Religion
Religion is a collection of organized beliefs, rituals, and systems that most typically pertain to the belief and worship of a dominating power such as a personal God or another supernatural being. While this is a general definition, there are many various interpretations of religion, and not all faiths are centered on a belief in a god or gods or supernatural powers.
Religion frequently entails cultural ideas, worldviews, scriptures, prophecies, revelations, and values that have spiritual meaning to adherents of the particular faith, and it can include a variety of behaviors such as sermons, rituals, prayer, meditation, holy locations, symbols, trances, and feasts.
In the modern world, religion has become synonymous with inner peace, mental health, and a person’s overall well-being. We practice religion to relieve ourselves from everyday life’s ordeal and attain spiritual knowledge that brings us steps closer to the almighty. Religion is different for people from different walks of life; for example, some practice Hinduism, some Jainism, some Islam, and so on.
But achieving that spiritual connection isn’t easy; it requires dedication, meditation to train your mind, yoga to train the body, and other ways to connect to the almighty. People in India are staunch believers in God, and they want themselves to feel connected to God thus practice numerous ways to achieve it. But the major issue lies with the so-called “gurus” who take advantage of this sentiment for monetary, physical, sexual, etc., forms of gains.
Game of deceit
We humans are not perfect, and we need someone to reassure us, lift us, give us hope to move forward, and that someone for most of us is God. But we do not have the entelechy to do so, and thus we need a medium to act as a pathway between the almighty and us.
The pandits, maulvis, Father, etc., act as a medium for their respective religion. We trust them blindly because they are believed to have greater knowledge of our traditions and scriptures than all of us. They are the only ones to guide us through the darkness that engulfs the pathways to the purification of the soul we seek. But alas, only some of them in the true sense can be called spiritual gurus and learned ones, but the rest are just phonies who are misusing the emotions, faith & our weakness for their benefit.
They build religious places to cater to the gods but behind the scenes use it as a cover to carry through with their heinous crimes. We have quite a big list of such “FRAUDS” in India who have been caught in the past decades. The kind of crimes they committed was of such extreme levels of atrocity, even speaking about them makes us feel disgusted to an unimaginable extent. Cases of using religion as a cover for money laundering acts for various big-time businessmen, ministers, and the underworld have also been uncovered. Yet, these people have not been put behind bars, majorly due to the power exercised by the formerly mentioned people and the blind support of the common masses.
Mental peace is like an addiction, and once someone has experienced it, they want it again and again. So, the people can’t have the person who gave them this relief taken away as it would imply they would have to suffer again. This fear of dependence on externality for their peace is what drives them to go on protest, also fueled by the false agenda, proofs by the influential leaders who want these criminal gurus to stay for their illegal activity to work and be safe.
Preying on the feeble humans who just want purity of soul, mental peace, and spirituality is a source of enjoyment for them. Violation of the mind and body are common events that occur behind the scenes, as in Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh Insaan’s case, against whom rape charges were filed.
Infamous Aasaram Bapu, even though his guilt was proven and the court sentenced him to imprisonment, many great leaders of our country protested against his imprisonment, claiming he did nothing wrong and the pieces of evidence were forged.
Suppose these kinds of criminals will teach us religion, then in the future, religion is just for namesake. In that case, the people at high post will control what should be called religion and what should be excluded.
Solution to rectify
There are numerous solutions through which these errors swaying us away from the path of religious spirituality can be rectified. Firstly, the core problem is that these frauds can take advantage of us due to our lack of knowledge of our religion (whichever you follow).
We should take the initiative to gather knowledge from the religious scriptures by reading them ourselves. We would face problems understanding the true meaning of those scriptures, but by the time you have read the scriptures, you would encounter someone who would be a true guru, who would rectify your error and lead you to the correct spiritual path.
We also have to stop following religious ideal mixed in with agendas. Religious sentiments highly influence our country’s political scenario. Events to prove the same are evident in the history of the “Riots in India”. Even currently, the scenario is such that particular religious groups are being targeted and labeled as “terrorists”, “anti-national”, “spies”. Understanding the difference between religious beliefs and political agenda is crucial, especially in this twisted political age.
