Blasphemy?? What do Sy say to such a thing?

[Guest guest]

Dear all,

sometimes i come across acticles like these and wonder what they

are all about or why such people feel the need to write such things

or outright disbelieve everything, especially not knowing the people

who wrote them and their involvement very well.

 

I stumbled across an article i would like to post below and then i

would like to pose a question to all.

 

How do Sy reply to such things when they come up in conversation

with people and in general? Has anyone seen this article before and

have any comments on it.

 

I always seem to feel bad or worried when i read acticles like this

and i don't know why people want to write such things without their

own involvement , but on other peoples words.

 

If i could get a reply from any and all, epsecially Jagbir and

Violet, that would be great.

 

The article is below.

 

Take care

 

ky

 

==========

She's been hailed as a saint: a selfless distributor of goodness and

light. But, on the eve of her appearance at the Royal Albert Hall,

Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi is under attack.

 

Independent News/July 13, 2001

By Mary Braid and Beatrice Newbery

The posters are appearing again, all over east London. They depict

an elderly Indian grandmother, of comfortingly rotund proportions,

her forehead stained with the traditional red tikka, her face

radiant and serene. She will, we are told, be appearing at the Royal

Albert Hall tomorrow night, where spectators will be able

to " experience the living power that will change your life. "

 

This cuddly, sari-clad lady is called Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi; now

78, she founded the Sahaja Yoga movement in the early 1970s; she now

has tens of thousands of devoted followers across the globe.

 

Tomorrow, if all goes according to divine plan, Shri Mataji - whose

full name means " Venerable Great Mother Immaculate Goddess " - will

dispense to thousands, absolutely free, her gift of " self-

realisation " . Those gathered around her should be able to feel a

release of spiritual energy, or Kundalini, that will rise from the

base of the spine until it bursts through the fontanelle area at the

top of the head. Shri Mataji will then ask if they can feel a cool

breeze on their head and " vibrations " on their palms and over their

heads. If previous events are anything to go by, most hands will

shoot up and the audience will have connected, en masse, with the

divine. Thereafter, they will be able to make all the right

decisions in life, to know the truth of things, and even to heal

themselves of illnesses.

 

Over the years, countless newcomers have been sufficiently impressed

to find out more, joining one of the 44 Sahaja Yoga groups and seven

ashrams across Britain. Worldwide, Shri Mataji is estimated to have

between 30,000 and 100,000 followers. Official publicity material

makes much of her standing in the international community. She is

married to " one of India's top diplomats " (Chandrika Prasad

Srivastava, who has an honorary British knighthood), comes from an

aristocratic family, advised Gandhi on spiritual matters and has

twice been nominated for the Nobel Peace prize.

 

But harmless as she looks, and sounds, Shri Mataji has her

detractors. Ian Haworth, founder of the Cult Information Centre, has

spent the past 20 years dealing with families who believe their

children or siblings may have been " lost " to Shri Mataji. Former

members who claim to have been " lost " themselves and

subsequently " recovered " are becoming increasingly vociferous in

their attacks on the organisation. Their message is that Sahaja Yoga

is a cult which aims to control the minds of its members.

 

According to them, followers meditate in front of a photograph of

Shri Mataji which they believe emits powerful vibrations. They

regard her with both devotion and fear. While most Sahaja Yogis

continue with their jobs, their spare time is spent in the worship

of Shri Mataji, meditating, performing rituals, mixing with other

Sahaja Yogis, recruiting newcomers at public meetings.

 

Every year, thousands of her devotees travel from all over the world

to India or Italy (where she lives), to perform mass pujas,

worshipping her with mantras, offering sweetmeats, honey, incense

and gifts. Shri Mataji, according to these ex-members, claims to

be " Adi Shakti " , the Supreme Goddess or Primordial Power - or, more

simply, God in the feminine form.

 

One ex-disciple, Juan, from Switzerland, claims the organisation

insisted he break off all family ties: " Once they told my Sahaja

Yoga brother and I that we should slap our mother if she argued. As

zealous disciples, we followed instructions and my brother slapped

her. Next we were told to cease all communication with her. I loved

my mother but I forced myself to obey. "

 

Babies born of two Sahaja Yoga parents are considered realised

souls, of high calibre with an extra responsibility. " Your children

have to be the soldiers of Sahaja Yoga, not dainty darlings, " Shri

Mataji announced at one puja. " You have to rough it, you have to

make them sturdy. "

 

Parents are encouraged to send their children to a Sahaja school in

Rome from the age of four, and then on to the school in Dharamsala,

India that accepts children from the age of eight. Extra-curricular

activities there include learning to meditate in front of Shri

Mataji's image and listening to her teachings.

