Book Distribution at Iskcon silicon valley

A Nazis Confession

The Hosenfeld Website
www.hosenfeld.de

The comprehensive edition of Wilm Hosenfeld's letters and diary notes - edited by the Office for the Research of Military History at Potsdam - provides insight into the life and thought of a German patriot who joined the Nazis out of idealism, but turned away from them in horror when he recognized the dreadful consequences. In November 1939 he wrote to his wife that he was sometimes ashamed to be a German soldier after having been an eye witness to the execution of members of the Polish leadership and the expulsion of Polish and Jewish citizens.

On September 1, 1942, he asked: "Why did this war have to happen at all?" This was his answer;

"Because humanity had to be shown where its godlessness was taking it ... This denial of God's commandments leads us to all the other immoral manifestations of greed - unjust selfenrichment, hatred, deceit, sexual license resulting in infertility and the downfall of the German people. God allows all this to happen ... to show mankind that without him we are only animals in conflict, who believe we have to destroy each other. We will not listen to the divine commandment: "Love one another" ... and must die, guilty and innocent alike."

http://www.hosenfeld.dk/Diary.htm

a grt realisation by a former NAZI ...

His answer is simply wonderful & clear.

...... NO God NO peace ........

,,KNOW God KNOW peace,,

Fwd: The American Prison stories

-----Original Message-----
From: Indradyumna Swami [mailto:Indradyumna.Swami@pamho.net]
Sent: Wednesday, April 22, 2009 4:05 PM
To: IDS Diary (of a Traveling Preacher)
Subject: Volume 10, Chapter 4


                     Diary of a Traveling Preacher

                         Volume 10, Chapter 4

                            February 2009

                         By Indradyumna Swami


                         "A Difficult Place"


The America that Sri Prahlada das and I flew into after our Australian
tour
was not the America I had visited a year earlier. The country was mired
in
recession, sinking into despair with financial problems. Unemployment
had
hit a twenty-five-year high, with 5.1 million people having lost their
jobs
since the beginning of 2008.

More than a million foreclosures had cast a shadow over the housing
industry
and sent a ripple of despair throughout the country. Particularly
disturbing
was a report that 1.5 million children would be homeless this year. Car
sales had fallen by fifty percent, the U.S. Post Office was considering
dropping one day a week from its delivery service, and tourism had
dropped
by twenty percent.

Everyone seemed to be affected. Many people I spoke to said they would
need
second jobs and were opting for shorter vacations and less-expensive
homes.
A storeowner told me that his sales of wedding gowns had decreased by
thirty-three percent. "Brides are just being frugal," he said. "They're
using their friends' old wedding gowns."

In California, a state senator went so far as to propose selling San
Quentin, a 432-acre penitentiary with a breathtaking view of San
Francisco
Bay.

"Our inmates don't need an ocean view," he said. He estimated the
property
could realize $2 billion, even in a depressed market. It would boost the
coffers of the world's eighth largest, but slumping, economy.

Toward the end of our tour, while I was walking around the grounds of
New
Vrindavan in West Virginia, a devotee turned to me. "Maharaja," he said,
"has the recession affected your fundraising in the U.S.?"

"Of course it has," I replied.

"Will you be able to do your festival tour in Poland this summer?" he
asked.

"We'll manage," I said.

"Wow," he said shaking his head, "these are really difficult times."

"That's not always negative," I said. "Difficult times are the best for
preaching Krsna consciousness. I was reading the other day that church
attendance has risen by ten percent in many parishes in this country."

"Really?" he said.

"In Bhagavad-gita," I said, "Krsna lists distress as one of the four
reasons
people turn to Him."

catur vidha bhajante mam
janah sukrtino 'rjuna
arto jijnasur arthahi
jnani ca bharatarsabha

"O best among the Bharatas, four kinds of pious men begin to render
devotional service to unto Me-the distressed, the desirer of wealth, the
inquisitive, and he who is searching for knowledge." [Bhagavad-gita
7.16]

My godbrother Akhilananda das spoke up. "Yes," he said. "I have plenty
of
experience about how difficulties push people to take up spiritual life.
I
work with ISKCON's Prison Ministry, preaching in prisons throughout the
state of Ohio. Many prisoners are receptive to our teachings."

