Godly qualities

There’s hardly any publicity or marketing, but there are queues outside temples, churches and gurudwaras. People come, pay ( in the form of offering- keeping aside the ticket factor for the time being) and go back highly satisfied with complete peace of mind. It sometimes wonders me what are these godly qualities that attract everyone, do not guarantee any cure or resolution and yet provide deep satisfaction to a customer?

I think one proverb that I learnt in my primary school, but it still rings in my ears is “Silence is Golden”. God is silent; you speak all your problems to him or her and he/she listens patiently without interrupting or repudiating you. Alas today this golden quality is all but vanished. Be it politicians, news channel hosts, activists or anybody who is somebody! They all speak at the top of their voices creating din and pollution that’s now infested deep into our social fabric.

Secondly, it’s the lack of identity of anyone visiting God’s place. Everyone is welcome to God’s place and no one asks the identity of a pilgrim. We on the other hand treat with people according to their status, religion, gender, backgrounds and in the process create such a deep divide that it is increasingly getting more difficult to bridge.

There’s no ask from the God whether you offer Re1 or gold biscuit. Everyone has access to the same audience and (probably) the same treatment and though commercialism has led to a few high profile places having deluxe and super deluxe darshans at a cost, largely the God has remained agnostic to material offerings; these are more for one’s personal satisfaction.

There’s no quid pro quo! God bestows largesse on all – believers and non believers, man and women, rich and poor, northerner and southerner- without expecting anything in return!

Lastly, the ecosystem around the God is serene, peaceful, pious, comforting and highly satisfying. One goes to God’s place with heavy heart and tense mind, but comes out with renewed hope and vigour.

I will stop here with Godly qualities for now but correlate it to another very important proverb that I learnt in my secondary school. “Work is worship”. As I heard today, Michelangelo, the great Artist, once said, ” One should excel in whatever one is doing. My mother doesn’t care whether I am an artist; but if I am one am I at the top? She exhorts me to be anything, even a sweeper, but the one who sweeps the best!” Work is worship is not only about excelling in your field! It’s about working with the Godly qualities, explained above viz. selflessly, without discrimination or prejudice, for the betterment of all, by making your place of work to be God’s place. And you will have a society where politicians serve rather than rule, police helps rather than bother, people love each other rather than fight or murder and you will see the real Ramrajya that we have all read about in our scriptures!