Make spirituality more attractive to bored world youth: Rajan Zed

Organisations and leaders of various world religions and denominations should make spirituality and religion more attractive to youth, who appears to find it boring, acclaimed Hindu leader Rajan Zed stressed today.

Zed, who is the president of Universal Society of Hinduism, in a statement issued at Nevada (USA), argued that in this age of complexities and distractions, spirituality does not seem to be on the priority list of youth who appears to feel alienated and religious organisations and leaders are to be blamed for that.

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Culture of youth is different today and we should plan, tailor and prioritise our initiatives, programs and projects accordingly. Parents should also take spirituality and religion seriously and help the religious organisations in better engaging the youth in spirituality. Conventional style of dealing with spirituality and religion does not appear to be effectively working with today’s youth. Make it more exciting and challenging, Rajan Zed suggested.

Zed was of the view that comparative religion should be part of high school curriculum worldwide, which in addition to making the youth superb spirituality and religion consumers, will also make them better world citizens and pluralistic in this increasingly diverse society.

If religious leaders and organisations do not attend to this challenge more effectively in this consumerist society, we can lose our youth to the other marketplace players, which are more powerful, attractive and vocal than religion and spirituality, Zed said.

Youth is not hostile to religion. Religious leaders and organisations need rethinking and reflection and come up with creative and new practices, norms, and ideas to make their product more competitive. Show sincerity and honesty in your discussions with youth and enhance your understanding of their subculture, Zed argued in the statement.

A spiritual world will be a better place to live than a non-spiritual world, Zed added.