Cover article on amma in THE WEEK magazine( text of article)

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Cover Feature

Embracing the world

Once an illiterate girl, Amritanandamayi at 50

is a global guru who heads a spiritual empire.

Devotees worship her as God

 

By C. Sujit Chandra Kumar

 

 

As he sat for the evening bhajan in that imposing auditorium of Mata

Amritanandamayi's ashram among 500 devotees, Raveendran Nair's mind

raced between disappointment and hope. There she was on the dais,

dressed in a white sari and flanked by two swamis. Some western

inmates had brought their quilts but most others sat cross-legged on

the floor. On both sides of the dais were gigantic photos of a

smiling Mata.

 

Earlier, an ashram official had advised Nair against joining the

queue to meet Mata Amritanandamayi or Amma as her devotees call her.

Fridays are reserved for first-timers and inmates. But he knew that

if he stayed back, she would take him in her arms the next day.

 

As the hi-fi system relayed the high-pitched bhajans, mostly in

Malayalam but interspersed with Hindi, English and even French songs,

Nair's anxieties began to dissolve. A little white girl, right behind

Amma, swayed from side to side and so did many in the audience. As

Amma chanted 'Krishna, Krishna' and her ecstatic laughter

reverberated in the hall, his troubles seemed irrelevant.

 

He was in his forties, wearing a cervical collar. He had a fall, a

year ago, while carrying a head load of stones. Being the only

breadwinner of the family, he had to carry on. When his limbs began

to go numb, he consulted a doctor who advised surgery and warned that

there was only 20 per cent chance of recovery.

 

"Since then, I have been coming here off and on. I am feeling better,

physically. I am sure Amma will see me through this," he says. And

she had suggested that his daughter, who had just passed plus two,

should try to join the nursing course at AIMS College of Nursing run

by the ashram. Unfortunately for him, the interview board did not

select her and he was awaiting further instructions from his saviour.

 

Captivating: A bhajan in progress at the Vallikkavu ashram;

(above right) Amma in a blissful moment during the session

 

Many who come to this scenic, remote fishing village of Vallikkavu,

now called Amritapuri, in Kerala's Kollam district are driven by

material needs. But there are others who have been wallowing in

wealth and fame but were still not satisfied.

 

Like Janani, 57, whose name was Beverley Noia when she was professor

of comparative religions in a New Mexico university. Her studies gave

her an idea of God but she craved 'direct' knowledge. She had a house

in the city and another in the mountains but wanted 'something' more.

 

A student told her about Amma's US visit. "I was very sceptical

because we get false gurus in the west who come for money," she says.

Her encounter was uneventful; Amma hugged her, as she hugs everyone.

 

But she watched her in action for four days. The distance, formality

and solemn manners that she expected in a guru were missing. "She was

like everybody's darling mother. Nobody could have put on an act for

so many hours," says Janani. She gave up her job, family and other

worldly possessions and has been serving Amma for the last 11

years. "I don't know if she is God. But she has a special

communication with God," she says.

 

Amritanandamayi, Kerala's hugging saint who straddles the material

and the spiritual worlds, is turning 50 on September 27. Her ashram

is celebrating the golden jubilee for four days from September 24, in

tune with her exalted status as a spiritual leader. In 1993, she was

one of the three people who represented Hinduism at the Parliament of

the World's Religions in Chicago. Last year, she won the Gandhi-King

Award for Non-violence; earlier recipients were British primatologist

Jane Goodall, former South African president Nelson Mandela and UN

Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

 

President Abdul Kalam has agreed to attend a CEO summit, which is

part of the celebration, "to discuss ways of creating a spiritually

strong, economically self-sufficient India with loving, compassionate

and selfless leaders".

 

Gentle persuasion is Amma's mantra, whether it is to fine-tune

spiritual practices or behaviour (left, with the ashram elephant).

 

Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani and Karnataka Chief Minister S.M.

