28 March 2004, Sunday, Jersey City, NJ:
The auspicious birthdays of Purna Purshottam Narayan Sahajanand Swami and Shri Ram were celebrated by Jersey City mandir with great joy and happiness in presence of sadhus and devotess. Traditional decoration surrounding utsav murti of Maharaj was done on the stage. Sabha started at 4 p.m with dhoon, prarthana… devotional filled kirtans like 'premvati sut jayo', 'sonal suraj ugiyo', ' unchi medie', pag mane dhova dhyo' and " vandan karie karodo' were sung by vadil mandal ,that captivated the whole sabha. A video of Maharaj's murti was shown on the screen.
Sabha was fortunate to have presence of santos . Brief introduction of santos was given by a devotee. Later a speech by pujya Shilbhushan swami explained, why Lord Ram was known as Maryaada Purushottam? His life exemplifies the ideal son, ideal husband and ideal ruler,how we can make our life "ADARSH" like Lord Ram. Pujya Mangal Nayan swami explained the life of Shri Sahajanand Swami, like how he enlightened infinite hearts, inspired thousands to sacrifice themselves on his commands, gave women a well-defined status in society and the Sampradaya, thus uplifting them ,boosted literature, music and arts, propounded Ahimsac (non-violent) yagnas . He also explained one aspect of Upasana which is Pragat, which means manifest in human form, which means we have Maharaj in form of Swami bapa. After opening ceremony of dvd and two books, santos were welcomed with flowers. Sabha was lucky enough to have swamibapa's aashirvachan.. The small murti of Thakorji was placed in a 'parna'. Right after the aarti while kirtan vrund were singing "sona na bor' and 'dharma gher anand" santos and later devotees rocked the parna.. everyone took the blessing of Pujya santos and left after mahaprasad .