Opening the Doors of Vedanta

In many ways I feel I have been working on a twenty year socio/spiritual experiment, being conducted largely SRV Retreat Center. I became a main participant in the experiment in 1988, ten years after it began in 1978. Over the past twenty years many people have inquired,

What is going on with the Vivekananda Vihar/SRV Retreat Center in Greenville? Does it still exist, and is it still a Vedanta Center?

SRV Retreat and Cultural Center, was run from 1978 to 1986, as another independent Ramakrishna organization. It was at that time, called the Vivekananda Vedanta Vihar. The Vihar was initially the idea of American students, who wanted to live in community. They eventually asked an Indian swami, formerly a monk of the Ramakrishna Order, if he would be the resident swami. This devoted group and associated devotees built a Vedantic temple, largely based on the Ramakrishna temple in Calcutta at Belur Math. A large house was renovated, it¹s grounds were kept impeccably beautiful, daily classes were held and worship was performed in the shrine room. This continued for eight years bringing benefit to many people, both living at and visiting the Vihar.

Unfortunately, because of a sexual scandal involving the Swami and a number of female devotees, the group disbanded, disheartened and devastated, to say the least, in 1986. The Vihar devotees dissipated, though their wish to have the center owned by a group dedicated to the teachings of Ramakrishna, Sarada Devi and Swami Vivekananda was fulfilled when the property was purchased by the fledgling organization, namely Sarada Ramakrishna Vivekananda Association of America. This group was originally brought about through the inspiration of religious scholar Lex Hixon, while in a meditation he had in the shrine room of the Portland Vedanta Center, when he was visiting Swami Aseshananda, its former head-swami. SRV was not only the initials of the 3 main people in our tradition, but was also an acronym pronounced as ³serve.² This naturally depicted the concept of worshipping God through the process of service, what we call karma yoga.

The center was purchased by SRV Association of America, a non-profit organization in 1987. In 1988, after living as a monk for ten years at Vivekananda Monastery in Ganges Mi. under the tutelage of Swami Bhashyananda and having lived for two years, as a sanyassin, running the Atlanta Vedanta Society I was ready for a change and a challenge. I walked into what was a a very interesting situation in Greenville.

It became obvious to me that the center was going to have many difficulties from the start. The Vihar group had remained somewhat isolated from the local community. When the Vihar broke up, the local community was confused about why the center had disbanded, especially after having seen the devotees build an ornate temple and maintain the ornate grounds so beautifully. SRV Association of America was started by Lex Hixon, himself considered a spiritual renegade, who in the eyes of many, challenged the established traditions of Order. He wanted American Swamis to run centers, to get devotees to be more involved in the running of the centers. He hoped to help rejuvenate the apparent dying interest in Vedanta in America, as was evidenced by the lower number of people on the rosters of the centers in the 1980¹s as compared to the 1970¹s. This was one of his deepest wishes for SRV Association of America and the SRV Retreat Center, to present Vedanta to Americans by Americans. To many, though, Lex was acting on his own authority, without any sanction from the official Ramakrishna Order of Monks of India. He did not receive much support or recognition from orthodox followers or devotees.

For obvious reasons, there were very few Vihar devotees still interested in SRV. There was a small number of people interested in the new SRV group. It was apparent that the main stream followers of Ramakrishna Vedantists had numerous reasons to not get involved. Because of organizational difficulties during the first two years of SRV¹s purchase, largely concerning a lack of funding, leadership and direction, many of the Vihar followers and the few SRV followers lost interest and no longer participated in the centers activities.

This is when I arrived at SRV Retreat Center. After living there for three months I was appointed as Executive Director, largely because I had the credentials of being a Ramakrishna Order swami. It was left to me to decide how to keep the Center running. I was told by the board to ³take the football and run.² I took it as my own opportunity to create a unique manifestation of Vedanta work in America. Being a great admirer of the Swami Vivekananda¹s teachings, especially his ideas for the West as delineated by one of Swami Ashokanandas students, Marie Louise Burke. In her books such as New Discoveries, Second Visit to the West, I had lots of concepts to use to recreate the center. Though there were many problems, I also felt I had in many ways what could be seen as a clean slate to continue my experimental work. My years of living with Swami Bhashyananda and Swami Nisreyesananada, and numerous other swamis, at Vivekananada Monastery in Ganges, Mi. had imbued me with the vigor and ideas of how to try something different.

