CURSE IS RELIGION TO GOD… is it so?

We are living in an era of extinction. So many flora and fauna, and other habitats are disappearing from the face of the earth on daily basis. Previously, so many different types of species existed but today we find them only in museums, laboratories, or in history books. Contrarily, we are constantly battling today with the rapid growth of human population. However, time is not far ahead, soon human beings will realize that even they are at the verge of extinction.

Human beings have destroyed enough and more species by playing with them and now they have began playing with their fellow human beings. When they were playing with natural habitats, they were busy with them and so as among human beings they were united. They were full time busy waging war with species and natural habitats. But today human beings have very few species left to keep themselves busy waging wars with them. So, human beings to keep themselves busy playing tragic game they are turning towards their fellow human beings. Though they realize that their fellow friends are also of the same kind, but they would not resist playing with them because in any case they had to keep busy. Otherwise, they do not know how to spend their leisure time. So, they find some excuse to differentiate themselves with other fellow human beings. Thus, in their attempt they find the excuse in religion. Belonging to another religion makes them a different species all together. So, today religion is being used as a differentiating factor among human beings and this is just to play the war of game to destroy others.

People down the centuries had believed that God created human beings and everything of the universe. But today many will not believe in such old belief because today it is quite evidently proved that human beings instead of worshiping the real God they have created god in their own image and likeness. If God were to create in His own image and likeness, the world would have been different; people would have celebrated life as brothers and sisters in the unity of love as many would say. However, in reality we see just the contrary things happening. God who is the source of love and mercy has become the cause violence and hatred in the hands of human beings.

People have created gods in their own image and likeness and because of this they are trying to defend the god of theirs. Being narrow and limited people have created gods who are no different than them. If God were to create human beings, would God require human defense to protect Him? Will God require human brutality to defend the honour of His name? The gods of human mind needs protection because they are imagery creation for psychological security. Out of insecurity human beings created gods of their own nature, gave attributes and now they are afraid that if their gods are destroyed their secure home which they have established and adorned for years will be destroyed. Hence, they do everything to protect their pity gods.

Today, in India one is witnessing the ultimate fallenness of human beings wherein animals have been treated as gods. Animals have become gods but human beings have become lower than any created creatures that exist in the world. To protect the cows, stinky people are slaughtering the once considered their fellow human beings. People of different faiths have become indifferent towards people of other faiths, and only prying to crush others. Religions have utterly divided. Instead of bringing the entire human beings under the umbrella of love, care and concern it has divided them. Human history evidently illustrates the divisive consequences brought about by religion. If religions were to concern really about God, the world would not have been so brutal and murderous as we are witnessing it. I cannot reconcile in any case that God can kill a human person to bring order and harmony in the world. If He does so than I do not doubt but unhesitatingly affirm that that God is fraud. Just like animals, even people kill only out of insecurity and not otherwise. So, if God kills than even He is insecure. Moreover, if God is the source of everything then He should be able to change the heart and mind of human beings without even causing the end to their life. But the fundamental question we need to ask is, which god is killing, is it the real God or the god of human mind?

If the God that human beings worship can kill any human life than religion is purely a human venture which is devoid of any godliness. There might be divine elements in it but since it is a human creation, creation of insecure human mind, when life becomes hard or when things do not suit their life, they change the principles of religion just to suit their behavior. Their religion is guided by their convenience. If such is the case then religion is a curse to God. Human beings have cut God into pieces and it is the slaughtering of God into pieces that is dividing and cutting human beings into pieces too.  

Is religion a curse to God? Viewing the inhuman atrocities that are being committed in the name of religion, it is evident that religion is a curse to God. Would the real God choose a religion that is murderous? It is the high time to realize that though religion is a human creation, founded to share the personal experience of God’s love, mercy and forgiveness; it is not any kind of organizations to suck the blood of others. Religion was supposed to be the epitome of love but has become the graveyard of the humanity. Can human beings who have created such a bloody mess, realize and therefore restore it? It is possible but if human beings do not turn away from their fundamentalist attitude one must be ready to face the dooms day. Hope if God wills humanity would not have to face such a day. Humanity can only hope and pray that they learn to treat each fellow human beings with dignity and respect, enrich each other with their unique experiences of God’s love and mercy, and more especially may the religious leaders bless the world with Godliness that will enable to see fellow human beings as brother and sisters.

Hatred begets Hatred

Violence begets Violence

Reaction begets further Reactions

Opposite is also True:

Love begets Love

Peace begets Peace

Acceptance begets further Acceptance

So, let us change the world, begin with the self and reach out to others… love changes in the ways we cannot see… do not wait for others to change… others cannot change you… you be the CHANGE!