Krishna have agreed to participate and so have celebrities from

different countries including former US senator Larry Pressler,

Martin Luther King's daughter Yolanda King and Hotmail founder Sabeer

Bhatia. Swami Amritaswaroopananda, vice-chairman of the ashram, has

been camping in Kochi to coordinate the arrangements including

accommo-dation, whether in hotels or homes, for 2.5 lakh admirers. In

all, nearly 10 lakh people could attend the various programmes and

charity activities. Commemorating the golden jubilee, the Kerala

government, led by Amma's admirer A.K. Antony, has announced a

housing scheme for the homeless; in the first phase, the government

would give five acres of land where the ashram would build houses

costing Rs 50,000 each. Famous musicians will perform at the

celebrations and 125 leading artists from India and abroad, including

her American follower the renowned Peter Max, will display their

paintings of Amma.

 

The celebrations and the guest list, not to speak of the massive

funds involved, reflect the importance of Amma, who has grown from

being an illiterate child with strange spiritual experiences to a

global guru who presides over an empire of charity. Her ashram

figures at the top of the list of charities receiving donations from

abroad. In 1998-99, for instance, the ashram is said to have received

more than Rs 50 crore. Amritaswaroopa-nanda says, quoting a minister,

that it is also the only one to pump back into the society all the

money it receives. But Amma and her disciples attribute the growth of

the ashram to the service rendered by the brahmacharis and devotees.

 

Listen to Dr Prem Nair, medical director of the ashram's prestigious

Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences (AIMS), and you realise it's no

bluster. He chucked his job as gastro-enterology professor at

Southern California University after meeting Amma in the US in 1989

and joined her ashram. Later, he was asked to take charge of her

hospital in Kochi. "For a lot of people, priorities in life change

after meeting Amma," he explains.

 

Prem was also moved by a personal experience. He had a growth in the

abdomen and it was diagnosed as lymphoma. Doctors suggested bone

marrow transplant. When he told Amma, she said he was going to be all

right. This was more than 12 years ago. "I declined the suggested

treatment and here I am, still alive," he says. How could a modern

medicine man choose such an option? "It is a matter of faith," he

says.

 

Besides AIMS, which in five years has grown to a Rs 70-crore, 800-bed

hospital and has treated around 20,000 patients free of cost, the

ashram has institutes that teach science, technology, computers and

management, homes for the aged, orphanages and family groups. Amma

has also established 16 Brahma-sthanam temples with women priests,

something unprecedented in the male-dominated Hindu society.

 

If in the early days, her fame was dependent on the belief of her

devotees in her

supernatural powers, the accent now is on service.

 

These institutions, most of which have come up in the last decade,

reflect a shift in the ashram's approach from sadhana (penance) to

service, though inmates insist these are but two sides of the same

coin. If in the early days, her fame was dependent on the belief of

her devotees that she had supernatural powers, the accent now is on

the service aspect.

 

The Vallikkavu ashram was once a soul-soothing spiritual tourism spot

for foreigners. It is now the self-contained headquarters of an

international charity conglomerate with towering quarters for

devotees who live with their families, a post office, a bank and a

vehicle booking counter. The only reminder of old times is the ferry,

which one has to take to reach the ashram.

 

The ashram has built 25,000 houses for the poor in 12 Indian states

and will build another 1 lakh in the next decade. It rebuilt three

earthquake-affected villages in Gujarat and distributes a monthly

pension to 50,000 destitute women, mainly in the south Indian states.

The ashram has branches in many Indian cities and has centres in

several Asian countries, the US, Europe, Mauritius and Reunion

Island. Soon after the celebrations, Amma will kick off her European

tour, covering England, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Belgium,

Switzerland, Finland, Austria and Holland. In November, she will

spend two weeks in the United States. In February next year, she will

tour north India and then fly to Mauritius, Reunion Island, Malaysia

and Singapore.

 

A curious admirer recently wanted to know Amma's reaction to a media

assessment that she was now more like a corporate executive than a

guru. She replied that her institutions stood for dharma, not profit.

The electricity tariff for all her institutions in India would add up

to Rs 10 crore a year and a radiation equipment that had just been

imported for the hospital cost Rs 12 crore. How was she to pay for

all this?

