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people. Nevertheless, there was one woman who came every week. When we
told her we had decided to quit, she said, “You can’t! I’ve been looking all my
life for a teaching like this.” We listened to her and heard her. I believe it was in
that moment that a real ministry began. Our focus shifted from what we could
accomplish to how we could serve, starting with one person. A deeper awareness
that we had a role to play in the divine plan, one that would unfold in its own
way and time was dawning. From that shift in consciousness, and the surrender
that accompanied it, many doors opened. We stopped struggling and started
serving.
We were offered the community room of a savings and loan building in Los
Gatos for Sunday mornings. People started to come and to tell others about this
new ministry. Those who had left traditional churches, but were still spiritually
hungry, came to hear the radically positive message, as well as to learn to medi-
tate. Couples from different faith backgrounds found a spiritual home where
they could worship together. Those who had no previous religious affiliation
were delighted with the freedom to develop their spiritual life in a nonsectarian
environment. One man told me that when a friend invited him to go to this new
worship service, he replied that he didn’t go to church. His friend said, “It’s not
a church, it’s in a bank.” He said, “Okay, I’m comfortable with going to a bank!”
Gradually, the group of worshippers grew from one, to thirty, to three or four
hundred attending two services on Sundays.
Through the years, we have offered nearly two thousand Sunday worship
services, as well as thousands of classes and retreats, teaching people how to
meditate and follow principles of spiritual living. It is inspiring to consider that
services have been continuous for thirty-five years. Not a day missed. Today,
worship services and classes are filled with seekers from all religious back-
grounds who sit side by side in the silence of divine communion worshipping
the one Reality that is known by many names. The ministry itself has offered a
witness: our lives and the lives of others are changed for good with faith in the
ability of a power greater than ourselves to fulfill its purposes of healing and
repairing our families, our community, and our world. All of life conspires to
support our awakening as compassionate beings living in harmony with Truth,
with one another, and the planet.
The spiritual root of CSE’s teaching is the tradition of Kriya Yoga, the science
of Self-realization brought to the West by the great sage, Paramahansa Yoga-
nanda, in the 1920s. The Sanskrit word “yoga” means to yoke, join, or experience
union. It is divine remembrance—the direct experience of our essential Self.
The teachings of yoga are a nonsectarian spiritual path for seekers of all faiths
“Our focus shifted from what we could accomplish
to how we could serve, starting with one person.”