IPM Newsletter January / February 2006

Letters from Inmates

Many times people ask us why we are helping people in prison. They committed the crime; why not let them do the time? But we see that we are all prisoners in this material world. Some of us are in a state or federal prison, some of us are in the prison of our minds, or a physically disabled bodies, but just to have a material body is a type of prison. We have no freedom to enjoy all our insatiable desires. So we, at the ISKCON Prison Ministries, try to help others and ourselves by practicing Krishna consciousness. The following letter is a nice example of how Krishna consciousness is working in prisons.

Dear Mother Shyama Priya Prabhu,

All glories to Srila Prabhupada. All glories to Sri Guru and Gauranga.

I have been having a wonderful time. For a devotee can go to hell and still be happy. For the devotee, being situated in the heavenly planets and being in the hellish planets are equal, for a devotee lives neither in heaven nor in hell, but with Krishna in the spiritual world.

So in prison or out, it’s all the same. There are many people to preach to. The devotee is not interested in so-called meditation in the Himalayas or the forest. Rather, his interest is in the busiest part of the world, where he teaches people Krishna consciousness. The Krishna consciousness movement was started for this purpose.

A Vaisnava is interested in enlightening people in Krishna consciousness because that is the only way for them to be happy. A Vaisnava would say “let others be saved, let me rot in hell on their behalf.” The willingness to feel that and to carry it out if necessary is the cost of true compassion!

I didn’t come to prison to preach…or did I? I believe Lord Krishna put me here for that purpose! A do or die proposition. So as long as we preach we’ll be happy, no matter where we end up.

Just today I went to chow, all these men where sitting there. How can I give them Krishna? I felt a deep compassion for them. I sat down. A man came over to me and asked for a Bhagavad-gita and that just made my day!! I happened to get back one I had loaned out, so I went over and gave it to him. “Oh that was fast.” He got all excited looking at the pictures.

Another man who is not interested in God or religion took The Hidden Glory of India. I gave him the book, and later I found he liked to draw. A few days later I saw him and I asked how he liked the art in the Glory. He said he really liked it. So, a few days later I saw him drawing in the card room and what picture did he decide to draw? The changing bodies, the picture that shows going through animals too, with the Grim Reaper in the middle. I asked him: “What does it mean?” he said “Reincarnation, we came through the animals too!” I said “What does that mean?” He said, “We’re not the body” All this from an 18 year old kid who hated to be preached to! Hare Krishna!

Your Servant, Jivananda das, Salem, Oregon

Dear Prabhu, Hare Krishna!

All glories unto Lord Jesus Christ and His Divine Grace!!

...Krishna Consciousness—very vast, very big, profound! Things have been up and down here. At least that’s the illusion of it all. Got it all loaded down on me by the new Warden back in June behind a fight and have been here in K-dorm ever since. But being back here has given me the opportunity to study more and chant—of which I got up to 16 rounds a day.

Now I have two months to go till I go home….You know I have a strong Judeo/Christian faith and still have many, many questions. However, after reading the words and many books of Srila Prabhupada, along with that faith, I accept the chanting of the Holy Names and the regulative principles as Divine.

We are very fallen in this material world, very unintelligent—especially myself—but by the grace of Yahweh/Krishna we are raised out of the dust of ignorance, passion, and eventually goodness.

Your God brother,
Archie, San Antonio, TX