The Butterfly - Pencil Sketch

Religion of a ''New born''

What should be the religion of a new born? Is religion inherited? A new born baby is forced to follow the religion inherited by the kid’s parents. Why there is no freedom of choice? A new born can definitely not have the intellect to choose among different religions. Richard Dawkings says that we shouldn't refer to children as 'muslim, christian, jewish' and so on. We should say, 'children of muslim/ chirstian/jewish parents'. His argument is that children are too young to have decided if they are religious or not. But when the kid grows up and if, still adheres to the ideology of God, even then they don’t have freedom in choice. For example in the movie, ‘’ Life of Pi’’ the kid follows many religions. He has the freedom to choose and is well supported by his parents. Atleast he takes time to experience the different religions. I don’t think we still have that freedom in our societies. Any family who supports such kinds of activities is hated and is seen as a black sheep, because religion is still very sentimental to people.

I feel that, a parent should guide the toddler with ideas on life in the simplest way, basic etiquettes, good habits, give them information from all religions etc. And our job is to pass on the right information to them which is only possible when we ourselves read different religious texts. How many of us have taken the initiative to read other religious texts? We surely should not dump the misinterpreted versions to them.  Then the kid comes up with umpteen questions which is good for the development of both the child and parent. The kid will have some basic knowledge to start his quest, which would be filtered or corrected with his interest later in future. Most kids in our present world are not even presented with the ideas of religion but they are accustomed with the rituals. I still feel religion should be by choice. When the crux of all religions was to spread harmony, peace and brotherhood, then why not pick any? 

God and Karma

Few days back I got this thought on God and Karma. I was thinking how these two things work together. There are people who say that God is everything. He is the one who drives our actions, directs us to whatever deeds we perform in our life. It is said that everything is pre written. When that is the case where is the space for Karma? If by sowing good, we reap good, which is Karma, but the director of this is the God then how come we say Karma solely driven by our actions. I think these two ideologies are different concepts. God and Karma are mutually independent. One school of thought says that God is everything and we should have utmost respect for the God as he is the director and we are the actors. Whereas Karma says you are the director cum actor and you perform all your actions and take the responsibility for that.

But what about the people in middle, there would surely be people in the middle who believe both God and Karma. Have they misinterpreted the ideologies? They say God wants us to perform good acts. If this is the case, then somehow I don’t see a fit to the logic. For example, a teacher guides us upto a certain period of time. Then we are left of our own for the quest of truth which is when we learn the most valuable lessons. In this process we do remember the teacher but we concentrate more on our present actions and always thank our teachers. When we are born, the basics are taught by our parents, teachers and one day we are of our own, performing our own actions. And that is when Karma comes into play. Then where is the question of God?  

So I think, we should either we should believe God or Karma. I haven’t read the different religious texts which talk about these two concepts. I would like to read them and rethink the idea. As of now, my vote is for Karma!!