Deity Darshan: Sunday March 8, 2010

Sunday Feast Recordings - March 7, 2010

The recording for this week's Sunday Feast can be viewed by clicking the image below.
As a reminder, the recordings from our weekly live web broadcasts are stored on our ISKCON Toronto Video Archive Blog.

Deity Darshan: Sunday February 28, 2010

Click HERE for full Gaura Purnima Deity Gallery!

No Sunday Feast (Gaura-Purnima) Recordings!

Due to technical dificulties we were unable to broadcast and record the Sunday Feast and Gaura Purnima festivities. We apologize for any inconvenience.

We hope to resume with live broadcasts and videos with the upcoming Sunday Feasts!

Gaura Purnima & Holi Festivities This Sunday!

The Hare Krishna Centre would like to warmly invite you to join us for grand Gaura Purnima and Holi Celebrations this Sunday, February 28, 2010!

Holi, one of the most popular festivals in India, marks the beginning of spring. Although there will be no throwing of coloured powders during the festival, it will certainly be a festive and colourful event. For Hare Krishnas, this day not only marks Holi, but also Gaura Purnima, the appearance anniversary of Caitanya Mahaprabhu.

Gaura Purnima, one of the largest festivals at Toronto's Hare Krishna temple, is the celebration of the appearance of Lord Caitanya, who is none other than Lord Krishna Himself. Over 500 years ago, in a special appearance, Lord Krishna personally came as Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and acted as His own devotee by propagating the chanting of the Holy names of the Lord in every town and village!

The festivities will be punctuated by some special surprise features that you will definitely not want to miss! The schedule of the evening will be as follows (subject to change):

6:00 pm - 6:30 pm: Arati

6:30 pm - 6:40 pm: Welcome & Announcements

6:40 pm - 7:10 pm: Class by Krsnadas Kaviraj Das

7:10 pm - 7:30 pm: Childrens' Drama

7:30 pm - 8:00 pm: Abhisheka (bathing ceremony of Sri Sri Gaura Nitai)

8:00 pm - 8:30 pm: Arati

8:30pm: Free Vegetarian Feast (Prasadam)

Friends Of BBT Features Toronto!

Friends of BBT recently featured two articles highlighting the recent Sankirtan efforts happening in Toronto.

Sankirtan is the form of sharing bhakti or Krishna Consciousness with the public through books and outdoor kirtan. The Bhaktivendata Book Trust (BBT) is the world’s largest publisher of ancient and classic Vaishnava texts, epics, and contemporary works on the philosophy, theology and culture of Bhakti yoga.

One of the articles profiled Gaurachandra das, one of our resident devotees at the Hare Krishna Temple, who has been going out for years on book distribution and sharing his realizations with many Torontonians. An excerpt from the article:

"Doing door-to-door sankirtana requires a softer mood than street sankirtana, and it takes qualities like patience and gentility to create that mood.
Gaurachandra Dasa, a Hungarian native living in Toronto, is just this type of person: calm, composed, and persistent enough to preach door to door." (Read More)

Another article featured the exciting sankirtan efforts taking place in the city as a part of the Monthly Sankirtan Festivals, where congregational members go out once a month to share bhakti with others! An excerpt from the article:

"Most of these devotees in the GST are under thirty, working jobs or attending school, but they make the time to do book distribution.
So the GST breaks barriers. They prove that any devotee can be engaged in any service that suits him, from preparing prasada to packing and loading the van to transporting books and devotees to creating care packages for the day to actually distributing books on the street."(Read More)

If you feel inspired to become a part of the Toronto Sankirtan Team, come out on the special Sankirtan Festival this month!

Monthly Sankirtan Festival - Gaura Purnima Special

For the past eight months, members of the Hare Krishna Centre have been going out once a month, hitting the streets of Toronto to be friendly ambassadors of goodwill. This involves sharing books, cookies and friendly smiles and is called sankirtan.

This month, on the auspicious occasion of Gaura Purnima, the appearance day of Caitanya Mahaprabhu who pioneered the Sankirtan movement in India over 500 years ago, the Toronto Sankirtan Team is inviting every one to come out on Saturday, February 27th for a very special Sankirtan Festival!

Schedule:
9:00am - Arrive at the Temple
9:30am - Training on "How" and "What" of the Sankirtan Eexperience
10:30am - Team Assignments
10:45am - Drive to Various Locations
11:00am - Sankirtan at Different Locations
2:00pm - Final Harinama & Wrap up
2:30pm - Return to Temple for Hot Lunch Prasadam

The nice thing about being part of this special Sankirtan Festival is that it is not simply restricted to coming out on book distribution. There are various avenues where you can help contribute to make this event a success! Whether it be helping to prepare prasadam (sanctified vegetarian food), spreading the word about the event, helping out with logistics, being part of the kirtan team or just being a friendly face, we encourage everyone to come out!

The goal for this special Sankirtan festival is to have at least 108 members go out on the streets, with smiles, as an offering to Caitanya Mahaprabhu! If you want to be a part of this special festival, please contact the Toronto Sankirtan Team to register! We look forward to seeing you on Saturday!

Flashback Photo: Vintage Darshan

With Gaura Purnima around the corner, this edition of ISKCON Toronto Flashback Photos is themed to get you into the festive mood!

Gaura Purnima celebrates the appearance of Lord Caitanya, who is none other than Lord Krishna Himself. As such, this presents the perfect opportunity to share this vintage picture of Sri Sri Gaura Nitai and share their wonderful story. Lord Chaitanya and Lord Nityananda came to reside in New Remuna Dham in 1973, click here for the story of Their arrival.

Sunday Feast Photos - February 21, 2010

Here's a look at this week's Sunday Feast through the eyes of a camera lens! Photos courtesy Dan Osadtsuk.

Dhira Grahi ready for another 8:00 arati

Lost in the sounds of the instruments and chanting!


A youthful mrdanga player drowned deep in the ocean of kirtan!


The beautiful sounds of the kirtan emit from the harmonium.


Devotees praying infront of Srila Prabhupada before they exit the temple.

Sunday Feast Recordings - February 21, 2010

The Sunday Feast recording can be viewed by clicking the image below. As a reminder, the recordings from our weekly live web broadcasts are stored on our ISKCON Toronto Video Archive Blog.

Deity Darshan: Sunday February 21, 2010