Dolphins'
The Bright Red Line of Faith
19/05/10 16:16
South Asian rivers experience the best and worst of treatment. The Ganges river — also called Ganga or Ganga Ma (Mother Ganges) — is treated like a sacred body, even a person or god, by hundreds of millions of people. Her many tributaries and branches are part of a sacred continuum spanning between the Himalayas and the Indian ocean. This year, there is a great mela in Varanasi, India, a mass event relishing the river that will involve hundreds of thousands of pilgrims who come to wash the sins of their current and previous lives away. Melas occur every twelve years, and they are widely described as the largest peaceful gathering of humans on the planet. In many towns and villages along the Ganga, you see ghats, which are steps going down to the water for bathing. Many people also hope to bring the ashes of their relatives to the river so they have find absolution and release. Several times I’ve seen funeral pyres on the banks of the Ganges or, during the dry, in the dry riverbed. The faithful depths of the Ganges are inspiring, even for those weak in faith.
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