Religion vs Spirituality

▪ Religion is not just one, there are hundreds.
▪ Spirituality is one.

▪ Religion is for those who sleep.
▪ Spirituality is for those who are awake.

▪ Religion is for those who need someone to tell them what to do and want to be guided.
▪ Spirituality is for those who pay attention to their inner voice.

▪ Religion has a set of dogmatic rules.
▪ Spirituality invites us to reason about everything, to question everything.

▪ Religion threatens and frightens.
▪ Spirituality gives inner peace.

▪ Religion speaks of sin and guilt.
▪ Spirituality says, “learn from error”.

▪ Religion represses everything and in some cases it is false.
▪ Spirituality transcends everything, it brings you closer to your truth!

▪ Religion speaks of a god; It is not God.
▪ Spirituality is everything and, therefore, it is in God.

▪ Religion invents.
▪ Spirituality finds.

▪ Religion does not tolerate any question.
▪ Spirituality questions everything.

▪ Religion is human, it is an organization with men’s rules.
▪ Spirituality is Divine, without human rules.

▪ Religion is the cause of divisions.
. Spirituality unites.

▪ Religion is looking for you to believe.
▪ Spirituality you have to look for it to believe.

▪ Religion follows the precepts of a sacred book.
▪ Spirituality seeks the sacred in all books.

▪ Religion feeds on fear.
▪ Spirituality feeds on trust and faith.

▪ Religion lives in thought.
▪ Spirituality lives in Consciousness.

▪ Religion deals with doing.
▪ Spirituality has to do with the Self.

▪ Religion feeds the ego.
▪ Spirituality drives to transcend.

▪ Religion makes us renounce the world to follow a god.
▪ Spirituality makes us live in God, without renouncing us.

▪ Religion is a cult.
▪ Spirituality is meditation.

▪ Religion fills us with dreams of glory in paradise.
▪ Spirituality makes us live the glory and paradise here and now.

▪ Religion lives in the past and in the future.
▪ Spirituality lives in the present.

▪ Religion creates cloisters in our memory.
▪ Spirituality liberates our Consciousness.

▪ Religion makes us believe in eternal life.
▪ Spirituality makes us aware of Eternal Life.

▪ Religion promises life after death.
▪ Spirituality is to find God in our interior during life and death.

-We are not human beings who go through a spiritual experience.-
-We are spiritual beings that we go through a human experience.-

Why do good people suffer?

Why do good people suffer is question of many people. Many people say why me? What have I done wrong? I have harmed or hurt nobody. Then why me? Again and again this question arise, it comes in mind. People say till I remember I have not done anything wrong. Then why I am suffering. I pray many times in a day. I ask God for help and protection. Every morning and night I offer a prayer. I also think about God and keep praying. Why of all the people did this happen to me?

This is the answer to the repeated question that why do people suffer? It becomes clear when we understand, the Law of Karma ( what you sow so shall you reap.) and reincarnation. Law of karma is cause, and effect. Every effect must have a cause, the effect we see now must have a cause, recent or remote, whatever suffering I am getting today is cause of behind. Dhritrashtra King of Hastanapur. When Mahabarata war was over he asked Shri Krishna why I am blind and I have lost my hundred sons? I have been good to everyone. And shri Krishna told him that an earlier incarnation he had been a tyrant King, one day as he walked by a lake side, he saw a swan bird surrounded by a hundred signets. He asked his people to remove the eyes of the swan bird and kill all the hundred signets just to please his passing fancy. And Krishna also said that what you sow so shall you reap, one cannot sow thorns and reap apples. The low of karma is universal in its application , it applies equally to all we are sowing seeds every day in the field of life. Every thought that we think, every word that we utter, every deed we perform, every emotion we arouse within me every feeling fancy wish that awakens within me, are seeds I am sowing in the field of life, in due course the seeds will germinate and grow into tree and yield fruit, we have to eat whether bitter or sweet. Some causes produce their effects immediately and some after a long time. You are the builder of your own life. Therefore, be careful of your thoughts. The theory of Karma is wide to understand and it kept secret and our karmic links are not known to us? Else it may be difficult for us to live in the world. For example there may be a woman whose husband, in the present incarnation, was her enemy in an earlier incarnation and has now become her husband to settle previous accounts.

The natural law is “As you think, so you become” and another Law is “As you sow, so shall you reap” and these two law together becomes the law of karma, There is an incident, a little boy, one night came home, and felt thirsty he drank few sips of water than he noticed that there was something wriggling which looked like a snake in the water. The very thought that came in his mind that he had taken poisoned water, he dropped down on the floor muttering “ I am dying, I am dying”. Family members rushed to find what had happened to him. One of them rang to doctor. Another asked, what made him feel that he was dying. In a frightened voice, he said that he had taken water from a glass that had a snake in it. Other family member went to kitchen to investigate and found that what had happened in the dark, to be a snake was actually, a string. As he heard those words, he jumped up, strong as ever. Thought has great influence on the body and mind. Therefore take care of thoughts. We need to understand that thoughts have force, thoughts are things, every thought generate for my good or evil. Every thought has form and colour. The though may have the form of an angel or demon depending up to its contents. If I think thought of peace, purity, love, prayer, sympathy or service, it will stick me wearing the form of an angel. If I think a thought of envy, jealousy, hatred, greed, dishonesty it will stick to me wearing the form of demon.

