Rituals and Publications
At the moment I’m sitting in a little village about 35 km outside Visakhapatnam, in Simhachalam, an old temple village, where for 3 days the Guru Pooja celebrations of the World Teacher Trust are being helt, in honour of the great Masters of Wisdom. Ever since 1962 these celebrations have been done here, and people from different states of India as well as our group of about 35 Westerners are attending. There are approx.3-4.000 people around, participating in the rituals or listening to the talks of our spiritual teacher, Dr. K. Parvathi Kumar.
Today’s topic was “Spiritual Fusion of East and West”. All Western members were invited this morning for the group meditation to come to the stage, in front of the large open air hall (there is a huge space between two rows of houses, which is covered by a long palaquin). Afterwards there was a lecture – in Telugu, like most of the lectures here. Though I don’t understand anything, I enjoy being in this atmosphere charged with spiritual energies. It is very relaxing for the mind – and sometimes I also fell comfortably asleep on the chair 🙂
After breakfast there was a water ritual in honour of the divine aspect of Will, expressed here in form of a lingam- an oval shaped stone. Water was poured over the lingam and afterwards it was decorated with flowers, accompanied by the rhythmic chanting of mantric songs. A very uplifting energy charged the atmosphere, while the ceremony went on for about 1.5 hours.
Afterwards there was the presentation of new publications. I was asked to come unto the stage, together with Dr. Kumar and Navaneetam. Navaneetam was presenting the different books – again mostly in Telugu. Then the people who had worked with the publication of the different books came to the stage and unveiled the parcel with the fresh publications. In all there were 16 different publications, mainly in Telugu, but some in English, and one even in German, my mother tongue.
Then I was asked to speak a bit about the work I’m doing with electronic communication. I explained how several impulses I got from Sri Kumar had developed over the years in an astonishing way, such as the newsletter “The Lunar Messenger” or the activity of the last months with the lectures and powerpoint presentations on “Meditation – Experiment and Experience” (I have written about it in several previous blogposts…).
Now the afternoon pause is coming to a close, and you can already hear the sounds of a musical presentation. So I’ll come to a close for today.
