Spirituality and social service

Being mindful of the needs of the people we serve and giving these priorities in our programs seems like a no brainer. Yet, often, in government, business and nongovernment organizations the needs of the bureaucracies that run these organizations become the paramount concern, and the wishes of the managers become the primary concern.

For businesses, even those that make it a point to place customers and communities at the top of this list, stockholder requirements can easily trump service to customers and community. In government bureaucracies and NGOs, sticking to rules and regulations trump the aim of providing needed services.

Over the years I have been asking myself what makes people with a strong sense of service the way they are — so strong that they would dare defy organizational “givens” if they get in the way of providing the needed services. And what makes the people who are more oriented to the needs of the bureaucracies and the managers more attentive to organizational and managerial requirements?

I have not studied enough people globally to draw strong conclusions, but enough to draw theories that may be tested. To avoid controversy, I will write about my own case, my own stand, if you will. It applies to me and am not imposing it on others. I am sharing it to stimulate discussions.

I start with my basic belief that there is a Maker — a belief shared by most great religions and belief systems except Buddhism — that put me here for a purpose, a purpose best by the Judaeo- Christian-Islamic faiths; first to love the Maker above all, and to love the least of the Maker’s Creation, understanding that what we do the least of Creation we do to the Maker. The Greeks translated this last line to, “For what you do to the least of your brethren you do to me.”

How is this? Everything that exists comes from the Maker and has elements of the Maker’s divinity; is of the Maker; and seeks union with the Maker. This belief is strong in not only in the three religions that were established by the Children of Avram/Abraham/ Ibrahim but also in Hinduism, Buddhism, Shinto, and polytheistic religions globally. It seems to me the underpinning principle behind the Jewish concept of Kosher and the Islamic Halal ( both go beyond the concept of how animals are slaughtered).

It took decades for me to realize and fully accept the full extent of these admonitions. In the meantime I was pretty much the product of the programming imposed by the culture I grew up in. Clearly ego and pride got in the way and so did the seduction of the three “Ps” — power, popularity, and (material) prosperity, the very temptation both the Buddha and Yoshua bar Mariam (Jesus) rejected.

Perhaps I was fortunate. As a boy I enjoyed growing up in a family of privileged in Bacolod City, Negros Occidental, and Jaro, Iloilo. Alongside, however, the family owned business and farms that also exposed me to the realities of the life of our poor. A UP-educated father made sure I had a more balanced view of Philippine society.

I was also fortunate that as a boy to have seen movies like LVN’s Anak Dalita, Biyaya ng

Lupa and Badjao. I read Leon Maria Guerrero’s translations of Noli and Fili before I finished high school — in UP — and had the chance to ask questions from teachers and professors about the two books.

These exposures had so influenced me that by the time I got to college, public service loomed large in the horizon for me. I had seen families destroyed, including my father’s, by squabbles over material wealth and I was re-