Question: Over the millennia, has God's attitude towards humanity changed in any fundamental way?

Sri Chinmoy: God is like a mother. Her son may be dying; it may be a matter of only a few minutes or a few hours, but the mother still cherishes the hope that he will recover. Even until her son's last breath, the mother will say, "My son will be all right, my son will be cured." When we are very upset with the behaviour of human beings, when we are extremely disappointed and disgusted, when we have lost all hope, then we say stupid things. We declare that God has given up hope and God does not care for humanity the way He cared many years ago. Sometimes, when the governments of some countries are bad, we take it as proof that God has given up. But actually, as long as God keeps His Creation here on earth, He maintains the same hope, even to the last moment.

Some spiritual Masters over the years have predicted that there will be another period of destruction. They say the whole world will be destroyed because we are acting so badly. Because of mankind's misdeeds, they say, God has lost all interest in earth, so He will destroy the whole world. In all sincerity, I must disagree with these spiritual Masters. This world of ours is very vast. Even if there are numberless disasters, tsunamis and so forth, the world will not be destroyed.

God keeps hope as long as He keeps His Creation. As I said before, if the son is about to die, even then the mother maintains the hope that he will be all right. As long as God keeps this Creation, this earth planet, He will never give up hope, never give up hope.

It is we who lose hope because we want to see the truth in our way, but, alas, the truth comes and stands before us in a totally different way. We give undue importance to the way we see the future of the world. We feel that it is going to come to an end. But, I assure you, it is not true. As long as God wants to keep this earth planet alive, He will keep the same Hope, because He knows inside His Hope there is His Promise. In our hope, there is no promise. As soon as our hopes are shattered, we are doomed to disappointment. There is no promise inside our hope, but in God's case there is Promise. Promise looms large in His Hope, so He knows what is going to happen.

We do not know what is going to happen in the next moment, whereas God knows what is going to happen even in the distant future. That is why God never, never gives up hope. We human beings give up. If things do not go well in our own way, we lose hope immediately. In God's case, God never gives up Hope. If He had given up His Hope, then we would not exist here on earth.