My interaction with Religion and God…

 

Nopes... It isnt a temple of any God... Just a picture from my album at Picasa...

Continuing on last thread and Inspired from a write-up that my friend Prashant Murarka shared with me few days back…

 

All of us some time or other have had some interactions with these words… God, Religion, caste, etc. Trying to share a few of my major interactions from since childhood…

 

—Religion for me started when I was told by my Parents that I was a Jain as I was born in a Jain family… Maybe my rational thoughts even as a child did not make me feel that I should follow Jainism as I was Jain by birth… It was not like my parents were forcing me to follow Jainism… They were in fact very liberal and always said, ‘follow if you feel it is right’… But I guess the whole environment, big joint family, close society, etc. were embossing on me that Jainism was a obvious choice when I was to still understand for myself what is a Religion?, what is Jainism?, Why Religion? Why God? before I started accepting things…

 

—Most of my childhood days I spent at my home town village Vaduj. My Grandma used to offer 24 mangoes to God, before anyone in the house could start relishing the mango season… I still remember those mangoes… Bigger, better quality and TWENTY FOUR of them were offered to God and what we all 4-5 grand children got was one mango in the morning and one in the evening… When God never ate any of those 24 best ‘chosen’ mangoes and I always felt that it is unfair on me and my cousins; when I used to think that I alone could have taken all those 24 at the same time in my small tummy… 🙂

 

The Temple experience…

 

Sri Muneshwara Swamy Temple...

Early morning around 6:25, as usual I was sitting waiting outside this temple for my office cab… Another Software Engineer walked towards the temple… Now somehow I can identify a Software Engineer from distance in Bangalore… 😉 Coming close to the temple he performed the usual actions that people perform while passing by a temple usually in a hurry or otherwise and stood by the side of the temple… We both now wait for our cabs… Our eyes met with a formal smile followed by “Morning…” from both sides… And he walked to join me on the stairs… A pause for few seconds… I don’t know if it was early morning effect or going to school childhood feeling I asked him…

“Hey, you know which temple is this???”

Surprised with a unexpected question… “Ummmm… Well, No!”

“Mate you should have at least got to know something, before you bowed…”

“Well, yeah…” Reluctant to get up… He just turning around, reads the paint… “Sri Muneswara Swamy temple…”

A pause… His reluctance to move that bit reminded me of those people worshiping Dagdusheth Ganapati standing in the middle of the road…