Meher Center Archive Collection

Dear Meher Center Family and Friends,

A loving Jai Baba to you from Meher Center. We hope you had a happy Thanksgiving in Baba's love. Here at the Center, our Thanksgiving dinner was attended by approximately 175 guests and day visitors. Staff and volunteers worked hard and the weather was beautiful. By Baba's grace, a sense of community and His presence seemed to pervade the atmosphere.

Meher Baba said:

“Among the many things which the aspirant needs to cultivate there are few which are as important as cheerfulness, enthusiasm and equipoise, and these are rendered impossible unless he succeeds in cutting out worry from his life. When the mind is gloomy, depressed and disturbed its action is chaotic and binding.

“Hence arises the supreme need to maintain cheerfulness, enthusiasm and equipoise under all circumstances. All these are rendered impossible unless the aspirant succeeds in cutting out worry from his life. Worry is a necessary resultant of attachment to the past or to the anticipated future, and it always persists in some form or other until the mind is completely detached from everything.”*

In His love and service,

Buz Connor

For Meher Center board and staff

*Discourses, by Meher Baba, 6th ed., vol 3, pp. 121-122

From November 1st - 4th, 1962, Meher Baba invited His followers from all over the world to attend the momentous East-West Gathering, held at Guru Prasad in Pune, India. Photos and precious video footage of the Avatar are played while we listen to the message Baba had read out at the start of the program, entitled "My Dear Workers." The video ends with a message from Baba read by Eruch, which was read aloud prior to the beginning of the Darshan.

Video, 7:21

Guru Prasad, Pune, India 1962

Courtesy of Meher Baba Messages

Photo of Eruch in Mandali Hall by Bob Ahrens

ALTHOUGH ERUCH DID NOT COME TO BABA because he was interested in spiritual advancement, nonetheless, all his preconceived ideas of what it meant to leave the world were being shattered one by one once he joined Baba. As a young man who by nature was an observer, Eruch didn’t know what to make of it all. Everything that he had grown up believing was right and good and “Godly” seemed to have been turned on its head. 

After just a few months of our joining Baba, the first of the Blue Bus tours began and soon some excuse or the other was there to send us away. Baba looked at my little brother and said, “Poor Meherwan is missing school. He should have a good education.” Then He would tell us to settle down in some town large enough to have a good school for Meherwan to attend. My brother must have attended half a dozen different schools this way. But after some time there would be another thought, another excuse. Baba would say, “You are all away from Me, I want you to come be with Me,” and again we would pack up, and my mother and sisters and little brother would join the ashram in a different locality.



My God, I thought we’d left the world and everything. But the difference was that we were carrying out His behests. Now we were doing it for Him. Not because our father wanted it, or we wanted it, but just because He wanted it. That is all. Yet, the passing thought was there, that after having left the world, we were again being asked to establish another world. But the oppressiveness was gone, because leaving the world means to live a life in obedience to His pleasure; leaving the world is within oneself. Whether He puts you in the world and makes you an engineer, or makes you a boss, what is important, and all that matters, is that you are there because He wants you to be there. So if you have that imprinted on your mind, then you have already left the world.

Raymond D'Argenio preparing to serve the Thanksgiving dinner at the Refectory

Thanksgiving at the Center! What a sweet, familiar tradition for so many years. But how does it get done? The tradition started with Kitty Davy, who wanted the guests staying on Center during Thanksgiving to enjoy a traditional meal together. Then, a growing nearby community joined, more were merrier, and more were at His home celebrating community and tradition.

Over the years, the capacity to produce this gigantic and glorious meal required additional equipment, more hands, and some leadership. During the last half of the 2000s, an energetic and enthusiastic local lover of Meher Baba was sent for the task. Raymond D’Argenio had kids attending Youth Sahavas and a passion for cooking. He volunteered to prepare all the pre-Sahavas meals.  By the end of that decade, he had naturally become the person who could take on the holiday Center traditions of preparing and serving Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners. When he was gently asked, he firmly and emphatically said “YES!!”

This is Raymond’s 15th year of doing “back-to-back marathons”: Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners. For about half of those years, he was collecting all the food items himself from local sources including organic high-quality ingredients, cooking six to eight turkeys in the new larger oven set up in the work garage by the Refectory, and preparing all the usual casseroles, stuffings, vegetables, salads, gravies, relishes, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes and much more.

Seven years ago, he collaborated with Reverend William Gause and the Racepath Community in a joint effort to serve. The Racepath community cooks began to prepare the turkeys and many of the dinner items for the Center’s holiday dinners. Raymond continued to prepare the salads, sauces, dressings, rolls, “side” items, or anything else needing special attention. Raymond and his loyal team (Gabe Wood, Donna Stewart, Maraiya Latulippe, and many others) unmistakably served a beautiful and hot meal for a large number of people precisely at 1:00pm on the day of both gatherings. Staff and volunteers have backed this effort by managing the rest of the event set up and cleanup. 

