When the pocket sized, green covered,New Testaments were periodically handed over to us in our convent school, matters of faith, religion or dogmas of moral behavior were of little importance to me. The silky thin white pages and the fine print marveled me, the contents had no significance . Between school and home my religious upbringing swayed like a pendulum. Though the goal of both must have been the same, to indoctrinate in my little brain the values of good living. At home there was an alter with various Hindu Gods and Goddesses, there were incense sticks, evening diya, little sugar crystallized balls of prasad, and Slokas in Sanskrit ( the meaning of which I still don’t fully comprehend due to my ignorance of the Sanskrit language ) . Back to school , there was the chapel, holy water, morning prayers and the hymns. Thus happily I grew up singing ” The world around us sings of The Lord.. ” in school and “Mon ek bar Hari bol” at home, both with equal ease and fervor. Why the fervor the mind never asked, it just knew that religious practice is an important world of the adults in which we were being tutored to partake.

My brain had not started it’s uncomfortable questions yet, but curiosity was perhaps the first seed of question ! The divide between Moral Science class and Catechism class in school made me curious. We knew that us, the non- Christians were supposed to attend Moral Science class. But I was curious to know what was taught in Catechism class which was different. In a vague way my child mind had perhaps already understood that the teachings of being good from bad cannot be differentiated by sitting in different class rooms.

The seeker seeks everywhere. The seeker is almost like a lost lover knocking from door to door. There is no difference in the silence within a gurdwara or a church. There is no difference between my fasting or yours. There is no difference between your namaz or my puja. When I hear a Bangladeshi Muslim talk of Durga pujo, when I see young adults practice lent and giving up more meaningful things than food , I feel like telling myself “All is well”. For we the humans are not mere puppets of mass hysteria, we have faith in one religion ,called Humanity.

No one in particular teaches you this but the young mind learns to understand that God is the immediate helpline number you dial with folded hands and closed eyes. This need for helpline is simple when we are young. Just before every exam, report card,or simply to sort out silly differences with best friends ! Even today I find myself praying for the ‘report card ‘; this time though it is for my children. The obsession with ‘report card’ keeps chasing me. A voice within keeps mocking and reminding of the true meaning of ‘report card’.The need of Gods intervention from the school report card to life’s report card happens in the process called growing up. I stumble and fall, I fail and lose, I hurt and reconcile. The lessons of life are learned and unlearned many a times and many a ways.

With every festive fervor my questioning mind awakes. The uncomfortable questions of why and how we seek Divinity arises. The atheist and the believer both dwell within me. In the battle of logic and faith the realm of reality and metaphysical collide. The answers are not simple. Often I have come across true atheists with much deeper knowledge and study of the scriptures than the blind believer. To quote Paramhansa Yogananda ” Faith means expanding your intuitive awareness of God’s presence within, and not relying on reason as your chief means of understanding.”

I sway once again like a pendulum between being ritualistic and spiritual. Rituals keeps me busy and distracted, spiritual seeking needs hard work. But peace descends when I sit at my altar with the single candle burning. My mind wants to surrender and grasp that fleeting moment of complete bliss which does not flicker with the flame. With age I have realized that the helpline I have been dialing since childhood has always been redirected to me. The answers I have seeked out wards have always come from within. It is time to look within and reconnect with the seed of strength already sowed inside my heart. As the world prepares for the festive season , the true blue Bengali me rises at dawn to listen to the chants of Devi Bandana, is it religion or culture I forget to question. The walk on the path of self realization is arduous and the journey has just begun.

“How happy is the blameless vessels lot,
The world forgetting by the world forgot,
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind,
Each prayer answered, each wish resigned.”

Alexander Pope