QUESTION:
Can somebody tell me if it is possible to marry somebody outside of our faith in a Gurudwara? My partner respects my wishes to do so he is a catholic although not a practising one. He also wants to adopt Singh as a middle name? He spends a lot of time lreading and earning about our way of life, including the language.
When we have children they will take sikhism as the chosen religion for their upbringing.
I appreciate your advice.
ANSWER:
I can give you two answers, one is what the organised religion says, and the other is what the spiritual saints say.
1. The religion says that a sikh should marry a sikh, that a sikh man should arrange his daughters marriage to a sikh boy. You can look this up in the Sikh rehat maryada (rules and regulations).
In the old days it became fashionable to insist that both the bride and groom got inititated as Sikhs too.
Realistically though most Gurdwaras dont insist on the partner becoming a Sikh before or after the marriage. They will do the marriage ceremony as long as both people respect the ceremony.
2. But what the saints say is what Gurbani teaches. And Gurbani teaches us to remember there is One God and forget about religious labels, castes, colour and anything else external. Because there is one God and we are all his children who he loves equally. That is what Guru Nanak ji meant when he came outof the river and said ,"There is no Hindu or Muslim."
Then he revealed the NAAM to the world – SATNAAM – and explained it by uttering the Mool Mantra. Guru Nanak Ji was beyond religion, he was part of God. All true saints go beyond the religion they followed and become part of God – walkig talking NAAM in a human body.
In Sukhmani , Guru Arjun Dev ji explains that the greatest religion of all is NAAM.
Naam is greater than Sikhism or Catholicism, or Hinduism or any ISM.
Naam is a part of God Himself.
Religion is only a path to God.
Every religion has the concept of NAAM, Christians call it the HOLY Spirit. It is the prescence of God within you that gets ignited in you by a great soul, eg Christ, or Guru Nanak ji, or a living Saint
So how does this apply to your marriage situation? Live and let live, let your partner be Catholic, let you be a Sikh, teach your kids EVERYTHING from all religions. But realise all relgions are just tribes – groupings
of society, topped with cultural practises. But the highest tribe says Gurbani is God’s tribe – and that is NAAM.
Pray for the blessing of Naam for yourself and your partner and your children in the future. Naam connects you to God inside yourself. And you can all practise what you want on the outside. NAAM is the thing that
unites all the children of God – it is higher than religion, it is where each relgion should lead you ..out of tribal thinking.
Sant Baba ji who has been guiding me has been blessed to give the Naam. A few years ago a Muslim devotee came to his sangat. He had been searching for God for many years but felt stuck and wanted the blessed Naam. Baba ji blessed him with it. but he said, "I’m not repeating Satnaam, I’m going to carry on doing Allah Allah". And Baba ji smiled, didnt; get offended, and said, "thast’s fine, go ahead." Then he started mediatting on Allah and went into deep mediatation – smadhi – when he opened his eyes he could hear himself repeating , "SATNAAM SATNAAM". HE asked, "How did that happen?"
Baba ji told him, "All names, all relgions came from the TRUTH (God) and should utlimately lead you back to their source – SAT – TRUTH."
Another couple came to Baba ji , the lady was a Sikh, the man a Christian. They were having problems because their faiths were getting in the way. Baba ji explained to them that NAAM is the highest religion (as above). They both got blessed with the Gurprasadi Naam. And did their inner meditation on it. They never had any more conflicts about their religions.
Realise that religon is a path to God, and God says for us to break our prejudices and groupings. So religionshould help us to become God-like : a saint. But instead relgion becomes another grouping, another division that causes us NOT to see God in everyone.
Please do reply and let me kknow what you think and how you get on.
Love and blessings and light.
REPLY:
Thank you so much for your response. It made me feel so powerful! I have had a little bit of a difficult time with my mother. But we are making progress she talks to my partner very lovingly, and ignores me!!
I know that although this is not the way she would like me to live my life, I tried it her way and I was very unhappy for 7 years when I was married. That seems like a lifetime ago though because I was married at the age of 19.
If every Sikh person focused on the real messages from our faith, life would be so magical.
Once again thank you so much.
sat sri akal!
M Kaur