Formerly a monk of Prinknash Abbey and Prior of Farnborough Abbey in England, Bede Griffiths went to India in 1955 and assisted in the foundation of Kurisumala Ashram, a monastery of the Syrian rite in Kerala. In 1968 he came with two monks from Kurisumala to Saccidananda Ashram, Shantivanam, in Tamil Nadu (the former Madras State). This ashram was founded in 1950 by two Frenchmen, Jules Monchanin and Henri Le Saux, and was a pioneer attempt in India to found a Christian community following the customs of a Hindu ashram and adapting itself to Hindu ways of life and thought. It has become a prayer center, where people of different religious traditions meet together in an atmosphere of prayer and grow together towards that unity in Truth which is the goal of all religion.