"This way, is the way of the religious mysticism, the way of the monk that in the Vedic tradition is called Sannyas. A Sannyasi transforms his life into a spiritual path with the sole purpose of being-in and loving God, and only his daily contact or search gives the necessary significance and justifies his life. This experience is the dreamed and daily consolation that fills his life deeply and progressively day to day. To become a Sannyasi it is only necessary to believe in God, to live with God and for God."

Vishnupada Acharya

 

"Never forget and teach to your children that as is the difference between a firefly and the blazing sun, between the infinite ocean and a little pond, between a mustard seed and the mountain Meru, such is the difference between the householder and the sannyas!"

Swami Vivekananda of the Puri Order

 

"Sanyasa means dying to live. It is the complete death to the gross selfish life as man, as ordinary being accustomed to living upon the physical plane. It is a new birth into a life, where the self ceases to be, and the universe stands before him in the glorified personality of his new birth, and it takes the form of wondrous manifestation of cosmic love or Viswaprem. That he does by declaring that the whole universe is in him and that no creative need fear him. He gives what is called the Abhaya for all the creatures of this earth, for he is nothing but love, nothing but Tyaga, and compassion will come out of him as per promise in Sanyasa initiation ceremony. OM."

H.H. Swami Chidananda- Divine Life Society

 

"A true sanyasi is divine oriented. His thoughts and actions revolve around God. Despite of this proclivity he does not abandon his duty as a human being towards himself and towards others. He is driven by compassion and unconditional love and shows no desire for the fruit of his actions. He makes his life an offering to God and surrenders himself completely before him. He remains untouched by the impurities of life, because of his detachment, self discipline and absence of egoism, pride or sense of doership, and thus remains untouched by sin. Renunciation is the highest form of spiritual discipline, for peace immediately follows renunciation."

Jayaram V.

 

Today, there are more than 900 millions of followers of Hinduism in the world, a fact that places our religion in the third place after Christianity and Islam, regarding the number of followers.

In India there are approximately three millions of monks, sannyasis and sadhus... The Ramakrishna Mission has approximately 700 monks, the Order of Swami Narayana has 800, and other organizations of the Hindu religion have thousands of monks...in general sannyasins represent a minority in the Hindu society.

 

The quantity of temples of our religion is estimated around 500,000, from which 1,000 are found in the USA, which are visited annually by thousands of believers...

According to the report of 2004 of the department of international freedom of religion of the US government, the number of Hindus in the United States is approximately 1,478,670, or 0.5% of the entire population. That number refers to both immigrants from countries where Hinduism is the original religion, or their descendants, and also to North Americans who have been converted, accepting Hinduism as their own religion.

America's Hindus, in these modern times, enjoy de jure and de facto of equality under the United States laws. Generations of Hindus, both from South Asia and from Europe, have lived and worked in the United States, raising their families, buying their houses and growing their roots, converting their culture and religion into an integral part of the multi-faced diamond which is the American experience.

 

After the above said, it is evident that it is not expected that all the loyal believers and followers of the very ancient Hindu religion, will adopt the rigorous monastic life which is reserved only to few, who have felt the call of The Lord and the vocation that demands the strict life of an ashram or a monastery. Always have been within the Hindu religion beings whose hearts have felt more attraction towards God than towards mundane pleasures; a few of them dedicate to a solitary beggar life and others gather and live in ashrams and monasteries.

Because of this, The Ramakrishnananda Yoga Vedanta Mission, along with creating a temple and centers of yoga open to the public, has created its ashram or residential monastery, inhabited by those who have decided to adopt the monastic life according to the Hindu religion, accepting the vows of humility, service and purity, where life our monks or sannyasis who accepted a life of complete celibacy.

 

We invite you very cordially, if you feel the call of God in your heart and you are older than 25, you can consider joining our order, "The Ramakrishnananda Yoga Vedanta Mission", compound of persons of different nationalities and cultures, who have formally adopted Hinduism as their religion. We reside in monasteries or ashrams, separating ourselves from the world in a life of meditation, worship, service and study of the Vedic Scriptures, converting our lives into a source of inspiration for the humanity.