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EC+10: Religion & Spirituality Workshop

I’m a catholic Christian. I grew up in a small village in a rural area. My friends are catholic and protestant Christians. Some people in my village are Muslims. But I don’t know one of them.

I don’t know how their religion looks like. I don’t know what they are praying every day. I have never read their holy book. I don’t know nothing about Allah.

All I know is that women have to cover their heads and that they fast when it is Ramadan.

But I never understood why women have to cover their head. Why people fast for such a long time and only eat when it is dark.

Why don’t I know that?

Because I never had people telling me. I never had friends going to a mosque. I was never part in a community that really cared for the Islam. And I never really cared.

I can continue.

When I came to India I didn’t know anything about Hinduism. I didn’t know much about Muslims. I didn’t know much about any other religion.  

India = Hinduism. India = Muslims. India = all kind of religions.

That didn’t change the fact that I knew nothing about all this. And that I did not care. 

And I started asking myself:

Why don’t I care?

Why don’t we care?  

Why are we so focused on our own thing?

Why are we living in our small perfect world?

Why are we intolerant in ignorant?

One Example:

Why does the world ignore facts like the happening here in Gujarat in 2002? Why does no one spread it everywhere?

I was in Germany at that time, still very young.

I did not care about happenings like this.

No one cared around me. No one told me. No one spoke about it.

I heard about it when I decided to go to India.  

Then I started to care.

Muslims attack Hindus in a train. Hindus attack Muslims. Shops and stores, restaurants and homes were burned, people were killed, pursuit crucially.

But still the world did not care.

People have different opinions, people have different faiths. But it that a reason to judge over people- over children, women and men; young boys and girl; old grandma’s and grandpa’s?

Is that a reason to crucify people, to torture and to kill them? Do you feel that is right?

Where did the humanity go to?

Do we need to go abroad to start caring about our world?

I started to care in India.

Where will you start to care???

-Karin Schätzle-