Do you still see a role for religions today, as they so often seem to create separation & violence?
Indeed, for someone who used to take religion for granted, I now feel it is almost something I do not want because it causes so much violence, pain and difference. Wiping them all off though would be too short-sighted. Because if you remove spirituality from people’s lives there is a huge emptiness. And religions are supposed to lead people to spirituality. But if you take it out and focus only on rituals, then it would be much better without religions.
Unfortunately I do not think the world would function well without them. It needs them. Of course if you are philosophical enough to evolve your own spirituality then you can do without religion, but most people need a sort of pathway. And religion tells people what the path ought to be.

Then once again people confuse the journey with arrival and that is the main problem. We have all seen what happens to society when you remove religion altogether. The kind of consumerism we see today, the emptiness, the violence that many youth feel --- it is because they have not found a comfortable way to address that thing which is other than themselves.
Recently for instance, I was in Baroda, looking at the Fine Arts students’ final work. It was very disturbing to see the violence, the emptiness, the lack of beauty and tenderness emanating from their work. We all need some answers and guidance. And to find it, some go into violence, or extremism, or pay lip service to some religion.

... contd.