A new awakening is necessary, a new affirmation of the ancient truth. Austerity and asceticism are lacking and they must be brought back into the mainstream of spiritual living. A lax attitude towards the fulfilment of the fundamental principles of the life of the Spirit in the name of doing welfare activity has become the bane of whatever goes by the name of spirituality today and has set in a decadence that has made spirituality come closer to the material life in many a way. The references and allusions made by monks to the Wall Street and other business dealings while explaining spiritual texts seem so incongruous in the light of the one they purportedly represent and need a quick eschewing for firing up the discourse which now seems so insipid.
Austerity, austerity is the call of the hour. A meditative tranquillity rather than intellectual gymnastics, serenity rather than theatrics, chastity in reference and maintenance of spiritual altitude rather than playing to the gallery and lowering diction, these seem to be some of the features that need immediate addressing and a redressing thereof. Else, spiritual discourses will continue to be uninspiring and will fail to attract the best attention of the people.
The current scenario seems bleak in terms of future prospects from the crop of preachers who are today holding centre-stage and this has been going on for some time now, being the inertial baggage of the not-so-distant past of spiritual propagation. The decadence has been there for some time now and is fast accelerating the wrong way whereby the principles of the Sanatan Dharma are up for sale and merchants of the mantra are now masquerading as messiahs of mankind. So much for the worst of the lot, those who pose as god-men and gods, as gurus with miraculous powers, as babas with medicinal remedies to all the ills that afflict the body and why, no less the soul, as preachers with the purse to pursue and as politicians to mask their mischievous motives. The less hypocritical ones are, nonetheless, of firmer character but prone to the ills of seeking name and fame and the support of the rich and the powerful. There is one even more refined class of pure preachers in the shape of monks who are well-grounded in the scriptures and have a modicum of spiritual awareness as well but, sadly enough, they too have lost their spiritual moorings in the melee of work they reckon as being conducive to world-welfare when instead they are mere distractions from the fundamental discourse of the divine.
In all the aforesaid classes of pretenders to piety there is a common link, and that is the absence of austerity in their lives. Without spiritual practice of the highest order, character is not formed, and without the cementing of character, spirituality is not attained. How can the fire of the Spirit that alone can animate the soul of man be lit in others who are listening to your spiritual discourse, O preacher, if it has not been lit within you in the first place? And this explains the failure of the speakers from the pulpit in igniting the lamp of knowledge within the soul of the congregation, and its concomitant ills in the polity thereof, especially, the proliferation of charlatans in the fertile field of this 'spiritual' profession.
Austerity then is the call of the hour and a semblance of asceticism the least of the requirements before one is reasonably empowered in terms of spiritual perception and conceptual clarity to be able to successfully convey the life of the Spirit to the audience and inflame many a soul with the fire of renunciation and service.
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