As it sometimes is with great service, Raymond’s volunteer efforts have almost been invisible, but always infused with his leadership, humor, dedication, and love for His home in the West.

This Thanksgiving, we thank you Raymond; one more time!

The Young Adult Sahavas held at Meher Center from November 8th to the 11th was a weekend full of opportunities to come together in Baba’s love for young adults. Through discussion groups, workshops, skits, the Dhuni, visiting Baba’s House, hearing Wendy speak of her time with Beloved Baba, making garlands, nature walks, chai, delicious food, we spent time in Baba’s presence and with one another.

Rushing from the parking lot to our opening meeting, I was aware of how immersed in the world I had been and how I looked forward to leaving it behind. But it’s not always an easy task and it often (well, in my case) requires the help of the Beloved. And so, I asked Him: Please help me to leave the world behind and be fully present to receive your Love.  



About fifty of us gathered in a large circle to reintroduce ourselves and come together in Sahavas. The theme of the weekend was: “Do not search for God outside of you. God can only be found within you, for His only abode is the heart.” ~ Meher Baba. 

One of the personal highlights for me was watching Meher Baba’s Grace, a film of Baba that happens to be my favorite. With beautiful music by Cindy Lowe and Judith Shotwell as the backdrop, Baba is so radiant, joyous, and humorous in this film that every time I watch it, I feel that I am right there with Baba, and He is right here with me. The film is especially significant to me as it brings back memories of watching it every night at Meherazad with Arnavaz Dadachanji (one of Baba’s close disciples), when I had the great fortune to be one of her caretakers at the end of her life. Watching this film as a group set the tone of what would be a love charged weekend.

I was entertained to hear the multitudinous ways Baba continues to bring His lovers to Him in a discussion group that I led. The topic of my discussion group was how Baba directs us in our life which was inspired by a recent dream I had of Baba when I was in Portofino a few months earlier. In the dream, Baba looked so sweet, radiant, and innocent in His blue coat. I was driving Baba and the message I received from the dream was: Do not drive ahead of Me. I will direct you and show you where to go. We then expounded on this idea and ways we see or feel Baba directing our lives.

On the first evening we all broke into groups and did skits for each other using a Baba quote that each group picked at random from Meher Baba Calling. Our quote was, “The more you have of My Company and receive of My Love with an open heart, the more whole-heartedly you begin to accept Me. And the more you see of Me, the more convinced you become that you understand Me less and less. 

“Exerting yourself to comprehend My Divine Game through the process of understanding opens up vast fields of speculation in which you wander and arrive sooner or later at a dead-end, finding yourself hopelessly lost. 

“If My actions cause confusion, it is because of your lack of complete trust. Therefore, uproot all doubt and remember well that whatever I do is for the best. All My actions are My Divine response born of My Divine Love.

“I never make plans, never change plans. It is all one endless plan of making people know that there is no plan.”

As I think back on our skit put together in the brief thirty minutes we had, I marvel at how Baba created a perfect skit for us – both in characters and in the storyline! It was one that we were all proud of! And it was surely Baba’s doing, crafting it through us.

Baba was alive in so many precious moments during the Sahavas and no doubt for each person these moments were unique to their personal experience. For me, He came alive not only in His film but in dear Wendy’s talk where she taught us many of His gestures and with the sparkle in her eyes, I saw Baba’s sparkle. He was present in the songs we sang to Him at His dhuni and at His house. He was present in discussion groups where I learned how Baba made Himself known to His lovers and how He captured their hearts. He was present when I fell down the stairs and was carried like a baby by one of His lovers. He was present in the glisten of the lake and the sunrays through the trees. He was present in the love-songs we sang to Him in our hearts. 

By the closing day, Baba’s love was palpable. We sat in the Barn to sing, reflect, and gather in His love. A beautiful garland made at the Sahavas cradled the Beloved’s face on His chair. A bowl of flowers lay next to His pillow for us to offer to Him. I was touched to witness a young lady carefully pick a flower to offer Him. The day before she had been in my discussion group where I had shared a story about how Mehera taught me to take much care when picking a flower for Baba, and to talk to this flower so that it would be beautiful for Baba. Now I sat there, watching how Mehera’s love for Baba had flowed from Mehera to me, to this beautiful soul, and back to Baba. A circle of love had been completed as this young woman carefully picked her flower and offered it so sweetly to Baba.

And with that the Sahavas came to a close, but His company didn’t end there. He came with me as I ventured back into the world with a heart full of love and prayer upon my lips to hold onto this love and His presence for as long as Baba would grant me this gift – until the thirst would come again to draw ever-closer to Him.