Placing faith over reason and logic

As I was growing up, there were frequent news stories about prodigies — two year olds whose first words were the Ramayana or the Koran; children who sang before they walked and knew all the ragas; children who could heal the sick by the age five and more. Being an Indian I didn’t dismiss them completely, and as I grew up and became a recipient of some strange inexplicable events myself, I always thought there was something our science had not yet caught up with, something that could be one day explained in the frame of science as we know it.

A few days ago I came face to face with it after a long while. Walking to my office in Darpana, I saw four ‘white’ girls leaving café Natarani. As is my want, I said hello and smiled. They gave a cheerful wave back. A lot of young people and many foreigners hang out at the Café, so I thought nothing more of it.

The next afternoon, a very pragmatic and ‘cynical of things inexplicable’ colleague of mine came to me, somewhat flustered. “I have just heard a bizarre story. Do come and listen”. I went with him to the Café and there were they four young women from the day before. “Listen to their story,” said my colleague.

Kara (21) is an Australian from Brisbane. One day, late in December, she was driving to meet a friend, Savannah, a pastor who had just returned from a trip in India. Suddenly she felt herself blacking out and pulled the car to the side. She was having a vision. God came to her and told her that he was going to teach her about being compassionate and gracious. The vision lasted about twenty minutes and then at the end she kept hearing the word Natarani, Natarani. She was very flustered and spoke to Savannah about it as soon as she met her. Savannah told her that the word sounded Indian and they immediately started a Google search, thinking they would come up with a hundred things. No, there is only one Natarani in the world and that is here. “God wants me to go there”, Kara said to Savannah. “Then we must go,” she replied. She then called her friend Courtney who had wanted to go to India. Kara called her friend Alie because in her vision God had a message for Alie, saying she needed to go to India. So the four girls decided on the trip. They each started getting visions, one of them of the exact lay out of the Café, another of the amphitheatre.

But going to India is expensive and none of them had the money. So they held hands and prayed: “God if you want us to go to India, you have to make it possible”. A couple of days later Kara received a call from her grandmother who had a similar experience where God told her that her granddaughter was in want of money. She called the family together, all of whom chipped in, and she called to tell Kara that the money was being sent for whatever it was that she needed it for. That very day someone donated the right amount into Savannah’s bank account. Alie, who has a part-time shift based job, and who had no roster planned from the 27th of January (the day for which the trip was planned) suddenly got a call from her employer who said that another worker couldn’t make it and could Alie work extra shifts in the next week. She earned exactly the amount needed for the trip. The fourth young woman, Cassandra, got a Facebook message from an aunt saying they wanted to gift her some money – the exact amount for the trip. So here they were, having travelled to Delhi, Agra and Udaipur and they were waiting to hear from Him for what they were supposed to do next.

We have spent a delightful few days with them. They seem overwhelmed by being here. They have made friends all around. They have prayed over my sick dog and my bad ankle. And they are sure they are living His commands. They feel they have grown a lot, they are more compassionate and understanding of the world, and are being prepared to play their roles in life.

And tomorrow they return home, more enriched and having fulfilled what their individual visions told them to.