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Spiritual leader of Vedanta Center dies at 82

By WAVENEY ANN MOORE, Times Staff Writer
Published November 7, 2007

Swami Adiswarananda, who died Oct. 31 at Mount Sinai Hospital and Medical Center in New York, visited the Vedanta Center in St. Petersburg several times a year to provide spiritual leadership.
	[Cherie Diez | Times (1997)]

ST. PETERSBURG - The swami who provided spiritual leadership to the Southern United States' only official Ramakrishna community for more than two decades has died.

Swami Adiswarananda, who visited the Vedanta Center of St. Petersburg several times a year until the community got a leader of its own a year ago, died on Oct. 31 at Mount Sinai Hospital and Medical Center in New York. He was rushed to the hospital Oct. 29 after a cerebral hemorrhage and did not regain consciousness. He was 82.

Besides overseeing the St. Petersburg center, Swami Adiswarananda served as spiritual leader and minister of the Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center in New York for 34 years. He was born in West Bengal, India, and ordained a monk in 1963.

Members of the Vedanta Center, whose devotees are primarily American, were saddened to learn of his death, said Kathleen Scargill, a longtime member of the group.

"He actually kept the St. Petersburg center alive for 23 years," she said, adding that he convinced the faith's Indian leaders that the community at 216 19th Ave. SE needed its own full-time swami.

"I don't think the center would exist without Swami Adiswarananda, had he not been so persistent and so faithful and encouraging to us that you will get a swami. Twenty-three years is a long time. He did not give up."

Its first full-time leader, Swami Yuktatmananda, came in 2006.

"I remember his fatherly affection, his love, his words of encouragement for the work here. I would cherish it always. He was a real father figure for us."

To Scargill, Swami Adiswarananda was her guru, her spiritual teacher and guide. "He never failed to encourage you," she said. "He never ever saw any negative aspect in you. The whole aim of Vedanta is to know God in this lifetime. He was so inspiring. Maybe even more so now."

Vedanta teaches that the goal of life is to manifest the divine and that an underlying harmony unites all religions. The faith evolved from the teachings of the Vedas, a collection of ancient Indian scriptures, and was founded by Sri Ramakrishna, who lived in the 19th century. Ramakrishna's foremost disciple, Swami Vivekananda, brought the religion to the United States in 1893.

Waveney Ann Moore can be reached at wmoore@sptimes.com or 727 892-2283.

[Last modified November 6, 2007, 22:46:09]