Born into a pious family in Dere, Bengal, at about the time of the American Revolution, Ksudiram grew up devoted to Sri Ramachandra and blessed with the noble qualities of a true Brahmin—truthfulness, contentment, forgiveness, renunciation—all of which his life was to test again and again. Each day he began by gathering flowers for his worship of Ramachandra. All day … Read More
Born into a Quaker family, Jane Tyson Clement lived a life of faith and service until her passing in the year 2000. Deeply affected by the suffering and injustice in the world around her, she entered into an intense spiritual search that brought her to God, and to the understanding that only in God lie the answers. Together with her … Read More
Just after the full moon in November the Ananda community gathered to bid farewell to our great-souled friend Ramdas, who had the day before passed from this earth life. His was a life given in loving service and divine friendship to everyone he met, and more deeply, to God and Guru. He loved God, and he loved God as He … Read More
December, 1878: Next to the convent school run by the Sisters of Loretto in Santa Fe, New Mexico, is the chapel of Our Lady of Light, at that time complete except for any means of access to the choir loft two stories up. Designed, at the Bishop’s insistence, by an architect in Paris on the model of Paris’s Sainte Chapelle, … Read More
1871: Civil war rages in Paris. The Parisian Republican insurgents have risen against the repressive Versailles government. The Communards are overwhelmed; many die in the fighting; of those who survive, some few flee abroad. The Danish writer Isak Dineson fictionalized the story of one who escaped the carnage and was given asylum in Norway. Babette has stood behind the barricades … Read More
Not long after the end of World War II, an American writer named Paul Gallico, repelled by the materialism of the post-war years, stopped on impulse to see the tomb of Saint Francis in Assisi. Though he knew little about Francis and did not come as a pilgrim, he left as a devotee, profoundly changed and inspired. Walking the cobbled … Read More
One evening, for a “movie night,” the Ananda Village monks watched Into Great Silence, a documentary film about a very strict French Catholic monastery. The monks live in complete silence, praying long hours in their cells, coming together only for meals and formal worship. Over time one monk seems to be sinking deeper into dementia. His monastic brothers treat him … Read More
At the close of Ananda’s celebration of its fiftieth anniversary, Jyotish urged us to memorize Yoganandaji’s poem “God! God! God!”—and to so train our minds that whatever comes our way we turn within and call on God: When boisterous storms of trials shriek, And when worries howl at me, I will drown their noises, loudly chanting: God! God! God! The … Read More
Soon after Ophelia left her body, mid-May of 2019, the Ananda community gathered to celebrate her life and to affirm our eternal friendship in God—with Ophelia, and with one another. A deeply devoted Mexican Catholic, Ophelia came often to Ananda to keep a watchful maternal eye on the two of her eleven children who were members of the community. At … Read More
“‘America! Surely these people are Americans!’ This was my thought as a panoramic vision of Western faces passed before my inward view.” And just after this vision, Yoganandaji cries joyfully to young Bimal (who has found his hiding place), “I have news for you: the Lord is calling me to America!” And so begins our Master’s sacred journey to America, … Read More
