Source SRI LANKA, March 22, 2015 (by Jayanth Jacob, Hindustan Times): Prime Minister Narendra Modi assured Tamil minorities in Sri Lanka on Saturday of India’s support in their fight for equal political rights during a highly symbolic first visit by an Indian premier to the island nation’s war-scarred Tamil heartland since the end of the civil war. Modi’s trip to…
Source O Mother! Let all my speech be your prayer; let all my crafts and technology be your worship and be the mystic gestures of my hand, adorning you. May all my movements become your devotional circumambulations. May everything I eat or drink be oblations to you. Let my lying down in rest and sleep be prostrations to you. Mother!…
Source KAUAI, HAWAII, March 22, 2015 (Hinduism Today): Hinduism Today is offering at auction its collection of English translations of the Bhagavad Gita. These range from Edwin Arnold’s early translation to multiple editions issued since 2000. Condition of books is from new (many of them) to fair or poor condition, mostly depending on age. To see the Ebay auction with…
Source What is the instant? That is what we have to discover through a moment of concentration. What is the moment? We all know what the past is–many people live in the past, over and over again, and they never catch up with the present. Other people live in the future–but of course when they do, they are really only…
Source LAOS, March 18, 2015 (Global Times): A large 7th century artifact described as one of the most significant archaeological items ever found in Laos has been unearthed at a world heritage site in the country’s south, local media reported Wednesday. The discovery was made during archaeological excavations at Phou Kao, a mountain site associated with the UNESCO World Heritage…
Source FIJI, March 19, 2015 (Fiji Times): Reciting tales from Hindi religious books through song has long been the domain of tambura bhajan masters armed with decades of experience tucked under their belt.This form of traditional Hindu music is normally performed by mature men devoted to the study of Hindu scripture. But this Saturday, a 17-year-old Lautoka boy will defy…
Source BALI, INDONESIA, March 19, 2015 (Jakarta Post): Preparations are gearing up for Nyepi, the Balinese Hindu Day of Silence, which falls on Saturday. This year’s celebration will offer another demonstration of Bali’s strong interfaith relations, as the celebration coincides with the Catholic period of Lent, where adherents fast and make penitence in preparation for Easter. Chairman of Bali’s Interfaith…
Source Sectarianism, bigotry and its horrible descendant, fanaticism, have long possessed this beautiful Earth. They have filled the Earth with violence, drenched it often with human blood, destroyed civilizations and sent whole nations to despair. Had it not been for these horrible demons, human society would be far more advanced than it is now.— Swami Vivekananda (1863-1902), disciple of Sri…
Source COLOMBIA, March 16, 2015 ( by Lila Maclellan, Quartz.com): In New York or L.A., it’s pretty common to learn that a yoga teacher used to be a dancer, an actor, or even a former Wall Street banker. In Bogota and Medellin, the same is true. Except that here, the teacher may also be an ex-member of a Colombian death…
Source JAMAICA, NEW YORK, March 14, 2015 (Sachi Dastidar): The Indian Subcontinent Partition Documentation Project, Inc. (ISPaD) invites you to send articles, essays, poems, short stories, photographs or documents for the 2015 issue of the Journal. We plan to publish well before the October 2015 Partition Center Conference. Our past journals contained articles from the U.S., India, Bangladesh and Pakistan…