Mimo Khair Creative

These two images were taken in China, in a Buddhist temple. I remember, during my time living there, asking a Buddhist friend when he typically went to the temple. His answer stayed with me ever since. He said, “I go when I want something, and when I am sick.”

That struck me as fascinating, so practical and so human and yet very strange. It made me reflect on my own habits. When do I pray? And what is prayer, really?

As a child, I went to church, thought about prayer, and indeed prayed. But over the years, I have seen faith, at least in that traditional form, fade. Today, when people visit churches, not all, but most, seem to go as tourists. In all the great cathedrals around the world, people line up with their phones and cameras, myself included, marveling at the architecture, the sheer scale and beauty of these places. But rarely do we pause long enough to truly connect with whatever presence or essence might dwell there.

For me now, prayer has become something private, something between myself and what I aim, however imperfectly, to connect with. It is no longer about grand buildings or public rituals. It is about an ongoing, quiet conversation.

And so I wonder, what is happening to these institutions, the churches and temples? Are they changing shape as people turn inward, seeking a more direct connection to whatever they believe in? Is faith itself evolving? If so, is there a new kind of faith emerging that we need to learn to recognize?

This week, coincidentally, is also the start of the papal conclave on May 7th, when the highest authority in the Catholic Church will be chosen anew. That prompts another question. How much of the old Catholic Church is still surviving? And if religion were to reinvent itself for this new era, what might that look like?