Last night Sri Swami Vishwananda started with the Shivaratri celebrations.
In the early evening he held the following speech:
'Shiva took in the form of Anjaneya (Hanuman) the Aspect of service. Shiva shows how great it is to forget about oneself, to be dedicated to the service, to serve the lord. Shiva stands for the forgiveness of the pride, he is the destroyer of the pride so that only god is live.
We are so concentrated on the Ego, on the 'I', the 'I' is so big, and as bigger it becomes, as more difficult it is to get rid of it. With Shiva the 'I' disappears an what awakes is the consciousness, which is Shiva. But the consciousness will not just stay as the consciousness, as Shiva, it will devolve to Narayan. The consciousness itself will loose its Ego consciousness and will arise to the super consciousness and it will reach the absolute.
Thats what Shivaratri is: You forget about the pride and let the pure consciousness inside of you awake.'
As there where already more than 400 visitors here to celebrate the great night of Shiva, we organized 4 shifts so that everybody had the opportunity to sit one abishekam inside the temple.
Who could not be inside the temple was sitting outside nearby in the lighthall where there was a big screen to watch live what happens inside.
The night was supposed to finish at 2am in the morning, but our 'hardcore' devotees rocked the night till the morning prayers at 7am.