New Vrndavana

By His inconceivable potency, the Supreme Lord Sri Krsna appeared 5,000 years ago as a cowherd boy in the village of Vrndavana, India. The devotees of the Hare Krsna movement, therefore, who have established a 1,000 acre Krsna conscious community in West Virginia, have called it New Vrndavana. In New Vrndavana, the devotees find that by following the Lord's example of living with what the land and cows provide, they can easily be free of all economic problems. By pursuing Krsna consciousness in such an untroubled atmosphere, one can reestablish one's eternal relationship with the Supreme Person and thus begin the joyful journey back home, back to Godhead.

One can start this journey back to Godhead here on earth, by developing an attraction to serving the Supreme Personality of Godhead. In the material world, we are not able to see Krsna everywhere. Therefore He appears in the form of the worshipable Deity in the temple to accept service from His devotees.

The devotees in New Vrndavana work hard at their different duties, but they all work on behalf of the Deity. Both the Lord and His devotees derive transcendental pleasure from such devotional service. Throughout the world, the disciples of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada are following this authorized process of self-realizationbhakti-yoga, or devotional service to Krsna, the Supreme Lord.

In his purports to Srimad-Bhagavatam Srila Prabhupada writes: "The secret of success is to take refuge under the protection of the Supreme Lord. Without His sanction, nothing can be possible. The rivers, the hills, fruits, flowers, grains and so on are not creations of man. They are all creations of the Supreme Lord, and the living being is allowed to make use of the property of the Lord for the service of the Lord. By His will, there is enough of everything, and we can make proper use of things to live comfortably without any enmity between men, between men and animals, or between men and nature. The control of the Lord is everywhere, and if the Lord is pleased, every part of nature will be pleased." It is this Krsna conscious understanding that has made New Vrndavana an exemplary community, worthy of being emulated throughout the world.

Visakha-devi dasi graduated from Rochester Institute of Technology in 1970 and then wrote a technical book on the art of close-up photography. She and Yaduvara dasa, her husband, also a professional photographer, joined ISKCON in 1971, while shooting assignments in India. They are now traveling around the world making documentary films about the Krsna consciousness movement.