The Hugging Saint Sees a Need, Fills It and Profits

You can find love.

Can’t give up actin’ tough,
it’s all that I’m made of.
Can’t scrape together quite enough
to ride the bus to the outskirts
of the fact that I need love.

- From “Middle Cyclone” by Neko Case

Get there, my friend. Get there.

I need love. You need love. We need love. Without the feelings of appreciation and security that come only from true love, people go through life with a hunger unfulfilled. Money won’t fill the void, no matter how many cheap loans and personal loans you take. On his blog “Family Answers,” Dr. Randal Wright shares some tragic information with readers:

All of us have a basic human need to feel loved and appreciated. One powerful  way to express love is through appropriate physical affection. When children are  given this affection they often feel secure, loved and worthwhile. When family members  do not get affection in the home, they often go out seeking it. And of course, there is  usually someone who will gladly give them physical affection. Unfortunately it is almost  always an inappropriate type of affection that will damage them instead of protect them.

Unfortunately, many have trouble showing love and affection. This problem is especially true of fathers. In research conducted among high school students the following question was posed: “How often does your father/mother show you physical affection (kisses, hugs, etc.)? The results of this survey were disturbing. “Only 24 percent of fathers showed their children physical affection on a daily basis. Mothers were better but still only 49 percent gave daily physical affection to their children.” (American Youth Survey, 2001.)

Too few find it

Anyone can be the hugging saint kind. Give of yourself, and never let those closest to you go too long without telling them and showing them how much you love them. Yet still there are hundreds of thousands willing to give up their money and possessions in order to follow an Indian woman who goes by the name of Amma. Her worshipers believe Amma to be the avatar of a god; she is popularly known as “The Hugging Saint.” According to Cathy Lynn Grossman in a 2006 USA Today piece, Mata Amritanadamayi  (”Mother of immortal bliss”) opens her arms wide to all comers. While people don’t have to have money to “open their hearts to the world” and share an embrace of love, it seems all too convenient that many have given over their worldly possessions to fund her charitable work. Amma has donated millions to worldwide disaster relief.

I’m not against charity

Far from it. What I weep over is how often people fail to recognize the true love they have in their own lives, waiting for them. The pressures of the world, insecurities and even substance abuse act as barriers to being comfortable in one’s own skin. Still others suffer from an inability to express their own love, whether it was because they’ve never been taught how or were convinced at an early age that they were not worthy of such all-important feelings.

Honestly, I do weep. I’m crying as I write this, remembering the rejection and worry I’ve faced. Yet I find real healing… and I don’t have to join a cult to get there.

Love is not everything, but it contains so much

The daughter of a lower-caste fisherman, Amma decided when she was a child that she wanted to “make an offering of herself” to those in need. “Just by feeling (someone’s) pain you cannot resolve it,” she says. “You have to do something. If you see a blind person who is crying, why suffer for him when you can hold his hand and help him across the street?”

Exploiting in the name of love?

I believe that Amma’s base intentions of sharing love are good, as do the more than 27 million who have hugged her so far. People line up for hours to be in her presence and share in love from this tiny kind of mother. But the worship of her as a goddess made flesh (which The Hugging Saint apparently does not discourage) is troubling, in that it opens the door for the love-lorn to be manipulated. At least one such person, Jovan Jones, has written a book about her escape from the controlling atmosphere of the Cult of The Hugging Saint. See the video below, where she reads a chapter from that book.

Love should always be free

Ride the bus to the outskirts of the fact that you need love. (Photo: Geekologie.com)

On The Cult of the Hugging Saint Blog cited above, a work entitled “The Guru Papers: Masks of Authoritarian Power” by Joel Kramer and Diana Alstad is cited. Ms. Jones draws attention to the following passages that speak of her experience of devotion to Amma:

If an authority not only expects to be obeyed without  question, but either punishes or refuses to deal with those who do not, that authority is authoritarian. (p.15)

Gurus can arouse intense emotions as there is extraordinary  passion in surrendering to what one perceives as a living God. (p.33)

In spiritual realms fear and desire can become  as extreme as they get. When a living person becomes the focus of such emotions, the possibility of manipulation is correspondingly extreme. (p.41)

Cultivate love. You deserve happiness.

And be careful not to lose yourself in the process of sharing love. It is always you who needs, who wants and who loves. There’s a vast world to explore; be the navigator you need. If the vehicle breaks down now and again, try cheap loans and personal loans. You take care of the spirit, cheap loans take care of budgetary need.

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