My Religion

 Prafulla Kumar Mohanty

If I am to choose a religion today, I will choose none. This answer may shock you for religion is man’s identity today next to his official ID. The passport or Adhar card without which you are officially dead, is the definable identity of a man or woman in a modern state. But religion is the identity  of a person in his social  life. You will ask, then you must have a religion or at least belong to one. Yes, I will say I belong to  a religion because my father had a faith inherited through generations without asking questions or exercising choice. I am  a Hindu as my father was a Hindu , his father was a Hindu...and ad infinitum. I never go to a temple, I never observe the rituals, never read the Gita or any religious scripture, I don’t fast on ekadasi or eclipse. I eat all types of food- beef, pork- whatever comes on my plate, I haven’t married on the altar to the chanting of Vedic mantra or somebody's badly pronounced  Sanskrit. I don’t remember when Navaratri comes or when the Holi colours scald unsuspecting skins, I have never  bathed in the dirty waters of the Ganga although I have boated in the ‘holy sangam’ for more than 200 times, I don’t perform shradha ceremonies for my parents: Yet all records say I am a Hindu.

Now coming  to your question my love, If I am to choose a religion today I’ll choose none. I view religion and God business as an unnecessary luxury for which I have no time and no need. I need not submit to a fictional reality which religion creates. How can I believe that God has created men and women just to multiply and conquer the earth. Woman in God’s scheme of things is less intelligent, cannot be even trusted to testify in a court case. She is a commodity for man’s use. If God has given life and shape to man who created sickness and death? Gods never fall ill, they never vomit blood, they eat the sacrificial offerings and are always happy. They never face ecological problems or tsunami nor do they face the wrath of vigilantes. Man faces all disasters, blizzards before dying on a farm or in a hospital. What is God’s purpose then, If he has created men, animals, insects and nature? Are the created objects, things including men and creatures meant for God’s recreation? Are we the motley jokers to entertain gods who  are perpetually bored? We have no identity then!

No, I don’t want the identity of a creature of God. This religious identity of man  has created a new problem for man besides  hunger disease and death. And that is hate and war. Ever since man wore this identity, this planet is soaked in blood, the atmosphere is fetid in hate and is crouching in fear. The religious leaders make all constitutions invalid. The fear of the other world is added to the available fears of the human condition. Civilizations with science and technology dispel some natural fears but they cannot contend with the fears created by religion. The fear of hell and the lure of ‘Heaven’- no matter how many storeyed- make life on earth a far more sinister proposition than Dante’s Inferno.

I am my own God on earth, not immortal like the perpetual dictator, but mercifully mortal, a creature with birth, growth, manhood, old age and death as changing scenes in a theater. I love man admire woman, take delight in biodiversity and try to befriend all those who appear, however briefly in my sphere of activity. I respect my parents who brought me to this beautiful earth; I love with all divinity and purity at my command the woman I live for and appreciate everything that man does except his hate, anger and greed.            

Life is the greatest gift of nature. This earth is the loveliest theatre to play my chosen role. My quest for knowledge is never punished here as in the Garden of Eden. My birth is not a sin to be washed away in austere penance rituals. I never harm others’ interests. I obey the law of the land and pay my taxes, stand in a queue for my turn to come. And I love my beloved children and share their happiness. Above all I love the most graceful woman on earth.

This is my religion. Come my love: lets sing love’s sweet songs of life to man and forget gods, devils and heaven and hell.`