Merciful Prabhupada
Rupa Vilasa Dasa: We had a guest who had been visiting the temple regularly and had won a Teacher of the Year award and I wanted him to meet Srila Prabhupada. But when he came, that man was in distress from a great misfortune. On Valentine's Day he had been driving a school bus and when the children got off at a certain stop, one of them crawled under the bus to get a card that had blown there. This man didn't see the child and had run over and killed him. The man was thinking, how can I meet Prabhupada in this state? I said, just tell Prabhupada what happened. I wasn't sure that was the right thing to do but when we got into the room I told Prabhupada about the situation. I was amazed by Prabhupada's compassion. Prabhupada questioned the man at length to get the whole story, "Did you look both ways?" and so on. Prabhupada got a sense of exactly what had happened, how the parents reacted, and how the school staff reacted. Then Prabhupada said, "It's not your fault. You didn't do anything wrong and you will not be blamed for this." This man was completely pacified, and he began to ask Prabhupada different questions. In his answers, Prabhupada brought up a rocket scientist, Werner Von Braun, who, at a large scientific conference, had declared that the real purpose of science was to establish the existence of God. This caused consternation for some people, but when Prabhupada read about it he deputed some of his disciples to speak to Von Braun and give him his books. I got excited and said, "Prabhupada, this is wonderful. He's a famous person. If he becomes interested in Krishna consciousness, it will be a great boon for the movement." Prabhupada said, "I am not interested in speaking to him because he's a famous man. I am interested in speaking to him because he has come to the right point." Throughout Prabhupada's preaching, whether people were low or high, little or big, he would spend sometimes hours with them answering their questions and being merciful to them because of their sincere interest, not because of name, fame or wealth.
Reference: Memories Anecdotes of a Modern Day Saint - Volume 3 by Siddhanta Dasa
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