page_title: Kirtanananda Swami
section_title: After imprisonment
hierarchical_section_title: Kirtanananda Swami / After imprisonment
caption_attribution_description: Kirtanananda Swami, taken at Radha-Muralidhara Temple, New York City (March 4, 2008)
context_page_description: Kirtanananda Swami, also known as Bhaktipada, was a Gaudiya Vaishnava guru and the co-founder of New Vrindaban, a Hare Krishna community in Marshall County, West Virginia, where he served as spiritual leader from 1968 until 1994.
  The first sannyasi in the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, he also served as an initiating guru in ISKCON from 1977 until his expulsion in 1987.
context_section_description: For four years after his release from prison, Kīrtanānanda (now confined to a wheelchair) resided at the Radha Murlidhara Temple at 25 First Avenue in New York City, which was purchased in 1990 for $500,000 and maintained by a small number of disciples and followers, although the temple board later attempted to evict him.
  On March 7, 2008, Kīrtanānanda left the United States for India, where he expected to remain for the rest of his life. "There is no sense in staying where I'm not wanted," he explained, referring to the desertions through the years by most of his American disciples and to the attempts  to evict him from the building. At the time of his death Kīrtanānanda still had a significant number of loyal disciples in India and Pakistan, who worshiped him as "guru" and published his last books. He continued preaching a message of interfaith: that the God of the Christians, Jews, Muslims, and Vaishnavas is the same; and that men of faith from each religion should recognize and appreciate the faith of men of other paths. "Fundamentalism is one of the most dangerous belief-systems in the world today. Fundamentalism doesn't promote unity; it causes separatism. It creates enmity between people of faith. Look at the Muslims; Mohammed never intended that his followers should spread their religion by the sword. It is more important today than at any other time to preach about the unity of all religions."
caption: Kīrtanānanda Swami in New York City, March 4, 2008.
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