Vedic Perspective
Editorial Commentary
6-11-87

  This week marks the end of the school year for Chicago public school
students.  Is the kind of education are students getting nowadays preparing
them to cope with the ever increasing problems facing youth today?
  Children are being brought into a very stressful condition of life today.
Fifteen to twenty-five years ago when we were attending the Chicago public
schools, there was not much talk of teenage suicide or child abuse.  But
these problems, along with teenage sex, teenage abortion and teenage drug
abuse have risen to a level where it becomes a test just to see if one can
survive ones teenage years.
  If children are not getting a good education, the blame cannot rest solely
on the credentials of the teachers.  What's at fault here is that no one
knows the real goal of education.
  The present goal of education in our schools focuses mainly on preparing
the students to enter into the work force.  But even our top college
graduates are even finding it difficult to find a job upon graduation where
the competition for jobs is fierce and the demand for graduates small.  The
real goal of acheiving success in life is lost in the intense competition
for finding a high paying employer.
  The Vedic science of Krishna consciousness explains that the real goal of
education is different than the goal of education taught in our present high
tech society.  Technological education is good for getting a good paying
job, undoubtedly, but without a spiritual education of Krishna
consciousness, one is completely lost.
  The process of Krishna consciousness is to educate one from the early age
of five about how one can make a success out of his life.  That means that
during the course of ones education, he must get some actual realization
about his eternal identity and his relationship with God.  But the standard
of civilization has fallen all over the world so that people are neglecting
this fundamental aspect of their education and culture and turning toward
the technological way of life.
  The science of understanding our relationship to God is the most important
education.  It is senior to all the other sciences.  Other sciences like the
medical sciences, the political sciences, the social sciences, the
biological sciences, the legal sciences and so on all rest on the foundation
of rules and regulations set down by the Supreme Lord Krishna.  After one
has understood the philosophy of Krishna consciousness, then one may know
how to apply practically these other branches of scientific knowledge.  But
without understanding Krishna consciousness, these other sciences become
tools for exploitating one another.
  The science of understanding ones relationship with God cannot be avoided
in a civilized society.  However because religion nowadays has been taught
in a sectarian fashion, so-called religion has been the cause of much
controversy and cannot fulfill this great lack in today's spiritually
impoverished condition.  The Krishna consciousness movement is meant to
fulfill this great need.
  There is only one Supreme Lord for all people, animals, nations, etc.
That Supreme Lord is known by people of the Vedic culture as Lord Krishna
and is known in different parts of the world in different religions by
different names.  But everyone, regardless of nationality, caste or creed is
ultimately nothing but a part and parcel of God.  This is the foundation of
understanding real religion.
  Real religious education consists of understanding that this material
world is basically evil because the living entities must suffer from the
fourfold miseries of birth, death, old age and disease.  Only when one
sucessfully reestablishes his personal relationship with Krishna can one get
eternally lasting freedom from these miserable conditions of life.
  Unless one can get this education, then he repeatedly tries to find
happiness in this miserable world but without success.  Just like our
students who engage in sex and drugs, they're not understanding that these
dead end activities are very dangerous.  They're accepting these activities
as happiness.  Where are they learning such things?  They're taking the
examples from society's leaders who avoid the issue of real religion but who
cannot avoid the pitfalls and miseries of a godless life.

--Vaishnava dasa