I was also aware that Swamiji had many ideas of how Vedanta should be spread in the West. His idea of Mayavati, a place where worship of the Impersonal Spirit was the main form of spiritual practice, was one of his and my most appealing Vedantic ideas. Swamiji stated about Mayavati, ³The purpose is to train seekers of truth and to bring up children without fear and without superstition. They shall not hear about Christs and Buddhas and Shivas and Vishnus-none of these. They shall learn, from the start, to stand upon their own feet. They shall learn from their childhood that God is the spirit and should be worshipped in spirit and in truth. Everyone must be looked upon as spirit. That is the ideal.²

In fact, the original purpose of the Vihar and idea for building what is now called The Temple for the Celebration of the Universal Spirit, was for worship of Impersonal Spirit. I knew that there were many people who felt that there was little outreach or social work to local communities from many of our Ramakrishna Centers. I felt it was ample time to put all of these ideas together and even more, to put these ideas into practice, when I was put in charge of SRV Retreat Center.

The first thing I did was to open the arms of the center to almost anyone and everyone. Didn¹t Sarada Devi do this in her life? Did she not attract drunks and saints, thugs and children? In fact, they were all attracted to her because of her own attitude she had towards them. Did not Swamiji talk of one of the highest spiritual practice (other than music) as worship of Virat, with worship of daridya narayana (the living god in human form) being the most efficacious? Indeed the RK Order in India is different than in America largely because of the philanthropic work it does in its hospitals, schools, orphanages, widows homes, etc. Its seem that in the West we have had only the equivalent of what they call the Math in India, and very little of the Mission. Times have changed and just as there are social, cultural, physical, intellectual needs in India that are being met by the RK Order, so we are now finally doing the same in America, though more through centers independent of the RK Order.

The members and workers of the Mothers Trust/Mothers Place and SRV Retreat Center in Greenville, NY , largely through the inspiration of their guru, Swami Bhashyananda, have reached out to touch the hearts of local people in the community on an equal footing as they would touch the hearts of those who want to be devotees. These are some of the ways I have reached out to the local community with an attitude to serve them as manifestations of Brahman.

At SRV in Greenville, we have now for ten years sponsored AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) meetings at the center. Many attending members feel a spiritual presence at the Center and an openness that is not felt in other local meetings, which also matches the ideals and openness of AA¹s ideals. The meetings are held in a room called the Girish Ghosh room, in the the main temple. Girish Ghosh, of course, was the devotee who first proclaimed Ramakrishna as an incarnation. He was a well known playwright, and it was well known that he was a avid drinker and opium user, though rehabilitated through the influence of Ramakrishna..

For eight years there have been dance classes, yoga classes, aerobics classes and karate classes, also held in the temple. I feel Swamiji would have loved these, being an athlete himself. I think of the type of person whom he felt ³football would be more helpful than reading the Gita.² Discipline of the mind and senses, as well as intense spiritual emotions can come in many different forms and from many different activities.

The center has been used for worship by many different spiritual groups. Numerous Buddhist groups, Christian groups, Hindu groups and other spiritually based groups, as well as what might be labeled secular groups have used the Temple for their own particular inspiring practices. Art presentations and dance recitals have been one of the mainstay of activities over the years here. Did not Swamiji say at the beginning of Practical Vedanta Part I,

Vedanta, therefore as a religion, must be intensely practical. We must be able to carry it out in every part of our lives. And not only this. The fictitious differentiation between religion and the life of the world must vanish for Vedanta teaches Oneness-one life throughout. The ideals of religion must cover the whole field of life, they must enter into our thoughts, and more and more into our practice.