Romanius Barwa

BEING TRUE TO ONESELF IS THE HEAVIEST CROSS OF LIFE

The whole humanity will agree with me if I say that we must live each day to the full or to the maximum. All of us want or at least wish to live each day in the best possible way, bringing all our potentialities and talents to fruition. None of us want our energies and talents go in the waste dustbin. We want them to be in the vanguard of our life as an inspiration to others. Sometimes we find ourselves in the midst of activities, trying hard to achieve so many things in life. Such suffocating moments make us think that we are very busy. When we are busy we think that we are living our life to the full potentiality. We often confuse realizing our potentialities with accomplishing activities. However, we realize that to live each moment of the day to the full, with unconditional love, sensitivity, openness and intelligence is not so easy and at times even seems as the heaviest cross of our lives.

We make great plans for our lives and then we  attempt to tailor each passing moment of the day according to that giant plan of ours but often in the process we forget to live the moment, and all the more we are never fully present at the moment. We forget to live the present, we get entrapped by our constant worries of how to achieve that giant goal of ours that we have set for our lives. In the process of striving for the set goal, we encounter so many amazing internal and external realities of life but we become blind to them. They never catch the attention of our lives. We become dead practically to everything, perhaps except for the thing that we are striving for. For instance, internally we might get lovely feelings or sensations that might evoke to greater mysteries of life but we will not care about them because they come as an obstacle in our way to achieve our set goal. All that we do is push them aside. Externally we might encounter fascinating natural beauty or we may encounter sweet smiles of a child or a crying face of the old person but we will ignore them as if they are non-entities to us. For us all that matters is how to achieve the set goal. In the bargain of achieving the goal we become insensitive, conditioned, narrow-minded, and so on.

Living each moment to the full and in the happiest way possible requires of us to be totally authentic first of all to the core of our very being and then to others and finally to the whole of reality.  This authenticity also means to act according to our own convictions and not to follow blindly the commands or the dictates of others. Blind acceptance of anything does not in any way make us better human beings. To be fully human we need to understand what we accept, obey, follow, and also the significance of it. Moreover, when it comes to the integration of thinking and acting things becomes very difficult and at the same time complicated. There emerge a big gap between what we think and what we do. Sometimes all the good things that we think of remain only in the theoretical level. Very often they are realized in the theoretical level, intellectually we might feel happy about it and it might even give intellectual satisfaction but they are far from being realized in the level of action. In the level of action they are paralyzed. We might be bombastic in our speech but in action we might be empty. For this reason the toughest thing perhaps is to be the person we are.

Most of the times, we are never the real person as we are deep within.  Very often we get lost in accumulating either material or psychological goods that we see as necessary for our security. We are worried about what people say or think about us but we forget to inquire our very own selves. Instead of finding who we really are, we depend on the words of others. We always want to escape from our own selves and dwell in the world of fantasy. Most often we are frightened to inquire to the deepest core of our being because at that level we realize the constant battle that goes on deep within. Many times we would want to share with others but we can’t express them as we would want to because we get the feeling that others might not like or it might even disturb them. There is the burning desire deep within to share but we would not do so, rather we would rationalize and say that we have absolutely no problems. So, what we do is to dress up the internal battles with lovely aprons so that people might see it with appreciation. Sometimes we struggle so much but we will not show them. Rather, if at all we disclose the problem we do so by decorating it with appealing piece of cloths but we know that covering up the reality will not solve our problems in any way.

Perhaps the heaviest cross of our life is to live each and every moment of the day to the full. As we said it is not as easy as it sounds to be. However, in the Person of Jesus we have a great model who can help us in this aspect of living each moment to the full. He lived his life to the full with authenticity but He also paid the price for being true to Himself. Living to the full in its authenticity demands a heavy price to be paid in this beautiful world infected by corrupt individuals. However, living authentic life has its blessing for one can live in freedom and in peace of mind. He advises to His disciples, ‘take my yoke for it is light,’ meaning to say that Jesus is addressing us to live like Him and in living like Him there will be no heavier crosses because His love is unconditional. If we live our life with unconditional love, honesty, sincerity, affection and so on then our life will be very simple and very easy because there is no burden in being authentic to oneself. In fact, being authentic liberates an individual’s because Jesus Himself has said that if you know the truth the truth will set you free.

Hence, to set ourselves free we need to find the different types of crosses that encumber us. It is in realizing our problems and encountering them as they appear to us that we set ourselves free. Just as Jesus encountered the death to attain total liberation, so too we need to encounter our problems, face the challenges as they come, get up to courage and wisdom if we are fallen for it is only in rising from the fallen state that one encounters the newer reality that which is totally different.  To resurrect we need to acknowledge the crosses of our lives and it is in bearing the crosses like Jesus with unconditional love that we would be able to liberate ourselves to ultimate freedom or love. Jesus forever stands as model in living life to the full.

Romanius Barwa