HTGC celebrates Vivekananda 150th birth anniversary

CHICAGO: A two-day event remembering Swami Vivekananda’s unique contributions and the lasting spiritual legacy to humanity and celebrating his 150th birth anniversary was held at the Hindu Temple of Greater Chicago on January 12 and 13.
The Vivekananda International East West (VIEW) Yoga Conference was held on the first day. The President of temple, Tilak Marwaha, kick started the VIEW Yoga Conference after Veena Marwaha and Rama Palacharla lighted the lamp in memory and honor of Swami Vivekananda on his 150th birth anniversary celebrations.
In his welcome address to the gathering, Marwaha invited all 120 participants attending the conference to learn and understand the contributions of Swami Vivekananda who brought yoga and Vedanta to the United States when he attended the first Parliament of World Religions in Chicago in September 1893.
He said that Vivekananda, after giving several talks on Vedanta, traveled all over mid-western and eastern United States giving lectures on Vedanta and Yoga for almost two years.
Swami Vivekananda stayed in Thousand Islands in New York for several months teaching and giving discourses on Raja Yoga, Karma Yoga, Jnana Yoga and Bhakti Yoga. He even wrote and published his first book on Raja Yoga while he was in New York.
Marwaha also said, “Swami Vivekananda later traveled to Europe and came back to the US to teach for some more time before he went back to India. During his first visit to the US, Vivekananda founded the world’s first Vedanta Society in New York.
When he went back to India he founded the Ramakrishna Mission in honor of his master Ramakrishna to serve humanity. Then in 1899 when he visited US for the second time, he founded Vedanta Society of San Francisco and started Peace Retreat (Shanti Ashram) in California.
Thus he planted the seeds for yoga and influenced many leading thinkers, scientists and philosophers of his time both in the East and in the West”.
The temple’s Vice-President Bhima Reddy, in his speech, mentioned having the privilege of being part of the team that was responsible for installing Swami Vivekananda’s statue at the temple, the first statue of Swami Vivekananda in the US, and how the temple later expanded to build the Vivekananda Spiritual Center (VSC) which contains state-of-the-art meditation hall with Audio/Video facilities for people to sit quietly, meditate, listen to music kirtans, bhajans and also enjoy many spiritual discourses by distinguished speakers from all over the world.
HTGC Yoga Committee Chair Prasad Palacharla shared the agenda for different yoga workshops by distinguished speakers and teachers lined up for the entire day. As part of the yoga conference, three major workshops on Raja Yoga, Vedanta, and Ayur Yoga were conducted in the morning. After the morning sessions the participants in the yoga workshops had delicious Indian vegetarian lunch prepared by Temple’s Prasadam Kitchen. The temple had four other major workshops on Jnana Yoga, Karma Yoga, Bhagawad-Gita and Bhakti Yoga in the afternoon.
The participants also practiced Omkar Pranayama and Yoga Mudra and a mini-Hatha Yoga session in the morning and two Mini Hatha Yoga sessions, Pranayama and Dhyana sessions in the afternoon which were taught by HTGC Yoga teachers Prasad, Tomek, Alex, Loreta and Ramasami.
These mini Matha Yoga and Pranayama sessions helped all participants to stay relaxed, calm and rejuvenated throughout the day as tension breakers and smooth transitioning between workshops.
As Swami Vivekananda pointed out, there are several means to achieve the ultimate goal of yoga i.e. to manifest the divinity within, thru Karma Yoga (selfless action), or Bhakti Yoga (devotion), or Raja Yoga (cultivating mind through eight limbed path), or Jnana Yoga (cultivating wisdom).
He said, “Each soul is potentially divine. The goal is to manifest this divinity within by controlling nature, external and internal. Do this either by work, or worship or psychic control, or philosophy – by one, or more, or all of these – and be free. This is the whole of religion. Doctrines or dogmas or rituals, or books or temples or forms are but secondary details.”
Swami Varadananda, Hindu monk of the Ramakrishna order from the Vivekananda Vedanta Society of Chicago, hosted the next workshop on Vedanta. Vedanta is the body of knowledge, spiritual essence and philosophy from Upanishads at the end of Vedas (ancient scriptures from India on the Sanatana Dharma, meaning “Eternal or Universal Righteousness.”) He explained how Swami Vivekananda strongly emphasized his life’s mission was to awaken divinity within humanity and how by serving humanity one would be actually serving the Divine.
Poonam Gupta, Director of Yoga Gyan Jyoti, Center for Yoga and Ayurveda, hosted Workshop on Ayur Yoga. Man Mohan Shukla, author, motivational speaker and life coach, conducted workshop on Jnana Yoga, the path of knowledge, truthfulness, wisdom and transformation through yogic consciousness.
Swami Jyotirmayananda, editor of “Vivekananda – His Gospel of Man-Making,” hosted a session on Bhakti Yoga, the path of devotion. He shared inspiring incident in Swami Vivekananda’s life. Although being an Advaita Vedantist (non-dualistic philosopher who believes that Self and Brahman are One and the same), Vivekananda was also a Lord Rama Bhakta (Devotee, dualistic philosopher who believes that Self and Brahman are separate but merges into one another). He also concluded with a talk on how to integrate all four paths of yoga, i.e. Raja Yoga (path of meditation and mind control), Jnana Yoga (path of wisdom), Karma Yoga (path of selfless action) and Bhakti Yoga (path of devotion) into modern daily lives.
On the second day, the Conference celebrated Swami Vivekananda’s 150th birth anniversary as the main event. After Swami Chinmayananda from Vedanta Society of Chicago and Swami Jyotirmayananda of Ramakrishna Mission from India garlanded Swami Vivekananda’s statue in the Temple Campus ground, they visited Vivekananda Spiritual Center Meditation Hall before the Temple priests started the main event with an invocation. Minnu Purushotam sang beautiful bhajans and kirtans before Vivekananda Spiritual Committee Chair Amrish Mahajan introduced all the dignitaries and speakers for the day.

Consulate General Mukta Tomar gave a talk on how Swami Vivekananda worked hard to bring equality and uplift the condition of Indian women and emphasized that a country would prosper and make progress only when women are equally respected in that country’s culture. Mukta Tomar also spoke on how the Indian Consulate is working hard to strengthen the relations between India and the US by promoting and reviving teachings of Swami Vivekananda and how he served and bridged the cultures of both the East and the West.
Dr Indra Makhija and Dr Cindy Visscher presented excellent narrative of “The Great Coming Together: Swami Vivekananda at the Parliament of Religions in 1893”. Finally after keynote addresses by Swami Chinmayananda from Vedanta Society of Chicago and Swami Jyotirmayananda of Ramakrishna Mission, a movie ‘Swami Vivekananda: An Introspect’ was screened.
Amrish Mahajan proposed a vote of thanks and this was followed with Sacred Waters Group from South Bend, Indiana concluding the celebrations with beautiful renderings of few more bhajans.

India Post News Service