I remember when I was 3 years old...
In retrospect I wonder if I was agnostic and was losing my religion at that impressionable age too!
My parents being Sikh by religion took me to their religious temple along with them the first time in my conscious awareness.
It was a religious gathering in a big hall that was called a 'Gurudwara'. As you entered it, you were supposed to walk down a narrow path created by the separating foot-mat in between the gents and the ladies compartments.
Reaching the end of the path, you would reach the holy book that the religion gives the utmost importance to.
Next you were supposed to sit down on your knees and touch your head to the ground in front of the holy book. It depended on the amount of faith you had as to how long you would keep bowing down in that posture of yours.
Then you would stand up, fold your hands in front of the book and move on to your compartment - the ladies or the gents - and sit down anywhere on the mat.
The priests would be singing chants called 'Paatth' from the book and you were to keep listening to them.
As the chants were over, there was a joint prayer called 'Ardaas' during which everyone was supposed to stand up and keep hands folded.
After the prayer there would be a few more chants further before you got the hot sweet pudding called 'Parshaad' served to everyone present over there.
And that was the end of the congregation.
I went through all this experience, but somehow to my little curious mind it couldn't make any sense. I was not interested in chants or 'Parshaad'. But the most objectionable thing that troubled me was sitting down on your knees and bow your head to touch the ground and keep it there to show your respect to a book that had some divine words written in it.
I remember I had no faith in the divinity of the words written in the book. I was born agnostic I suppose or else I was losing my religion now!
On the top of it, there was some minor clash at the main door of the hall where some poorly dressed non-Sikhs intending to enter the hall were being stopped by the enthusiastic leadership activists over there in the hall; and this left a very bad taste in my 3 year old mind.
So the next time when my parents asked me to go there, I refused. Their faith got hurt and they warned me of God's wrath. They said God would punish me for this.
It was a deciding moment for me. I started imagining God punishing me in various different ways. Each one more torturous than the other! It was a test of my nerves, which I was to pass in my cold blood and not hot!
I remember I took my decision after a great turmoil in my mind. I said I was ready for any punishment He subjected me to... if He could!
My parents were taken aback.
My father walked away, saying I was losing my religion and had turned agnostic.
I kept sitting wondering as to what the word agnostic meant and how I was losing my religion when I never had it as my faith ever in my life of those 3 long (or short!) years.
