Confusions Of Our Generation

Just reading through the pages of Karen Armstrong book “The Spiral Staircase” I came to realize something. The regime of 60’s, 70’s, and a bit 80’s in Britain and other parts of the world was passing through the same contradicts of religion and modernity as we are encountering now. It’s not just us. The confusions, contradictions, extremism are the diseases which infected every other country. And every country reacts to it in different ways. European countries shed off the religion and found so called serenity in secularism and countries like Iran grabbed the other end.

Karen describes in her book that how after passing seven years in a convent and getting the training of a nun she finally left it. She was the one who chose to become a nun on the first place as she wanted to find GOD and wanted to satisfy her inner quest. But the church rules and other so called disciplinary things made her end up hating GOD and everything related to religion. People called her the survivor because in those days everyone was considering that being into religion is the most out of mind thing. But gradually she began to realize that even though she is no more into religion and does not quest for GOD, still there is a kind of gap in her. She was not able to recognize the reason behind her restlessness.

I realized that the situation is very much similar to ours. There are two extremist parties in our country. The one who wants a strict implementation of the religion without going through the religion and without answering the questions of the inquisitive minds. And then there is the other party who calls for modernism. Who without knowing the boundaries set by our religion associate entirely wrong things with it.

The real thing is that both the parties are drifting away from the real religion. And even more worse is that their behavior is damn hypocrite. And the younger generation has to undergo the destruction which would be the result of their hypocrisy and extremism. The thinking process has long been forgotten. We no more quest for anything. Infact I’ll say it never had been. We are extremely lazy nation. We have not developed the nation. We have not put the strong foundations on which a mature and clear-minded generation can be raised.

We are a confused generation. If we ask questions then either we are shut up or given a hypocrite and wrong answer. We are swinging between the two extremes.

The need of the hour is that we, our self, have to do something. We have to hold hands to go on a quest together. We have to search our answers on our own. We have to do a struggle to understand the real meaning of Islam. We have to understand what does modernity really means. Our only survival is in it. Our religion is the most beautiful thing. It’s the thing which prepares us for everything in life, gives us discipline, gives us excitement, gives us serenity and takes us on our own quest which is far more charming and adventurous then the petty issues we get involved.

But these are the things which are yet to be understood. We have to find a way out.