Speech at UN by His Holiness Bhakti Caru Swami on Peace Process

Speech at United Nations

The following is the speech H.H. Bhakti Charu Swami gave at the United Nations Headquarters, New York City, NY, USA for the Panel Discussion on “Forgiveness: a pathway to human transformation”.For voice and details see www.bhakticharuswami.com

What I will present here today is the Vedic perspective of forgiveness and the appropriate means to cultivate and demonstrate that noble quality. Vedas is the wisdom that descended from the spiritual reality, since time immemorial – since the time of creation. Just as, along with a machine comes the operation manual describing what is the purpose of the machine and how to operate it, the Vedas describe the purpose of this material nature, how it functions and how we should achieve our desired goal here.

Vedas generally do not deal with the immediate effect, rather with the cause behind the effect. For example, the Vedic branch of medicine, “Ayurveda,” does not deal with the symptoms of the disease only, rather with its inherent causes. It deals with the three elements of the body – mucus, bile
and air, whose imbalance manifests in the form of disease.

According to the Vedic understanding, we act according to the three modes of material nature, namely, the mode of goodness, the mode of passion and the mode of ignorance.

Goodness is motivated by spiritual understanding; passion is motivated by the desire to enjoy this world and ignorance is total oblivion of the actual reality. For example, one person gets hit by a bicycle. If he is in the mode of ignorance he will start crying due to pain. If he is in passion he will grab the cyclist by his throat and start beating him up. However, if he is in goodness, he will brush the dust off his body and will tell the cyclist that everything is alright and there is nothing to worry about. Those who are in the mode of goodness are generally known as “saintly”. Qualities such as tolerance, mercy, compassion and forgiveness are their natural ornaments.

One of the most wonderful demonstration of compassion and forgiveness is when Jesus was being crucified. He was praying to the Lord, “Please forgive them because they do not know what they are doing.”

How could one display such tolerance and compassion? It is because of his love for them. Although they were treating him in such a brutal way, he just saw them as his brothers who did not know what they were doing. Just as an elder brother sees the wrong doings of his younger brothers, and when fails to correct them in spite his repeated endeavors. Knowing well how angry the father will become, he appeals to the father to forgive them because they do not know what they are doing.

One can develop such an attitude only when he becomes situated in the mode of goodness. Then only he becomes saintly by being enlightened with true knowledge of understanding God and developing his loving relationship with Him.

People in general are acting in the mode of ignorance. They have to be reminded about their mistakes and help them to rectify their mistakes. They must be brought to the platform of knowledge. They have to be educated.Punishment alone will not achieve that noble cause. We have to make them understand that for their own benefit as well as for the collective benefit of the world, they should refrain from such actions.

In order to assume the role of the elder brothers and guide them on a proper path, we ourselves have to become situated in the mode of goodness first; we have to become saintly and develop the qualities that will truly benefit the misdirected civilization of today.

In order to develop this universal brotherhood, we have to recognize our Supreme Father. It does not matter by which name we identify Him or call Him, but we have to recognize His presence and His affectionate influence in our lives. Then only can we develop our loving relationship with each other.
Subsequently the divine qualities such as mercy, tolerance, compassion and forgiveness will become the natural ornaments of our noble characters. At that time we will be able to help this planet to become transformed into paradise.

