A true global age is yet far off and must be very different from the present commercial globalism that masks many of the same old sectarian and regional interests. The real global age that is struggling to emerge should not be equated with the current post-modern high tech materialism, which is only transitional in nature. A true and enduring global age must an era of ecological responsibility, clean technology, and the restoration of the Earth and its older spiritual traditions. The true global age will be one in which science and religion become reconciled, in which religion as dogma must disappear before religion as a spiritual science of consciousness as found in the systems of Yoga and Vedanta. Yet given all the current obstacles this may take most of the coming century to fully manifest.

The new global age that is behind these present churnings must be more favorable to Hindu Dharma than the previous postwar era and its naive Westernism. We are coming into an age of pluralism. It is no longer possible to believe that only one religion is true, any more than only one country or one culture is valid. This pluralism benefits Hinduism, which is the main world religion that is pluralist in nature, accepting many beliefs and practices, many paths, and many names and forms for God or truth. This new religious pluralism casts a shadow over missionary religions. If many different religions can be valid or helpful, what right does any single religion have to try to impose itself upon the entire world? Hinduism, on the other hand, has no need to convert the world to a belief because it holds that truth is already our real nature.

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