Belgium
Who Are We?
By Shirdi Sai Baba’s grace and HIS eternal blessings we have started with a small group of devotees in Belgium to worship HIM together and feel HIS presence amongst us. Now we have almost 150 members in our group with a couple of key coordinators who have spread the love and joy of worshipping Sai Baba.
What we do?
This group aims at gathering all devotees together to pray, to do social work, to sing and gather Sai Baba’s blessings in myriad ways. We regularly:
- Read Sai Sathcharitra every Thursday
- Initiate Saptahams together
- Sai Sandhyas at the Brussels Mandir
- Sai Sandhyas at devotees houses
- Sai bhajans everywhere
These are lively events with minimum fifty to hundred devotees singing in accord to seek the divine’s grace and blessings. This synchrony and symphony of melodious singing is sure to reach all hearts and touch every soul. Such sathsangs are sure to convert non-singers to singers and non-believers to the path of belief. As Sai Baba says “Words create Maya but a good Sat-Sanga – good people around and singing creates knowledge removes your ignorance!” Sai Family – Belgium is trying to follow this path distinctly.
Every Thursday we read the “Shri Sai Satcharitra” book atleast two chapters per person and we cover the entire book that way. One of the coordinators distributes the chapters and it’s a lovely opportunity to read. We read in our own houses but we feel connected to all the others who read that day!
Some of us love to take up the Saptaham challenge and many do 2-3 Saptahams in a row during festive season. We are also trying to do the Namasaptaham soon when HE intends!
Distinguishing Feature
One of our delightful and prominent features is to involve and include children in all events. Children are the souls of innocence and when they sing it reaches every heart. We have almost made it a tradition to make children sing at all events and bhajans. We have regular bhajan singers and many more who have keenly joined the list out of sheer interest. This becomes a part of their life style a discipline and a needed guidance and blessings.
Some Miracles
It’s difficult to write about all the miracles our group members have experienced this last year but a few come to mind.
One member who left to America one day asked us to pray for her mother who was critically ill. And the next day she wrote saying that she felt as if all of us were with her praying beside her and Sai Baba blessed her and her mother through all our prayers. No prayer no wish no desire goes unnoticed! Yet again!
Another member was herself in the ICU and had a lot of difficulty breathing but she insisted on reading the Sai Sathcharitra book from her bed on a Thursday. A little later she recalls that someone called her like an angel from heaven and encouraged her to get up and push herself out of bed. That was a turning point for her recovery when even the doctors had given up hope Sai Baba pushed her forward. The grace of the Guru is on all those who believe!
Over and Beyond
Sai Family – Belgium is not limited to only Belgium. Many devout members are active in all sathsangs across the neighbouring countries and visit Luxembourgh, Netherlands and far away Scandinavia from time to time to join the Sai groups there.
We look forward to expand with more devotees in the next year and will try to form a trust fund for social activities too. By Baba’s grace we plan to have our own Sai Trust in Belgium soon.
-Article Contributed by Mr. Vijay Inguva & Ms. Raji Inguva.
Connect with Shirdi Sai family in Belgium: shirdisaibelgium@gmail.com