Camelot owner hopes for "Peace Palace"

Editor’s Note: This is the third of a multi-part series investigating the demise and possible future of the Camelot Hotel. Once one of the most popular gathering places in Tulsa’s history, and the host one time to President Richard Nixon, the building has become an eyesore and health menace.

Greater Tulsa Reporter/September 1, 2005
By Nancy K. Owens

The present owner of what was the Camelot Hotel is Maharishi Ayur-ved University, a school for teaching transcendental meditation and the teaching of the founder of TM, the Maharishi Mahesh Yoga.

The building or parts of the property may be turned into a “Peace Palace,” described on www.MaharishiPeacePalace.org, as “a beautiful modular building that is covered in white marble. The Peace Palace will include exhibition and lecture halls, offices, residential rooms and a dining hall.” According to a TM practitioner who recently relocated to Tulsa, “We will be building a Peace Palace on part of the land where The Camelot is located.”

Until the Peace Palace comes to fruition, a Maharishi Enlightenment Center will be opened at 5800 S. Lewis Ave., according to a Maharishi Ayur-ved spokeperson. The Center will teach TM, sell Maharishi Ayurveda herbal products (also available at www.mapi.com) and have a Maharishi Spa for Ladies, whose sister facility can be seen on www.theraj.com.

“Peace Palaces,” similar to the one planned for Tulsa, are an integral part of the Maharishi’s global philosophy.

According to the Peace Palace website, “Each Peace Palace will offer to everyone the knowledge and practical programs for peace and enlightenment, for a healthy, happy, more creative, more fulfilling and successful life through the Transcendental Meditation program. Its benefits in the fields of education, health, social behavior and world peace have been amply documented during the past half-century all over the world.”

The five to ten most prominent families of every city are invited to “join us in becoming founders of the Peace Palace.” Peace Palace construction in the USA is being undertaken by The Global Country of World Peace, a tax-exempt 501©(3) organization.

The Global Country of World Peace is a “virtual” country (not physical) and was established on October 7, 2000. It was created by Maharishi to “establish global world peace by unifying all nations in happiness, prosperity, invincibility, and perfect health, while supporting the rich diversity of our world family.” Its stated mission is to establish Heaven on Earth by raising the quality of life of every individual to complete fulfillment and affluence in enlightenment. It will establish a Global Administration through Natural Law by enlivening the nourishing evolutionary power of Natural Law in the life of every individual and in the collective consciousness of the whole world.

The Capital of The Global Country of World Peace is Maharishi Vedic City, IA, known simply as “Vedic City.”

Maharishi’s goal is to replace what he refers to as “damn democracy” with the peace inspiring politics of The Global Country of World Peace, according to their literature.

His thoughts concerning this issue were published in a TM Bulletin. His opinions are clear from some of his quotes: “Damn the democracy, which is based on the popular will, vote. It is not based on knowledge, it is based on number.

“The man-made constitution, that system of self rule called democracy. They say the Minister is in the cabinet, he has no time to meditate. What does he do in the cabinet? He does opposition.” “If your religion tells you to be a devil, then I would advise you to be a devil, but enjoy life, enjoy life. All those countries who are earning their livelihood by selling arms, Natural Law will take care of all that. Time is different now, they will not be able to save themselves from the fury about the sin they are committing.”

The same TM Bulletin offers Maharishi’s solution to society’s problems, “So, this is what we’ll do, it is the rise of unifying principles through education, this will motivate the creation of leaders in each country, of an ideal character and quality, not like the monsters or dragons of destruction who dominate in nations today.”

For those who aren’t familiar with Maharishi, www.tm.org offers a glimpse of his global achievements during the last 40 years. To list a few:

• 1957- founded the worldwide Spiritual Regeneration Movement.
• 1972- inaugurated his World Plan and created a new science, the Science of Consciousness.
• 1975- discovered the Constitution of the Universe.
• 1978- created the World Peace Project, sending teams of Yogic Flyers to the most troubled areas of the world, to calm the violence through TM.
• 1984- sent the first group of 7,000 Yogic Flyers to Fairfield, Iowa. (According to the website, scientific research on this assembly validated Maharishi’s prediction that when the square root of one percent of the world’s population practices the TM-Sidhi program, including Yogic Flying, together in one place, positive trends increase and negative tendencies decrease throughout the whole world.)
• 1988- formulated his Master Plan to Create Heaven on Earth for the reconstruction of the whole world, inner and outer.
• 1994- introduced programs for prevention in the fields of health and security creating a Prevention Wing of Yogic Flyers in the military of every country.
• 1998- The Maharishi Open University was founded offering Total Knowledge of Natural Law to everyone accessible via a network of eight satellites broadcasting to every country on earth.
• 2003- developed The Global Country of World Peace currency, the “raam.”

The “raam” is currently used in The Netherlands, the base of Maharishi’s empire, and in Vedic City, Iowa. It comes in denominations of one, five and 10. The exchange rate is one raam to ten USD, and one raam to ten Euros. More than 100 Dutch shops, some of them part of big department store chains, in 30 villages and cities have accepted the notes. Shopkeepers can exchange their raam notes at the Fortis Bank branch in Roermond. According to information provided by The Dutch Central Bank, it is keeping a close eye on the raam and allows the raam to be used as long as the notes are not used as legal tender and it stays within a closed-off circuit of users.

Part 1Once Grand Camelot Hotel Had a Quick Demise
Part 2: The Camelot has become a mysterious place, one possibly controlled by what some call a worldwide cult. An investigation into what may be the Camelot’s future will be highlighted in the Mid-August GTR Newspapers.
Part 3: Man fails to fly sues Camelot owner: A deeper look into the teachings and plans of the Maharishi Mahesh Yoga.