If He Is Not My Teacher

When Dodula first came to Kailash's lecture, she was dressed in her black nun's costume. To everybody's surprise, she was one of the ten people who signed up for the follow-up. Kailash spoke the first evening, and I continued the following three evenings until the end. Kailash told me that in case this nun stayed until the last evening, I had better not speak about how to become a disciple, in order to avoid problems with the church. Sure enough, she was one of the few people who stayed until the last class. Right from the beginning she was so open to Guru. She loved his Transcendental photograph; she said it was always smiling at her. She bought many books, which she also gave to her nun sisters and the Mother Superior. She also bought quite a few pictures of Guru and put them up in her little room. When I was in New York, I was inspired to tell some of the experiences she had with Guru's music and with the Transcendental picture in connection with the children she was teaching. The stories were as beautiful as fairytales, but they were real! Guru's only comment was: "Is she not a disciple?" I answered: "No, Guru, she has been a Catholic sister for 27 years!" Guru just smiled compassionately at my stupid answer. After a few weeks Guru came to Munich, and since Dodula came to our Madal Bal store every week, I told her, "Next time I will not be here; I will go to visit Sri Chinmoy in Munich." She said that she had written a poem for him and asked me if I could translate it and give it to him. I opened the envelope, and there was a photo of her inside. I asked her why she wanted to give Sri Chinmoy a photo of her (since I never told her how to apply to become a disciple). She said that since she had so many pictures of him, she wanted him to have at least one of her, just so that he knew who was thanking him for all his blessings and help. Then I had to tell her that Sri Chinmoy happened to be not only a peace philosopher, artist, composer and poet but also that he was a spiritual Master of the highest order who accepted his disciples through a photo. She had tears in her eyes and said, "If he is not my teacher, then who is my teacher? I learned from him much more in these few months than I learned in all my 27 years as a spiritual sister in the convent!" When Guru saw her picture, he accepted her as a disciple and said, "Christ has stolen her heart and brought it now to me."

Gunthita (Zurich)