 

Be Indian: Amma with native American Indian chief Sah Pah in July

2002.

In traditional style, he presented her a white eagle feather

 

Prajnanamritananda, who was pursuing his doctorate at Tata Institute

of Fundamental Research before he gave up everything for Amma, points

to Amma's manage-ment skills when asked about the ashram's

success. "Companies usually follow a fear-greed management policy,"

he says. "In the ashram, compassion and love are what drive the

inmates. And stress is on the spiritual growth of the individual. So,

there is a blooming of potential."

 

Gentle persuasion is the management mantra, whether it is to fine-

tune disciples' spiritual practices, behaviour or dress code. In a

recent session for the inmates, she spoke of how, in the early days,

a western woman devotee wore a transparent dress, and the 'big swami'

(Amritaswaroopananda) ordered her to leave the spot, leaving her in

tears. Amritanandamayi consoled her, explaining that the brahmacharis

were yet to gain full control of their minds. But why should I suffer

because somebody else can't control his mind, the tearful woman

wanted to know. Message 1: Pay close attention to what you wear. Then

comes another anecdote. During a foreign tour, Amma was at this

airport, and a couple was kissing in public. "I was hoping that the

brahmacharis wouldn't see it and they were praying that it escapes my

notice," she said, plunging her admirers into peals of laughter.

Message 2: What is acceptable in one culture is anathema in another.

 

For long, Damayanti, Amritanandamayi's mother, would withdraw when

press photographers visited Edamannel house, next to the ashram. She

hasn't been too kind to her extraordinary child, called Sudhamani in

those days, and the biographers have not missed it.

 

Damayanti and Sugunanandan, who now address their daughter as Amma

and light a lamp before her photo, recall that the child had great

concern for the poor, though their own family was barely subsisting.

She didn't care much for education, which ended in the fifth

standard, but was keen about chanting and prayers. She was virtually

the servant of the family, doing all kinds of menial jobs.

Sugunanandan remembers that the child was found mixing water in the

milk the family sold, so that she could give the money to the needy.

 

A dramatic tale: Sugunanandan and Damayanti, Amma's parents

 

It was in 1975 that Sudhamani showed her 'Krishna bhava' (behaving as

if she were Lord Krishna) during a religious reading in the

neigbourhood. At other times, she used to behave like 'Devi'. Says

Sugunanandan: "Even though a believer, I found it difficult to

understand this and was worried that it was a mental problem."

 

People began to flock to the village and seek her blessings. But

there was also opposition from within and outside the family, which

culminated in her expulsion from the house. For a time, she lived

outdoors and around 1979, a few disciples left their families and

started living by her side. Sugunanandan remembers that the

rationalists made life difficult for Amma and her family by harassing

them and those who visited her. In 1981, the Mata Amritanandamayi

Math started off in a few thatched huts near her family house.

 

Today, after two eventful decades, the Math is big, with its imposing

structures, presses, canteens, computers, and baby elephant but not

big enough to host all her devotees from around the world who want to

wish her happy birthday. Almost unmindful of the celebrations in

distant Kochi, Amritanandamayi carries on, giving darshan to men,

women and children, black, white and brown, solving their material

and spiritual problems, and hugging them till it hurts.

 

 

Tactile tonic

If Mahesh Yogi's trademark is Transcendental Meditation and Sri Sri

Ravi Shankar's is Sudarshan Kriya, Amritanandamayi's spiritual USP is

a simple, warm hug. As the Herald Tribune wrote in a front-page

report, during Amma's visit this July to Japan, "if there were a

world record for hugs, it would surely go to Mata Amritanandamayi, a

small, dark woman with a radiant smile". The Independent had this to

say when she visited London a few years back: "There were no rousing

speeches, no religious messages, no strong-arm fund-raising tactics;

just a round-faced woman in an armchair, smiling and dispensing

tactile tonics."

