In Part 1 of this series of articles we explained that the overall reason for building the TOVP (or any temple of Vishnu/Krishna) is that the spiritual upliftment of society is more important than any mundane services to the body like helping the poor, opening hospitals, etc.. In this part we will elaborate further and present some specific reasons.
The recorded histories in the shastras prove the above point, and in our own personal lives we can experience this. The goal of life is love of God; everything else comes as a result. As stated in shastra, nityo nityanam cetanas cetananam, the one supreme eternal, conscious nitya, God, is maintaining His infinitesimal eternal, conscious parts, nityanam. There is no mystery in this because He is our divine father. And as Lord Krishna says in Bhagavad Gita, yajnarthat karmano nyatra, all sacrifice must be performed for Vishnu and that will bring about our happiness on the physical plane and ultimate liberation into the spiritual plane.
So there can be unlimited temples for Vishnu, even one’s own home can be made so. And the astounding benefits of personally helping to build an actual temple structure for the Lord like the TOVP are incomparable to anything else as you will read in Part 3 of this article from the Agni Purana and other shastras. But first, here are some other important reasons as to why we are building the Temple of the Vedic Planetarium:
- The TOVP represents the specific line of disciplic succession from the Yuga-avatar, Lord Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, at the sacred land of His birth, Sridhama Mayapur.
- This temple will disseminate the pure, spotless, eternal religion of Bhagavat Dharma, pure devotional service to the Supreme Lord, Sri Krishna.
- Srila Prabhupada, the Founder/Acharya of ISKCON, specifically urged his disciples to build this incredible temple/planetarium combination for the spiritual welfare of the world and to challenge the atheistic, mechanistic and materialistic scientists’ view of the universe and life. His desire was, “to attract the people of the whole world to Mayapur”.
- The TOVP permanently establishes Sridhama Mayapur as the World Headquarters for the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, ISKCON, and will become the main attraction of an eventual grand city of pure devotional service to the Lord.
- The six goswamis (and other acharyas) all built immense and beautiful temples for their deities in Vrindavan. This example shows that there can be many temples even in the same location. As a matter of fact, Vrindaban is known as the village of temples.
- Donating to the construction of a temple not only benefits the donor, but his family members for many generations in the past and into the future.
- Building a temple benefits not only the donor and his family but the pilgrims who visit it for years to come.
- The donor is also benefited by the accrued spiritual advancement of the pilgrims who visit the temple he helped to build for as long as the temple exists.
- Building a temple is a practical service to engage those who have wealth, and follows the Lord’s instruction in Bhagavad-gita to offer Him all that you do, all that you eat, all that you give away, as well as all austerities you perform.
- Service and worship of the deity of the Lord is the easiest way for the common man to begin their spiritual progress.
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