Dear Śrīla Prabhupāda,
Please accept our sincere obeisances. All glories to you on the sacred day of your Vyāsa-pūjā!
Fourteen years ago I read in the Līlāmṛta, “One competent man can start a center.” Foolishly
thinking of myself as one such person, I allowed the desire to settle into my heart that I could
be in charge of one of your centers. This year the fruit of that foolishness and the force of your
mercy reached ten years of maturity, as your Harmony Collective community celebrated a decade
together in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Though the place sounds obscure to most ears, and it is certainly
very far from Śrīdhāma Māyāpur, you might remember the name as it was shared by an immigra-
tion lawyer who first helped you with your America visa (a fact pointed out to me by a godbrother
curious about any prior connection between Ypsilanti and yourself). At the least, you would have
driven past our exit 181 on your way to State Street, exit 177 off US HWY 94, while on your way to
the University of Michigan for a speaking engagement arranged by the Detroit temple devotees
on June 22, 1971.
This decade has for us been a reckoning on many levels as we strive to even begin to align with
the direction and weight of your instructions and example. Today, as you know, we have a temple
for Śrī Śrī Gaura-Nitāi, a farm with eight protected cows, and a school for children. Confident
in your continued mercy, we seek to consolidate these three separate properties into one master
parcel in the next year. The attempt to serve your vision has kept a core group of us together amid
all the usual upheavals, and we have drawn in other committed followers of yours interested in
serving your long-term vision of a viable society.
And that is where I’d like to put a special emphasis of gratitude this year, Śrīla Prabhupāda.
While you put so much into establishing the formal organization of ISKCON, it’s so clear that
you had a vision for Mahāprabhu’s family that went beyond the borders of any formal organiza-
tion’s mandate. You spoke to this many times – so often that the many who feel alienated or
estranged from aspects of ISKCON as an institution today needn’t at all feel separated from you
or Kṛṣṇa. As you explained to your direct disciples:
Organization and institution are material. They are necessary to keep order, but they
are not the essence. The essence is to be Krishna conscious. (Letter to Haṁsadūta
Dāsa, June 22, 1972)
Don’t be dependent on any organization. Depend on Krishna. Organization is
for preaching, but our real business is to become Krishna conscious. (Letter to
Madhudviṣa Dāsa, February 4, 1973)
If one thinks that simply by joining an institution he becomes liberated, that is not
the fact. One must practice Kṛṣṇa consciousness personally. (Lecture on Śrīmad-
Bhāgavatam 1.2.12, Delhi, November 14, 1973)
Ironically, we have found the more we highlight this simple and open spirit of yours in our saṅga,
the more we receive trust and dedicated effort from your sincere followers. We have learned that
nobody needs the Harmony Collective, and that anybody can be rescued from the mundane mal-
aise by the mercy of yourself and Mahāprabhu. You have shown us we are not the source of that
grace, and yet you have trusted us with the profound opportunity to support its flow and recep-
tion. For that we are perpetually left astounded, grateful, and engaged.
Please continue to keep us close, Śrīla Prabhupāda. Please continue to send us your dear ones
in all shapes and sizes. Please ensure we always hear from which direction your living voice is call-
ing us forward today, tomorrow, and eternally. And finally, please help us live in such a way that
others are inspired to also listen to that sacred vibration and allow it to become the source of their
life.
Always for you, on behalf of your ISKCON Ypsilanti,
Deva Mādhava Dāsa (community director)