Gopal Krishna Maharaja's Vyasapuja

His Holiness, Gopal Krishna Narachi, which we are celebrating without His physical presence. And it's actually very purifying when we are glorifying devotees. I remember one little episode after Mayapur GBC meetings, I was sitting with His Holiness, Srila Radhanath Maharaj, and I mentioned Gopal Krishna Maharaj's name, just mentioned. And immediately just by hearing Srila Gopal Krishna Maharaj's name, Sīla Radhanāt svāmi Marāj, started glorifying Him as if He had hundreds of monsters. He was praising Him and saying, talking about His qualities and of course I kind of replied in my small way about His glories. And after this glorification of Vaishnava, it was physically, tangibly, we could sense the purification of this process. When we speak about the qualities of Vaishnava, it's very purifying to the heart. We all have some, you know, tinges of envy and some other problems within our consciousness. But when we really try to appreciate and see the qualities of Vaishnava, the heart becomes purified from these traces of dirt. And of course, you know, so many people already spoke about the glories of Gopal Krishnamaraj and one of the most outstanding qualities which he had is his tirelessness. It's absolutely amazing how much energy he had and for me it's 100% clear that the energy which he had is not of the material origin. You know, no material energy can be so inexhaustible, you know. He was as if there is totally inexhaustible source of energy within himself and he was, you know, running from early morning, every Mangalareti he was there in the altar of Shishirada Shamasundara or Radha Parthasarathi and then till the late night, you know, 10 o'clock, 11 o'clock, 12 o'clock, to get up early in the morning. I remember one very funny episode. I had to call him urgently with some emergency in Russia and it was around probably 9.30 at night when I was calling and I asked Maraj, where are you? He said, oh, you know, I'm just driving from Delhi to Chandigarh for Ratha Yatra. So at night he's driving there and he started chuckling and he said, I am semi-retired now. It was It was so funny, you know, he's driving late at night for this engagement, and he says, I'm semi-retired. And we all know what he means when he says semi-retired. It means that he will work, you know, a hundred times more than before. And I had, you know, my friends traveling with him in America. Janardin Maraj just said that he was traveling with him. and they only could do it once because second time it just didn't work because it was so difficult even though they were much younger than him. But one quality which I would like to highlight here is his amazing humility and at the same time his accommodating nature. You know, when you were, like now Manjari Devi was speaking about this, how he was kind to her. And I remember at the day of Srila Gopal Krishna Maharaja's departure, I met his secretary Madhava Priya in Delhi. And I asked her, how are you? Because I knew her, she helped me a lot in some governmental work and everything. And she started crying. And she said, he was too much kind to me. Very kind of Indian expression. He was too much kind to me. And when I heard this, I told immediately to her. He was too much kind to everyone. His quality of being so accommodating and so kind, and especially at the end of his life, he was always like this. But by the end of his life, this quality became, you know, tangibly sensible. You could sense, you know, how he is just welcoming you. And of course, you know, the glory of India Delhi Temple, which is his major contribution to ISKCON, is exemplary of being the place of utmost hospitality. But that's the extension of his nature. You know, you could feel that he is just accepting you without any reservations, without anything, you know, he would not see bad qualities in you. Through my long times of associating with him, and there were many difficult situations when we would, you know, had to speak about some difficulties. Never, never even once I heard even half of the word, not even the word of some criticism of anyone. He would not criticize anyone, at least I never heard about this. And he would always be very kind, and if people would do some nonsense, he would still find some good qualities in them. Of course, especially when we would be speaking behind his back. But I also seen how once somebody was doing some nonsense in Russia and was deviating quite heavily. And Gopal Krishna Maharaj, all of a sudden, unexpectedly for me, because I never heard him doing this, all of a sudden he became very strong and he said, Krishna will crush you as a bug. And I saw that this man started trembling because he said it with such conviction and such force. So he was like, you know, classical devotee, he was soft like a rose most of the time. So accommodating, so kind, so humble, utterly humble, you know, heartbreakingly humble. But at the same time when it was necessary he would apply his force and he would be very forceful when it's necessary. We saw it in these beautiful videos from Vancouver. In any case, what I want to say is that this kind of ceremony is utmost important because by hearing the glories of Vaishnava, we purify ourselves and we invoke their presence among us. And I really hope as Janardhan Maharaj, and I'm sure, yes, that Vopal Krishna Maharaj will be present here, especially when we remember his amazing Abhayishnamo qualities. Thank you very much.