Business in Religion

What would have happened to you if there was no God in our world? What would have happened if there were no religions in the world? These are the two daunting questions that have made many religious scientists to ponder. We are also faced with these questions at some point in our lives. It is natural for every religious or non religious to ask these questions whilst we are faced with the stark reality of life in the universe; reality of violence, reality of poverty, reality of hunger, reality of natural disasters, reality of chronic diseases and list is numberless. It marvels us when we witness allegiance of the people to religious duties. People have been paying allegiance to religious duties over centuries. The religion plays a vital positive role in the lives the people whereas it also downgrades the human reasoning in regards to the current happening around us. 

Let me cite a few examples of religion can make you admire with an almost radical mindset.  I was attending a Sunday service in certain church. The pastor was very oracular in his delivery of preaching. He was a successful speaker, who could grip and play on the psyche of people. The pastor was excluding himself from the instructions on the morality of people. The tone of his preaching was very negative and downgrading the faithful. He claimed that the people are not living a life worthy of God, rather they a life of selfishness and immorality. This was not new that pastors involved in instructing the right way of life, but what surprised was that the faithful were like a sheep heeding the voice of the shepherd. The sheep was listening to the shepherd. It occurred to me now that the shepherd is always superior to the sheep and when the sheep is fat and ready to be slaughtered, the shepherd himself scoops the sheep to be handed over to the butcher. It was more alarming to know that the pastor himself has many flaws, which must be a turn off for the people. 

There is a popular understanding among the people that a pastor is worth millions of profit for the family. Some of the pastors would like to help their family. An iota of nepotism creeps into our society. There is one thing we hear today about pastors, that pastors have fat bank account and they siphon wealth to their own family. This is true to a large extent among a few pastors who look at church's wealth for personal gratification. People have nosedived to reason as to why one has doll out money to be prayed over. Can we buy graces from God? This is proving against St. Paul's concept of free graces irrespective of religion and class. As St. Peter spiritualized, ‘Silver and gold, I have none to give you, but I will give you what I have in the name of risen Christ” (Acts 3:6), we have received freely, lets give freely. Jesus instructed that, ‘no one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other.” More important statement follows, “You cannot serve both God and money.” (Mat 6:24).

Religion can make a person conscientious to oneself and to one’s neighbor. This can be seen in our proximate when someone is conscientious because of the religious arousal. Religion can be a watchdog to the humanity. It can be a morality-check. It enforces the good and condemns evil in the humankind. It teaches values to the people; these values make one to build one's life. Consequently, religion paves a strong alleyway towards good and mends what is not right in the universe. 

I would like to point out a few incentives that people get from religion. Why do people clutch on to God and their religion? Why are people zealous about their religion? There are a few things that make them to clasp on to their religion and be passionate about their religion. 

Fear of God can make people hold on to their religion. In the early childhood I was taught in the church that God would punish if I don't obey my parents. God will punish and send me to the fire of hell if did not do my homework. God will punish me if I didn't go to church regularly. I was constantly reminded of my duties with a fear factor of God. Hence God became a cop in my early childhood. This understanding took convincing stem in me. This above fear factor seemed true when someone was struck unfortunate events. Some times it coincided with the threat of God. Many of the religious persons have this understanding that God will send us into eternal fire if we did wrong. We have to be redeemed in order to go to heaven. The church and other practices can make one pure and worthy of heaven. Only God can redeem us is the common understanding that drives one to do good and avoid evil. Can God really punish us is the question. We don't have to be frightened of God because God will never let us down. 

Fear of after life, is also a negative force driving one to hold on their religion. The early doctrinal understanding of hell and fire is still the teaching of many religions. There is new understanding given to this concept of hell and heaven. Heaven and hell is not a place that we get as reward for our works here on earth. They are situations in which we live. We create these situations; they can be here and now. A situation where God's values prevail or simply good values prevail. Therefore, it is not ideal for anyone to be fearful of these abstract concepts. We hear from the pulpit to live a good life otherwise we will be sent to the fire of hell. If we do good we go to heaven. Now I am not rebutting on that idea, because I really do not know whether they are rewards for our good or bad actions. 

Religion can be a cleansing pond to cleanse myself of all my sins and be pure again in order to live a good life. It's an incentive to every one who longs to be cleansed and be free. When someone is bogged down by the evil committed, naturally he needs to find a place to vent out. It is this juncture that religion comes in handy to be freed from all the immoralities. Someone can be a monster outside the sacred space but he can be well mannered within the religious sphere. Hence religion can become merely a place to rejuvenate, and just to begin anew day monstrosity. 

Indoctrination of the righteous, people can be follow instruction so blindly that they can even destroy other people who do not belong to their religion. In the struggle to keep one's religion active, the religious authorities can make the people hate other religious people. This can divide the community based on the religious allegiance. It is a struggle to prove that one's religion is superior to that of others. Most of the religious violence is driven by this one concept that one religion is truer than the other, neglecting the fact that religion is man-made entity. Indoctrination is the worst evil in our society, where humanity is divided and seed of hatred is sown in the hearts of the innocent. 

Religion is trendy charm to many people. It is trendy to try out different religions. For example, western world is bewitched to the eastern way of practicing religion. It is attractive because of its colors and bodily peace. There is an element of fashion and selfishness. It can provide people with personal gratification regardless of God and his existence. Most often these attractions cannot last long because there is always a better religions in the market. 

Religion is the platform and a springboard to launch one's own political and personal ideologies. We have known the many political ideologies have met their start at the religious scopes. It is to emphasize my earlier point of indoctrination; indoctrination by the powerful to spring to the heights of glory. 

Religion is divisive. In many circumstances religion has caused division among the people of the same community. People of every walk of life live together but as regards to religion people failed to accept each other. When I was studying in India it is customary for the Hindus and Muslims and Christians to go to same school and learn to read together. Hence school becomes a second home for most of us and education is noble. In our contemporary world every religion tries to promote religious awareness among the students. It would be noble cause for any school to promote morality, which comes from religion but not divisive indoctrination. 

Religion is comforter; Richard Dawkins once pronounced, that religion can give a person some comfort when the person is in sorrow or pain. It is true to a large extent, that we get our comfort in God. We go to church or worship places to make ourselves quenched; spiritual nourishment. We need someone to pay heed to our ordeals in life, especially if one is suffering with prolonged illness. This will make religion like a counseling clinic, where there is the pastor, the comforter. We need this clinic when we are in need of it. Hence religion is really a use at convenience.

Religion is a sedative to the human aggression. It is scary to hear about the stories of God being angry with the people for their evil behaviors. Children are constantly told that God would punish you if you don't do good. This would be a wrong approach in indoctrinating children that God is a police or nosy in our business. Religion brings in an eschatological dimension to human existence; if you do good on earth you'll be rewarded with heaven or virgins or superior beings, if you do bad you'll be sent to hades, where there will be grinding of teeth. Therefore, religion can make our warrior genes mellow down because of its aftermath consequences. Religion will help calm down human aggression. 

In conclusion, I would like to ask you the readers, what is religion for you?