When we are children swaddled by much love, governed by reason and sanity it's logical to believe in a supreme Deity, a Father figure, (prototypical of our own?),who is in charge, in complete control. Such a very calming comforting thought.
One that children need, to survive and thrive, and sleep peacefully at night.
Supremely confident that the monsters under the bed are being taken care of, by God's angels, or by the Good Lord Rama and his valiant kid brother.
Why?
For no other reason, but because, they've been good and obedient kids, and deserve to be safe and protected.
The problem with adulthood is the scathing discovery that life isn't fair, and unjust desserts are often served, heaped upon one's plate;
(or upon one's head like coals of fire!).
Cynicism and scepticism is the adult mental landscape. Leading to paranoia instead of paradise.
From insulated innocence to chronic insecurity.
Not surprisingly, there's a gradual erosion of rote learnt childhood moral values.
Live long enough, see,hear and do enough, and sure enough, moral decadence at worst or sluggish apathy at best will set in.
Lead kindly light, of childhood promises kept, the sacrament of love given, wishes fulfilled and rightfully earned through appropriate conduct... and so despite all the cons, a touching sense of belief in fair play and ultimate reward remains at the back of one's mind.
Religion is reinforced by endorsement and reinforcement of those shadow beliefs. That if not in this life, a blessed afterlife, an eternal hereafter awaits where we will be rewarded for our good deeds.
Is this such a bad thing? Naive perhaps, even gullible, but endearingly innocent, if not pushed like relentless propaganda, that subtly serves to substantiate one's own faith. Denying all others.
As though a strength in numbers confer infallibility.
But there's a third stratum in the garden of human souls. Not the perpetually innocent, nor the abrasively skeptical, but a strange willy nilly growth, a flower posing as common garden weed.
The more his or her beliefs are broken in an innate sense of deserved justice, the more this kind's backbones are strengthened.
Not by faith, nor cynicism but by an iron determination to sanctify and protect the sacred garden of peace called childhood, were early on, the best values were sowed.
And which are now, all the more necessary to reap, when this world appears a barren arid wasteland, unfulfilling and holding no promise for humanity.
These strange humble wildflowers stand strong facing up to the sun always.
Looking for light, abhorring darkness and defeat.
Not because they can still in all fairness, believe in a God father, but because they cannot cede the enlightenment of happiness and grace that was once received. The tender benediction of early fair play and kind treatment, the protection of earthly parents.
That is why our earliest memories are sacred.
The happy days spent in roaming carefree green fields, sipping the crystal waters of light, reason, sanity and knowledge, climbing every mountain courageously, provides safe anchor.
Against the uncertainty of the roll of the dice of capricious adulthood.
God is created by such acts of positive strength and goodwill.
Not by any sense of awe, or blind faith in an unknown divinity, but by an abiding faith and trust in our humanity.
The Gods are all around us, within us and without. Imperfection perfecting itself.
Love and laughter spread into more than a billion prismatic bits, over billions of years,
each of us lie in wait, to reflect own bit of light and wisdom, our own few shades of the rainbow's spectrum.
One for all and all for one, is God's sole divine plan and there's no other, as ennobling as that.
Seek and ye shall receive. This Kingdom of Heaven on earth.
(c) Amrita Valan 2016
