Lecture Lahore — Page 4
4 more and more inclined towards agnosticism. All this is easily testified by people’s practices which are far from what they should be. They do profess a great deal but never practice what they preach. Here I do not mean to question the sincerity of anyone who privately leads a life of piety, but, for the most part, people have failed to attain the object for which religion was made essential for mankind. Most people do not care for the purity of their hearts, true love for God, sympathy for mankind, and higher morals, such as meekness, kindness, justice and humility; and have no re- gard for purity, piety and righteousness, which is the soul of religion. Alas! even as religious rivalry grows, spiritual- ity only continues to decline. The purpose of religion is that people should recognize the True God Who created the world, love Him so much that every other love should grow cold in their hearts, be kind and compassionate towards His creatures, and strive to attain the utmost purity. This purpose is being ne- glected in this age and most people are practically following some form of atheism. They do not seem to be aware of the existence of God, and it is this lack of awareness that causes sin to be committed with more and more audacity. It is plain that unless we possess true knowledge about something, we cannot understand its worth and can neither love, nor fear it. All forms of love and fear and appreciation are born out of awareness, and the major cause of the profusion of sin in this age is man’s lack of awareness about his Creator. The sign which dis- tinguishes a true religion from others is that it opens up