Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Finding one’s religion
Maneesh on Twitter is having a hard time understanding how I could manage humour while stuck in a fire. I had posted:
A Corner House treat to whoever gets a picture of me looking out of the window. Seriously, people, there’s no need to panic. Bad for you. #
My colleagues prayed. I didn’t. I was a skeptic when I entered my teens and a confirmed atheist when I left them.
I prefer to call myself a humanist now. I believe that humankind created God to explain the mystery of one’s own existence. God represents all that is unknown and inexplicable. The domain of God has receded with each new scientific advancement. We have gone from the vengeful gods of natural forces to a single capitalized God, representing the human notions of love, mercy and justice, in both the Dharmic and Abrahamic traditions. What was once an Act of God is now mere probability theory. And yet, God won’t go away, because there will always be an unknown, and we fear the unknown.
What was to be our fate, trapped in that building? Was the fire moving towards us? Would we be rescued? Who knew? That is why we pray, to seek Faith as relief from uncertainty. Our tools of prayer have changed with time. A ghee lamp used to be mandatory, but a pulsing LED on your car dashboard is now a good enough substitute. Caught in a pinch like we were, our tool of prayer was the mobile phone. We called anyone we could, asking them to pray for us as per the traditions we had been raised in.
My tradition, atheism, has disconnected me from the traditions of my parents. I can not pray the same way. As far as I was concerned, we were trapped and helpless, and could only be saved by the people outside.
That tweet, then, was my prayer.
Madhulika Garg — Feb 24, 2010 5:44:33 PM — # ↩
God helps those who help themselves.....U did d rght....n we were here prayning for all....I think n honest,true n hard work lies one’s prayer....
Rachana Shakyawar — Feb 24, 2010 6:23:39 PM — # ↩
Indeed, Prayer can Heal-Mend anything and Everything…
My prayer extends to tech too. jai Ho..TWIttER..
Blessed to be born in this era..
Shoan Motwani — Feb 24, 2010 6:55:20 PM — # ↩
Very nicely articulated. I can now point people here, when they ask me about my beliefs.
Gurung — Feb 24, 2010 7:15:12 PM — # ↩
You are inside a burning building, you do not know if you will survive or not, whatever you say or tweet, whatever you think to keep your spirits up is fine. You got out of the building fine, that is all important. Even if the tweet was humorous, it is perfectly fine. The problem is really with other tweeters with too much time on their hands, who go through all your tweets to pass moral judgment on one tweet. From outside the burning building, it is very easy for people to say that they will be heroes if they were inside.
Zainab Bawa — Feb 24, 2010 11:32:58 PM — # ↩
To Maneesh: To each his/her own?
Jayadeep Purushothaman — Feb 25, 2010 9:27:21 AM — # ↩
That was a true test for an Atheist indeed! You sure are a true one - loads of admiration for you!
Satya — Feb 25, 2010 9:33:12 AM — # ↩
And just a few backs I tweeted “Religion is out of fashion, humanity is in” Wish humanity picks up :P
Ritesh — Feb 25, 2010 10:29:56 AM — # ↩
Having no fall back option, (read the hand of God) keeps a person sane and in control of the situation. Feeling let down by God for being stuck in such an unfortunate situation only adds to the despair. Great post!
Sagar — Feb 25, 2010 10:40:44 AM — # ↩
“Fear of the unknown” sums it up well :)
Vishwanath — Feb 25, 2010 11:03:33 AM — # ↩
Perfectly right. God is only a way of believing in yourself. Humans, themselves are the root cause of their problems and they ought to solve them by themselves.
Noella — Feb 25, 2010 2:23:52 PM — # ↩
I think most people understood your tweet :).Frankly when death is at your own doorstep I think its a complete waste of time to do what others perceive as right,proper,polite,or sensitive.Glad you did what you needed to do.
Naresh V — Feb 25, 2010 3:58:34 PM — # ↩
Some of the comments here reminds me of xkcd.com/703/
Cruisemaniac — Feb 26, 2010 4:06:35 PM — # ↩
<quote>That tweet, then, was my prayer!</quote>
Couldn’t be put better!
-Peace-
Shree Kumar — Feb 26, 2010 4:55:30 PM — # ↩
Very well articulated.
basyt — Feb 26, 2010 7:48:40 PM — # ↩
there is no real problem with an “unknown” so to speak. probabilistic models have to inevitably replace classical models. that is something i guess we should just accept and move on.