"Steal my heart!"

Many, many years ago, when I was in Jamaica, West Indies, I went to a church and gave a talk on spirituality. There were about eight hundred people in the audience. They were very impressed with my talk. Then they asked me many, many questions on prayer, meditation and various aspects of the spiritual life. Somehow I managed to satisfy them.

The minister of the church was a lady. She became a disciple and stayed in our Jamaica Centre for many years.

At the end of the programme, one of my Jamaican disciples said, “We are all extremely grateful to Sri Chinmoy for offering us his talk and for answering so many questions today. We hope his answers have been of service to you in your own spiritual quest.”

Then the disciple explained that our spiritual path includes people from all faiths and greatly encourages seekers in whatever religion they belong to. The disciple asked if anyone in the audience would like to follow our path and become my disciple. Can you imagine! All eight hundred members of the audience wanted to become my disciples.

They stood in a long queue. Since I knew that our path was not meant for everyone in the church, I said, “Each person may kindly pass by me slowly, in a meditative consciousness. I shall meditate on each person.”

After meditating briefly on each person, I saw that seventy or eighty were definitely meant to be my disciples. One by one, each of those whom I accepted in our Centre came and stood on one side. To the rest of the people, I offered my soul’s loving goodwill. I knew that they would do better on another spiritual path.

Afterwards, all the new disciples came to the house of the Centre leader, to whom I had given the name Durga. I agreed to see each person separately.

One very thin policeman came into the room and sat in front of me. I cut a joke with him. I said, “I am so happy you have come. If I happen to steal something, then you will be the first person to arrest me!”

He answered, “No. I have come here for you to steal my heart!”

I was deeply touched. That policeman was so nice.

Right after the policeman left, his wife entered the room. She wanted me to solve all her family problems. Alas, she had quite a few things to say to me against her husband!