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Good morning. This is one of the five days of the festival of Diwali. In my role as a Hindu chaplain to students I’m often faced with young ladies and men who come and sit in my room to bemoan their difficulty being good.

They are often away from home for the first time and have usually been over indulging in the fruits of their freedom. They are certainly experiencing the growing pains of having to find a balance. By the time they get to me they are in a state.

A swami once told me the story of a thief who went on pilgrimage. His inclination was to be a thief but he also wanted to be good, so he journeyed to a holy place. As was the custom en route he would stay at a dharmashala, a place with a simple facility for pilgrims.

The poor thief, sharing a sleeping space with many others, was appreciating their nice clothes, their jewelry, and their purses. So he rose in the middle of the night and stealthily approached the bed of a wealthy looking man. In the morning the dharmashala was in pandemonium. No one could find anything they owned and the cry of ‘thief!’ arose loudly. One pilgrim recognised our errant hero as being the thief and accused him.

The thief admitted to the struggle he had in the presence of so much temptation. But he also pointed out that while he had difficulty keeping his hands off others’ property all he had done that night was to move everything around the room. Nothing was missing.

Dear Lord, we all share the student’s dilemma, and that of the thief. The thief made an honest effort, as we all can. Diwali is about new beginnings, and about doing good, so let us move things around in our lives, to begin again, and do a bit better. Hare Krishna