Anju Kaur

I was in a small group discussion with some well known Sikh lecturers from around the country and India who talked about issues facing our community. One of the lecturers was a young Sikh man from California who talked about his many accomplishments. But when he paused for a moment, a woman asked him how was he able to grow up in this country with such a command of Punjabi and such strong convictions about Sikhi. She was concerned that her teenage son was not even interested in going to Gurdwara. The young man’s answer was that it was because of the strong will of his father. He was made to sit in the Gurdwara during divans and not play with the other kids and his family only spoke Punjabi at home.

But the woman seemed frustrated. She said that she has done all those things that the young man’s father did, but her son still had no desire to go to Gurdwara. That was when I realized that this woman was facing the same problems that Sikh moms faced when I was growing up. But before I could get a word in, a whirlwind discussion erupted with everyone jumping in with their opinions. One of the other lecturers went on about how Sikhi is a spiritual thing that cannot be forced upon anyone - really off the mark. Another man said that the mom should make her son read books on Sikhi - she had done that. Another woman said that Gurdwaras should translate what is being said during divans - exactly right. Then suddenly, the young lecturer was asked to step down because his time was taken up.

As the next lecturer spoke, the young man from California left the room rather annoyed and never came back. Apparently, I was the only one who noticed that. At the end of the lecture, I was asked to step up and give my opinion, impromptu. And this is what I said:

My mom was just like the mom sitting in front of me. She tried very hard to get me to go to Gurdwara every Sunday. And I did, grudgingly. I spent three to four hours every Sunday listening to keertan and kathha and vaakh - I did not understand a word. I was seven-years-old. There were no Gurdwaras at that time. We would have divans at people’s houses. And as I grew, the community grew, and Gurdwaras were built. But by the time I was a teenager, I just had no interest in Gurdwaras. Why would I go to a place where I didn’t understand what was being said, and even worse, where fights broke out?

Looking back, I feel that everyone of my generation, and perhaps all the second generation Sikhs, have felt the same way. We missed a golden opportunity to be taught Sikhi at the Gurdwaras in a more regular and more involved manner. Young children are a captive audience and have an amazing ability to absorb information. That ability is substantially lower after the preteen years. If children are not involved at a young age, they will be gone for good by the time they are teenagers.

If we look at the sangat of any Gurdwara in North America, we would see that almost all the people are first generation Sikhs. What happened to all the second generation Sikhs who grew up here over the past 100 years? Shouldn’t the ratio of the first to second generation be at least 50/50? This is a real problem. We are losing our younger generations.

It is not acceptable to loose even one child. Why don’t we do something about it? Let us tell our children what is being said or sung at the Gurdwaras through translation. It is possible for raagis to explain, in English, the meaning of a shabad, who wrote it, and a little history behind it. It is possible for granthis to read the Vaakh and then translate into English. This would bring so much meaning and interest to the youngsters. They would feel like they belong and that Gurdwaras are not just for their parents.