The Inter-religious Council of Russia has denounced a recent “Food of Life” campaign organized by Russia’s Hare Krishna community where members handed out vegetarian sweets to veterans and the disabled in a Moscow district.
The council, an affiliate of the World Conference of Religions for Peace, is an independent organization that has pledged to “enrich the age-old traditions of interreligious cooperation,” its site reads.
The council’s executive secretary Roman Silantyev, however, has called the Hare Krishna community a “destructive sect” that is offering food under the guise of humanitarian aide, Interfax quoted him as saying.
The food, since it is dedicated to “pagan gods”, could “harm the spiritual health of Christians, Muslims, and Jews.”
He expressed regret that there were no legislative means to “apprehend such provocations” and called on special labeling of Hare Krishna products, indicating that they were “inappropriate as food for Christians, Muslims, and Jews.”
He also called on the Federal Epidemiological Control Center to test its products for traces of cow urine and excrement, since the “sect members” come in contact with these substances “when they wash their idols,” Interfax quoted him as saying.
Silantyev stressed that that Hare Krishna’s campaigns have already been denounced by “all traditional spiritual leaders as an especially cynical and prevocational form of proselytizing.”