Condemned

Today was obviously not a good day for me. I had this fear from day one when I came here the other day in California that family would bombard me about being in the Krishna Conciousness movement. I know they would all love for me to leave this movement. But I REFUSE! I had given my guru Maharaj my promise to him that I'd NEVER leave this movement.

So what happened was today my grandmother was actually questioning me about her own religion testing me on what I believe in her faith. She asked me who Jesus was...I simply told her that Jesus is the Son of God a spiritual master who went around to preach, then she asked me who God was. I simply said God is a person with many names and gave her a short list but there are unlimited names and then she claimed her bible is the ONLY bible out there and apparently that's where she started to get into a heated conversation with me about religion. It only got worse by the minute. I tried staying calm and not say much,  but my grandmother totally blew it out of proportion about my beliefs and yelled at me by saying "The devil has got a hold of you and you will be going to hell!" So another words she condemned me to hell. She claimed I didn't answer her questions which I did and apparently they were not good enough answers for her. I finally had to walk away before any more damage fell through. One thing she doesn't know she doesn't have the right to say that Im going to hell only God Himself can say that and judge that she is in no power to say so.

But little does she know that in the Bhagavad Gita it says that the devotee does care where God sends him because the devotee pleads with God to always remember His Lotus Feet and to preach about Him EVEN when he's in hell. So if Krishna wishes me to go to hell then I will do my best to beg Him to let me remember Him in Hell and and to let me try to preach about Him and let me do some service for Him there. My family believes in that they only have one life and that they will all go to heaven and not come back here. But again little do they know that the soul keeps on going and changes bodies. But they do not believe in reincarnation either. I am the only one who does.

And here is another realization that hit me with my grandmother's statement. Even though she condemned me, we are ALL condemned because we live in this material world and we are only thinking of ourselves and serving our sense gratificiation and that alone will send us to hell as well. So thinking of this brings me comfort so I am not afraid of what my grandmother told me. Maybe being in hell will teach me to be more humble and tolerant so that I can return to God one day. There are some of God's devotees in Hell right now preaching to the people there to help them realize about Him. So why fear that? I would simply only ask Krishna to stay in His service even in Hell and beg Him for protection while I am there.