Praṇamāmi Guru Tīrtha Padaṁ

My humble obeisances to all who are here in this conference. And, of course I would like to say that my most humble prostrated obeisances to the most divine, most revered His Divine Grace Śrīla Bhakti Ballabha Tīrtha Gosvāmī Mahārāja. When I say most revered, actually, 'most revered' while being formal, to some extent, is not how I actually feel. It does not actually convey the right feeling. I prefer to think in terms of the most beloved Śrīla Bhakti Ballabha Tīrtha Gosvāmī Mahārāja.  Śrīla Bhakti Ballabha Tīrtha Gosvāmī Mahārāja is the very personification of divine wisdom and devotion. I have never met anybody who compares to Śrīla Gurudeva. His compassion and affection are seen towards his disciples, and not just to his disciples but to all the people he comes in contact with, all the fallen souls of this Kaliyuga. These qualities are superlative in Śrīla Gurudeva Bhakti Ballabha Tīrtha Gosvāmī Mahārāja.  I had the extremely good fortune to meet him in 1980. A set of unusua

I feel we are very fortunate because I really see that when Śrīla Guru Mahārāja was in the West, he would manifest his human side in a particular way. Although I know he was also manifesting it everywhere, maybe in the West he was more in touch with what might be understood as normal devotees or even non-devotees [those who are not directed connected with Vaiṣṇavas]. We could witness how our Gurudeva was simultaneously fully human and fully divine. What really touched me was that he was so accessible, personal, caring, and simple. I could really feel he was genuine; not like a show. Śrīla Bhakti Kiṅkara  Dāmodara  Mahārāja was saying we can try to imitate simplicity, but it is nearly impossible. To be simple-hearted like Gurudeva is not possible for me. It is very complex to try to imitate something so simple.  He was really grateful for even small  sevās . I especially witnessed this gratitude as related to devotees who hosted him such as Viśvaṃbhara Prabhu and Bindu Mādhava Prabhu i