Dear Devotees,

Jaya Prabhupada! I am writing to inform you that due to physical limitations, I will have to adjust my email protocol. On a normal day, I send out between 40 and 60 emails. Out of sincere respect for the devotees, I have always endeavored to respond promptly.

Unfortunately, I am beginning to suffer a recurrence of very severe eye strain. I first had this problem over 35 years ago when I was working hard to finish Prabhupada’s Bhāgavatam. I never recovered fully from this problem, and when it reoccurs, I am unable to read at all for some time, and this prevents me from doing most of my devotional service. This condition is also painful. In fact this inability to read as quickly as normal scholars, or to read many books, forced me to give up my hopes for an academic service career after I finished at Harvard. In various ways, I have compenated for this permanent disability, without bringing it to the attention of other devotees. But now, I am forced to explain it.

At present, it is simply not physically possible for me to continue to personally read the volume of email that arrives every day. Therefore, I must take the following step: I will adopt Prabhupada’s own system and have a secretary read most letters to me. I will then dictate a response, which will be sent out.

In cases that reasonably require absolute privacy, you can write CONFIDENTIAL in the subject line. I must emphasize that such confidential letters cannot be very long. Given my physical condition, and the real danger of it becoming worse and crippling my service, I must take these measures. I fully trust that you will understand my situation and help me to deal with it.