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EDITORIAL December 20, 1999 VNN5113 Comment on this story Prabhupada Centennial Survey: Final Report BY KUNDALI DASA EDITORIAL, Dec 20 (VNN) — THE FOUR MAIN ISSUES By Kundali Dasa According to the Prabhupada Centennial Survey, these are the four issues that rated highest concern among the devotees worldwide: 1. Lack of open and honest communications between devotees. 2. Lack of economic opportunities within the devotee community, thus forcing devotees to seek employment outside of the movement's ranks. 3. An adequate system of education for devotee children. 4. Poor management by Temple Presidents and other ISKCON authorities and the leaders being out of touch with the everyday lives of devotees. These four items are not the only issues on the minds of devotees, but they are the most prominent. As an aside, it is interesting to note that the guru issue does not rate among the four most urgent concerns of the devotees in general. Perhaps it is not as big a problem as some more vocal devotees would have the rest of the society believe, or perhaps the guru issue is more a symptom than a problem in itself. As for the four issues listed here, if our leaders would address these in a satisfactory or pragmatic way the devotees in general would have a concrete basis for more positive feelings about the society and for a deeper sense of commitment. Good leadership therefore would seize the opportunity in the upcoming Mayapur meetings to discuss these topics and delegate persons to devise strategies for addressing them. Sadly, one of the urgent issues we face is that the GBC, rather serve as a facilitator for various needed developments to happen, it serves more as a bottleneck on the society. Desire to control is one cause of this chokehold on progress. One result of the control freakishness is that yes-men rather than competent men get the service opportunities. Another reason for the bottleneck is eagerness to take credit for others achievements. Also, some decisions on the GBC level just make no sense at all. Take for example the decision to put a sannyasi in charge of the social development ministry. Okay, if the particular sannyasi has some professional training in this area, then one could see trying to engage him in that way, but without such a calling, the appointment of a sannyasi to head up social development is a typical example of how our top decision-making body is a victim of constipated thinking. Naturally, as we saw above, one of the four "urgent" issues in the survey is poor management. (1)LACK OF OPEN AND HONEST COMMUNICTIONS BETWEEN DEVOTEES. This problem is really not a mystery. We say that devotees base their relationships on love and trust. This, of course, sounds very noble. However, when you have practices within the organization that undermine trust (which must come before love), naturallt the principle of trust and love erodes; it becomes empty, meaningless, hollow, although high-sounding. When a devotee discovers, for example, that "for the preaching" it is okay to mislead the public while out on book selling or fund raising; or "for Prabhupada's service" it is okay to mislead and manipulate each other, rather than deal straightforwardly; or discovers that leaders and seniors frequently coerce, and thereby exploit the trusting devotee in various ways; or discovers that the needs and objectives of the institution always seem to take precedent over any and all individual needs, then it is the most natural thing to withhold trust in such an atmosphere. It would be unintelligent not to withhold. And when trust is withheld, there can be no question of love. Then, just to preserve some sense of self, everyone begins to play his or her cards close to their collective chests. We get miscommunications rather than communications. Nothing means what it appears to mean. The result is that except in isolated little groups that may have fostered some trust and mutual respect for each other, there can be no authentic communications among devotees in general, and especially between the leaders and the led. Instead one becomes guarded all the time. Mistrustful, and rightly so. How can leaders turn this around? Essentially, they have to set the example of being more personal with the devotees. Deal respectfully and show visible regard for the individual; and persuade rather than coerce cooperation. And give up all manipulative and deceptive practices, even the ones directed at the non devotees. In short, they have to create a trusting atmosphere in our society. Communications problems of this type cannot be reformed by resolutions, only by attitudinal change. (2) LACK OF ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES WITHIN THE DEVOTEE COMMUNITY, THUS FORCING DEVOTEES TO SEEK EMPLOYMENT OURSIDE OF THE MOVEMENT'S . A number of church communities have worked wonders engaging their members within their own economic circle. The Mormons and the Seventh Day Adventists come to mind. One wonders, therefore, if ISKCON is jinxed so badly that in thirty odd years we have not been far-sighted enough to work on this aspect. An amazing amount of money has washed through the society and in so many areas we have not got much to show for it. Of course, "Krishna will take care of us, prabhu." It seems that He has, and we have pretty much squandered or skimmed much of His help, which leads one to think that Krishna is way too smart to keep on caring for people who simply want to misuse the opportunities He give them. Some may question whether it is the role of ISKCON to assume economic responsibility for its members. Perhaps ISKCON should be an educational rather than an all-encompassing social organization. Something to think about, whether it is in fact desirable in terms of the ultimate vision of trying to get the high court judge to be a tilaka-wearing devotee, if the society should try to be all things to all people. As a primarily education organization ISKCON members could be trained in Krishna consciousness thought and practical devotional activities and then it's members should pursue careers in the mainstream society, or perhaps ISKCON should have both features. In any event, this is a topic that merits further discussion and research. (3) AN ADEQUATE SYSTEM OF EDUCATION FOR DEVOTEE CHILDREN This item is at once urgent and the hottest potato for our leadership to handle. Years of neglect or of giving token attention to the education program of ISKCON has now come full circle to bite us on the rump. If we are to have gurukulas at all, it is very clear that we need to involve more householders/parents in the effort. It is always the parents that care most about their children's education. Sannyasis as heads of gurukulas or too much involved in the school's administration has been a hopeless failure. They are generally not very keen on the developmental years of the children. They tend to be more concerned with the older kids who are closer to eligibility for initiation. We may also consider the likelihood that the gurukula scheme may be a premature objective for a society as mired in dysfunctionality as ISKCON is at present. Whatever the upshot will be, as with the previous item, once again the GBC body needs to give a freer hand to those who would assume responsibility for sorting out this issue. (4) POOR MANAGEMENT BY TEMPLE PRESIDENTS AND OTHER ISKCON AUTHORITIES AND THE LEADERS BEING OUT OF TOUCH WITH THE EVERYDAY LIVES OF DEVOTEES By now it should be very clear to devotees that leadership is not a simple thing. Just by getting a title one does not become magically endowed with leadership qualities. At best the title may signify the potential for leadership, meaning that one's skills need to be refined through a combination of training and practical experience. Depending on Krishna to magically empower us is out. At worse, getting a title may signify that in the current corporate culture of ISKCON, said leader has risen to the level of his incompetence. We need to put more emphasis on competence. That means, among other things, have job discriptions and match people to the job, rather than award positions as rewards for years of service, or because "he is my trusted yes-man", and so on. We need to distance ourselves from corporate culture and adhere to varnashrama culture, wherein one is encouraged to soar with one's strengths and less risk of rising to beyond one's competence. Once again, the GBC can and should delegate to non-GBC persons the task for coming up with programs to meet these requirements. The practice of loading up such committees and ministeries with GBC personnel, who are already mostly over-burdened, is primarily to police things, rather than really contribute to achieving the committee's aims and objectives; and it simply undermines the effort. Possibly the key here is to delegate each of these four items to the most competent and concerned devotees and leave it to them to come up with workable solutions, and give them a free hand to implement their prescriptions. Not a bad idea to show model trust and love from the very top. Not a bad idea at all. Comment on this story  Contact VNN about this storySend this story to a friend
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