The ISKCON Deity Worship Journal

Editorial

®r… ®r… Guru-Gaur€‰ga Jayataƒ January 15, 1997

   Dear Devotees,

   I beg to offer my humble obeisances to all the Vai�Šava devotees of the Lord, praying for your blessings for the project at hand.

   It has been thirty years since ®r…la Prabhup€da mercifully invoked the Lord’s presence in His Deity forms of ®r… ®r… Jagann€tha, Subhadr€, and Baladeva in San Francisco, in 1967. In the course of the next ten years he opened temples and installed Deities throughout the world. Following in ®r…la Prabhup€da’s footsteps after his physical departure, devotees have opened many more temples and installed Deities of Lord K��Ša in His various forms. Now there are hundreds of centers where regular worship of the Deity form of the Lord — the arca-vigraha — is going on by hundreds of devotees.

   Many of us consider it high time we dedicate a journal to the subject of this important service — a journal of Deity worship for the International Society for Krishna Consciousness.

   We plan to start in a humble way, with all of one issue per year, hopefully published by Gaura-p™rŠim€ each year. If this project expands, it will probably be shown by an increase in the number of pages per issue, rather than number of issues per year.

   At present we have defined three Purposes for the journal:

1. to act as a forum for devotees engaged in Deity worship — whether in temples, n€ma-ha˜˜a centers, or at home — to discuss the challenges and problems, as well as the glories and victories experienced in arcana-related matters.
2. to provide inspiration and stimulation for maintaining and expanding the proper worship of Deities in ISKCON, based on the teachings of ®r…la Prabhup€da.
3. to promote awareness of the importance of Deity worship as an integral feature of the process of devotional service and the preaching mission of the Krishna Consciousness Movement.


   This is our first attempt. Although we consider our main "audience" to be devotees regularly engaged in the direct worship of Deities (including cooks!) we hope others will also find it valuable.

   Please help us with suggestions for improvement, letters, articles, or criticisms.

   Your servant,


K��Ša-k�etra D€sa
ISKCON-GBC Monitor for Deity Worship

© International Society for Krishna Consciousness, Bhaktivedanta Book Trust 1998
Founder-šch€rya His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhup€da