Larger Hindu temples are such big business that the government has taken them over and pays the salaries of both gurus and guards. Many big temples are marketplaces, renting booths to shopkeepers who sell food, toys and baubles amid neon lights and an unholy cacophony. Hinduism, of course, does have an intellectual theology, but on a popular level much of Hinduism is karma marga: keep caste regulations, perform religious rites, offer sacrifices.

            Tens of millions in India believe that such practice puts the cosmic powers in an indulgent frame of mind toward them. Children learn to fear gods and attempt to placate them in ways large and small. At one of India's largest temples, the famous Menakshi in Madurai, children and adults can pay 2 rupees (about four cents) to throw balls of butter at idols of Shiva and his wife Shakti, thus cooling down their anger. By late afternoon, the statues are dripping in butter.

            Adults also try to justify themselves in the face of potentially severe cosmic forces. In northern India, I saw hundreds of Shiva devotees carrying pots of water from the Ganges River several hundred kilometers to their home temples. Compare their expenditure of enormous effort for nothing with the hope offered by Christ's statement in chapter eight of the gospel of John: "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."

            Fear rules, until a point of light makes a difference.