Numerous local colleges use SRV Retreat Center annually for leadership training and residential assistant training weekends. A local Schenectady Inner City Theatrical group uses SRV for yearly retreats. The local high school has brought it¹s ninth-grade Social Studies group here annually to use the library and its vast collection of Indian literature for their Indian studies classes. Not only does all of this interactivity culturally and spiritually educate and inspire people, but most importantly it brings people through the door, in a spirit of openness and acceptance, unseen in many places, whether Ramakrishna centers or otherwise. An open door policy prevails at SRV, NY. Our bottom line is that whatever activity takes place here is a transformational activity, hopefully and ultimately leading to spiritual growth if directed and understood properly.

For years SRV has provided a safe haven for battered wives, husbands and children, as well as provided a recovery space for people with a variety of substance abuse problems. We have served as a half/way house for young men and women in transition, whether from marriage or jail, or even those who are leaving cults of various types.

I have found both in Atlanta and in Greenville that making close friends and associates is as important, possibly more important than remaining and emphasizing only devotee sangha. Ultimately we will find more friends of Vedanta than devotees, I am sure of that. I have found that, helping to spiritually ³upgrade² friends has been equally as fruitful, if not more beneficial in many far reaching ways. My experience is that many individuals respond to Advaitic ideas, without necessarily needing to become any labeled even as Advaita and particularly without the listener feeling any need to become a devotee of any particular diety or incarnation. Naturally though, that option or choice is of course open at SRV.

As Swamiji said,

Our duty is to encourage every one in his struggle to live up to his own highest idea, and strive at the same time to make the ideal as near as possible to the Truth.

Some of the initial credit for this open door policy must go to Lex Hixons original vision of SRV, which certainly follows what many consider to be the highest teachings of Swami Vivekananda.

Lex wrote:

SRV is a national association of the friends and admirers of Sarada, Ramakrishna and Vivekananda--both those who have received formal initiation in their living spiritual lineage and those who have not been formally initiated but share the same universal ideals: the absolute oneness of all existence, the underlying harmony of all religions and cultures, and the practice of contemplative disciplines along the path of spiritual realization, not simply to benefit oneself but to benefit humanity.

...The focus of SRV, which is pronounced 'serve', is service in the fields of religious education and spiritual understanding as well as in various other fields of helping and caring for humanity. This service is carried out specifically in the names of Sarada, Ramakrishna, and Vivekananda, in the light of their teaching and their personal example, and with the spiritual power they have awakened in the heart of humanity. However, SRV is not a religious organization and expresses no doctrinal or denominational bias, being open to all authentic religious practices and philosophical teachings as well as all forms of helpful, nonpolitical activity.

.... The large temple is a sacred space for worship, meditation, various kinds of spiritual disciplines, individual or collective, music, dance, talks, and silence. This temple is an experimental space into which Sarada, Ramakrishna, and Vivekananda invite the whole world in order to help bring to spiritual birth our future global civilization. This shrineless temple is a symbol of the perfect realization of oneness, or nonduality, and a place to experience at least a spark of this supreme realization.

I have personally tried to integrate myself into the community as much as I can. How many other communities in America have had their children interact with a swami on a daily level for over ten years? I feel my employment and participation at the local school district has brought me in association with the majority of people, participants and connections I have made here. We have introduced Vedanta ideas into the core of childrens experiences, and therefore their parents, as they grow up. Children come and use the temple and grow up in it, without the restrictions of having to religiously accept or reject it, having specifically the freedom to experience it as a natural part of the community they grow up in. In this community Vedanta has become a natural part of peoples experience in this town.. Interestingly I have been personally asked to check out various new religious groups, which some fear as possible cults, that come to town, that cause local people to feel wary. This indeed is an interesting paradox, seeing that I live in a temple with Shiva tridents projecting out of the top of it, and could easily be considered as a cult leader myself, if judged by external and narrow ignorant views.

Greenville , NY is indeed a rural community. There are approximately 1,200 children who attends the local public school, gathered from an area of 400 square miles. I am probably know by easily 60% of the children, and most all of the teachers and employees. I have been asked to speak at graduation baccalaureate ceremonies, as well as numerous award giving ceremonies to children. I have even been Santa Claus a few years.

