Lavina Melwani, popular Indian-American writer, recently interviewed ISKCON’s Minister of Communicatons for her blog, “Lassi with Lavina”. Lavina hopes that this interview can evoke comments and inspire discussion, and so do we. So we encourage our readers to visit “Lassi with Lavina”, read the whole story, and share their comments. – Editors

It was a bit like a floating library of Vedantic literature – and now it’s shutting down, or is being grounded, if you want to take the airport analogy a bit further. For the last four decades, the Hare Krishnas, as the followers of International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) are popularly known, were a fixture in American airports.

Heads shaved, clad in orange and white robes, they would cluster in busy terminals, waving Vedic literature at rushing passengers, sometimes singing and dancing in kirtan. Now their spiritual take-off has been canceled – a California Supreme Court ruling prohibits the Hare Krishnas from soliciting passengers at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX).

Distributing literature and requesting donations have long been regarded as free speech but the Court ruled that the LAX restriction is constitutional, and that the Hare Krishna activities were impeding traffic in a busy airport and also posed a security problem.

“Our reaction is disappointment because it limits our ability to contact people and share our faith and spiritual literature,” says Anuttama Dasa, who is a Governing Body Commissioner for ISKCON. “We believe these teachings offer valuable contributions in helping us to gain peace within ourselves and peace in the world.”

(Read the full interview, and share your comments, here…)