Religion and Sacred Places

Most religions recognize particular places as sacred. Some sacred places are natural environmental features, such as rivers, forests, springs, and mountains. The ancient Greeks identified Mount Olympus as the home of the gods. For Hindus, the Ganges River is sacred.

The Polluted Ganges.For thousands of years, the Ganges River has been regarded as sacred by India's Hindu population. Devout Hindus regard the Ganges as the River of Heaven, or the liquefied form of God. Every year, over seventy thousand Hindus bathe in the waters of the Ganges. Many are pilgrims who have traveled hundreds of miles from remote villages throughout the vast country. Hindu pilgrims believe that those who bathe in the Ganges can be cleansed of their sins and that the souls of those who are cremated in the holy city of Benares may be liberated from the endless and sorrowful cycle of reincarnation central to Hindu belief.

Today, both pilgrims and long-term residents of Benares are aware that the Ganges is suffering from extensive pollution problems (Figure B5-1). Cremated corpses and the remains of sacred cattle committed to the holy waters of the river float downstream side by side with the industrial wastes generated by tanneries, textile factories, and chemical plants and by residents of upstream communities who dump raw sewage into the water. The population of Benares is over a million, and the city's antiquated sewage system, nearly one hundred years old. cannot cope with the myriad of pollutants arriving from upstream in addition to the 3.500 gallons of raw sewage injected into the system daily.

Figure B5-1. The Ganges River has for thousands of years been regarded as sacred to Hindus.

In 1985, India's prime minister. Rajiv Gandhi, proposed a S250 million project intended to clean up the Ganges. He established a panel of scientists and environmentalists to carry out the project and solicited technological assistance from the World Bank, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and other governments and private corporations in Europe and the United States. Yet. the proposal met with resistance from an unlikely coalition of local industrialists, politicians, and religious leaders in communities along the Ganges.

Some orthodox Hindus refused to accept that the holy stream was polluted, or that microbes could survive in it. Few were willing to risk the possibility that their souls would not be released from the cycle of reincarnation. At the same time, many factory owners were reluctant to pay the high costs associated with maintaining and installing expensive sewage-treatment and pollution-control equipment. Today the situation is at an impasse, and the Ganges at Benares remains as polluted as ever.

Some places are venerated because of their association with religious history and theology. The Wailing Wall in Jerusalem is sacred to Jews because it is the site of the last remaining portion of their ancient temple. Many places throughout the world are recognized as sacred by Roman Catholics. The Lourdes in France and St. Anne-de-Beaupre in Quebec were sanctified as the scenes of miracles. Buddhists recognize several places in India as sacred. These include Buddha's birthplace at Lumbini and the spot at Bodh Gaya where he attained enlightenment. Muslims recognize Mecca, the home of Muhammed, as a sacred city, along with Medina and Jerusalem (Figure 5-10).

Figure 5-10 Religions of Islam, Shintoism, and Buddhism. Each faith has its own way in which it represents itself. As with Catholicism and Protestantism, one means of identification of the religion is the distinctive features of the places of worship. Notice the differences in architecture from the shrines of Muslim (a), Shinto (b), and Buddist (c)

A pilgrimage is a journey to a sacred place, undertaken for religious purposes. Pilgrimages have been important components of religious practice for many centuries. Chaucer's Canterbury Tales were told by a group of pilgrims on their way to visit the shrine of England's famous martyr Thomas a Becket. The tales helped the pilgrims to pass the time during their journey.

Pilgrimage to Mecca is a religious duty for Muslims. Today, modern transportation has greatly increased the number of Muslims who can undertake this pilgrimage. Airlines and shipping companies schedule numerous flights and voyages from areas of large Muslim population throughout the world to the port of Jidda on the Red Sea near Mecca. The organization and administration of pilgrimages is a major economic activity for the city of Mecca and. indeed, for all of Saudi Arabia.