View source for I'm a servant of the government right now, and will it take more love of Krsna for me to be devotee, or what...?

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[[Category:Questions asked to Srila Prabhupada]]
[[Category:Questions asked to SP... 1976]]
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<div id="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="section" sec_index="5" parent="compilation" text="Conversations and Morning Walks"><h2>Conversations and Morning Walks</h2>
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<div id="1976_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="sub_section" sec_index="9" parent="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" text="1976 Conversations and Morning Walks"><h3>1976 Conversations and Morning Walks</h3>
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<div id="EveningDarsanaJuly81976WashingtonDC_0" class="quote" parent="1976_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" book="Con" index="195" link="Evening Darsana -- July 8, 1976, Washington, D.C." link_text="Evening Darsana -- July 8, 1976, Washington, D.C.">
<div class="heading">No, you can become a devotee even if you are a government servant. It does not hamper... You become a devotee. Any material condition does not hamper your devotional life. Ahaituky apratihatā. If any condition of life you remain a devotee of Kṛṣṇa, that is success.
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<span class="link">[[Vanisource:Evening Darsana -- July 8, 1976, Washington, D.C.|Evening Darsana -- July 8, 1976, Washington, D.C.]]: </span><div class="text"><p style="display: inline;">Guest (2): Śrīla Prabhupāda, I was twenty-seven years old and I learned about God through Jesus. I was twenty-seven. For thirty-five years I thought I had a relation with... (break) ...and through your knowledge that you are writing. I'm a servant of the government right now, and will it take more love of Kṛṣṇa for me to be devotee, or what...?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, you can become a devotee even if you are a government servant. It does not hamper.</p>
<p>Guest (2): So I can hear and I can chant and I can pray and I can serve and I can do all those and still...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: You become a devotee. Any material condition does not hamper your devotional life. Ahaituky apratihatā. If any condition of life you remain a devotee of Kṛṣṇa, that is success.</p>
<p>Devotee (4): Must initiation be there, Śrīla Prabhupāda?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Initiation must be there. Otherwise, how you'll be guided? But it is not necessary, but if you can cent percent engagement in Kṛṣṇa, that is better. Just like Sanātana Gosvāmī, he was a minister, so he resigned and became cent percent servitor of Caitanya Mahāprabhu. But if it is not possible, it does not hamper.</p>
<p>Guest (2): But I can retire in twenty days, and if that is possible, then I can make one more good step.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes, oh, yes. So twenty days you are going. That means compulsory retirement?</p>
<p>Guest (2): No, my... I can retire or not retire. I can work until eight more years as a servant of the government. And at the same time...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Don't retire sentimentally. Yes, don't retire.</p>
<p>Guest (2): But through Kṛṣṇa's love I can retire...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is another thing, but not sentimentally.</p>
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