namahatta.org - Congregational Development Ministry

Vrajadhama and I went down to Byron Bay on Thursday. We spent Thursday rehearsing and sound checking with Jai Uttal for his Byron Bay concert, and the evening doing kirtan with him at the concert.

Backstage before the concert we met Tahir Qawwal, a 30-year Canadian who has been studying classical Indian singing since he was 14. The next day we caught up with him at his place and did some Qawwal and kirtan. We all knew the Hare Krishna maha-mantra and the famous hamd "Allah-hoo", so that was the intersection of our devotional chanting.

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Making friends with two Franciscan monks in Italy. A few more minutes and I would have joined up…

Sometimes – but only sometimes – I like to think my interfaith credentials are all in order. I mean, as a Vaishnava I regard all religions as paths towards the same supreme Godhead. Religion is one, but the ways we do it – and the outfits we do it in – are many.

by Vasu Murti das

In 261 B.C., the Indian emperor Ashoka witnessed firsthand the innumerable casualties he caused during one of his many military campaigns. His heart was filled with grief. He converted to Buddhism. 19th century scholar and writer H.G. Wells considered Ashoka's conversion to Buddhism one of the most significant events in world history.

Ashoka, formerly a bloody and ruthless emperor, became a remarkably kind and gentle leader. Ashoka established some of the first animal rights laws. He stopped the royal hunt, stopped the sacrifice of animals in his capital city, stopped the killing of animals for food in the royal kitchens, and gave up the eating of meat. Ashoka made it illegal to kill many species of animals, such as parrots, ducks, geese, bats, turtles, squirrels, monkeys and rhinos. He forbade the killing of pregnant animals, or animals that were nursing their young. He declared certain days to be "non-killing days," on which fish could not be caught, nor any other animals killed. He established wells and watering holes, places of rest and hospitals for humans and animals alike.

by Kaunteya das

I find this article relevant because I consider it to be a balanced, no-hype introduction to the concept of moving to a small group model in one's community:

www.acpi.org.uk/articles/explainingcellchurch.htm

This comes from the Anglican Church Planting Initiatives, from UK. The Anglican Church has been experiencing a dramatic decrease in membership.

by Jeyanthy Pillai
Source: malaysiakini.com

KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA — Muslims can continue practising yoga as long as no elements of worship or mantras are involved, said Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi today.

Furthermore, the premier underscored the fact that yoga is good for health.

He also urged all quarters to understand the content of the yoga fatwa issued by the National Fatwa Council and not twist facts which could cause confusion among the public.

About eight years ago I attended a twelve-week 'Alpha Course'—a Christian outreach programme designed by the preacher Nicky Gumbel of the Holy Trinity Church in Brompton, London. There was lots of publicity at the time and there were courses springing up all over the place, as churches throughout Great Britain discovered that good results came from taking a new approach with an old message.

The Telegraph reports that the Catholic Church in Italy is planning to follow the summer exodus of it's flock to the country's beaches by setting up a hundred foot long inflatable church at Molise on the Adriatic coast:

The 100-foot-long church will be set up on Saturday and is to be manned by a team of priests waiting to hear confession, give mass and sing holy music.

"There will be four or five people singing, with music about God," said Chiara Facci from the Catholic group Sentinelli del Mattino, which is putting up the blow-up church.

Read a brief article on this.

Keep your finger on the pulse. It's happening everywhere. Hippy was the cultural context of the 60's and 70's. Emergent is part of the contemporary cultural context.

Play to the terrain.

Orthodox at the core. Innovative at the edge

This is the account of an email exchange, starting in 2004, between Kaunteya Prabhu and Dayananda Prabhu about the organized and successful way Jehovah's Witnesses engage their congregation in book distribution and contact preaching. Through the PAMHO conference "Nama Hatta (Congregational Dev.) Forum," Caitanya Mahaprabhu Prabhu from ISKCON Vallabh Vidyanagar, Gujarat, finally picked up the idea and implemented it successfully in his preaching area:

Inspired by this email I started Bhagvad Darshan in Gujarati. I used congregation devotees for all kinds of management, all voluntary service. We started BTG with 2,000 subscriptions; then, the next year 6,000, and now, in 2008, we have 17,000 subscriptions. You mentioned one point, that we were behind because our leaders didn't know the potential power of our congregation.