The Power Of The Holy Name

We have another interesting story to share with you.

In 1975 we were just beginning our Krsna conscious life and it was very ecstatic. In those early days we were trying to serve Srila Prabhupada to the best of our abilities. It was very trying and challenging as we were all very naïve and green about almost everything.

We were renting a bungalow house at 5 Gardenia Road and were using it as a temple. There were no full-time devotees then and hence we all used to meet regularly on the weekends for a Sunday feast program. The Sunday feast was well attended and we used to have very loud Kirtans, chanting the holy names of the Lord from 5pm in the evenings to 9pm followed by the lovely Sunday feast.

We were all very enthused in trying to be of some service to Srila Prabhupada in trying to spread the movement in this part of the world. It was the beginning and we were very determined to help Srila Prabhupada in his mission.

As our Sunday program began to grow we were having very big kirtans and this was indeed creating a problem with our neighbors as it was a very quiet and posh neighborhood with many rich people residing there.

Soon without our knowledge one particular neighbor started a campaign to have us evicted from the place. He was very determined and was going door to door trying to gain support from all the other neighbors. We believe he must have got a lot of support.

One one fine Sunday program, we had a very ecstatic kirtan and we were all dancing in bliss. The next day we learned that the gentleman on the campaign had a fatal heart attack and had passed away in the night. He was very antagonistic to the chanting and was very envious of the devotees. It was indeed a very high price to pay to be against the chanting of the Holy name. We leave it to the readers' discretion on his circumstantial death but we strongly believe that Lord Nrsimhadeva must have got rid of him for creating these disturbances.

Soon after, the campaign too mysteriously died a natural death as the others saw the outcome of what would be the result. They were very frightened by the death of the gentleman who was not very old but was quite young and healthy. They did not try to intervene again.

We continued our weekend Kirtans without any hindrance thereafter. The neighbors then onwards, were very respectful of the devotees and they too began to relish the power of the holy name.

By the mercy of Srila Prabhupada and Lord Sri Krsna Chaitanya Mahaprabhu we were successful in pushing on the movement despite the many obstacles we had faced as we progressed along.

Sankirtana Maha Yajna ki jai!

Sundar Gopal Das