SECOND SPEECH AT THE UN IN MAY 2009

At the beginning I just want to mention that the purpose of my speech hereis not to give the ultimate solution to all the problems of the world, but toappeal to the religious leaders of the world to get together and sincerelyconsider how we can find that ultimate solution. Although I will bepresenting the vedic viewpoint of religion, I want to make it clear at the beginningthat I don't have any intention to establish the supremacy of my ideas, rather, Iam here to share it with others. At a time when so many atrocities are going on in the name of religion, itis extremely important that we try to find the similarities between differentreligious faiths instead of creating dissensions. All religions accept twocommon concepts - they accept God and they show the way to develop ourrelationship with God. When we stick to these fundamental points then we cansee that all the religions are actually striving to achieve the same goal.Due to the difference of language, due to geographical and cultural differences,there may be some differences in the practice, but actually the goal, andthe means to reach and develop the relationship with the supreme Lord, is thesame. Due to the difference of name or identification, we tend to create adifference about the same personality - God. In some language we call Him by a certainname, and we think that this is our God and we become totally intolerantabout others' beliefs and others' approach to Him. But the real fact or objective is that He is one. When we take the identity of Him then we get the description of Him in all religions as thegreatest, the supreme, the supreme controller and proprietor, and in thisway we can see that He is the supreme in all respects. Now this term supreme isnaturally singular; supreme cannot be more than one. Supreme is the one whois without a second, who doesn't have anyone superior to Him, and who doesn'thave anyone equal to Him. So when we are approaching that supreme, and if werecognize that He is one without a second, then irrespective of our religionor religious faith, we have to come to understand that He is the one that allthe religions are talking about. All the bonafide religions of the world acceptthis one fact that God is one without a second. He is our father, He is ourdearmost friend, and at the same time, He is the supreme proprietor andsupreme controller. Now the question arises - is He an imaginary character or is He a creationof a man's imagination? If we leave it at that - God is a creation of man'simagination - then I will say that there is no need to accept that kind ofGod. God is never a product of man's imagination; God is real. He is not onlyreal, He is the supreme reality; He is the absolute truth. Now let us make acommon sense approach. The Common sense approach I am saying because intelligentclass of people want to find some rational and tangible understanding of certainbelief and faith. Religion is not just a belief or faith, it is the realityor approach to reality. Religion is the means to understand God. Therefore, allreligions are actually a science - it is not just faith but a science ofunderstanding a reality beyond our sense perception. In this room around us we can see there are so many different objects – this microphone is inert matter, this telephone is inert matter, this table, the floor, the room - these are all inert. But you and I - although our bodies are made of inert matter - we are living beings. We are living, we are conscious. We are not functioning like inert matter. Our functioning is completelydifferent from the way matter generally functions. Although we are situated in a body of matter, but we are functioning in a non-material way. So let's start from here - what makes us function in such a way? In order to make the point again, I will give a simple example, say I am talking to you now, and at the back of your mind you are thinking that he is here and he is speaking. Now if I drop dead, my body will be lying here but you will say he is gone. Now who is that he who is gone? Obviously the one who made this body alive. The body made of dead matter was alive because of the presence of that, that whom you identify as he and I identify as I. That I isn't material, it is spiritual. I is the spirit soul which makes the body alive, which makes the body conscious, which makes body function in an amazing way. If we take every single organ of our body, we will see that it is such a complex phenomenon. And what makes this happen - it is the presence of the soul. Now isn't it important that we try to find out what the soul is, where does it come from, and what is it's special characteristics? Now when you probe into it, there is a systematic approach to that, and all the religions are actually showing us the way. Let us consider - all the bonafide religions of the world are either established by God Himself, or by God's messengers, God's prophets, God's children, God's sons. And what are they doing? They are actually carrying the message of God and giving it to us. Giving us information
about that reality which is beyond our sense perception. We cannot see that reality with our eyes, nor can we approach that reality through our senses. Now they came and gave us the information about that reality, reminding us of our actual identity being spiritual. That's why it is a science; science in the sense that it is a systematic way to understand a subject through proper studies, and which can be experimentally verified as facts. Now experimental verification of the facts of the existence of the soul is a simple consideration - what is the difference between dead body and living body; what makes a body alive for so many years and all of a sudden, in a flash of a moment it's dead. So presence of the soul, at least let's make a common sense approach. Now do we have any information about the soul? Yes, all the religions are actually giving the information about the soul. Not only this, they are actually providing us with all kinds of relevant means to understand what the function of the soul is and where it comes from. Obviously the soul is not a product of matter. A soul is not a product of some chemical combination. Soul comes from another world, another reality, and that is the spiritual reality, and in that spiritual reality there is a supreme personality who is the predominating factor, who is also the cause of creation and who is the maintainer of everything, and He is doing that in an inconceivable way, and that is God.
Now about the soul, the soul can be existing in two ways. When the soul is connected to the Lord, establishing his relationship with Him, that soul is a liberated soul; and when a soul is oblivious of God and has severed his relation with Him, that soul comes to this material nature and leads a life which needs an ultimate relationship with that Supreme Personality of Godhead. And that is why in this world we, who have become separated from God, we need to be told about God and how we can develop our relationship with Him. So this relationship, the means to establish our relationshipwith God, and the need to establish our relationship with God, is the essential factor of all religions. Therefore while we are thinking of establishing peace in this world, I personally think that it's extremely important that we – the ones who have taken the religious path, and those who are trying to educate others - get together and discuss amongst ourselves about our commonalityand similarity, and forget about our differences and try to educate the world about the similarity of all different religions, and then at least the atrocities that are going on in the name of religion can be stopped. Thank you very much..