 

"If there were a world record for hugs, it would surely

go to Mata Amritanandamayi, a small, dark woman

with a radiant smile".

 

No one has counted but a popular estimate is that she would have

hugged more than two crore people. And, every day the record is being

broken. Disciples say there have been times when she has hugged over

20,000 people at a stretch in 20-hour sessions.

 

It is no exaggeration. Visit Vallikkavu whenever she is in the ashram

and you can see people queuing up for her embrace. If the queue is

longer, she quickens the pace. But never does she get up till the

last man or woman has got the hug.

 

Earlier, Devi Bhava or the special darshan when she dresses up as a

goddess, used to be three days a week. Now, it is only on Sundays.

Starting in the evening, these sessions often stretch to the

following morning.

 

With a friendly pat on the back, she brings disciples, sometimes two

at a time, close to her ears, allowing them to whisper their

innermost anxieties. She kisses and consoles them, whispering, "my

darling son". Grown-up people bury their faces in her lap and cry

unashamedly. Disciples pass on packets of prasad to her from behind.

Sometimes she gifts people a candy or an apple.

 

There is no attempt to put on an air of superiority. Sometimes she

sympathises. Sometimes she taunts people for sobbing like kids. Or

she shows genuine concern. Like when it was a French woman's turn,

recently. Amma told those around her, alarmed: "Do you know this lady

is completely off her mind? Anybody from France around?" She then

gave instructions that the woman be put up only on the ground floor

and that she be given her medicines regularly.

 

A student is there to seek her permission to join a particular

course. A retired professor wants to name his school after her. A

young girl from the west wants to clear her spiritual doubts. Sitting

on a platform on the floor, she obliges everyone. First-timers find

it irksome that they have to go down on their knees to come face to

face with her. But her joyful demeanour and the warm hug dissolve

such misgivings.

 

As she retires to her room, waving and extending her arms to the

disciples, some of them crouch and kiss the spot where she sat, to

capture some of the grace.

 

Is there a psychological explanation for the way the devotees behave?

Dr Philip John, clinical psychiatrist in Kochi, points to the fact

that Amma represents a mother figure. "There is a subcultural

perception of comfort and security in the mother's bosom. In a

spiritual setting, the devotee looks forward to a symbol of this

relationship. Amma has translated the hug into that symbol. The hug

is therefore a perpetual reminder of that relationship," he says.

 

"When she listens to the confession or plea and smiles, it abruptly

takes away the weight on the chest, making the devotee cry. This

catharsis, besides giving comfort or solace, provides hope which

keeps that person going," he says, adding that the enfolding presence

continues even without her physical presence.

 

The inner circle

The first set of monastic disciples of Amritanandamayi were from

Harippad, a town not very far from Vallikkavu, in the late 80s. They

suffered taunts and threats from sceptics, gave up their education

and worldly assets and stayed near her house. Today, they as well as

some others of that era are senior swamis, looking after the ashram's

multifarious activities.

 

Leading lights: Amritaswaroopananda (centre) with Ron Gotsegen (left)

and Dr Prem Nair; (below left) Amritatmananda

 

The most important disciple, now known as valiya (big) swami in

ashram circles, is Swami Amritaswaroopananda. He was the first to be

initiated as a sanyasi. "It took 11 years before Amma thought I was

fit to be a sanyasi," he says. The once curious BA student from

Harippad called Balagopal is now like a confident COO, coordinating

the ashram's activities within and outside the country. Handsome and

knowledgeable, he is the visible face of the marketing machinery of

the ashram that people speak highly of.

 

Ramakrishnananda, who regularly accompanies Amma during her world

tours, belonged to an orthodox Brahmin family and was a bank employee

in Harippad. He went to Amma in the hope that her blessings would

help him get a transfer to Palakkad. Instead, he got transported into

the world of renunciation.

 

He wanted to join her immediately but she told him to wait till his

sister's marriage. After three years, he resigned his job and joined

the ashram, against the wishes of his parents. His father was able to

reconcile to the fact that his son wanted to be a sanyasi but not to

the fact that he would be sishya to a Dalit woman. Over the years,

his parents became frequent visitors to the ashram and even settled

down there.

