In search of My God

As a growing up child, I was always forbidden from asking such questions as, “where is God and why should we worship him?” My mother, the only person who would give me a hearing would reassure me that their existed a superior omnipresent power who we all ought to worship for all the good things we enjoy in life. And indeed, for this reason I worshipped God (whenever the need arose, as most of us do) until sometime around the age of 10 when I started to suspect that probably praying was all but a waste of time. “The God who I prayed to had never shown himself to me. Why then should I pray to him?” My rising doubts were criticized upon at home and even at school (I studied at one of those affiliated to the Arya Samaj) where they punished me for refusing to attend the ‘compulsory’ Saturday morning Havan (a vedic ritual).

The continuous rebukes and sermons that I began receiving finally ended my defiance and made me submit to the existence of God. I remained passive though and continued to sincerely worship him owing to the fear instilled in me that said, “You’ve got to believe in him for otherwise you shall have to endure great miseries.” It was the fear of the unknown that made me believe in him. When I look back now, I realize how I had been rather tortured to believe in a God that I wasn’t so much willing to believe in. I had always been told at home that no religion was better than Hinduism. However, there lay one question that plagued my head and that distressed me to no end. Which religion’s funeral practice was the best one to follow?

Disturbed as my thoughts were, I was asked to believe in God and worship him, but never was I told on how I could get to meet him and get to know him.” Blind faith or imminent suffering was the response

While pursuing my Bachelors degree in Mumbai, I was introduced to the treasure trove that was my college library. It proved to be the first source to my search for answers. My first book was the Psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud’s – Future of an Illusion. It declared in its very cover page, “Religion is the universal neurosis.” The book fascinated me as I had done some previous readings of Freud and his contributions to Personality Theories. It made me realize how I had been but an ignorant all through this while. I still strongly believe on a lot of what he wrote, and I quote from his book,

“When a man has brought upon himself to accept uncritically all the absurdities that religious doctrines put before him and even to overlook the contradictions between them, we need not be greatly surprised at the weakness of his intellect.”

-          Sigmund Freud, Future of an Illusion, 1927

This along with Marx’s famous “Religion is the Opium of the Masses” was enough to make me forego all my beliefs in God. Atheism, as my non-belief was termed, made me criticize the institution of religion and mock the concept of God. I felt a strange sort of freedom. A freedom from the ignorance that I had been enclosed within for so long. A freedom from the false belief of the existence of a supernatural power who was constantly overseeing us and was keeping an account of all our good and bad deeds that were to be accounted for later in our afterlives.

It was around the same time that an uncle of mine, having known my views on religion, recommended me to read a book titled What Religion is; in the words of Swami Vivekananda. Vivekananda was a 19^th century spiritual monk who had established the Ramakrishna Mission and had gained fame for representing Hinduism, and for speaking on the unity of all religions at the Parliament of world’s Religions, Chicago, 1893. My views on Vivekananda had been a little negative due to his portrayal as a Hindutva icon by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. But the book, a collection of his speeches was enough to make me rethink my opinions.

Religion is to be realized. And for you to become religious means that you will have to start without any religion, work your way up, and realize things, see things for yourself. When you have done that, then, and then alone, you have religion.

-          Vivekananda

Each soul is potentially divine. The goal is to manifest this divinity within, by controlling nature, external and internal. Do this either by work, or worship, or psychic control, or philosophy – by one or more of all these – and be free. This is the whole of religion. Doctrines, or dogmas, or rituals, or books, or temples, or forms are but secondary details.

-          Vivekananda

I had read Gandhi’s autobiography My Experiments with Truth rather lethargically as a kid back then just to be a part of those many who had read it as well. Gandhi had never inspired me, but that was only till I read Hind Swaraj. It was then that I truly began to understand his ideas.

We should do the labour that the poor do, and thus identify ourselves with them and through them with all mankind.

-          M.K Gandhi

Another document that I came across on the internet titled Truth is God was truly enlightening. Though lengthy, it is worth a read for all those confused on their perceptions of God. It is available on the internet and is just a Google search away.

