The International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), widely known as the Hare Krishna Movement, was founded in New York in 1966 by His Divine Grace A.C. Srila Prabhupada was a distinguished scholar, teacher and practitioner of Vedic religion, philosophy, and culture. He established ISKCON as a means of sharing Krishna conscious culture with the world and revealed a 5,000-year-old unbroken
chain of spiritual teaching originating from the Supreme Lord Himself. Our aim is to build a society based on the teachings of Lord Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. We believe that God is a person and that He has a name, His own family, and friends, that He performs transcendentally wonderful activities with, and is cherished as the life and soul of His devotees. This Supreme Person is unimaginably beautiful, wealthy, strong, famous, intelligent and at the same time detached from everything. Although He has unlimited names, His original name is Krishna, meaning ‘all-attractive’. When Prabhupada began the International Society for Krishna Consciousness he formulated a clear mission statement listing 7 Purposes of ISKCON.
1. To systematically propagate spiritual knowledge to society at large and to educate all people in the techniques of spiritual life in order to check the imbalance of values in life and to achieve real unity and peace in the world.
2. To propagate a consciousness of Krishna (God), as it is revealed in the great scriptures of India, Bhagavad-gita and Srimad-Bhagavatam.
3. To bring the members of the Society together with each other and nearer to Krishna, the prime entity, thus developing the idea within the members, and humanity at large, that each soul is part and parcel of the quality of Godhead (Krishna).
4. To teach and encourage the sankirtana movement, congregational chanting of the holy name of God, as revealed in the teachings of Lord Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu.
5. To erect for the members and for society at large a holy place of transcendental pastimes dedicated to the personality of Krishna.
6. To bring the members closer together for the purpose of teaching a simpler, more natural way of life.
7. With a view towards achieving the aforementioned purposes, to publish and distribute periodicals, magazines, books and other writings.
