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A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Shaunaka Rishi Das

Good morning.

A person once called me a 鈥榢now-it鈥�, a term I had never heard, but the meaning was clear. I thought I knew it all.

I was a young Hare Krishna student, shaven-headed and saffron robed, and full of the joy of having found the Truth. Now I wanted to share it all over everyone, whether they liked it or not. In reality I didn鈥檛 know much more than I was right.

Well, Old Mary put me wise. We called her Old Mary because she was old. She used to prowl O鈥機onnell Street, in Dublin, preaching her brand of radical Catholicism, and she took every opportunity to harass us Krishnas as we prowled the same street. Her favoured form of harassment was to sprinkle holy water on us, invoking her Lord loudly, 鈥淚n the name of the Lord, in the house of Juda, in the line of David鈥�etc鈥�.

One day, from behind, she poured water on me, not sprinkled. She had ambushed me, and I was drenched. She stood there with a broad smile and a twinkle in her eye, and somehow, I began to feel a bond with her. We were certainly the strangest people on the street. I asked her about herself and it turned out she was from my hometown, and was to be a nun but didn鈥檛 fit into the church. Much like my own story. I could relate to her commitment, her sincerity, and her surreal compassion in pouring her Truth all over me. Each of us well matched in our conviction that we had a monopoly on the truth.

Lord, none of us can see what you see, or can love as fully as you. We all have a grasp, an angle, but none of us have a monopoly on the Truth, except you. May I see you in everyone, and everywhere.

Hare Krishna