I’ve been on a search for spirituality in India. You must be thinking, “Oh, that’s so awesome! India is such a spiritual place!”
Let me tell you, it is, but far from the way you are thinking. I think the Orientalist view that many Westerners have of India, of yogis on mountaintops and of the Beatles staying at an ashram isn’t quite what the reality is. Currently in Haridwar, a city on the Ganga not far from where I live, the Maha Kumbh mela is going on. This is a massive once-every-four-years Hindu festival that attracts pilgrims and sight-seers from all over the world. There are mass dips in the river and the Naga sadhus (naked holy men) come out of the woodwork to hang out (so to speak). Foreigners also arrive en masse to catch a glimpse of the bizarre, the mystical, the spiritual. Room rates are quadrupled.
I got to travel around India this past winter, traveling from unfortunate tourist spot to unfortunate tourist spot. One place after another I saw signs catering to another sacred cow of India- the cash cow- the spiritual seeker. Ayurvedic medicine treatments, spiritual tutorship for cash schemes, and yoga classes abounded. I should say I have yet to see an Indian doing yoga after 1.5 years in the country. Almost every foreigner I met and talked to was enthralled by what they saw as Indian spirituality.
As a Christian, I see spirituality differently. To me, spirituality is not found in the bizarre and mystical cosmic forces of the Universe, but in the knowable nature of the infinite God. While many foreigners willfully ignore the trash, the poverty and the suffering to go catch a glimpse of the Dalai Lama or do yoga on the beach, I find a spirituality rooted in the hope that there is a New Jerusalem coming; these problems so far beyond my ability to fix are not beyond the abilities of God.
While many come here to find the most secluded shrine, the holiest cave, or the highest mountaintop ashram, I have found spiritual food at the colonial-era, centrally located building owned by the Church of North India. A whopping twenty-five people showed up for Easter Sunday, the preaching involves folksy stories prepared with as much care as if the homily was being given to a thousand, and the hymns are so old, Calvin might have grown up with them.
I find spiritual food in the ordinary interactions with my coworkers and students (I teach at a school in the Himalayas). When we gather around our old, quirky houses to share each others’ altitude-induced baking failures and funny stories from the week, I am spiritually fed. When I have cafeteria-fed students over to my house for pancakes and hashed browns and we share a meal, I am fed. And when a few of us talk shop over an aloo paratha after church, I am fed. You can tell I eat a lot…
Something so typical of Jesus’ sayings and actions in the Bible are that they go against normal earthly patterns of thinking. The Messiah should come from a powerful city like Rome, not some backwater like Bethlehem. If the Messiah is going to come and deliver us, he should go straight to Pilate’s house and kick him out. Instead, Jesus went to the Temple and started turning over tables. Not exactly what they were expecting. In the same way, earthly thinking says that India is full of the mystical, the magical, and the marvelous. People come here all the time to find some connection to something bigger than themselves. Maybe it is here, maybe it isn't. But I’d bet it’s not somewhere they’d expect…
(Greg Miller wrote this post, find out more about this blogger at "many miles to go" )
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