Whose God is it anyway?

I must have been seven years old then. We went on a vacation to a hill station. My parents, me and my younger brother. We were passing through a narrow street with hawkers occupying their places on both sides of the road.

I stopped by at one of the places and asked my Dad, ‘What is it?’ he replied, ‘It’s called Cross beta.’

‘What is a Cross?’ I asked.

‘The way I am wearing a Krishna locket, it is worn by Christians.’

‘Oh, so am I not a Christian? Can I not wear this?’

He laughed and said, ‘Sure you can wear whatever you want. And let me buy two of them.’

He helped me wear one of those and wore the other piece himself, which hanged across his neck along with the Krishna locket.

I smiled and adored the feeling of that new ornament throughout the trip.
Since that day, wherever we went, I enjoyed buying different things which resembled God in any form, just to feel His presence close to me. For me, religion just meant only a word in the books, a way to describe God in a unique form as anyone pleased.

But as I grew up, I realised that religion actually meant-

‘My God is better than yours.’

‘God has no other form except our religion.’

‘We have the right to follow our religion any way we want, even if it disturbs the law and order, and no one has the right to raise a voice against us. And if they do, they won’t be spared. Everything is allowed in the name of religion.’

I understood that I was a Hindu first and later an Indian. I kept wondering if The Independence Day meant true Independence to us, as we were still hand-cuffed and jailed in yet another prison called religion. Every other religion meant a crime to the one you belong to. We are born only to hate the existence of other religions, take every discussion and every issue towards the religious angle.
For politicians, it means an easy way to ‘divide and rule’. After all, history repeats itself! The fact is, history never changed and has remained the same for centuries.

But not anymore. I knew I was wrong. I knew WE are wrong.

Religion is only a creation of our minds. It really doesn’t exist, an alien that should remain only in fantasy books. It’s a werewolf, a vampire; the only difference being that it is used to scare adults and not kids.

I wish I could remain a kid forever and would never get a chance and intelligence to understand the ‘real’ meaning of religion, aptly understood by the ‘adults’.

God doesn’t understand the language of religion. He only listens and understands the language of heart and soul.

Shikha Kaul