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In an earlier post, I mentioned about interpreting scriptures for practical application in our lives. In this post, I’m sharing with you a story in a Hindu epic that inspired me greatly. It’s a pity that I forgot the names of the character and reference but the moral of the story inspired me all through my life.

In the ancient days, according to Hindu epics, it is a common practice for men to undertake penance to invoke blessing of gods. One such story goes like this:

A king undertakes penance with a desire to taste God’s food. Days go by; months go by; and years go by. After many many years of penance, the king is tired and thirsty. Then a lowly man walks by and enquires the tired king, if he needs something. When the king requests for water, the stranger pees in his ‘thiruvodu’ (earthen pot used by beggars for collecting food) and place it before the king. Annoyed by this, the king throws away the pot in anger. As the king throws away the pot, the lowly stranger transforms into God saying, "You threw away what you’ve been longing for – It was God’s food’.

We all long for that one ‘thing’ in our lives – be it the job that will get us out of our  debts or the gal of our dreams, or the article that will take us to the pinnacle of fame. Call it ‘unfair’, but life never gives that in a golden plate. It comes in as a ‘pee in the earthen pot’.

In software industry, it always takes the form of ‘the risky project that none wants to handle’. Taking it could spoil your reputation. But there lies "God’s food", that one thing that you’ve been waiting for.

Those who know me, know that I grab such projects with all enthusiasm. (Sometimes it had been just plain ‘pee in the earthen pot’. When that happens, the emotional pain is too high. Still you learn something valuable about handling risks). But most often I end up as a winner.

Is this true only for professional life? No. I’ve found it to be true even in personal life.

Taking risks is a difficult decision. During the decision making phase, it drains you emotionally and during implementation it drains you physically. But there lies ‘God’s food’.

It’s easy to think of life in black & white. But in reality, it is never the case. Lots of factors throw in various shades of gray in between.

So is the case with scriptures. You can’t classify them as either bad or good. Its true that (relatively) few insane bigots (and institutions) have taken the scriptures into their hands and created a whole lot of bloodshed and madness. But that doesn’t mean you need to throw the scriptures completely.

Ancient wise-men realized that unless life-governing principles were coated with ‘God’, the message won’t get through. So they used the then prevailing religious medium.

Somehow over the years, we’ve trained ourselves to take the coating seriously leaving what is inside. That is just too sad.

Though the scriptures were written for an earlier generation, there are lots of gems still left in there. We should learn to distinguish the chaff from the useful. Having learnt to identify the gem, put that gem in to good use.

I’ve personally benefited from such a process – distinguishing a gem, and then applying it in real life. Lots of stories from both the Christian and Hindu scriptures have helped me enrich my life.

Though I’m vehemently against interpreting the scriptures literally and creating chaos in the world, I do encourage reading them to enhance the quality of your life.

In the coming days, I’ll share some of these stories and how they helped me. I’m not trying to convince you or to convert you into any principle. I’m sharing what worked for me. If it works for you, then well and good.

Or else, well, don’t go and burn my village. Just ignore it.

Every ‘Holy Scripture’ strikes a claim that it is either written by god or inspired by one. Believing such a claim, its followers have interpreted its text literally, ignoring the cultural context and generational gaps leading to holy wars, blood baths and genocides.

Even today such interpretations let loose hell-on-earth in New York, Jerusalem and even in Bangalore.

Too often we hear such statements in godly discourses.

"My God is the only true God"

"Hmm…Who says so?"

"The book says so"

Well, the other book says the same about the other god!

Whenever I hear such arguments, my mind goes back to childhood days. It is not uncommon to hear similar statements in kid’s conversations.

"My Dad is the strongest"

"Who says so?"

"My Mommy says so"

When the other kid runs out of argument points, he punched you on your face. With a swollen face you get home, only to find that your dad slipped in the bathroom and lying on bed.

You wondered if your dad was really the strongest!

Religious wars are no different.

"Only through my God, one can go to heaven"

"Any one killing unbelievers will enter heaven"

Bang!

You got burnt villages, mass-murdering mobs and polarized countries fighting with one another.

All the while, gods were taking a nap after slipping in the bathroom!

Such comedy has caused centuries of tragedy. Will there be a remedy? I’m not that naive to think that a simple blog entry can bring in a solution to this age-old problem.

I only dream of a theological revolution that breaks the shackles of religion for all people. Then we can truly sing, ‘Joy to the world’.

It is an age old question – is there a god? I journey through life to find practical answers. The journey isn’t easy; but the answers out of the journey is practical and they work good for me.

