Kumbha Mela 2025 – Part 4, The Mahasnan (The great bath)

By Teresa Guerra

Jan 29th – I could hardly sleep last night because of the excitement, the loud chanting in the street, and jetlag…Women in the tent started getting ready before 2:00a.m.

At 3:20a.m., the swamis and nuns were lined up. That was a scene to be seen! What a joy!!! So uplifting!  One of the swamis applied vibuthi (ashes) on the other swamis’ foreheads.  The matajis did the same and also applied on the devotees’ foreheads, including us. The procession began. Many were chanting Hara Hara Mahadeva! Srilatha and I were next to each other. At that time in the morning the crowd was huge!

 

Kumbha Mela 2025 – Part 3, Joy

By Teresa Guerra

Jan 27th - We had meditation at 5:30a.m. followed by a very short Puja, and then breakfast at 8:00a.m. We left camp at 9:00a.m. The streets were crowded with people walking, motorcycles, bikes, cars, ambulances and what not. It was amazing to see so many people! So many sadhus were walking! What a joy!!!  We also saw the Naga sadhus in their tents on the sidewalks.  You could feel something deeper in the midst of the constant beeping of the cars and people shouting. After walking 3 kilometers we finally reached the Triveni Sangam (confluence of three rivers – Ganga, Yamuna, Saraswati) and took a snan (bath)!

We got back to the camp by 11:45a.m. and had lunch. Later in the afternoon we had tea. I ran into a devotee from the DC Center. In the evening, we had Aarati. It was amazing… so uplifting…very special. 

After meditation I stepped outside. I cannot properly describe the feeling…subtle, sublime, profound and peaceful in the middle of so much noise. I couldn’t hold my tears…

Kumbha Mela 2025 – Part 2, Blessed Prayagraj

By Teresa Guerra

Jan 26th – I arrived at Blessed Prayagraj! No SIM card was available at the airport. Oh well, we’ll figure it out. I left from Prayagraj airport in a taxi towards the Khumba Mela camp a little after 3:00 pm. Once we were getting closer to the area, the traffic was moving very slowly. Lots of people walking, motorists, cars, 3-wheelers, bikes…were all sharing the same road. I thought about how much devotion people had!  Many of them were carrying their luggage on their shoulders or heads… and walking for such long distances! Jai Maa!

Kumbha Mela (Festival of the ‘Sacred Pitcher’) originates in the story of the Churning of the Ocean, where Lord Indra’s son took the pot (kumbha) of nectar (amruta) and ran.  According to one version, drops of nectar spilled at 4 places on earth. Another version has it that he kept the pot down at 4 spots to catch a breath, before reaching the heaven. Those four spots became sites for Kumbha Mela. At any site, the same constellation of stars appears every 12 years. And so, Kumbha Mela gets held at a site every 12 years, attracting millions of people. In Prayagraj, this year more than 400 million people took a dip in the first few weeks itself! It is a great place of pilgrimage. (Reference: Friday Feb 7, 2025: "Stories from Srimad Bhagavatam" by Swami Yogatmananda)

Kumbha Mela 2025 – Part I, Excitement & Patience

By Teresa Guerra

‘Kumbha Mela! Teresa, you can go for that.’ One evening at the dining table, Swami Yogatmananda-ji uttered these words… My eyes lit up, heart raced, mind filled with hundreds of happy pictures of India… and my pilgrimage to Kumbha already began! I had heard millions of people go to this event. Little did I know what ‘millions of people’ look like, feel like, and function as devotees. I was in for a grand adventure.

Kumbha Mela ('festival of the Sacred Pitcher') occurs every 3-4 years and rotates between four holy cities in India. In 2025, the site was Prayagraj, the confluence of Ganga-Yamuna, from Jan 13 to Feb 26. I was assigned a 5-day slot, Jan 26-31.

I applied for leave, got in touch with the Ramakrishna Mission (RKM) Kumbha Mela Camp organizers, and Swamis from other RKM centers that I planned to visit after Kumbha. Itinerary was arranged, tickets bought, and several hectic weeks with interludes of joy, gave way to Jan 24, the day I started from Providence for Prayagraj.

The Holiest of Unions

By Dawn Raffel

For the upcoming symposium on Sri Ramakrishna’s birthday, in which I am a designated speaker, I have been studying his divine relationship with Holy Mother. I decided to first distill my thoughts into a blog post. Therefore, I will do my best to etch some words about this vast subject onto the head of a pin, with apologies for my shortfalls.

Among avatars, Ramakrishna’s marriage is unique. Rather than decline to marry or renounce an existing marriage, he created a profound spiritual union with Sarada Devi, whom he identified as his bride when she was five years old.

Among the many momentous incidents in their marriage, one might argue that the most significant occurred on June 5, 1872, the night of the Kali Puja at Dakshineswar. Sarada, then 18, had joined her husband after years of separation, and they had established a non-carnal marriage. On that night, he worshipped her in a special puja as Shodashi, the third of ten forms of Kali. He went into samadhi and she lost consciousness. The impact of this worship would ripple through continents and centuries, helping to define the Vedanta movement as it spread across the globe.

Virtual Reality and Mummies

By Dawn

My husband and I recently went to a virtual reality show called “Horizon of Khufu,” which allows visitors to “explore the Giza Plateau and the Great Pyramid of Giza as if you were really there.” Upon entering the exhibition space, we stood in line to receive our v.r. goggles and instructions: “Remove the goggles if you feel dizzy” and “if you see a chair, don't sit try to on it because it isn't there.”

With goggles on, we embarked on a walking tour of ancient Egyptian pyramids and tombs, complete with a virtual human guide. Stepping along what appeared to be a narrow, jagged precipice, I felt a frisson of fear, yet quickly remembered that the precipice wasn't real; I was in fact walking on a flat floor. 

After passing through ornate rooms and stunning scenery, we were transported on a boat through time and entered the space where the mummification process was underway. As part of the ritual, we were told, all of the organs were removed except for the heart, believed to be the home of the soul and needed for entry to the afterlife. The body, in this case Pharaoh Khufu’s, was then meticulously wrapped to last. 

Interacting with REAL Elephants

By Dawn

In September, I volunteered with The Great Elephant Migration, a traveling exhibition of 100 life-size elephant sculptures made in Southern India. The elephants were crafted from Lantana, an invasive shrub that looks similar to bamboo, and the exhibition’s purpose was threefold: to promote the ideal of human/wildlife coexistence, to provide work for the artists, and to remove Lantana.

I knew that “the herd” had first spent two months in Newport, Rhode Island, on and around the grounds of Salve Regina University. By luck, I had the chance to chat about the exhibit with Dr. Linda Forsberg, the university’s Assistant Director of Retreats and Discernment, on Universal Brotherhood Day at Vedanta Society of Providence. 

Two days later, my first shift began in New York. The herd had arrived via flatbed truck, leaving those hallowed grounds for a densely populated part of Manhattan known as the meatpacking district. (No meatpacking occurs there anymore; the neighborhood is congested with high-end retail.) After being issued a green vest and a nametag identifying me as an “Elephant Guardian,” I was sent to interact with some of the hundreds of people milling around. Many had planned their visit; others had stumbled, delighted, onto to the sight of elephants dominating the plaza, peeking out from behind urban planters, merrily tearing the fabric of expectation. The atmosphere was giddy. There were babies in strollers and old people in walkers, people of all races, in every manner of dress, plus a couple of unimpressed dogs. For hours, I answered questions, snapped group photos, listened and observed.