation for the purpose of maintenance is never approved by the Lord, nor by any religious scripture. After all, one has to maintain ones body and soul together by some work. Work should not be given up capriciously, without purification of materialistic propensities. Anyone who is in the material world is certainly possessed of the impure propensity for lording it over material nature, or, in other words, for sense gratification. Such polluted propensities have to be cleared. Without doing so, through prescribed duties, one should never attempt to become a so-called transcendentalist, renouncing work and living at the cost of others.

When I first heard about the sexual abuses of children in gurukulas I was shocked, but it did not affect my faith in the process... only my faith in people suffered...
However, that does not mean that Iskcon did not make very serious mistakes in that area. While extremely oppulent multi-million dollar temples were being built, children in our gurukulas were given almost no resources, to the point of being forced to eat substandard food. THAT is completely inexcusable and shows that gurukula education was a very low priority for our movement.

I agree with JSmith, most people 99.999% do not qualify to become transcendentalists as per the quote in BG 3.8, the ones that pretend cause a huge disturbance to themselves, to others and to society at large. The child abuse is a symptom of unqualified fakes and phonies pretending to be someone they are not. Artificially suppressing all of their inward attachments and desires and outwardly portraying themselves as pure and godly. The longer this game of denial goes on the bigger the monster inside becomes until eventually truth breaks free and it does so with such damaging consequences. The fact that authorities do nothing about it allows it to continue, if these people faced jail sentences that would deter many from committing these heinous acts.

The denial is also there at a society level, so much of the child abuse that is surfacing both in Iskcon and in society happened back in the 50s 60s and 70s when society at large was in denial about itself. Iskcons continued lack of effort in resolving these issues and dealing with the perpetrators is another symptom of a society largely in denial. As a society it promotes itself as the "Only Society" that can deliver you from maya, yet its rank and file seem to be steeped in the activities of maya while at the same time pointing the finger at society at large.

The fact is we have failed, we have failed Srila Prabhupada and we have failed even to look after the precious future generations, the children. Yes we have erected massive temples of bricks and concrete, these continue to get bigger and mightier as the essence and spirit walks out the back door.

Think of how elevated Arjuna is in his personal relationship with Krishna, a close intimate friend. Yet Krishna advised him not to become a fake and a phony. Yet many of us think by changing our cloth after a few months of following a program we qualify as born again brahmanas straight out of the Satya Yuga.

We are all less than Hari das Thakur, far far less and look how humble he was. This problem wont be fixed by spending more money, it will be fixed when the fakes and phonies stop pretending and when the Iskcon authorities start handing the perpetrators over to the local authorities with full evidence supplied so they can get their just rewards.

"I agree with JSmith, most people 99.999% do not qualify to become transcendentalists"
Yes, it means that we have to be all eternally conditioned in this material world. life after life... ;-(
So we have all no hope, because we have no qualities. But how then one can become transcendentalist?

"do not qualify to become transcendentalists"
I know some want to become Brahman... be we are already souls (parts and particles of (Para-)Brahman, Supreme Godhead). So is there need to become transcendentalist? but probably if we try to become Krishna conscious - then it is beneficial, as it is original position. So it is rather not "become transcendentalists", but rather "become-BACK transcendentalists", as now we are gross materialists or impersonalists etc...

P.S. Why indeed we discuss all these (see subject)?

child abuse is still happening in ISKCON as we speak It is usually well covered up until it is too late.there are just to many perverts in the society of the devotees.the only thing that can be done is to trust nobody with your children even for a second.This notion that it is all thing of past is naive and uninformed.Child abusers are readily welcomed back to ISKCON even if they have damaged or destroyed so many lives.New ones are joining every day and are well received too.I have preponderance of proof on this.I would warn all parents.Trust nobody.No matter how nice,kind and sweet devotees appear or suffer the consequences.