thankfuly

During my childhood, as a family trip we were visiting a well known temple in Himachal Pradesh. While I was moving away after praying, a pujariji came and said, “kuchh chadhao”. I looked at him, wondered, and said, “mere paas toh kuchh nahi hai”. Seeing that my parents were outside and no one was close to us, he stared at me with his big-red eyes and almost shouted, “kahan se aaya hai”? I was so scared that I couldn’t stand there for just a second. I just ran! They say, “GOD is everywhere”… but I doubt because if that’s true, then what purpose do temples serve here? And if HE lives in temples, how can HE be everywhere? Why one has to go to a temple (or a mosque or a church for that matter) for prayers? A confusing cycle of questions… and these questions arise in my mind due to these incidences, which often take place with one while visiting temples. In another recent incidence, while doing parikrama in a famous temple in AP, a pujariji came to me, put a small pudiya in my palm and...