Sri Chinmoy, Active in the Masters
Sri Chinmoy is a spiritual leader who promotes sports and physical fitness, combined with contemplative practices. Sri Chinmoy is with us for the celebration of the Fifth World Masters Games in Athletics: today will be the opening session of the competition at Sixto Escobar Parke and tomorrow will be the official opening by the mayor of San Juan, Hernan Padilla, at the Bithorn. “I have always taken part in sports because I consider them a basis for all human activities, said Sri Chinmoy during a talk we had with him at the Sri Chinmoy Centre in Isla Verde.
“We have again been invited to Puerto Rico and on this occasion, we will be offering a meditation, tomorrow, at the official opening ceremony of the Masters at the Hiram Bithorn Park. With us will be a group of members from the United Nations who will sing a song we have composed honouring the Fifth Masters Games, and which was accepted as the official song of the Fifth Games.”
At first glance, you can see humility and simplicity reflected in the words of this spiritual master who has been at other times in Puerto Rico, where he has hundreds of followers.
Among the other ceremonies conducted by Sri Chinmoy are ones at the half marathon in San Blas in 1981; the Track and Field Masters Championship celebrated in San Juan In 1980; the Pan-American Games in 1979; the New York City Marathon in 1978; and the ceremony at the United Nations for Olympic and world-class runners In 1977, just to mention some of them.
Next Monday, Sri Chinmoy will conduct a concert for the athletes participating in the Masters, which is one of many to which they have been invited.
“We consider that the benefits derived from athletic activity include better health, a release of tension, a sense of dynamic enthusiasm towards life and the experience of self-transcendence that happens when we are able to improve a personal record or surpass a limitation,” explains with extraordinary depth, this great contemporary man.
We would need many sheets of paper to write about Sri Chinmoy, but in this opportunity, we have to concentrate on the Masters and we can tell you that in this Master’s own words he said: “I participate to enjoy, that is my only goal.” So we will see him in the 100, 200, 400 metres, javelin and the 5K, in the 50 to 54 category. Sri Chinmoy is now 52 years old.
“I always ask my students to run a few miles every day and I set the example by doing it myself.”
While searching for a background of this contemporary world personality known for the diversity of his knowledge and religious practices, I came across a phrase where he said, “concentration, meditation and contemplation are three members of the same family.” Through international running clubs and the Sri Chinmoy Marathon Team, he and his students sponsor a great variety of public events for runners, including marathons, ultra-marathons and many short races — a total of 300 races a year in the USA, Canada, Japan, Europe and Australia.
The Sri Chinmoy Marathon is the official marathon of the city of San Juan. The Sri Chinmoy Triathlon is the official triathlon of Rhode Island and the Sri Chinmoy Marathon in San Mateo is the official marathon for the state of California’s Road Runners Club of America.
Published in the Sports section of El Nuevo Dia, San Juan, Puerto Rico’s largest circulation newspaper, Friday, 23 September 1983