"A prison ministry would be an unusual service," I said.

"Srila Prabhupada began prison preaching at Tihar Prison in Delhi in
1962,
before he came to America," Akhilananda said. "Similar attempts were
made by
ISKCON devotees here in the U.S. during the early '70s, but it was the
late
'80s before a devotee named Chandrasekara das actually developed the
ministry.

"He was staying in the New Orleans temple and noticed that many of Srila
Prabhupada's books were lying around unused. He sent some of the books
to
the state-prison libraries in Louisiana. Inmates began writing to him,
and
eventually he started visiting them. Now he writes more than fifteen
hundred
letters a year to U.S. prison inmates and has a team of devotees who
help
him all over the country."

"How did you get involved?" I asked.

"I heard about the program a few years ago," said Akhilananda, "and I
wrote
to Chandrasekara asking if I could help. Afterwards I contacted a prison
in
Youngstown, Ohio, near where I live. I told the prison authorities I was
a
priest and would like to minister to the inmates. They enrolled me in a
course that taught me about the prison system. It included dealing with
prison riots, what to do if taken hostage, how to use mace-all that kind
of
stuff."

"That's interesting," I said.

"Then I started a weekly evening program at the prison," he continued.
"The
day before I began, the main chaplain told me, 'This will be the best
experience of your life.' And I did find it to be so. Some inmates take
Krsna consciousness very seriously, possibly because of the constant
reminder of the miseries of material life. A few of them make quick
spiritual progress. One man I'm ministering to recently took initiation
in
prison."

My eyebrows went up.

"That's right," Akhilananda said. "Aaron was a convicted murderer,
Jamaican
by birth. Several years ago three white supremists attacked him in a
bar.
They broke a bottle over his head and beat him. An hour later, in a fit
of
rage, he ran over them with his car and killed one of them. He was
sentenced
to fifteen years to life. He became remorseful and suffered in prison.
By
the time I met him he was searching for an alternative in spiritual
life. He
took to Krsna consciousness immediately.

"He had plenty of time to chant and read Srila Prabhupada's books
because
they have no work for the two thousand prisoners in Youngstown. He told
me
if you don't get into something positive like Krsna consciousness,
you'll
get into gang activity, and there are plenty of gangs in the jail like
M13
or the Aryans or the Black Brotherhood. Sometimes there's violence
between
them. Some of them even continue their drug trade from within the
prison."

"How's that possible?" I asked.

"Somehow they do it," he replied. "They use codes in phone conversations
or
in talks with visitors. They get notes out through family members and
sometimes even bribe guards to pass messages for them. It's a whole
other
world in there.

"After his initial contact with us, Aaron began regularly practicing
Krsna
consciousness. After three years he asked me if I could put him in touch
with a spiritual master in ISKCON. He began corresponding with
Bhaktimarg
Swami, and the next year we arranged for Maharaja to come to the jail
and
initiate him.

"It caused quite a stir in the prison. All the inmates were talking
about a
mystic event. Of course, we couldn't have a fire yajna, but Maharaja
gave a
lecture, chanted on Aaron's beads, and gave him the name Arjuna dasa.

"A few days later Arjuna had another prisoner tattoo the mahamantra on
his
back. Tattooing is strictly forbidden in prison, and if a prisoner is
caught
with a new tattoo, he's immediately put into solitary confinement. But
Arjuna took the chance. He said gang members are identified by their
tattoos
and he wanted to make it clear he was part of the Krsna group, even
though
he was the only initiated devotee in the prison."

"How in the world did another prisoner give him a tattoo?" I asked.

"They use a small spinning motor that they take out of a tape recorder
and a
staple dipped in baby oil that's become black by being burnt," he
replied.
"It's a crude method, but I've seen some pretty amazing tattoos on the
prisoners.

"Arjuna's an artistic person himself, and he's now doing paintings for
several devotees' books. With good behavior he could be released in ten
years. When he does get out he'd like to distribute Srila Prabhupada's
books
because he's seen how much they've helped him."

"Have any prisoners become active in Krsna consciousness after they were
released?" I asked.

