Debriefing the Mysteries of the Sacred Universe Workshop.
Raga devi dasi : It’s my pleasure to offer this account of the “Unravelling the Mysteries of the Sacred Universe” workshop sponsored by the Krishna Institute and the Bhaktivedanta Institute of Gainesville held at the Alachua Learning Academy on the May 21-22. It included an all-star cast: Janmastami das did a stellar job of organizing the program, bringing in guest speakers His Holiness Bhakti Caru Swami (by internet), Brahmatirtha das in person, and key presenter, Murli Gopal das, who came in from the NYC Bhakti Center, toting an excellent PowerPoint presentation and many large charts and exhibits mounted around the room. Nandini Kishori devi dasi and her friendly helper, Vegavati devi dasi, facilitated online participation.
We began with the premise that the Srimad Bhagavatam’s Fifth Canto can be bewildering, and were quite relieved when Murli Gopal prabhu announced that we were welcome to consider our own appreciation of the information presented and need not conform to a definitive consensus. He cleverly avoided over-thinking complex topics by including two entertaining small group sessions exploring the 5th Canto’s cosmography. Throughout the workshop he presented fascinating Vaishnava pastimes involving this cosmography. We went to the Santa Fe College Planetarium to view “Passport to the Universe,” narrated by Academy Award winner Tom Hanks. It offered a dazzling tour of the modern scientific conception of the cosmos, which Murali Gopal prabhu skillfully contrasted to the Vedic version analyzed in the book Mysteries of the Sacred Universe by Sadaputa das (PhD in Mathematics from Cornell). Following in his footsteps, Murli Gopal prabhu has studied both science (Ph.D. in Physics from Ohio University) and Sanskrit (Columbia University), as well as Vedic cosmography and astronomy (and he has a 5th degree black belt in Karate!) He brought these impressive credentials to his well-organized talks, along with his deep loving respect for Sadaputa prabhu, plus a humorous, progressive outlook that allowed him to blend cartoons illustrating central concepts along with fascinating sophisticated graphics. The 48 participants (along with 20 more interacting online) appeared to be extremely satisfied with the spectacular presentations. Rucira devi dasi seemed to sum up the prevailing mood with her comment “I have no words to say how grateful I am to acquire this new knowledge.”