N KOREAN LEADER LIES IN STATE

NORTH KOREA LEADER
KIM JONG-II PASSES AWAY

Pyongyang (Associated Press) - The body of North Korea’s long-time ruler Kim Jong Il was laid out in a memorial palace Tuesday as weeping mourners filled public plazas and state media fed a budding personality cult around his third son, hailing him as “born of heaven.”  Indicating the leadership transition in the world’s only communist dynasty is on track, Kim Jong Un - Kim’s youngest known son and successor - visited the body with top military and Workers’ Party officials and held what state media called a “solemn ceremony” in the capital, Pyongyang, as the country mourned.  Kim Jong Il died of a massive heart attack on Saturday caused by overwork and stress, according to the North’s media. He was 69.  North Korean state media have given clear indications that Kim Jong Un will succeed his father.

Pyongyang urged people to rally behind Kim’s youngest son Jong-Un, describing him as “great successor” to the leader who presided over a famine that saw hundreds of thousands die, but still built an atomic arms arsenal.  Swiss-educated Kim Jong-Un, who is in his late 20s and was last year made a four-star general and given top ruling party posts despite having had no public profile.  Although there were no signs of unrest or discord in Pyongyang’s somber streets, Kim’s death and the possibility of a power struggle in a country pursuing nuclear weapons and known for its secrecy and unpredictability have heightened tensions in the region.  South Korea put its military on emergency alert but urged its people to stay calm, and swiftly closed ranks with its close ally the United States.  North and South Korea have remained technically at war since their three-year conflict ended only in an armistice in 1953.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il has died aged 69 of a heart attack brought about by overwork and stress, plunging the nuclear-armed and deeply isolated nation into a second dynastic succession.  Like the Russian communists, the North Koreans sought to expunge any trace of Christianity or other religious faiths.  We must surrender to God and not waste the invaluable opportunity of this life worshiping another human being, even though he is the supreme leader.

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US?

There is a wide gulf between mind and spirit that can only be bridged by spiritual cultivation.  There are so-called great men or rational thinkers who deny the existence of spirit. ... When theism is forced to give way to pantheism, atheism, scepticism and agnosticism, then irreligion, unscrupulousness and duplicity bring about chaos on earth. Sin and its consequences surge around us, tumultuously clamouring to have their way against our wishes, and we find ourselves in the midst of a whirlpool. ... With all His paraphernalia, majesty, might, glory, beauty, wisdom and supremacy, He reigns eternally in the spiritual world and exists simultaneously in every created object and place in His complete fullness.

Śrīla Bhakti Saranga Mahārāja :
“God-realization”
“Omnipotent God Beyond Error”
Rays of the Harmonist – Nº 13 Karttika, 2003
http://bvml.org/SBSGM/gr.html