Question: How do we encourage children to chant?

Jayapataka Swami: Well, interesting question to ask a sannyasi!! You should know better than me! Ha! I have more children, but they are all grown up! I saw in New Talavan that one lady had a plate of sandesh and all the kids around and she said, ‘chant me one round.’ They all chanted looking at the sandesh. When one round was finished she gave each one of them a sandesh. So I don’t know if that is the universal principle but the Garuda purana says, that children like sweets. Ha! Some boys and girls chant because they feel inspired. What inspires them? that is a good question? What inspires you (gesturing to a kid). (‘You’ the child said.) Ha! That is what someone told me that, the parents said that after they saw you, the children started chanting. I thought, he is suffering so much, yet he still is so enthusiastic, why don’t I chant? Srila Prabhupada was saying that although maybe what Lord Buddha did was a kind of cheating because He said, ‘well we don’t believe in God, just follow Him. He himself was God. So Srila Prabhupada said that sometimes a little child may have a 100 dollar bill and the father thought that maybe the child will destroy that hundred dollar bill, so he offered, give me that useless paper, take this valuable lozenges, oh lozenges! You may take that lozenges, and he said take the 100 dollar bill. The child doesn’t know that the 100 dollar bill will buy kilos and kilos of lozenges. So sometimes it is not Srila Prabhupada said it is not really cheating, because it is for the atheist or the children’s benefit. So like that we can see how to benefit the children.  So like that, we can see how to benefit the children. What is the tactic that works.
14-NOVEMBER-2019 ATLANTA, USA