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Essential teachings

Uni­ver­sal­ist Radha-Krishnaism comes under the head­ing of panen­the­ism, which the Oxford Amer­i­can Dic­tio­nary defines as “the belief or doc­trine that God is greater than the uni­verse and includes and inter­pen­e­trates it.” God-dess man­i­fests per­son­ally as Radha-Krishna, imper­son­ally as the Undif­fer­en­ti­ated One, and as an imma­nent, all-pervading presence–Cosmic Consciousness.

The more lim­it­ing and con­strain­ing our def­i­n­i­tion of God, the eas­ier it is to dis­prove. God-dess is unlim­ited and unde­fin­able. We do not want to wor­ship a God that is too small and can­not stand up to intel­lec­tual scrutiny.

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ESSENTIAL TEACHINGS
  1. God-dess means god-goddess, the Divine Cou­ple, Radha-Krishna, energy-energetic, ground of all being, pri­mal cause.
  2. God-dess is known through scrip­tures, spir­i­tual teach­ers, devo­tion, innate know­ing, and spir­i­tual teach­ings of all cul­tures through the ages to vary­ing degrees.
  3. While rec­og­niz­ing truth in all authen­tic spir­i­tual paths, Uni­ver­sal­ist Radha-Krishnaism focuses on cre­at­ing an indige­nous, west­ern expres­sion of devo­tion to God-dess based on the teach­ings of Bhak­tivin­ode Thakur. It employes inter­faith stud­ies and crit­i­cal ana­lyt­i­cal meth­ods of interpretation.
  4. Uni­ver­sal­ist Radha-Krishnaism estab­lishes a liv­ing, evolv­ing process of God-dess real­iza­tion rooted in tra­di­tional, Indian devo­tion, yet updated to pre­serve the essen­tials and dis­card unnec­es­sary cul­tural prac­tices that alien­ate prac­ti­tion­ers from con­tem­po­rary society.
  5. Nat­ural devo­tion is based on prin­ci­ples of lib­erty, truth, and love. It com­bines devo­tional love with intel­lec­tual hon­esty and open­ness. Devo­tees open them­selves to God-dess’ lead­ing through total self-surrender.
  6. Prac­ti­tion­ers live as spir­i­tual beings on Earth, one with Earth and life. God-dess per­vades all. Prac­ti­tion­ers embrace a lifestyle of sim­ple liv­ing and high think­ing. They offer all to God-dess as a liv­ing sac­ri­fice of love, are ves­sels of divine love, and live in accord with eter­nal spir­i­tual val­ues. Devo­tees live in the present as fully par­tic­i­pat­ing mem­bers of local and global soci­ety, work­ing for the well-being of all, accord­ing to their ability.
  7. Prac­ti­tion­ers work in coali­tion with those of like mind to address issues of peace, jus­tice, and the envi­ron­ment. They seek com­mon­al­i­ties rather than dif­fer­ences so that love may unite all peo­ple as the realm of God-dess man­i­fests on Earth.
  8. This tran­si­tory life involves much suf­fer­ing even in the best of times. There­fore, prac­ti­tion­ers only pass through the mate­r­ial plane and evolve their con­scious­ness to enter an eter­nal spir­i­tual exis­tence beyond space­time. They then dwell in the world of Radha-Krishna with their eter­nal spir­i­tual associates.
  9. Prac­ti­tion­ers do not earn their way there, but open them­selves to God-dess’ love and grace. All God-dess asks in return is love. Estab­lish­ing a lov­ing rela­tion­ship with Radha-Krishna is the key. There is no one way this love devel­ops. Devo­tees each find their unique way to God-dess as God-dess attracts them.
  10. By clar­i­fy­ing their vision of the spir­i­tual world and trans­fer­ring their thoughts and desires from here to there, at the inevitable time of death, prac­ti­tion­ers let go of this life and enter the next as if walk­ing through a doorway.
  11. Prac­ti­tion­ers pur­sue their ulti­mate best inter­ests in this life and the next. Eter­nity exists now. This life nat­u­rally flows into the next based on a person’s actions and desires. Devo­tees seek full real­iza­tion of their true nature in lov­ing rela­tion­ship to Radha-Krishna in their eter­nal spir­i­tual world.