Pain to Pray ?

My just previous write-up had been about the Church, rather the institution of the Church. Many of you are free to look at that exceptionally long post as a mere waste of time, but my efforts had been intentional. I wanted to draw the line black and white and also wanted to go little deeper to pour out the details which explains the situation till date. While I tried to be in a historian’s hat last time, it had been my conscious effort to set the perspectives right, so that I could take-off from where I had left then, for today’s blog.

Yes, today also, I would prefer to scribble on the same religious thoughts. What else to key-in logical during this blessed time of great lent. I remember reading one article couple of weeks back. The point of discussion of the same had been - “So how come doctrinal religions haven't overrun imagistic ones? “. While the article delved into the practices in various religions wondering whether willingness to indulge in ritual is an inherited trait or not it almost concludes with numbered proofs that the religions driven by frequent, unexciting rituals face their own problems. Also, Whitehouse points out that even when religions are founded on intuitive ideas, acquiring religious knowledge often comes at a cost, and it is this difficult-to-acquire knowledge that is most highly valued. Indeed, it is the complex concepts that are hard to acquire and understand that give any religion its unique identity.

Fine. Well said. So, while I see the same as a Jacobite Syrian Christian, I can understand the same. Both in the home crowd of Kerala and the immigrated crowd of outside dioceses, the church (and of course its keepers) retains its unique identity on silly but complicated issues – for eg Syriac Language. People who doesn’t understand the meaning of even a single Syriac word, feels extremely proud in singing the hymns in Syriac ! What a sympathetic display of megalomania it is, when you struggle with even the correct syllables of the Syriac words, while trying to enjoy the hymn as you sing it loud! If someone gave us the false idea of safeguarding orthodoxy and the rich culture of the church, by using as much Syriac words as we can, its nothing but false pride. If any of the church leaders, say priests, high-priests, or even episcopal dignitaries, flaunt with Syriac while the entire congregation is staring and wondering at the altar, its nothing but pseudo ecclesiology. Days are not too far when the younger generation will decide to walk away from these characters, for ever.

In recent years, several researchers have developed the idea that religion taps into intuitive ways of thinking. Even as young children we seem predisposed to believe in the supernatural, which probably explains why we develop beliefs in spirits, an afterlife and gods as we get older (New Scientist, 7 February 2009, p 30). Our church goes further down this line. If the bygone generations of church leaders had stopped at this level, the modern generation redefines the approach, in almost everything. It becomes painful to realize that, a church which was built on the sufferings and prayer of our forefathers, is now ‘managed’ by a set of business leaders, in all its corporate glory. It becomes a dark reality on our face when we realize that majority (if not all, because I still believe in a small subset of good people around) who wear the robes are shrewd entrepreneurs and a significant count are egocentric moguls.

In the troubled waters of post modern era, where people rush to Church for some peaceful time, it becomes easy to run businesses in the name of god and religion. And this realization was made by the people who matter, before we (the general public) understood the same. The result, the church which we are all proud of, which sustained from centuries, which was built on the firm faith taught by the prince apostle St Peter, is now wadding on the brink of public disposal, in the hands of these so-called ‘keepers’ of faith ! Now, if we just observe the clergy, who handholds us in the path of righteousness, we can see 5 different types among them. A majority of the clergy could be categorized as

‘Professionals’, who chose this as the easiest profession available and the interest is only at a living hood and social respect

‘Entrepreneurs’ , who realized that faith and church is the next hotcake area , invested in being one among the same, and is successfully running the business of ‘administration’ to mint money in multitudes

And

‘Politicians’, who realized the power and authority in this infrastructure, got into the power play, made to the significant posts and enjoy as either the ‘king’ or ‘king maker’

While, a very distinct minority could be categorized as

‘Serious’, who again chose this path, feel happy about the changes they could bring, continue on their quest for knowledge (about themselves, church and god) and live a life which is disconnected from the other ‘mainstream’

And

‘Divine’, who actually had received ‘the call’ and is lost in this rat race.

Finally, the significant majority of the laity belongs to the ‘Lost’ category, who wants to leave the church, as early as possible, after the service.

I don’t prefer to dig deeper, since I strongly believe that if someone preaches fossilized ideologies in 2010, this generation Y is capable enough of ignoring them and moving forward.

While we all feel proud about our history, we do understand that the same Church (that too unified, with JSOC and IOC together) which had been efficiently run by less than 10 prelates is now struggling in the hands of 60+ prelates (both sides together), wondering at the directions for future! How sad !

To conclude, if we feel the pain to pray (and not the pain of prayer), the it is time for a retrospective analysis. If not the so-called ‘keepers’ of Church, but atleast the young blood prefers to do so. Let us remember – we are all living in a world which practices RCA for correcting our path to progress !