Recent newspaper articles about the
Bhagwan Swami Sri Sathya Sai Baba's
Message of Peace to All of The World:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sathya-sai/message/65
Sri Sathya Sai Shanti Seva Sangha
prayer for global peace now
global peace now breaking out

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

US astronaut to spread Sai Baba's message for global peace,
Hindustan Times, January 19, 2003;

Old mantras and new software side by side,
International Herald Tribune, December 3, 2002;

A Friend in India to All the world,
New York Times, December 1, 2002;

Kshama, the Grandest and Noblest Virtue, by
Bhagwan Sri Sathya Sai Baba,
Times of India, February 7, 2003:

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$


http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_141804,0005.htm

Hindustan Times

US astronaut to spread Sai Baba's message for global peace

Press Trust of India -- Hyderabad, January 19, 2003

A former US astronaut has embarked on a mission to bring about
world peace by spreading the message of India's holy man
Sathya Sai Baba whom the New York Times called
"a friend in India to all the world".

Brain O'Leary, a physicist and former science and energy policy
advisor to four US presidential candidates, is arriving in India on
Friday to meet with Sai Baba to get his advice on how to bring
about peace, according to sources close to the astronaut.

O'Leary will also meet "free energy technology" scientist,
Paramahamsa Tewari of Karwar, former head of the Kaiga
atomic station, whose theory of extracting energy from space
has found followers abroad, the sources said.

Describing Baba as "the greatest example of inter-faith
spiritual unity since Buddha," the sources said that by spreading
his "message of truth, peace, love, righteousness, and nonviolence"
the US astronaut hopes that global peace will "break out in mere days
from across the US, India, Pakistan, to Iraq."


$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$


http://www.shashitharoor.com/articles/iht/mantras.html
Copyright © 2002 The International Herald Tribune |
www.iht.com

Old mantras and new software side by side

By Shashi Tharoor

[United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Public Information]

Tuesday, December 3, 2002

BANGALORE, India: I made separate trips from Bangalore
recently that revealed, within a span of 48 hours, two different but
related facets of India. Late one night I set out on a four-hour drive
with my mother to the well-lit and orderly town of Puttaparthi in
Andhra Pradesh.

Buildings gleamed white against the streetlights; the sidewalks,
patrolled by volunteers even at that hour, seemed freshly scrubbed.
Puttaparthi, once a humble village like so many others, had become
a boomtown as the birthplace and headquarters of the spiritual leader
Sathya Sai Baba.

A private audience with the ocher-robed guru was astonishing at
several levels. Sai Baba uttered insights about my family and myself
that he could not possibly have known.

He has a habit, disconcerting at first, of turning his palm quizzically
outward and staring off into the distance, as if silently interrogating
an unseen, all-knowing source.

Sometimes he scribbles in the air with a finger as if dashing off a
note to a celestial messenger.

Then he says things which are by turns banal or profound, and
sometimes both (if only because so much of what he says has
become worn out by repetition and frequent quotation, including in
signs on the streets outside). Most startling, he materializes gifts
from thin air - in my case a gold ring with nine embedded stones.
He slipped it on my finger, remarking, "See how well it fits.
Even a goldsmith would have needed to measure your finger."

My mother, a longtime devotee, received a little silver urn
overflowing with vibhuti, or sacred ash.

"It was as if he had heard what I wanted," she said. But a skilled
magician can do that, and it would be wrong to see Sai Baba as a
conjurer. He has channeled the hopes and energies of his followers
into constructive directions, both spiritual and philanthropic.

Everything at his complex is staffed by volunteers who rotate
through Puttaparthi at well-organized two-week intervals. Many left
distinguished positions behind. The free hospital in Puttaparthi is
one of the best in India; many leading doctors volunteer their services.
Sai Baba has built schools and colleges, and is now involved in a
project to bring irrigation to a number of parched southern districts.

The next day I drove from Bangalore in a different direction, to the
campus of Infosys, India's leading computer technology company.
It, too, wore the clean and scrubbed look I had seen at Puttaparthi.
But there were no temples here, no pavilions thronged with devotees.

Instead, escorted by the affable chief executive, Nandan Nilekani,
I saw the world's leading software museum, a state-of-the-art
teleconference center, classrooms with sophisticated video equipment
and a work environment that could not be bettered in any developed
country. Infosys is a world leader in information technology. It provides
services in consulting, systems integration and applications to some
of the biggest companies in the world. Its 13,000 staff members,
known in the company's argot as "Infoscions," work in more than
30 offices around the world. In Bangalore, they sit amidst lush,
landscaped greenery dotted with pools, recharge themselves at an
ultramodern gym, display their creativity at a company art gallery and
enjoy a choice of nine food courts for their lunchtime snacks.

