It’s sad how many conservative Christians (and Muslims as well, actually) reserve a particular loathing for Hinduism because they believe it is polytheistic and therefore deserving of special Biblical condemnation.

But at its core, Hinduism is no more polytheistic than Christianity or Judaism. Yes, Hindu storytelling is full of aspects and attributes of the one God who are described as gods in traditional English translations. But those lowercase g gods are not Hinduism’s divinities. They are merely suffused with God’s spirit, just as much and no more than every human and for that matter every other living thing in the universe.

The Vedic traditions which tell the stories of all these lowercase g gods are, for most thoughtful Hindus, metaphoric stories that relate important spiritual and moral principles.

As to praying to the lowercase g gods, in principle that spiritual practice is very little different from praying to the saints of the Catholic tradition.

As much as anyone might disagree with the usefulness (as if a spiritual practice needs to be useful) of praying to an intercessor, that still doesn’t add up to the need to loathe or mock.