 

Amritatmananda, yet another swami, from a well-known family of

businessmen in Harippad, is part of Amma's core bhajan group and

accompanies her during her world tours. He first went to meet Amma

out of sheer curiosity. When the non-believer joined an ashram led by

a low-caste woman, his parents were shocked and even lodged a

complaint with the police. But he was determined. "Amma touches

people in so many ways, especially the young," he says. He describes

how he came across a 25-year-old drug addict in Switzerland. "He had

lost his parents in an accident, took to drugs and was contemplating

suicide. After seeing a poster, he came to a session and Amma told

him, 'You have Mother, don't worry'. He became her follower and found

a new meaning in life. He is coming to Kochi for her birthday," he

says.

 

One incident that touched the earliest inmates involved a leprosy

patient called Dattan.

Amma hugged him and licked his sores.

 

One incident that touched most of the earliest inmates involved a

leprosy patient called Dattan who was so gruesome that he covered

himself with a cloth. They say Amma hugged him and licked his sores.

In time, they claim, he became free of the disease. But the ashram

faced a problem when more lepers came for blessings and other

devotees felt uncomfortable. "Then she agreed to send bhasmam (sacred

ash) to them," says Ramakrishnananda.

 

Swami Paramatmananda or Neil Rosner was the first foreigner to join

the ashram. He was with Ramana Maharishi's ashram in Thiruvilvamalai

and visited Vallikkavu. Amma later sent him to America to look after

one of her centres. He is now back in Vallikkavu.

 

One of Amma's prominent foreign disciples is Ron Gotsegen who is the

administrative director of AIMS. After meeting Amma, he sold his

highly successful electronic equipment business-Radionics was a

market leader-and helped set up an ashram in San Rimon, which now

functions as the ashram's US headquarters.

 

 

 

The beautiful touch

I got to know Amritanandamayi seven years ago. In our first meeting I

felt the beauty of her touch which is so divine. I went and met her

at the ashram. I felt at peace after her divine touch.

We have a lot of saints giving discourses in English and Hindi, but

she speaks her own language and is still able to reach out to so

many. I have given two concerts in her presence, one at her ashram

and one in America. Today we need peace. And she has so much to give

to the world.

I won't be around for her birthday celebrations as I am going to the

US. Once I come back I will try and see her.

Anup Jalota

 

>From the soul

Mikko Von Hertzen was his name and in German that means, 'from the

heart'. Don't worry about the pronunciation. The 30-year-old musician

from Helsinki is now called Satya.

 

A music composer, Satya's education didn't go too well because he was

performing throughout the year in Finland. "I was a star and

magazines had put me on the cover," he says.

 

Singing from the heart: Satya

 

Hearing about Amma's visit to Sweden from a friend, he travelled to

Stockholm to meet her. "It was an intense experience. I asked her

whether I could come to India. She advised me to finish my studies

(degree in eco-tourism) first."

 

He studied 16 hours a day and finished his course in two months and

went to Paris and met Amma there. "She agreed this time and I came

down here about five years ago. During my initial six-week stay, I

learnt more about Amma and that my life is connected to hers."

 

After joining the ashram, he stopped singing, thinking it a past

life. But Amma insisted that he should sing. "She told me to sing

about spiritual things instead of the material concerns which were my

subject," he says. Now a member of the bhajan group, he amazes people

with his rendering of Malayalam songs.

 

The sceptical view

While Amritanandamayi's popularity has been growing exponentially,

both within and outside Kerala, she has also had her share of

critics.

 

In the beginning, she had to face the wrath of rationalists in her

region. Though criticism has become less strident there still are

those who find fault with her and point to the affluence of her

relatives. They also have a grouse that they have not benefited from

the unprecedented development that has taken place in the region.

There is heartburn because the ashram is a self-contained unit and it

doesn't have to depend on outside labourers for skilled or unskilled

activity. "There is jealousy," says Sugunanandan, Amma's father.