I marveled at the sophistication and affluence visible in every
square inch of the campus.

"We wanted to prove," Nandan explained, "that this could be done in India."

Sai Baba and Infosys are both facets of 21st century India.
One produces rings out of the ether and urges people to be
better human beings; the other deals in a different form of virtual
reality and helps human beings to better themselves. One runs free
hospitals and schools; the other seeks to bring the benefits of
technology to a country still mired in millennial poverty.

In the 1950s, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru declared dams and
factories to be "the new temples of modern India." What he failed
to recognize was that the old temples continued to maintain their
hold on the Indian imagination.

The software programs of the information technology companies
dotting Bangalore's "Silicon Plateau" may be the new mantras of
India, but they supplement, rather than supplant, the old mantras.
Sai Baba and Infosys are emblematic of an India that somehow
manages to live in several centuries at once.

On our way out of Puttaparthi my mother and I talked to a devotee
who was lining up to buy a packet of vibhuti to take home with him.

"What do you do?" I asked.

"I am," he replied proudly, a cell phone glinting in his shirt pocket,
"a project manager at Infosys."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Shashi Tharoor's most recent novel is "Riot."
He contributed this comment to the International Herald Tribune.

Copyright © 2002 The International Herald Tribune
http://www.shashitharoor.com/articles/iht/mantras.html


$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$


http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sathya-sai/message/10 [--photos]
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/01/international/asia/01GURU.html?ex=10397640
[mirrored above as permitted fair public use]


New York Times

December 1, 2002,

A Friend in India to All the world

By KEITH BRADSHER

PUTTAPARTHY, India - The president of India, who is best known for
overseeing India's nuclear tests in 1998, recently paid a state visit to
the country's largest ashram, to meet and receive the blessings of a
holy man who preaches nonviolence.

The visit underlined the appeal of the unusual holy man, Sri Sathya Sai
Baba, who draws presidents, prime ministers and other leaders not only
from India but also from outside it; altogether he claims followers in 178
countries.

The separation between state and religion in India, clear and bright in
the years immediately after Indian independence in 1947, has grown
less distinct. That is especially true with the political ascendancy of the
governing Bharatiya Janata Party, which emphasizes Hindu nationalism.

Part of the appeal of the Baba, as followers and others call him here, is
that ever since the 1940's he has been preaching an unusual mixture of
faiths and encouraging religious tolerance. Official visits here have
become one of the odder features of Indian public life, and among the
most colorful. The Baba's mixture of religions extends far beyond
traditional Hindu beliefs, and that lets him attract politicians of various
faiths, including Muslims like President A. P. J. Abdul Kalam of India.

President Kalam, a former nuclear scientist, flew to the ashram's
private airport here in southern India on a blue-and-white air force jet.
Saluted by olive-clad police officers, he climbed into the lead car of a
motorcade, and Sikh military aides in scarlet turbans followed suit.

Lining the road to the ashram were stone tablets inscribed with the
swami's utterances. "Money comes and money goes/Morality comes
and grows," read one sign in English, signed simply Baba, meaning
divine father. On a hillside at the ashram's entrance stood enormous,
brightly painted statues of Jesus, Buddha and Hanuman, an Indian
monkey god. Farther on were a large Chinese temple and a big
billboard of a benevolently smiling Baba, his hand raised in blessing.

Two-story modern buildings in fuchsia lined the paved avenue,
incongruously interspersed with 30-foot-tall statues of acoustic
guitars and wooden drums. The clunky Indian-made Ambassador
cars chugged past them and pulled to a halt in front of the great hall
of the ashram. More than 10,000 closely packed acolytes sat
cross-legged on the floor, the women in saris of brilliant emerald,
ruby and indigo silk, the men in white short-sleeve shirts and white
trousers, symbolizing purity.

President Kalam deferentially slipped off his brown loafers and
walked in stocking feet to the front of the hall, followed by a small
entourage, whose members had also tucked their shoes under
flowering bushes outside. The Baba, 76, a short man with a
thick mane of black hair, shuffled forward in his robe.

Acolytes discreetly angled for the Baba's notice; one of the few
Westerners nearby, a middle-aged man also sitting cross-legged,
clapped his hand to his heart and wobbled visibly with emotion
when the Baba appeared to wave in his direction.

Famous for seldom saying much in public even to his followers,
the Baba silently greeted President Kalam. The two men
disappeared through polished wood doors decorated with
reliefs of Hindu gods and into the Baba's inner sanctum, where
they remained a quarter of an hour while the crowd waited quietly.

A senior aide to the Baba whispered that the spiritual leader's
full name, Sri Sathya Sai Baba, signified holy, truth, divine mother
and divine father.

