Universality of Religion Series

This year the Sai Centre of Adelaide Central started a new initiative under its Devotion Wing, the Universality of Religion Series. In conjunction with the different religious festivals, the Centre intends to invite guest speakers from different faiths to speak at the Centre. This is an effort to promote our beloved Swami's teachings - Honor all religions. Each is a pathway to God. That is the right way of life and a better understanding of the different religions and thus create love and respect.

The first talk of the series was done at the Centre’s Easter Celebration with Kevin Francis, a member from the Centre who spoke on the Essence of Easter.

Essene of Ramadan's Eid and fasting

A couple of weeks later, we had Memoona Rafique, from Relationships Australia, SA who spoke to the members about Eid and the obligation of fasting during the month of Ramadan. She mentioned the importance of fasting and correlated it with the teachings of Sathya Sai Baba. It is so fascinating and wonderful to see how our fellow brothers and sisters relate to Swami in their own ways and beliefs. At the end of her talk, she replied to the queries from the devotees.

For the Centre’s Buddha Purnima celebration held recently, Sanjeewa Goonewardene, a member from the Vale Park Centre was invited to speak about his Buddhist faith. Brother Sanjeewa narrated the story of Adinabupaka who lived during the time of the Buddha and spoke about how Swami’s teachings relate to the teachings of Buddhism. No doubt, the below lines kept resonating amongst us

Buddham Sharanam Gatchami

Dhammam Sharanam Gatchami

Sangham Sharanam Gatchami

Sathya Sayeesha Sharanam Gachchami

Adelaide Central has a few more talks planned for the second half of the year, such as Guru Nanak Jayanti and Krishna Janmashtami.

In addition to the Universality of Religion series, the Centre is planning to invite experts from various fields as guest speakers, such as medicine, environment, and culture. And we look forward to sharing them with you.

Key lessons learnt from these series are, Sai devotees get the opportunity to understand the essence of the different religions and the speakers from different faiths also get an opportunity to understand about Swami and this strengthens Swami’s teaching on Universality of the faiths.

Let the different faiths exist.

Let them flourish and

Let the glory of God be sung

In all the languages of the world

And in a variety of tunes.

Respect the differences between the faiths

And recognise them as valid

As long as they do not extinguish

The flame of unity.