My employment as a school bus driver has allowed me to transport sixty ³bundles of Brahman,² daily to and from school for ten years. Substitute teaching K-12, any subject, has allowed me to meet many more students, teachers and administrators who then learn about SRV Retreat Center. For them, some of the enigma is taken out of it and interestingly replaced with intrigue and understanding. The meditation class and Eastern Philosophy class I teach at the continuing education program, at the local school has proven to be continually well attended, and another chance for me to share Vedantic meditation and knowledge with those attending. It is always interesting to meet returning college students, who have temporarily left this community. Many come back with a new view of the broadness that SRV stands for. That they had a temple with the symbols of the five main religions in their hometown, gained its meaning only after they broadened their vision in the larger fishbowl of college and the world.

Another experience I have realized is that the Vedantic ideas can be shared in many contexts. As John Dobson shares and teaches Vedanta through his astronomy classes, I have found that I can teach Vedantic ideas through classes with animals. Like Shiva, I have become a friend to the friendless and thus have become a collector of snakes, particularly Burmese Pythons and Boa Constrictors.I have used these snakes to promote the teachings of Vedanta. I have chosen to use natural ³hands on² educational experiences to introduce Vedantic concepts, rather than using only foreign scriptures and cultural props to introduce Vedanta. I have brought my snakes into innumerable pre-school, elementary and high school classes over the last five years, Not only can one bring knowledge but one can remove fear and ignorance from people in a very real way. I can¹t count the number of times I have told the ³snake and rope² story or the ³I told you not to bite, but I didn¹t say you couldn¹t hiss² story to my children¹s classes. People are mesmerized by these ideas, and to see elementary children go from having a largely unbased & unknown fear of snakes, within five minutes to have a six foot boa constrictor around their neck, or a twelve foot python climbing along the backs of the shoulders of many young students is indeed a move from the Œsnake to the rope¹ as it were.

There are, naturally, ongoing activities as well for those who are interested in a more orthodox Vedantic study. Biweekly meditation classes and scriptural classes are given with an emphasis on Advaita and the teachings of Swami Vivekananda, particularly those he felt were more attractive to westerners. The Center is open year round and has become the favorite place for many individuals and small groups to take a short retreat and renew themselves.

Wayne Levitt, a member of the of the original Vivekananda Vihar community, states, ³Swami Bruce has almost single-handedly created and maintained the spiritual thread that has run from our initial intentions with the Vivekananda Vedanta Vihar through today and into the hearts and life of the community. I have watched Swami Bruce integrate his life and that of the center into the schools, businesses, spiritual communities and personal lives of this rural town and the larger Catskill Mountain. region. My respect and love grows for this man who has nurtured the struggling center he was given to run, not only to health but to wholeness. Opening the sealed doors of this center to a community that saw no welcome for eight years prior, was very fulfilling to see. This manifested against many barriers, resistance and was accomplished through Swami Bruce¹s loving kindness, personal efforts and persistence. Swami Bruce has manifested the kind of strength, commitments and depth of vision that has allowed the Vedantic ideals to be expressed by the center and the people of the community. This has been very rewarding for me, to see these ideals given freedom, place and nurturing direction, to be embraced by one and all. And indeed we are most pleased that he continues to run the center in a way that not only lauds the past but creates the future.²

The theme of the center has developed over the years to become a combination of the teachings Swamiji envisioned with Mayavati, and what Swamiji called the worship of Virat, where the universe itself is seen and and worshipped as Spirit. Our daily eclectic events and activities are modeled after those found in Swami Nityaswarupananda¹s book World Civilization Center and the model center he founded in Gol Park, Calcutta, The Institute of Culture.

