As I read reports of rapid high­way infra­struc­ture  devel­op­ment accom­pa­nied by destruc­tion of tra­di­tional sacred spaces in Vrind­a­ban, Braj, India which leads to end­ing the tra­di­tional lifestyles of many res­i­dents, I am sad­dened for those who live there and are trau­ma­tized by all this. I would also be sad­dened if such changes occurred here in the remote rural area where I live.

I lived in Vrind­a­ban in the early 1970s and laid the foun­da­tion for the Krishna Balaram Tem­ple. Gau­ranga Das Babaji told me, “Never leave Vrind­a­ban.” I con­sid­ered doing just that. Lalita Prasad Thakur told me, “Go back to the West and preach where you’re needed.” That is the path my life took.

How­ever, I fol­low both instruc­tions by always keep­ing a pic­ture of Radha Kund and imag­in­ing myself liv­ing there in my for­est cot­tage near Lalita’s. I med­i­tate on Braj and Radha-Krishna’s play in my heart mak­ing wher­ever I live a spir­i­tual Braj.

The cur­rent sit­u­a­tion in the earthly Braj reminds me of when Jerusalem was attacked by the Baby­lo­ni­ans. The Jews thought Yah­weh would pro­tect them since Jerusalem con­tained his tem­ple and holy of holies. They were his cho­sen peo­ple. The Baby­lo­ni­ans sacked the city and exiled its pop­u­la­tion to Baby­lon. The exiles’ prophets told them to work for the good of their cap­tors since their well-being was now inter­twined. They rewrote their the­ol­ogy and scrip­tures as they went from a sep­a­ratist tem­ple and holy city cen­tered reli­gion to a more uni­ver­sal one.

Per­haps this time of deal­ing with forced change within the reli­gion of Radha-Krishna devo­tion is a good time to insti­tute more sweep­ing vol­un­tary changes in its the­ol­ogy and prac­tice which would be uni­ver­sal­iz­ing fac­tors. I have made a first attempt at this.