Worship involves inciting the innermost feelings and emotions inside one self. Music is one way of doing it, work another, and prayer yet another. Most of us worship a false God. A God of our mental creation who is our savior at all times. God for most of us is like a sort of a UPS or generator which we resort to when down on power and low on morale. The only difference here being that the back-up we resort to actually exists in our mind itself. The saying “God helps those who help themselves” has a much deeper meaning.

From my long and silent personal deliberation over the subject of worship, I have come to believe that for me it is in the service of the people that I find true solace. In knowing that I have come of help to some and that I shall be able to provide the same service for someone else tomorrow, I find my God.

However, on keener deliberations, I often realize on how even my service as a social worker shall involve a selfish monetary intent. Truth be said, I believe my allegiance to my own faith of finding God through the means of service to be pretentious in certain ways. I often mull over these questions and ask myself.

- Would I provide service if denied a salary?

- Can I detach myself to such an extent that I start to live an austere and simple life where I expect nothing in return for my service?

- Far from expecting monetary benefits, could I remain without expecting even a smile or any sign of acknowledgment for my work?

The day I shall be able to do that, I shall have worshipped God for the first time. But that shall demand of me to renounce all worldly pleasures and get to a spiritual level which I doubt I shall ever be able to achieve.

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Social Work education in India

Studying in one of the foremost and most prestigious (or so it’s called) institutes of Social Work for Rural Development in Maharashtra for the past one year has enabled me to structure my long held thoughts on education better. Education is no more a means to apply knowledge and develop thinking capacities. Today learning has been reduced to being just a medium to ensure one a secure financial future. In the context of my college I can say thus; what is expected of the Agents of Change is very much in contradiction to what these Agents expect of themselves. Concerns of personal future monetary gains are so deep rooted that they far supersede the greater common good for which they claim to have taken up the course.

‘If the ends are satisfied, the ethics surrounding the means are often ignored.’ The following example would help elucidate this statement.

Ex: ‘A good (meaning ‘good placements offering’) college with bad lecturers and poor teaching quality faces no protests from the students. Protest is automatically suppressed in the delight of the expected future good.

I have been witness to innumerable complaints by students most of which emphasize upon the bad food offered, uncomfortable hostels, unfriendly college timings, unnecessary extra classes, etc. None seem to voice opinions regarding the more important points of bad teaching quality and lack of institutional infrastructure to help support our learning. Apart from empty talks amongst a group of friends during lunch or tea, very little initiative is taken in the direction of demanding better quality teachers, most of who happen to be former Social Workers who completed their PhDs from any random university and joined the bandwagon of incompetent university lecturers.

It isn’t difficult to figure out why students remain silent on these issues. Today’s materialistic world has made them so concerned about their future jobs that they fear to protest. The fear rises from the obvious possibility of them being rusticated in the name of ‘misconduct’. Placements have made each one of them so selfish and competitive that there is an utter lack of unity. Fears of gaining a bad impression with the professors surpass all other concerns. Thus, my esteemed Social Work institute continues to churn out students who are taught to suppress dissent in order to gain better grades. With them failing to advocate for their own rights, how is one to expect them to do anything for the people in the future.

In the first few months of our course, we were taught about how we were lucky to have got a chance to study in this college which has given the country some of its best professional social workers. ‘Professional’ of course stood for ‘expert’, ‘trained’ and ‘skilled’; but it was also emphasized (more profoundly, yet indirectly) that it stood for someone who commands a good pay-check in the job market.

“Don’t mistake Social Work with Social Service. We don’t need Gandhis and Mother Teresas. The industry needs professionals not sympathizers”, we were told coldly by our professor.

Social work education seems to stress excessively on the need to be professional as compared to the need to balance it out with being sensitive. The social work sector has been publicized as an ‘industry’ to such an extent that most social work students join with the sole intention of earning a big fat salary in the future. Very few go on to work in the grassroots except when left with no other option.

And when asks one, “What about the primary aim of SW?” prompt comes the answer, “Oh well, we certainly will be working for them. We will be using our professional skills and specialized knowledge (from our air-conditioned cabins in big cities) in order to bring a change in their lives. Of course we will.”

But in a country like ours where poverty seems rampant, how does one view a professional work attitude?

It is good to be professional in one’s work, but being professional in the approach towards one’s work, especially when that happens to be social work is shameful.

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