Hari-śauri: We used to have a Reverend who was in charge of our local church when I was a child. And when we used to go on outings, sometimes they used to organize outings for children to the seaside and everything, and they would stop at a public house and they would give refreshments. So all the children would get lemonade, like that, and the grown-ups would go and drink some beer or something. So the...
Prabhupāda: Their father, mother drinking, and the child is given some soft drinking. And learning how to drink when he'll grow up.
Hari-śauri: This vicar, he used to sit, and he used to sip small glass of clear liquid. So everyone thought he was drinking water, but then once they checked, and it was pure vodka.
Prabhupāda: While speaking lie "I was drinking water." (japa) (break—converses in Hindi)
Indian man: Prabhupāda, I'm trying to get one radio station you know, so far the, so that we make a Hare Kṛṣṇa program. So the radio is the big media for...
Prabhupāda: (Hindi)
Devotee priest (Bhakta Gene): I'm told that...
Prabhupāda: Oh, (laughs) how are you?
Bhakta Gene: Very fine, very fine. I'm told that you met with Thomas Merton some years ago. Is this correct?
Prabhupāda: The French?
Bhakta Gene: No, the Cistercian monk from Kentucky.
Prabhupāda: I do not know.
Bhakta Gene: You didn't meet with him? He was supposedly the most prominent mystical writer within the Catholic Church in the past one hundred years. His writings gained tremendous prominence in the past..., oh, the past twenty-five years.
Prabhupāda: Prominence amongst whom?
Bhakta Gene: Uh, amongst Christians. And non-Christians as well. He made a trip to the East. He had an accident in the East and was electrocuted. Oh, this is some ten years ago now.
Jayādvaita: He wrote that original introduction for your first Bhagavad-gītā published by Macmillan.
Prabhupāda: Oh.
Bhakta Gene: Well, this raises a question in my mind, Your Grace. Within Christianity there has been a history of mysticism from 100 A.D. to the present. Now there have been some prominent mystics, a few prominent mystics, and a great many not so prominent. Now how do you classify these men, these Christian mystics, Protestant as well as Catholic?
Prabhupāda: It is some yogic mysticism. It has nothing to do with spiritual life. They want to see some miracles, generally, ordinary public. So this mystic power, show some miracles and make them astonished. That's all. It has nothing to do with spiritual life.
Bhakta Gene: Perhaps you misunderstood me. I was referring to truly devotional mystics, such as St. John of the Cross, St. Francis of Assisi.
Prabhupāda: If there is devotional service, where is the need of mysticism? There is no need. God is my master, I am His servant. Where there is necessity of this nonsense mysticism?
Bhakta Gene: I think that the term mysticism, so many people have been playing with, particularly here in the United States.
Prabhupāda: So many people, we have nothing to do with so many people. If you are actually servant of God, so God is there, you are servant. So your transaction is there. Just to carry out the orders of God. That's all. Why do you want mysticism? Just to show some jugglery to the people? You serve God. That's all. And it is very simple thing, what God orders. Man-manā bhava mad-bhakto mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru (BG 18.65). Where is the question of mysticism? There is no question of mysticism. God says "Just always think of Me. Offer your obeisances and worship Me." That's all. Where is the need of mysticism? It is all jugglery.
Indian man: I tell you, I think there's a wrong conception.
Prabhupāda: You think in your way. There is no meaning in your thinking unless you come to the line.
Indian man: No, sir. There's a wrong conception, that mysticism. They say it comes with the spiritual advancement. I think that's what he's getting at.