**Festival Day!**

We hope you can come to the temple this evening for chanting, dancing and feasting, in the good old-fashioned way! The Deities on the altar are looking bright and beautiful and ready to receive you. Please scroll down for details of the festivities.

Sri Nityananda's blessing.

Lord Nityananda's name, composed of two Sanskrit words, nitya - eternal and ananda - bliss, give us a clue to His essential nature and to our relationship with Him. Devotional songs often play on this meaning; while Sri Nityananda is experiencing eternal bliss, we are having the opposite experience. Our lives are often a struggle to grasp even the barest minimum of happiness, through so much misery and dissatisfaction. The happiness we manage to find is hard to keep hold of, and nowhere near as strong as we would like. We can never feel secure in it as long as we can see how much suffering there is in the world.

In one of his best-known songs, the devotee poet, Srila Narottama das Thakura prays, "My dear Lord Nityananda, You are always joyful in spiritual bliss. Since You always appear very happy, I have come to You because I am most unhappy. If You kindly put Your glance upon me, I may also be happy".

It's not ordinary, mundane happiness which Lord Nityananda gives, but that transcendental bliss which comes from completely selfless devotion to Krishna. This can seem a far-off dream to those of us who are struggling with weak faith or shaky sadhana, but no matter how 'off the radar' we may consider ourselves in spiritual life, and no matter how often we may fall away, Lord Nityananda is quick to help us and give us spiritual strength if we turn to Him. And He gives us tastes of that bliss even at the foothills of devotional service.

Fortunately He doesn't expect us to become pure and perfect overnight; as expressed in a song by Bhaktivinode Thakura, Lord Nityananda requests only three simple things: "Chant Krishna, worship Krishna and teach others about Krishna.

The next verse of that song is so nice, we'll put it here: "Being careful to remain free of offenses, just take the holy name of Lord Krishna. Krishna is your mother, Krishna is your father, and Krishna is the treasure of your life." Happy festival!