Hari Om Parents,
Here is a summary of Balavihar class activities for January 09, 2022.
1. We commenced our class with three OMs followed by the opening prayers.
2. We then recited Ajam Nirvikalpam and Ganesha Pancharatnam stotram. Children took turns repeating the stotram a couple of times to get the pronunciation and the tune right. We will continue practicing the stotram. Please remind children to practice reciting this at home.
3. Mahabharata:
The children recapped the story covered so far.
We continued with our story…
- Karna approaches Parshurama to teach him archery by telling he is a brahmin and by hiding his identity. Karna sat through the pain of the insect bite when Parshurama was sleeping on his lap. Curse of Parshurama to Karna for learning archery under false pretenses and betraying his trust and that Karna's memory would fail when he will need those skills the most.
- Acharya Drona organized a tournament to showcase the prowess of the Kuru princes. Duel with the mace fought between Duryodhana and Bhima, exhibition of feats of archery by Arjuna. Karna's entry and challenge to Arjuna. Duryodhana crowned Karna as the King of Anga to fight the duel.
- Karna gives away his kavacha and kundala (armor and earrings) to Lord Indra when he asks for them when he comes disguised as a brahmin. Lord Indra had done this so that Arjuna could be invincible. In return Lord Indra gives Karna shakti weapon that would kill whoever it was aimed at
4. Gita Chanting:
We reviewed verses 39 through 46 from Chapter 2 Saankhya Yoga, kids took turns chanting the verses assigned.
We followed Swamiji's chanting video and kids took turns reciting it.
5. We then continued with our journey on learning about the Saints of India.
Three children presented about the life, teachings, work, and quotes of three saints- Sant Tukaram Maharaji, Narasimha Mehta, and Mother Teresa.
In today's presentation, we learnt that Sant Tukaramji was a 17th- century poet-saint of the bhakti movement born in Maharashtra. He was a devotee of Vithoba (Vitthala), an avatar of God Vishnu. His guru was Sant Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. He was best known for his devotional poetry called Abhanga and community-oriented worship with spiritual songs known as kirtans. Tukaramji pointed out the evil of wrongdoings of society, social system and maharajas by his kirtans and abhangs. He faced some opposition because of this from some people. He believed that no human being would ever attain happiness in life till there was a place for God in their lives.
Narasimha Mehta's also known as Narsi Mehta or Narsi Bhagat (1414–1481), was a poet-saint of Gujarat, India, notable as a bhakta, an exponent of Vaishnava poetry. He is especially revered in Gujarati literature, where he is acclaimed as its Adi Kavi. His bhajan Vaishnava Janato is Mahatma Gandhi's favorite and has become synonymous with him. We listened to the bhajan "Vaishnava Janato" composed by Narasimha Mehtaji in our class.
Mother Teresa was born as Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu in Skopje, Yugoslavia, in 1910. She was 12 when she felt a deep calling to become a missionary to spread. She trained to do missionary work and came to India in 1931. She was a teacher for several years, but strongly felt the need to serve. She started serving the poor and the under-served ill people. Over the course of time, her work expanded, and she established " The Missionaries of Charity" in Calcutta. She has been awarded the Medal of Freedom (US), Magsaysay Award and the Nobel Peace Prize (1979). We talked about some of her popular quotes. "Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person". This quote from Mother Teresa reminds us that we need to start making changes ourselves. When we see something that is going wrong or not working, when we see injustice or a person in need, we have the power to make a difference right there and then. The other quote that we talked about was, "if we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other". Connections with other people are what make life worth living. Strive to be kind to others and do your best. When we feel unsettled, anxious, angry, or sad, we can always turn to other people for comfort and help them, which will in turn make us feel better as well. Mother Teresa reminds us that even if all we can add is a little grain of sand, a small stone, it can have bigger effects than we imagine.
6. Class ended with aarti, shanti mantra, and pledge.
Our next class is on January 23rd.
Reminders:
§ Please have the My Prayers Book and the Balavihar Handbook handy during our Balavihar session.
https://www.chinmayavrindavan.org/balavihar/parents-corner/handbook
§ House Points: Please send your child's individual chanting recordings for earning house points. The recording video link can be shared with geeta@chinmayavrindavan.org with your session grade.
§ Registration for other house contests including Story Telling, Shlokathon, Art Contests is open. Please check chinmayavrindavan.org/HouseEvents for details.
Pranaam,
Subha and Rekha