Preaching the five principles of truth, peace, love, nonviolence
and right conduct, the Baba "represents unity of religion, all religions,
" not just Hinduism, the aide said.

The president emerged and led his entourage out of the great hall,
putting on his shoes and hopping back in a car for a short drive to
the ashram's guesthouse. In a brief interview there, he said he had
discussed with the swami how to achieve an educational system
that combined values with science. "When they are fused, you get
an enlightened citizen," said President Kalam, whose role is mostly
ceremonial in this parliamentary democracy; the Parliament elected
him in July.

Coming from a Muslim background, the president is a rarity among
national politicians in a country that is four-fifths Hindu. He has long
contended that India's nuclear weapons program is necessary to
keep the peace in the region, and he does not represent warlike
intentions.

N. Chandrababu Naidu, the chief minister, or governor, of the Indian
state of Andhra Pradesh here, said the Baba was not just a holy man
but a public policy expert. Mr. Naidu described repeatedly seeking
the swami's advice while turning Hyderabad, the state capital of
Andhra Pradesh, into a high-tech center where American companies
like Microsoft and Oracle now employ thousands of computer programmers.

Using donations from around the world, the Baba has built two
hospitals near here that provide free care to the poor. He is now
spending $50 million to build systems for drinking water and
irrigation, Mr. Naidu said. But for all the swami's interest in
technology, he refuses to use e-mail, or even pick up a telephone.
"He won't correspond with anybody, he won't use phones either,"
the chief minister said, "Everyone has to come here."


$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$


http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sathya-sai/message/56
http://www.timesofindia.com


Kshama, the Grandest and Noblest Virtue

By Bhagwan Sri Sathya Sai Baba

Friday, February 7, 2003

The Times of India - Mumbai Edition - Page 2

True and Selfless Love manifests as Sacrifice.

Such Love knows no hatred. It envelops the en­tire Universe,
and is ca­pable of drawing Sathya Sai Baba near even those
who are seem­ingly far away.

Love it is that transforms the human into the Divine.

In the phenomenal world, you come across many shades and
derivatives of this Primordial Love. You love your father, mother,
brother, sister, friends and so on. In all such cases, there is always
a tinge of selfishness some­where or the other.

Divine Love, on the other hand, is totally free of even the slightest
trace of selfish­ness.

You must surrender to such Love, become com­pletely submerged
by it, and experience the Bliss it confers.

For acquiring such Love, the quality of Kshama or forbearance
is a vital neces­sity. Every individual must cultivate this noble quality.

Kshama is not achieved by reading books or learned from an instructor.

Nor can it be received as a gift from someone else.

This prime virtue Kshama can be acquired solely by self-effort, that is,
by facing diverse problems squarely, enduring difficul­ties of various
sorts, not giving in to anxieties, and bearing with equanimity suffering
as well as sorrow. In the absence of Kshama, man becomes susceptible
to various evil tendencies. Ha­tred and jealousy easily take root in a
person lacking this virtue.

Kshama is the grandest and the noblest among virtues.

The troubles the country is currently pass­ing through are largely
due to the absence of this noble quality of Kshama. With­out Kshama,
mankind be­comes degraded and starts declining, but if it has this
quality then it can progress in leaps and bounds.

Kshama is thus the very breath of life.

Everything must have a basis. For spiritual progress and
advancement, Kshama is the real basis or foundation. When
Kshama disappears, disturbance sets in and there is decline.
Great countries have lost their glory, prestige and reputation for
this reason. Patience is therefore a virtue that must be assidu­ously
cultivated, by individ­uals as well as nations, if troubles and
tribulations are to be successfully faced. Without patience and
the capacity for forbearance, one becomes spiritually weak.

When patience is gone, the greatest of men get reduced to utter fools.

The importance of Kshama cannot be over-stressed. This virtue is
best cultivated under adverse cir­cumstances, and one must therefore
gladly welcome troubles instead of regard­ing them as unwelcome.

Jealousy is the greatest enemy of man and it takes root when Kshama
is ab­sent. If you possess the virtue of Kshama, then none of these
enemies can come anywhere near you. Cultivation of Kshama must
therefore be an im­portant priority.

No doubt you will face many difficul­ties during life's journey, but bravely
march on, tak­ing courage from the fact that once you have Kshama
there is nothing that you cannot achieve.


$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Swami Sri Sathya Sai Baba
Info, photos, streaming voice:
http://www.sathyasai.org

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Sri Paramahamsa Tewari
http://www.tewari.org

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Dr. Brian O'Leary
http://www.independence.net/oleary

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sathya-sai/message/65
Sri Sathya Sai Shanti Seva Sangha
prayer for global peace now
global peace now breaking out

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$