Values of Religious Education............................

Values of Religious Education of children......... Where has it disappeared. ????

Education is a major issue in religious communities around the world today, including our own Hindu communities. Those who value their traditions everywhere are worried. They see all too clearly that children are learning another culture, or a non culture, instead of absorbing the precious things in the various heritages. Elders, mothers and fathers, teachers and spiritual leaders are all wondering the same thing about traditional values:

"How are we going to pass them along, assure that they will survive?"

There is certainly solution to this :

Involvement of youth at all levels. They know the importance of inculturalization. Individual families have another answer: keep kids out of public schools, use home-schooling systems, of which there are many these days. India is seeking answers, too, and is striving for a balance that incorporates Western knowledge and Eastern wisdom--not an easy goal to accomplish, and as yet unaccomplished for India's 250 million school children. It's even hard to offer them wholesome Hindu literature, since so many books for children and other educational tools are heavily slanted toward violence. Many will excuse it when a God slays a demon or when an indignant sage destroys some evil person, making such stories unacceptable for the minds of our young ones. Presenting violence as a good thing, even a somehow holy thing, definitely causes problems in today's society, where hurtfulness is seen as a simple and legitimate solution to many problems.

Many parents are at a loss as to how to solve the problems that surround the education of their youth. One solution they turn to is sending them off to boarding school. This is not a great answer. This is not even a good answer or solution.

Religious and spiritual people of the world are now uniting in one common cause:

How to pass on the knowledge of religion and spirituality to the next generation. They are protecting the minds of their children, saturating the minds of their children, educating the minds of their children, penetrating the minds of their children with the knowledge of Science, Maths etc. devoiding from religious and spiritual subjects- suppose to be the powerful subjects for righteous growth from the tender age.

Where is religion preserved? It is preserved in the minds of children, recorded in the brain cells of our youth, stored there for the future. We must teach the religious Dharma to our children. For this we need more religious courses, more religious schools and more religious parents willing to teach the young ones. We owe it to the next generation, the next, the next and the next. Share your knowledge with them. Have them memorise a consistent and logical approach to Hinduism. Then their life experiences are imprinted intelligently and righteously, as they draw upon those memories to control their karma and dharma.

In the ancient days, the kings/ Maharajas, were responsible for the religion. They saw to it that the priests performed their duties, that the pandits added to the store of knowledge, that the temples were built and maintained and that religion flourished throughout the land and remained alive in the minds and hearts of the people. This was the dharma of the kshatriya caste, headed by the kings, their ministers and heads of state. When the kings fell from power, the entire caste system was, for all practical purposes, left there on the battlefields. Decades have passed, and now we are in a technological age where computers and machinery replace more burdensome work, where caste is a matter of choice, not by birth, where the common man and woman have replaced the royal powers as the protectors of religion and spirituality ( I mean the present political system of our country). Hardly any importance is given to teach religion and spirituality in the
school curriculum.

Let those responsible to impart religious ans spiritual teaching to children take initiative and interest to do the needful on a war footing in the best interest of the children to preserve the religious culture and heritage of our Motherland.


Compiled & edited by J.K