shri kunjuppu,
the choices available to us are:
-> do the spiritual practices; help the poor and needy
-> do the spiritual practices; dont help the poor and needy
-> help the poor and needy; dont do the spiritual practices
-> dont help the poor and needy; dont do the spiritual practices
we could belong to anyone of the groups above; that is according to our karma and gnyanam, imo. some prefer to term it as a choice. be it so.
your aversion arises because you implicitly assume that all brahmins, or the majority, fall into the second category. maybe you are right, maybe not. individual yardsticks differ; what is good to one may not be to another. this is universal and fundamental. but can we extrapolate our individual perceptions to interfere into anothers deed?
you can readily see that, at least in a majority of your opinions i am at the opposite extreme. there may be many more; the only difference is that i post my thoughts in the forum and others do not.
the reason i interjected is that, a seemingly benign information about a homam is being used to pile on thoughts about utilising the resource to another cause. this certainly is not the thread to voice such opinions.
each have their place; if i extend your logic to the govt. administration, perhaps we have to close down our entertainment ministry, tourism ministry etc as they ostensibly do not contribute to uplift the citizens above the poverty line. next to be pulled down would be sports ministry and so on and so forth.
sir, we need all kinds of positive activities... what is waste to one's eyes may not be really so...
those involved in this homam might contribute towards the needy cause, either individually or collectively; do we know that?
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the question of pujas and homams should be done according to one's ability, as a nishkamya karmam. that is the general objective in the long run. as a short term measure we ask material benefits too...
it is not a 'you help me, i help you' attitude with god, as you seem to think so. one has to do it, devotion and realization are warranted if one sticks to the basic karmas. that is all. no question of scratching god's back.
as far as vadhyars competency, i would not say more. are we competent brahmins? let us think that first. do we perform our svadharmams? we only ask a lot of questions, but never do anything.
...this is in no way critical of faith or tradition. it is more a critique of blind adherence to traditions, without giving as much thought to a credible interpretation of the vedics towards a better life for the living.
as i said before, blind adherence to traditions would, further on, lead to enlightenment. may not be in this janma.
regards,