Serving Hands

When my sister-in-law was killed in an automobile accident last month she was driving home from a Master’s Degree program in a Catholic college called “Servant Leadership”. Before her death I had never heard the title ‘servant leader’, but find it a good name for something that I think it essential to life — being of service to others.

When I was working as a youth minister I refused to call the adults who worked with youth ‘volunteers.’ Volunteers sounds like people that were doing something that they do not need to do. My belief is that we are called to be servants to each other. I called them youth ministers, the name that was given me in the Church. For I believed they were just doing something they were called to do in their baptism, being present for persons in need.

Today a number of friends called me for service, from driving someone to pick up medicine to helping restore a house that had a fire this morning. I said yes to every request, not because I am a nice guy or like to do volunteer work, but because I had to. We are all servants to each other, especially friends. It is something we do naturally as any seed, planted in good soil and nurtured, grows.

Serving others, especially those in need, is at the heart of all major belief systems, be they Hindu, Muslim, Christian or Jewish. It is in serving others that we find ourselves.

We can talk about doing good all we want, but as Gandhi said: “All our philosophy is dry as dust if it is not immediately translated into some act of living service.” (The Diary of Mahadev Desai, Vol. I, p. 261, 31–6−1932)

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