 

Amma herself quips that history is full of examples of gurus being

driven away from their place of birth and that people of her village

are better in that they haven't done that to her.

 

Certain intellectuals have also pointed fingers. Last year, there was

an uproar when Sreeni Pattathanam, a rationalist, published a book in

Malayalam, Mata Amritana-ndamayi-Divya Kadhakalum Yatharthiavum

(Sacred Stories and Reality).

 

Paul Zachariah is a prominent writer who has often spoken against her

movement. "Whether in politics or religion, personality cult is not a

healthy practice. It will lower the cultural indicator of these

followers and affect their critical intelligence," says

Zachariah. "Besides, if spirituality is a connection between human

being and a larger principle, why do you need an intermediary?"

 

But isn't there a sadguru tradition in Hindu culture? "But a guru

should draw the line somewhere. Somebody like Ramana Maharishi never

allowed people to worship him," he says.

 

Zachariah has one more worry. He claims there is a close association

between the ashram and Hindu fundamentalist forces and this poses

dangers, as Amritanandamayi wields influence over thousands of people.

The leading lights of the ashram, however, say there is no substance

to the charge. "Is A.K. Antony or S.M. Krishna, who respects Amma, a

fundamentalist?" asks a senior swami.

 

 

 

Interview/Mata Amritanandamayi

My karma is to console

 

By C. Sujit Chandra Kumar

 

It was 8.30 p.m. when we were ushered into Amma's headquarters, after

she had given darshan to everyone and conducted the bhajan. There

were Krishna idols and pictures in different parts of the room. There

was also a picture of Jesus Christ.

 

There were only two chairs and the swamis, who had turned up to

listen to the interview, sat on the floor or stood reverentially. She

offered me the other chair but I preferred to sit close to her on the

floor, in tune with the humility of her disciples and also to allow

the recorder to catch every word. Excerpts:

 

Asking why I hug is like asking a river why it flows. That is my

character.

If a person is falling down, won't you want him to get up?

 

Are you God?

(Laughs.) Son, tell me what is your concept of God?

 

Well, we can't see Him. We want to know Him... He has supernatural

powers.

I don't believe that God is there above the sky. I have a concept of

God in terms of qualities. The attempt is to instill those qualities

in people.

 

Thousands come to you with their problems. Do you feel tense

sometimes?

I live in this moment. So there is no tension. I know the world's

character. People come and express their desires. It is not a tough

task for a mother to look after her children. It becomes difficult

only for an ayah.

 

Crowds don't make me tense. Sometimes there are 20,000 people,

sometimes 30,000. If there are more people, I increase the speed with

which I attend to them.

 

Why do you hug people?

It is like asking a river why it flows. That is my character. It

became so. If a person is falling down, will you just watch or will

you help that person to get up? I don't see if it is a man or woman.

The duty of a doctor is to treat patients. In the same way, my karma

is to console those who are sad.

 

In Indian culture, we have the concept, mathru devo bhava (Mother is

God). Mother is given the premier position. When a child is crying,

you pat on its back. Then it lies down on your lap and cries. You

then put the child on your shoulders. Then you put an arm around the

poor thing. The embrace evolved naturally.

 

Sometimes there are so many who want to meet you. Don't you feel

tired?

Till now, I have not felt so. I have been giving darshan for over 35

years. I don't know about the future. Tomorrow is different from

today.

 

Do you get headaches or other problems?

Not really. But it is possible because the body is made of the five

elements. Till now, I have not stopped darshan midway and gone back

to my room. If I start in the morning, I stop it in the afternoon

because people will come again in the evening. That will go on till

the following morning, sometimes till noon.

 

What is your favourite food?

(Laughs.) Amma has no likes and dislikes. I accept whatever I get. In

the ashram, they don't cook fish or meat. Not that I'm against it.

But why kill animals? Some may say, eating vegetables also involves

destruction. But killing a chicken is worse than destroying an egg.

 

Do you listen to music?

