The day after celebrations for one of our biggest festivals of the year, Krsna Janmastami (September 6th), we will be celebrating one of the most important festivals for us as Hare Krishnas – Srila Prabhupada’s Vyasa Puja on Thursday, September 7th, 2023.
The Vyasa Puja festival is always held the day after Janmastami and the festival honours the appearance of our spiritual master His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada – Founder Acharya of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness.
This year the program will begin at 11:00am with an abhisheka of Srila Prabhupada (bathing ceremony of a small Deity of Srila Prabhupada) and will continue with the arati, flower offerings, and (pushpanjali). Selected devotees and groups will be reading pre-written offerings to Srila Prabhupada. While everyone is invited to participate in the program we will likely not be able to accommodate everyone reading offerings. We will be once again encouraging everyone to write their own offering for the Toronto Vyasa Puja Book.
Traditionally, Vyasa Puja “offerings” are made by devotees who write and present personal messages to the spiritual master. The Governing Body Commission (GBC) for ISKCON has stated that every devotee in ISKCON should write an offering to Srila Prabhupada on Vyasa Puja.
We would like to encourage all devotees in our community to write a personal letter, in the form of an offering to Srila Prabhupada for this year’s festival. To further facilitate this process special pages are available at the Temple reception desk, alternatively, you can download the letterhead HERE should you wish to print your offering. All written offerings should be brought to the Temple on September 7th no later than 12pm.