Honest Life

His Divine Grace Om Vishnupad
Srila Bhakti Nirmal Acharya Maharaj
Speaking online to the devotees in Singapore,
1 May 2021, part 7

How are you, *** Prabhu? Are you studying now or working?

Devotee: Working and studying.

Oh, both... Are you helping your parents? Do you give money to your mother? What you are doing? Are you drinking Thumbs Up and 7Up and eating chocolate with your money? You must give money to your mother. All right? They are struggling so much in their life, I do not even know if they have their own house. Do they have their own house?

Devotee (the father): The house where we are studying now will actually belong to us, and he is staying with all of us.

Yes, of course. They must stay with you, it is very important. Why will they leave you? They will stay with you, it is good because they were not born in the western culture where a sixteen-year-old boy leaves his parents and goes to stay with his girlfriend, separately. This is a very bad situation. It is not like that here in India, and I think that it is not like that in Singapore also. Your children must stay with you, that is good. If somebody wants to get married and if they have their own house, then they can get married and stay separately, that is all right, but to take a girlfriend and live with her illegally, separately from the parents, that is not good. Your parents have been taking care of you since you were a baby, they have been doing everything for you, taking care of you, suffering for you, and now that you turn sixteen you leave your parents and go to live a life of enjoyment? I do not support such things. I am dead against that. Do you understand what I am saying? If somebody leaves his family and goes to stay at the ashram, taking brahmacharya, that is another thing, but if you leave your father and mother to stay in your own house with a girlfriend, it makes me and everybody else very sad. Think about it. Your father and mother have been taking care of you since you were a baby, they are suffering and struggling so much to give birth to you, to make sure you can study, to make sure you have everything, and now you leave them and go to live a life of enjoyment. This is a completely bogus life. It is an abominable life. If you want to join the mission full time, I will be very happy. If you say you want to serve me, you can come to me then, and I will make you a sannyasi. I will send you back to Singapore sometimes for preaching, it is not a problem, but you will stay in the house of other devotees, not in your parents' house, but your parents can come and meet with you, it is not a problem.

You can see the example here in India. There are two sannyasis, one is twenty-six years old (Sripad Bhakti Tilak Niriha Maharaj) and the other one is twenty-eight years old (Sripad Bhakti Chandan Vishnu Maharaj). I made one of them a sannyasi when he was a twenty-year-old brahmachari (Sripad Bhakti Tilak Niriha Maharaj). Now he is twenty-six years old and he is taking care of my temple, a big temple.

You cannot imagine what kind of chastisement I give him (Sripad Bhakti Tilak Niriha Maharaj). When my Gurudev, Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj came to the Mission, Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj told him, "You must follow me. Do not follow your mind." Srila Sridhar Maharaj told him only that. And Srila Sridhar Maharaj also beat my Gurudev, but I do not beat, but I think that what I did to him was actually more than beating. One time, I was there [Sri Nrisingha Palli] at Gaura Purnima and he made some mistake after Gaura Purnima (I told him to do something in one way, and he did more than that, following his mind), and after Gaura Purnima I told him to hold his ears and squat ten times in front of everybody. He is a sannyasi, but he did that happily in front of everybody without any shyness or anything. This is the kind of chastisement I gave him.

His father also gives him respect addressing him 'Maharaj' and paying dandavat to him. He also always addresses his father 'Prabhu'—he does not say 'dad' or 'papa'. I told his father that I will make a great preacher from this boy. From the beginning I have been teaching him and making him a great sannyasi who can be humble, tolerant and give honour to others. These are his good qualities. Not only that, he is truthful—he can never tell a lie. This is his very important quality. He has never told a lie in his life. It may sometimes be necessary to tell a lie for management, but if I was to tell him, 'Go there and tell a lie', he cannot do that. Such is his quality.

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