 

Shri Mataji's supporters deny that there is anything irregular about

the movement's educational activities. But the Sahaja Yoga view of

children certainly seems unconventional. Juan has a tape of a

meeting in Canberra in 1991 at which Shri Mataji insisted that a

child who was crying during her speech was " possessed. "

 

Another ex-member, Alistair, has never forgiven himself for sending

his small daughter to the Sahaja Yoga schools. " I still can't

believe I did it, " he says. " My heart would break when I put my

young girl on a plane and sent her away for nine months. All the

parents would say 'How are your children doing?' and we'd always

reply 'Oh they're having a wonderful time,' since you can't

criticise. But my daughter's grades were very poor in reading,

writing and maths, and when we picked her up on her annual holiday,

she had lice and her clothes were tattered and dirty. "

 

Derek Lee, Sahaja Yoga's national co-ordinator in Britain, says the

organisation " believes in strong families. We are not in the

business of breaking up families. "

 

When the ex-members' group started to form, some of them had been

Sahaja Yogis for two decades and were grieving for their " lost "

years. Others were having trouble making decisions on their own in

the world, without guidance from Mataji or vibrations. They claim

it's not easy to leave the organisation. An ex-member called

Christine, once Sahaja Yoga's US country leader, explains: " When I

was in Sahaja Yoga, I thought that to go against Shri Mataji, to

fall from grace, was a fate worse than death. After I left, I had

nightmares for months. " For another, Anna, leaving meant confronting

the fear that the outside world was evil, a result of the " us versus

them " attitude encouraged in Sahaja Yoga. " Every morning, " she

laughs, " I would perform a bandhan - a ritual to protect against

negativity from other people. And I never looked at people straight -

I always focused between their eyes. The fear of the outside world

was deep in my system. " Christine cannot believe now that she

allowed Shri Mataji to arrange three marriages for her to other

followers.

 

Simon Montford, a Londoner in his late-twenties who works in further

education, went to his first Sahaja Yoga meeting in Brighton when he

was 19. " In time, I began not only to feel the vibrations, " he

recalls, " but to believe that others could feel my vibrations, how

good or bad they were, and that Shri Mataji especially had that

insight. This belief makes members fundamentally paranoid. " It also

makes them slaves, Montford and other former members say, to Mataji.

 

Montford, who " wasted " six years of his life following Sahaja Yoga,

now dedicates much of his spare time to disabusing her

disciples. " At first, followers are not told about the arranged

marriages, " he says. " Or how children are sent away to Sahaja Yoga

schools in Italy and India. "

 

His interventions are not welcomed by the organisation. Last year,

Montford went to a meeting at the Royal Albert Hall with a bag of

flyers detailing his objections to Shri Mataji. As soon as he began

to hand them out, he says: " Four followers came out and tried to

grab my bag, although they backed off when I yelled out. Next they

started snatching the flyers off people. Then they crowded round me

and threatened to smash my face in. "

 

In her defence, Shri Mataji and her supporters make much of the fact

that she offers her spiritual gift for free. The official Sahaja

Yoga website boasts that " without any financial support from any

person, Shri Mataji neither charges for Her lectures nor for Her

ability to give Self Realisation. "

 

According to ex-members, however, belonging to the organisation can

be a costly business. Typical costs might include: fees for the

music academy and youth camp; rent for ashrams owned by Shri Mataji;

bills for treatment at the Sahaja Yoga hospital; payments from

wedding ceremonies; and earnings from music and video tapes,

magazines, even Ayurvedic medicines that are " vibrated " because they

have grown on Shri Mataji's land.

 

And what many of them now point to is the discrepancy between their

old mistress's avowed altruism and her apparent wealth. Their

website lists the extensive properties she owns across the globe -

in Italy, the US, Canada, Australia and India - and also analyses in

some detail the movement's financial position, estimating its

profits at between $2.3m to $5.5m a year.

 

Derek Lee utterly rejects the insinuation that the guru is growing

rich on her followers' spirituality. " She is married to one of the

wealthiest men in India and was wealthy before she ever started, so

she doesn't need the money, " he says, adding that her long list of

properties across the world are mainly used as ashrams.

 

" Members do make contributions to things like the hire of the Albert

Hall, but no one forces us to do that, " he says. " And she does raise

money but for Sahaja Yoga but not for herself. The money comes back

to us. She has just given us £150,000 for a new centre. "

 

What's harder to refute is the accusation that there are unwholesome

elements in the philosophy of Sahaja Yoga. Shri Mataji's book Meta

Modern Era repeatedly talks about the " greed " of the Jews

exterminated by Hitler. ( " They always lent money on exorbitant

terms, " she explains.) And her claims to be not just a guru but

a " Divine personality of the highest kind " become less ambiguous the

further one examines her speeches and writings.

 

Of the claims that Sahaja Yoga members are pressured to send their

children to the movement's schools, Lee says that it is up to

individual parents but that some feel it is better to sent their

children to India or Italy to keep them away from " ecstasy and sex

before the age of 14. "

 

In the past two years, Montford and his allies have been battling it

out with their old spiritual mistress on the Web, at a website

address that is almost identical to that set up by the Sahaja Yoga

movement itself. If one potential devotee, or wavering member,

stumbles on their site while on the way to the other, the effort

will have been worth it, say the ex-members.

 

A letter posted on the ex-members' website claiming to be from

the " Sahaja Yoga finance committee " in Italy acknowledged the

movement's extensive property holdings, but insisted that there was

nothing improper about them. It added: " Sahaja Yoga doors are open

for every individual. Sometimes we get people who are very sinful,

hypocritical, cheats, and have very low type of background. After

getting realisation many of them do rise and get transformed, but

some do get lost. These are the people who publish such wrong things

about Shri Mataji. "