When ritual masquerades as religion's true inner essence

Buildings, rituals, identities come and go. They cannot be the heart of religion.

- ACHARYA PRASHANT

A question often arises: if spirituality is about inner transformation, why do societies still quarrel so fiercely over temples, mosques, churches, and shrines? Why is the defence of religious symbols carried even to the point of bloodshed?

The uncomfortable truth is this: when we lose access to the real treasure within, we cling desperately to substitutes. A poor man with nothing but a cracked vessel in his hut will fight ferociously if you try to take it away. Not because the vessel is valuable, but because in his eyes, it is all he owns. Humanity, having forgotten its inner riches, clings in the same way to rituals, buildings, and labels. What should have been a gateway to freedom becomes the excuse for bondage.

The very word "religion" points to a return: going back to one's essence. In India, adhyatma carries the same meaning: knowing the self. Yet this original sense has been steadily eroded. Instead of showing us the mirror of truth, religion today has become a way to escape it.

True religion unsettles you. It forces you to see what you would rather avoid: dishonesty, insecurity, fear of death. That is why the Upanishads were likened to a mirror.

They did not comfort, they revealed. But mirrors are dangerous for the ego: they show the blemishes. Over time, priests and institutions found it safer to replace the mirror with marble walls. Temples and cathedrals rose high, rituals grew elaborate, and religion was largely reduced to a soothing spectacle. A shrine became the equivalent of a massage: momentary comfort, no transformation. The mirror was gone, and with it, the possibility of liberation.

If all I possess is a five-rupee note, its loss feels like the loss of everything. I will clutch at it as though my life depends on it. But if I have discovered a billion within, even the loss of a thousand will not disturb me.