Posted inRadha Soami Satsang Beas

Shivinder Singh lied about becoming a full-time RSSB sevadar

Here's another twist in the oh-so-fascinating big-money drama involving the Singh brothers (Malvinder and Shivinder), the guru of Radha Soami Satsang Beas, and a host of supporting characters. A Business Today story says, "Singh brothers case: Shivinder drew Rs. 9 crore salary during 'retirement'; misled SC about 'Sanyaas.'" (9 crore is about $1,300,000; SC refers to the Supreme Court of India)Download Singh brothers case: Shivinder drew Rs 9 crore salary during 'retirement'; misled SC about 'Sanyaas' Here's how the story starts out: Singh brothers Malvinder and Shivinder are on the verge of being thrown behind bars on April 11 when…
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Posted inRadha Soami Satsang Beas

New Delhi police investigating criminal complaint against RSSB guru

Here's a Bloomberg story from February that escaped my notice until a Google search brought it to my attention yesterday. Someone mentioned the story in a March comment, but I didn't read it in full until now.Download Indian Tycoon Accuses Brother and Spiritual Guru of Fraud - Bloomberg Those of us who've been associated with Radha Soami Satsang Beas for many years (35, for me) are marveling at the fact that the current RSSB guru, Gurinder Singh Dhillon, is the subject of a criminal complaint being investigated by the New Delhi police. This is a fact that I don't recall…
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Posted inAtheism Comments Religions

Critical thinking welcome here. Preachiness, not so much.

On this blog I've gone back and forth with moderating comments. After deciding a few weeks ago to return to approving comments before they're published on this blog, I'm feeling good about doing this. I'd rather have just a few -- or even just one -- thoughtful comments on a post than a bunch of irrelevant comments, especially if they're of the "Praise God!" or "Praise Guru!" variety. But for many years my boundless Buddha-like compassion for religiously-minded beings has led me to offer an "open thread" option to those who want to express themselves in a fashion that isn't…
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Posted inOpen Threads

Open Thread 19 (free speech for comments)

Leave a comment on this post about anything you want to talk about. Remember that I'm moderating comments, so it could take a while for your comment to be published. Almost every comment submitted to an Open Thread will be approved. Personal attacks devoid of substantive content are an exception. Though I haven't been doing too well on this, I'll try to remember to always have an Open Thread showing in the Recent Posts section in the right sidebar. If one isn't showing, I've added an Open Threads category in, naturally, the Categories section. You can always find an Open…
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Posted inGay rights

Queen’s Live Aid performance shows power of Freddy Mercury being himself

Last night my wife and I finished watching Bohemian Rhapsody, the movie. It ends with a re-creation of Queen's famous performance at the 1985 Live Aid event at Wembley Stadium in London. A New York Times story about the performance says, "Freddie Mercury’s set in July 1985 is often called one of the greatest live performances of all time." For sure. You can view it via the video below, which has gotten over 211 million views. Mercury performs for about 21 minutes. I found watching him to be both highly entertaining and deeply inspiring. Mercury was a gay man at…
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Posted inRadha Soami Satsang Beas

More focus on RSSB guru in Singh brothers financial scandal

Following up on yesterday's post, "Bad karma: Singh brothers may go to jail if RSSB guru doesn't pay up," here's two additional mentions of Gurinder Singh Dhillon, the guru of Radha Soami Satsang Beas, in the Indian financial press. Someone sent me this image of a Hindustan Times story with the mention of the guru outlined in orange: "Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing one of the brothers, said 'some babaji' has siphoned off the money of the two brothers and they have been duped." Babaji clearly refers to Gurinder Singh Dhillon. Kind of strange that the attorney wasn't willing to say…
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Posted inRadha Soami Satsang Beas

Bad karma: Singh brothers may go to jail if RSSB guru doesn’t pay up

I'd love to be able to listen in on what Malvinder and Shivinder Singh are saying right now about their uncle, Gurinder Singh Dhillon -- the guru of Radha Soami Satsang Beas.  According to the India Supreme Court, it seems that the only way the Singh brothers are going to stay out of jail is if Dhillon repays a massive amount of money that was loaned to him by Malvinder and Shivinder, seemingly in a fraudulent manner involving the siphoning of funds from companies controlled by the Singh brothers and the guru's right hand man, Sunil Godhwani. So says a…
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Posted inAtheism Buddhism Death/Rebirth

Here’s the problem with living: we’re going to die

This isn't exactly breaking news, but I'll say it anyway. Each of us is going to die.  Those seven words are undeniably scary. Life isn't always pleasant. Yet the gulf between having a difficult life and no life at all is more than immense. It's immeasurable. There's no way to compare being alive and being dead, or existence and non-existence. The worst day anyone can have is on a different dimension than not existing at all. Understand: I'm not saying that life is always worth living. Suicide and death with dignity testify to the fact that sometimes people prefer to…
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Posted inAtheism Radha Soami Satsang Beas Reality

I’m an atheist with more faith than any religious believer

A week ago I came up with the title to this blog post. The next day I wrote a comment in reply to someone who goes by "In Search Of" that ended up being a good start to explaining why I consider that atheist me has more faith than religious believers. Here it is. Following my comment you'll find excerpts from one of my first Church of the Churchless blog posts from way back in 2004, "Just have faith." I'm pleased that while I've become more of an atheist over the past fifteen years, my basic faith in reality hasn't…
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Posted inRadha Soami Satsang Beas

Gurinder Singh Dhillon isn’t adhering to the message of “Honest Living”

Below is a recent comment written by Radh(er Not) Soami that struck me as well worth sharing as a blog post. The comment points to something important that I feel has been overlooked by defenders of the Radha Soami Satsang Beas guru who are fond of saying, "Innocent until proven guilty!" (If you're not familiar with what the guru, Gurinder Singh Dhillon (GSD), has been accused of, it is a conspiracy to commit massive financial fraud and death threats. A criminal complaint filed against the guru is discussed in "Legal filing against Gurinder Singh Dhillon is fascinating reading.") The important…
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