Namaste Everyone,
Surely you remember the increase in food prices that took place around 2 years ago (in spring 2008)? The price of everything from rice to lentils to milk suddenly skyrocketed. And this is having an impact on the performance of certain Hindu rituals in India:
This leads to a few really interesting questions.
Aren't we wasting precious food and milk by performing these pujas and abhishekams?
I asked my dad about this, and he just told me "You can't solve all the world's problems."
Surely you remember the increase in food prices that took place around 2 years ago (in spring 2008)? The price of everything from rice to lentils to milk suddenly skyrocketed. And this is having an impact on the performance of certain Hindu rituals in India:
NEW DELHI -- Every morning, Hindu devotees haul buckets of fresh, creamy milk into this neighborhood temple, then close their eyes and bow in prayer as the milk is used to bathe a Hindu deity. At the foot of the statue, they leave small baskets of bananas, coconuts, incense sticks and marigolds. But recently, Ram Gopal Atrey, the head priest at Prachin Hanuman Mandir, noticed donations thinning for the morning prayers. He knew exactly why: inflation.
With prices soaring for staples such as cooking oils, wheat, lentils, milk and rice across the globe, priests like Atrey say they are seeing the consequences in their neighborhood temples, where even the poorest of the poor have long made donations to honor their faith.
"But today the common man is tortured by the increases in prices," Atrey lamented during one early morning prayer, or puja, adding that donations of milk were down by as much as 50 percent. He had recently met with colleagues from other temples, along with imams from local mosques, who reported similar experiences. "If poor people don't even have enough for bread, how will they donate milk to the gods?"
This leads to a few really interesting questions.
Aren't we wasting precious food and milk by performing these pujas and abhishekams?
I asked my dad about this, and he just told me "You can't solve all the world's problems."