"Many," replied Akhilananda. "Ben Baker, a former member of the Aryan
Brotherhood, did time and is now a dedicated preacher. He has a contract
out
on his life for renouncing the gang and taking to the non-violent path
of
Krsna consciousness.

"Another devotee who comes to mind is Sankirtan-yajna das, a disciple of
Bhakti Tirtha Maharaja. In the early '70s, before he went to prison, he
joined the movement and traveled for several years, distributing books
with
the Radha-Damodar traveling sankirtana party. Unfortunately, after some
time
he left the movement and got involved in dealing drugs. He was
eventually
caught and did a number of years in prison. After his release he's again
become very active in distributing books as well as helping with Food
for
Life in Washington, D.C."

"Huh?" said a devotee. "Why was he put in prison for selling a few
drugs?"

"Not a few drugs," said Akhilananda. "He was known as Mr. Weed among the
drug dealers of his time. Once he smuggled an entire shipload of
marijuana
into the country. He owned five homes, a Lear jet, a thirty-five-foot
yacht
and a Mercedes limousine. He had two hundred people working for him. He
was
big time."

"Wow!" said the devotee.

"During his drug runs he would sometimes meet devotees selling books in
the
airports," continued Akhilananda. "He'd always surprise them by giving a
thousand-dollar donation for a book.

"At his trial he was convicted of bringing marijuana worth more than
three
hundred million dollars into the country. The judge threw the book at
him
and gave him ten years in federal prison. Faced with a decade in jail,
he
had a change of heart and decided to become a devotee again.

"When he arrived at the prison to begin his sentence, some of his
associates, who had already been jailed, had arranged a special cell for
him, complete with a television, and someone to do his laundry. It was
big
news around the jail: 'The Weed is coming.'

"But when he arrived he surprised his former cronies. He wasn't
interested
in the facilities they'd provided for him. Each day he would invite them
to
his cell to chant with him and have a Srimad-Bhagavatam class. He
encouraged
them to become vegetarian. He devised a program where he taught some
illiterate prisoners to read, using the Bhagavad-gita. On special days
he'd
arrange programs in the chapel, where he would make Jagannatha deities
out
of bread and have arati and big kirtans.

"Like Arjuna das, he used his time wisely, and thinking of his future
devotional service, got an associate degree from Ohio University and a
degree in agriculture from Penn State.

"When he saw that the members of the Sikh religion were allowed to wear
turbans in jail, he successfully campaigned for the right to wear neck
beads
and carry a bead bag at all times. He even got the prison system to pay
for
sannyasis to come to lecture. He had at least five to ten bhaktas
practicing
Krsna consciousness at any one time.

"He attracted the attention of the prison authorities by keeping the
yard
clean and using small rocks and cement scraps to make a garden, complete
with a fountain. When it came time for his release the warden joked with
him. 'Maybe you could stay a little longer,' he said.

"After his release he received initiation from Bhakti Tirtha Maharaja
and
immediately took up the services I mentioned in Washington."

A devotee chuckled. "Seems like prison is a good place to get serious
about
Krsna consciousness," he said.

"That's true," I said, "but we are already in a difficult place and
don't
have to end up in prison to become serious about spiritual life. The
world
we live in is called Durga-dhama in Sanskrit, which means the prison of
material existence. There are four high walls around this gigantic
prison:
birth, disease, old age, and death. When one realizes this, one become
serious about devotional service and tries to go back home, back to
Godhead,
as quickly as possible."

That evening I found a quotation from Srila Prabhupada: "Sometimes in
New
Delhi I was invited to give some good lessons to the prisoners. So I
have
seen so many prisoners. They were shackled with iron chains, iron
chains. So
we are also chained up here, and what is that chain? That is our sense
enjoyment. Yes. We are chained in this material world by sense
enjoyment.
That's all. So if we want to cut our prison life, then the first symptom
will be to minimize this sense enjoyment or to regulate the sense
enjoyment."

[ Lecture, Bhagavad Gita, New York April 27, 1966 ]

Indradyumna.swami@pamho.net
www.traveling-preacher.com
Audio lectures: www.narottam.com
Facebook: Indradyuma Swami

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