Once upon a time, robes meant renunciation. To wear the robe was to burn down your personal desires, to strip yourself from the world’s games — money, status, ego — and to live solely as a servant of truth. A monk didn’t just wear orange cloth — he wore fire. He was a burning presence that reminded others what it means to be awake.
But now, the robe has become a costume. A disguise. A welfare pass.
Today, temples are filled with young boys and old men who did not choose truth — they were placed there by poverty, fear, or failed family systems. They don’t walk to seek alms as a ritual of humility. They wait. They sit. They scroll. They chant with their mouths while their minds wander. The world calls it holy. Yeah, I call it institutionalized laziness in sacred clothing.
There is a growing industry of what I call spiritual welfare. People — especially the deeply insecure — love to feed monks, sponsor temples, and donate for gold-leaf statues, not because they truly see dhamma, but because they were taught that giving equals merit. And the monks? Many of them no longer give dhamma. No awakening. No insight. No shock to the soul. Just a smile, a chant, a bowl, and an endless appetite for more donations.
You are not feeding enlightenment.
You are feeding the rot.
A monk who does not meditate is not a monk.
A monk who does not study truth is not a monk.
A monk who plays games, receives money, takes selfies, avoids solitude — is simply a man in a borrowed identity.
Because when you put on that robe, you make a sacred choice.
No one forced them into the path. They chose it.
They chose the orange robe. They chose the renunciation.
They chose a life of discipline, silence, humility, and service.
That robe is not decoration. It is a vow.
A vow to walk away from the world — not to wear the robe and still enjoy the world in disguise.
But today, many monks want both.
They want to wear the robe — but live like laymen.
They want the status of renunciation — but the pleasures of indulgence.
They want to avoid solitude, avoid restraint, avoid practice — and still be respected, still be fed, still be worshipped.
This is where the sickness lies.
Because the robe becomes a shield. A costume. A shortcut to power over those who still believe.
They exploit others easily now, because they hide behind the cloth.
They know that most people won’t question them.
They know that simply wearing the robe gives them immunity in the eyes of the gullible.
But this is a spiritual fraud.
If you do not want to follow the rules of the robe — take it off.
Live as a teacher, as a guide, as a spiritual speaker — but do not stay ordained and expect others to serve you while you refuse the path.
You cannot sit in the center of the temple, avoid solitude, scroll through your phone, build fame, take selfies, play the celebrity — and still call yourself a monk.
You are not walking the monk’s path.
You are walking your own path, wearing the skin of the Buddha.
And that is not spiritual. That is not honest. That is not worthy of offerings.
So we must say this loudly:
Either walk the monk’s path — or step out of the robe.
But do not wear the robe and demand respect while avoiding everything the robe stands for.
Let the robe be sacred again.
Let it mean something again.
Let it filter the false from the true.
The temple was once a fire pit for the ego.
Now it has become a daycare for those who refuse to grow up.
And donors — the givers — they are addicted to the feeling of being good. They don’t want to ask real questions. Because if they did, they’d have to confront the terrifying possibility that their giving is not producing merit — it is producing parasites. They are helping people avoid life, avoid responsibility, and worst of all — avoid awakening.
So let it be known: when you give to a monk, or a temple, you must give with absolute awareness.
You are not obligated to give to anyone who wears a robe. You are not buying karma points in a divine arcade. You are choosing — with your energy, your resources, your intention — what kind of society you want to feed.
If you give to the wrong ones — to the manipulators, the idle, the pretenders in robes — you are not creating merit.
You are creating demerit.
You are helping sustain a lie.
You are ruining the balance of spiritual life by feeding those who should not be fed.
It is not compassion to feed the parasitic.
It is cowardice disguised as virtue.
You are not generous — you are part of the problem.
Every offering must come from conscious discernment.
Is this monk walking the path?
Is this temple a place of inner transformation?
Is my giving strengthening the dhamma — or strengthening illusion?
Real spirituality is not passive. It is not decorative. It is not about looking serene while sleeping inside.
Spirituality is work.
A monk should be a soldier of consciousness.
His presence should pierce you — not beg from you.
If a monk is not growing, not giving, not shaking the illusion of the world — then why feed him?
Stop feeding the lazy in robes.
Start feeding the truth.
Give to monks who walk. Who teach. Who transform.
Because when you give blindly, you are not being compassionate.
You are being controlled.
And no amount of merit will save you from the karmic echo of enabling spiritual decay.
