amma’s message Sharing love, spreading joy
For India’s “hugging saint,” compassion for all begins with the simplest, most basic act of human affection. By PHil CatalFo
Continuing a practice that began during her childhood, humanitarian Mata Amritanandamayi (known as Amma) bestows hugs as a way to ease suffering and manifest love.
iF tHErE’S a WorlD rECorD For HuGGinG, surely it’s held by “the hugging saint,” Indian-born spiritual teacher Mata Amritanandamayi. Amma (“Mother”), as she is called, frequently hugs thousands of devotees in a single audience— she once hugged 45,000 people in a marathon 21-hour session—and has, since the 1970s, given individual embraces to more than 27 million devotees and curious seekers.
Why does she do it? Amma has her own explanation: “An unbroken stream of love flows from me towards all beings in the cosmos,” she says. “That is my inborn nature.” And her aim in dispensing her boundless affection is not only to comfort and nurture others but also to awaken a bottomless compassion that seeks to alleviate others’ suffering and heal the world.
by her father so she could perform household chores, she was so moved by the needs and suffering of others in the village that she offered them food and clothing from her family’s own meager stores.
As a teenager, she was attracting crowds of people and bestowing the blessings they sought in the form of hugs—a practice that earned her the disapproval of relatives and other villagers who frowned on a single woman touching strangers. They scorned, admonished, threw stones, and even attempted to poison and stab her. Undaunted, she continued her life’s mission of “uplifting ailing humanity.”
Born to an impoverished family in a small fishing village in the Indian state of Kerala in 1953, Amma felt a spiritual calling as a young child, when she would compose devotional songs and constantly mouth silent prayers. Taken out of school at age 10
Today, Amma’s efforts go far beyond hugs, extending to a vast array of educational, social-service, and relief projects in India, the U.S., and around the world. Since the Mata Amritanandamayi charitable trust was founded in the late 1980s, it has built a $20 million, 1,300-bed hospital in Kerala; funded monthly pensions for 100,000 destitute Indian women and physically or mentally challenged
davId enGlIsh
( 54 ) Organic Style Spring 2008
COnTEnTS HELp
organicstyle.com ( 55 )
OS_0804_edit_v7a.indd 54-55
4/17/08 10:32:38 PM
References:
Archives