Everything is God for me. There is no quality which is special. In

sanadhana dharma, there is no srishti (creation) and srishtithavu

(creator). It is the same. I see God in people. Whether it be music

or something else, these are all God's qualities.

 

What do you do when you are alone?

I read letters from devotees the whole night. There are about 3,000

people living here. They have complaints. There are letters from

different organisations. I am able to read only a small portion of

what comes. I give the rest to my children to read. If one person can

be helped, it is better to that extent.

 

They say you sleep only two hours.

Sometimes, not even that much. There is work. Day and night have

become almost the same.

 

Why do you dress up like a goddess?

I had this habit of dancing to devotional songs. Some devotees like

to dress up Amma. In north India, they put Krishna's crown and bring

butter. They enjoy that. In the same way, people who worship Devi

bring flowers, etc. It is the sankalpam (imagination) of devotees.

Once, a devotee from Madurai had a dream that he should bring a crown

for me. It is their desire and not that I wanted it. If somebody

gives trousers (she has a hearty laugh), I am ready to wear that too,

if it will help dharma.

 

Why did you assume the name Amritanandamayi?

I used to write the prayer, Om, Amrithajyothirmayame. My name was

Sudhamani and Sudha means amritham (nectar). And the sishyas renamed

it this way.

 

Your biography says you converted water to panchamritham (sweet dish).

I don't think of it as a miracle. For me, peace of mind is the

greatest miracle.

What happened that day was, there was this Bhagavatha reading in a

neighbour's house. While listening, I danced in ecstasy. Some people

came and demanded that I show them a miracle. When they insisted, I

asked them for a pot of water. That was distributed to everyone and

they ate the panchamritham. Another time, someone took away the lamp.

Those days, there was no electricity. Some devotees poured water in

sea shells. I asked them to light it. It happened while the devotees

were watching. They only did it. I haven't done anything myself.

 

People say you have cured diseases. Why then did you build a hospital?

Even if you remove the poison from body, if mind doesn't change,

there is no use. Jesus Christ is said to have healed people. Why are

his followers building hospitals? How did Krishna become Dhanwantara-

murthy? Prayer and medicine are necessary. Tomorrow, I can also get

unwell.

 

Celebrations are being planned for your 50th birthday.

We wanted to have a mass prayer involving people of different

cultures for world peace. That was combined with this birthday. For

devotees, birthday is important. We have these programmes for women,

youth and businessmen. People came forward for a forum like this.

 

Why do you go on foreign tours?

Spiritual life should be like a river. In olden days, there were no

buses or trains. Yet, Shankaracharya toured the country and set up

ashrams all over. He didn't sit in one place. Yes, if you sit in one

place, you develop more affinity to God. But inside you as well as

outside should become like a river. I travel to different parts of

India also.

 

Some local people still have doubts.

How can we remove the doubts of everyone? When Krishna, Nabi and Rama

came to this world, people had doubts. Is there anyone who has total

acceptance? Do children fully accept their parents? Does one have

full control of one's own mind? No. There will be two sides and that

is the way it should be. Some have preconcieved ideas. It is

difficult to wake up those who are pretending to be asleep.

 

They say your relatives are rich.

They can only look at such things. Amma's relatives are into

business. One brother is into building contracts. He also has some

chocolate agency. Father had about 20 boats. He sold some and set up

a business for another brother. Maybe, because of some devotees, he

was able to expand it without much investment. The younger brother

has a money-lending business. Kasturi (sister) and husband are

employed. Another sister's husband has a job. They also have boats.

 

Father still earns his bread through hard work. He doesn't take

anything from the ashram, which is managed by swamis. The local

people are generally good. But a few sometimes have got drunk and

tried to create trouble. Once, they threw stones. Now some are

showering flowers.

 

 

 

 

Ammachi, Mike Brooker <patria1818> wrote:

> > http://www.the-week.com/23sep21/cover.htm

> >

> I'm having no luck viewing this page. Just getting

> that #$%^&!*& "this page cannot be displayed" message.

> Can you please copy and paste the article.

>

> Keval

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