I have found ways to have Vedantic ideas become part and parcel of a persons personal experience in a rural town in ³anywhere², United States. For these ideas to integrate into American culture, they need to be a natural part of a persons daily experience. I don¹t feel Vedanta will ever grow or even be known to any larger extent if it always remains only encapsulated in foreign garb and cultural influences, as Swamiji himself said. I have found that Vedanta can also grow in many people hearts without having to recreate the typical guru/student pattern as exercised in the past. Vedanta must grow in a natural way in the hearts of people, but first we must give these ideas so they can be heard, then thought about. Then they enter the heart and soul of our experience. Somehow the doors of Vedanta must open in order to get more people through them, if we ever hope for Vedanta to become the future religion, as Swamiji spoke so brilliantly about in his talk, Is Vedanta the Future Religion. I have tried to use his ideas particularly from that lecture as the core of my work, wherever I am.

The Internet has also proven useful for the spreading of Swamiji¹s ideas in a worldwide way, at the click of a mouse. For over four years now I have been sending a daily paragraph from a lecture and/or writing of Vivekananda to those on the Vivekananda Mailing List. The response from recipients has been wonderful, such as, ³Thanks, it's really nice to come in to work each morning and have a wonderful Vivekananda quote waiting for me. Your hard work is appreciated!!² There are now some 400 people from around the world who receive the daily mailing with Swamiji¹s teachings. Another philosophical mailing/discussion list has added the Vivekananda messages to their¹s, for it¹s own recipients to enjoy. To join the Vivekananda Mailing list or get our website address, send a message to sarada@global2000.net.

Our web site has been visited by thousands who have downloaded pictures of Kali, Thakur, Ma and Swamiji, and the direct disciples. I wonder if Ramakrishna had any idea when he said his picture would be worshipped in many homes, whether he knew it be downloaded off the internet, and possibly used as a desktop picture or screensaver.

Another important factor about SRV Retreat Center is that is other than the initial financial investments in property and building¹s, and a 4,000 sq. ft. library/multi-purpose addition we are now building, the Center and all it¹s activities has been 90% financially supported by the classes and events held at the center. It is truly a community center, supplying as Ramakrishna stated, the type of food each member of the community needs, and each member gives back to help run the center. SRV Retreat Center is truly an open center, where we attempt our best in seeing and treating all people equally and serving them as equal manifestations of Divine Spirit. Swamiji stated

The moment I have realized God sitting in the temple of every human body, the moment I stand in reverence before every human being and see God in him -- that moment I am free from bondage, everything that binds vanishes, and I am free.

Interestingly, the biggest criticism over the years about the activities of SRV Retreat Center has come from Vedanta devotees. Whether feeling that the atmosphere has been polluted somehow, or that the place has become worldly, has only proven to me how narrow, fearful and superstitiously entrenched some of the Vedantic camps have become in America. One person even asked, ³When are you going to start doing Œreal Ramakrishna¹ work?² , which she told me meant to give classes only on the teachings of Sri Ramakrishna. It reminded me of when Ramakrishna went on pilgrimage to Vrindavan with Mathur Babu. Ramakrishna saw and felt the suffering of the local villagers so much that he would not leave for Calcutta until Mathur, a rich man, gave every person in the neighboring area a new cloth and a meal.

As Buddha had a mission for the East, Swamiji had a dream for the West. Swamiji stated,

My ideal can be put in a few words and that is to preach unto mankind their divinity, and how to make it manifest in every movement of life. (CW 7: p.501)

23. ...that this Math on no account be reduced to a Babajis¹ Thakubari. 24. A Thakurbari does some amount of good to a few; it satisfies the curiosity of a small number of people. But through this Math the welfare of the whole world will be effected.

 Ignorance of our true nature as Spirit is the disease of the ages, Swamiji is the cure. Swamiji surely has clearly prescribed the medicine necessary and has done so specifically for the West as he has also renewed and revitalized the cure for the East. Swamiji prescribed his remedy in a number of his writings and talks. In the Marie Louise Brake book Swami Vivekananda His Second Visit To The West, New Discoveries, especially in the inspiring chapter called Northern California: A New Gospel, Swamiji's medicine of the Vedantic message for the West is clearly laid out. Anyone interested in Swamiji¹s ideas should know this chapter well. Another of Swamiji¹s lectures that again clearly delineates his concept of Vedanta is called Is Vedanta the Future Religion, delivered in San Francisco on April 8, 1900. Swamiji begins,

I shall begin by telling you what Vedanta is not, and then I shall tell you what it is. But you must remember that, with all its emphasis on impersonal principles, Vedanta is not antagonistic to anything, though it does not compromise or give up the truths which it considers fundamental.