Innocent, Ignorant and Indifferent

Been born into a catholic family, my childhood days revolved around Church – Sunday Mass, Annual Festivity, Christmas and Easter celebrations and so on. Being in a predominately Hindu society, Diwali and Pongal were equally anticipated. Vocation Bible school and ‘Kirubananda variyar‘ discourses were attended with the same enthusiasm. We’re innocently ignorant of our differences. Gladly these differences didn’t matter.

I read Mahabaratha and Ramayana much before I read a single page in Bible. Right and wrong were taught from a cultural perspective than with a religious tone. I was friends with Vasantha, Jacqueline and Fatima (along with Augustine and Rama Subbu). We were either ignorant or ignored religious differences. What a bliss!

I got to save the world!

I transitioned from the blissful childhood into ‘I-know-everything’ college life. In college, I was introduced to ‘deeper’ Christianity. I read Bible cover-to-cover; prayed fervently for the salvation of the world; desired to be a Stephan or a Paul of this era. I was so passionate about Bible that you could say that I was breathing Bible.

I was interested in ‘practical’ Christianity than scholarly or religious Christianity. Instead of reading Bible ‘to find favor in the eyes of God’, I read it to find solutions for problems that I faced on a daily basis. Another aspect – as instilled by Mr. Murugan, Tamil master of High School – was ‘to check out if it was so’, rather than blindly accepting some theory or doctrine just because it came out of someone from the stage.

Though I read Bible and went for prayer meetings, there an aspect that I couldn’t reconcile which is, ‘Jesus is the only way to heaven; whoever have not accepted will not reach heaven’. It was the fundamental belief of Christian system. But I had difficulty accepting it. I believed in inclusion than exclusion – whoever accepted Christ will go to heaven; but I didn’t believe whoever didn’t accept will not go to heaven. My belief – rather disbelief of the fundamental truth – arose because of personal reasons: I lost my brother at an early age – he died when he was one. I couldn’t accept the fact that he wouldn’t be in heaven.

With that fundamental difference, I held the belief, ‘Listen, I’m telling you what worked for me. In all probability it will work for you. But I’m not saying something else will not work’.

Except for that one difference I went around happy with hope.

Naively I looked into world and life with an attitude of ‘Bible & I have the answers for all the questions; we have the solutions for all the problems of the world’. What Bible offered worked well for me; except when it didn’t work, because the other party was under the satanic influence (or in some cases its not God’s will).

Is God hiding somewhere?

While I was looking at life naively, life looked back with a sarcastic smile.

I was attending a small but vibrant Church. We were ‘jolly good’ youth bonded well with ‘love of Christ’. While we were praying, working hard and waiting for revival, an unexpected happened – the Church split. I was shocked. I didn’t understand. Personal differences cut the chords of love, bond and unity. The pastor and the youth leader went in different ways. I was torn – youth leader was my best friend who brought me into this Church; but Pastor seemed right. I stayed with Pastor, but I was still friends with the other side of the camp. Yet there was an ‘unanswered bitterness’ in me.

Couple of months later the Church was burnt in a ‘mysterious’ ways. Initial investigations indicated few miscreants. But the Pastor was future-focused and he didn’t want to be clogged with the past.

I admired the way that Pastor conducted himself but I was drowning with questions with only an answer of ‘God acts in special ways’ answer.

What came after threw me off completely. In a personal disaster, Pastor disowned me. I did everything I knew (prayer, consultation) before I took my decision. But it went awry. When it went from bad to worse, I was all alone to face the situation. I was hurt, puzzled; left with no direction. The pastors, priests and religious leaders that we approached behaved in selfish and materialistic way. As I was hiding from situations so was God hiding from me.

May not be innocent; may be ignorant; definitely indifferent

What Christ couldn’t do, whisky did; and what whisky didn’t do, family and friends did. I sailed through the toughest of the time through tons of self-help, loads of family support and friendship of those who didn’t know they were helping (I’ll ever be grateful to Xavier, Venkat and Steven).

I crossed the roughest of the sea; but the journey thwarted pretentious religiosity and strengthened me spiritually.  I’m neither a naive Catholic nor a passionate Christian; but an indifferent agnostic.

I still read Bible. I still go to Church – on my birthday and on Christmas day – because that makes my mother happy. But I don’t believe that Christ is the only way to heaven; in fact I don’t believe in God, Christ or Heaven.

I have a practical belief – if we act with love and consideration, we can have heaven ‘here and now’. If I don’t make a heaven out life before death, I’m not worthy of heaven in life after death. Since I can make a heaven for myself and those around me, even I’m God, may be in a small way.

If you believe, you are a God too.