A New Universe

With the participation of devotees from all over the world ISKCON Online manifests a “new universe” of service to ISKCON’s mission. Similar to ISKCON’s strategic planning network, this universe functions a bit differently from ISKCON’s “mother” universe.

One thing we’ve come to understand in working with the GBC Strategic Planning Network is that relevant, relatable, innovative spiritual change can more easily be created in smaller groups of devotees. Once the changes are created, they are exported to the “mother universe.” Please note that the ISKCON Online universe is a “subordinate universe” – we are not working outside of ISKCON.

While it’s true that the ISKCON Online Universe functions differently from the mother universe, the differences are not in the fundamental principles ISKCON is based on. Rather, they relate to those elements of ISKCON Online’s culture that allow for free thinking and creativity in service of the mother universe.

For example, our universe will have little fixed hierarchy, but will be flexible enough to come together into teams according to the task at hand. These teams will be fluid and will likely change often. Also, we will be a lot more experimental than might be healthy in other ISKCON efforts. And we may overlook protocol and procedure in order to take advantage of new opportunities as they emerge. We hope this will allow us to become highly productive.

In this and other ways our universe will serve ISKCON by maintaining a large degree of independence while fully respecting ISKCON’s overarching framework and authority.

Our first task has been to create this document. It will enable us to reach out to the devotional community and invite everyone who would like to participate to connect with us and help us build this new universe.

We start by introducing our specific vision and mission statements.