The three concepts which most religions believe in and which Vedanta does not, which makes it unique are, according to Swamiji, ³First, it does not believe in a book-that is the difficulty to start with. It denies the authority of any book over any other book. It denies emphatically that any one book can contain all the truths about God, soul, the ultimate reality.

....Second, it finds veneration for some particular person still more difficult to uphold. Those of you who are students of Vedanta-by Vedanta is always meant the Upanishads-know that this is the only religion that does not cling to any person. Not one man or woman has ever become the object of worship among the Vedantins. It cannot be. A man is no more worthy of worship than any bird, any worm. We are all brothers. The difference is only in degree. I am exactly the same as the lowest worm. You see how very little room there is in Vedanta for any man to stand ahead of us and for us to go and worship him-he dragging us on and we being saved by him. Vedanta does not give you that. No book, no man to worship, nothing.

and thirdly,

Vedanta is just that. Its God is not the monarch sitting on a throne, entirely apart. There are those who like their God that way- a God to be feared and propitiated. They burn candles and crawl in the dust before Him. They want a king to rule them-they believe in a king in heaven to rule them all. The king is gone from this country at least. Where is the king of heaven now? Just where the earthly king is. In this country the king has entered every one of you. You are all kings in this country. So with the religion of Vedanta. You are all Gods. One God is not sufficient. You are all Gods, says the Vedanta.

Swamiji further stated,

India cannot give up his majesty the king of the earth -that is why Vedanta cannot become the religion of India. There is a chance of Vedanta becoming the religion of your country because of democracy. But it can become so only if you can and do clearly understand it, if you become real men and women, not people with vague ideas and superstitions in your brains, and if you want to be truly spiritual, since Vedanta is concerned only with spirituality.

What does Vedanta teach us? In the first place, it teaches that you need not even go out of yourself to know the truth.² ³....Therefore Vedanta formulates, not universal brother hood, but universal oneness.

I see that many people are still looking for Vedanta, and search for it in different religious and spiritual centers that may preach the very three things Swamiji taught that Vedanta was not. Many still need to find a Vedanta Center or other type of center in a very external sense to help inspire their life, which has not been fully spiritualized yet. But there are others who have found Vedanta within, and therefore find it wherever they go. These are the people who will spread what Swamiji¹s message to the West.

Though this message of Swamiji seems self-evident, it is may be hard to see, even if it is in front of our eyes. After all, even Swamiji¹s brother-disciples of Ramakrishna didn¹t all immediately catch on with his reformatted views. Swami Premananda himself admitted to not understanding Swamiji¹s greatness, till many years after Swamiji¹s death when he finally read what was available of the Complete Works.

The heights of Swamiji¹s ideas may seem beyond us, but they are there non-the -less for us to work with. Expanding on his concept of, ³It is good to be born in a church, but bad to die there,² theme, Swamiji stated,

...these pratikas nearing-stages" are all right; but the chances are nine to one that we shall stick to the Pratikas all our lives. It is very good to be born in a church, but it is very bad to die there. To make it clearer, it is very good to be born in a certain sect and have its training-it brings out our higher qualities; but we find in the vast majority of cases that we never come out or grow.(CW IV. p. 42)

Maybe it is time for those who have been imbued with the ideas and ideals of Ramakrishna, Sarada Devi and Swami Vivekananda, those who now have become big trees and are no longer growing under larger trees, to stand out into the light and share what they have learned selflessly. In fact this is what I see happening in many places with Vedanta ideas and teachings. We are so early in the saga of the manifestation of Ramakrishna¹s idea¹s. It may be a great joy and surprise to all of us to see how it unfolds in so many unforeseen ways. I am very happy to be a part of the great lila unfolding before us and through us.