Take care of your desires also. With whatever desires, impulses, ambitions, feelings and thoughts you are building your own life, no one else is to blame for your present condition. You have built with your own thoughts and desires generated in the near or distant past. The forces of thoughts and desires have magnetic power. If we are surrounded by demoniac forms they attract to themselves many more demons. The desire to make easy and fast money, drives to cheatings.

Whom God loves send trials and tribulations. Those who love God with bottom of their heart, God also love them. Whoever would be chosen of God must gladly submit to a process of purification. He must be prepared to pass though the fire of suffering and he purified as thrice-burnished gold. There was a black smith who loved God deeply, even though he had to face many a sufferings. He was asked how can you lay your trust in a God who sends sufferings? Immodestly he replied as I have to make a tool I take place of iron and put it into the fire. Then I strike it on the anvil to see if it will take temper. If it does I know I can make something useful out of it. If not, I toss it on the scrap-heap. This has made me pray to the Lord, again and again “Lord put me into the fire of suffering.”

Solutions to sufferings

Here are some hints or suggestions:-
1. Always be aware of your thoughts. “As you think so you become”. Every time a thought approaches you, push it out of your mind. An effective way of pushing out a thought is to slap or pinch yourself the moment an undesirable thought enters your mind. Or else say to yourself wrong number, as we receive any wrong phone call.
2. As you sow, so shall you reap. Therefore, be aware of every little thing that you do. Everything has its effect so be aware of your own karmas. Everyday spend sometime in silence. Preferably at the same time and at the same place. As children go to school at same time and in a same class room. By sitting in a silence, go over all that you did during the earlier in whole day i.e. twenty four hours. If you think first of what you did a little while ago, then of what you did a little while earlier, and so on. You will surely find that there were things which you did but, which you should not have done as there are things which you did not do but should have done – many errors of commission and omission. Repent for them all and pray to the Lord for wisdom and strength never to do similar things again.
3. “As the company so the colour” so take care of your company the people with whom you associate. If you move in the company of holy ones, something of their holiness will penetrate your life and fill you with holy aspirations and vibrations. Hence the value of company of a holy man.
4. Develop the spirit of detachment. Attend to your duties and be inwardly detached, knowing that nothing, nobody belongs to you,you are only an actor and also a spectator, in the ever unfolding, cosmic drama of life. You must do your duty, in doing so, you will sow the right kind of karma.
5. Grow from more to more, in the spirit of surrender to God, “Not my will, but Thy will be done, O Lord” repeat the divine name and pray with a sincere heart that you may rise above the dwandas(conflict). The pairs of opposites, above pleasure and pain loss and gain for it is only then that suffering will not be able to touch us and we shall be at peace with ourselves and with those around us.
6. Do as much good as you can, in as many ways as you can. Help as many as you can to lift the load on the rough road of life. The day on which we have not helped a brother here, a sister there, a bird here, an animal there is a lost day, indeed.
7. Believe that the effects of karma can be mitigated through namajapa. In any case the suffering can be reduced, because namajapa acts as a sort of chloroform. It is like going through an operation. The surgeon puts you under anaesthetic and you come out of the operation without felling acute pain. Evil karma can be mitigated or lessened by Namajapa and selfless service (Nishkamseva) to those that suffer and are in pain.
8.Keep watch on your body organs. As tortoise uses his organs as and when required, otherwise keeps them under control. Keep Watch on your eyes for what it sees , ears what they hear, tongue what it speaks, hands what they do, feet where they go, mind what it thinks. How many of us live in this consciousness ?
9. Surrender yourself to God. As a child surrenders and trusts his mother.
10. Count your blessings and appreciate God for every little thing. For everything repeat Thank you God, Thank you God, Thank you God.

Do I have to choose between Science and Religion?

Seeking Wisdom
By Dr. Harbans Lal

Science, religion, and culture are three forces that greatly affect our world.

It is no exaggeration to say that the course of human history will depend on the relationship between these disciplines, and the impact and influence each area has on society. Intellectuals, for example, will be attracted to religions that are mainly dynamic, progressive, and at peace with science.

Science has succeeded remarkably in learning about the workings of the human brain and the earth and universe around us. It is unlocking the code of life by mapping human DNA, tracing the history of the known universe, and disclosing virtually all physical and biological phenomena in impressive detail.

And until recently, science and religion co-mingled well in Sikh society. Sikh clergy simply ignored science, as their educational handicaps did not permit the implications.

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Harbans Lal, PhD; D.Litt (hons)

Emeritus Professor and Chairman, Dept of Pharmacology & Neuroscience, University of North Texas Health Science Center.
Emeritus, Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, India.
President, Academy of Guru Granth Studies.

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