Tag Archives: public service

The Road to Diamond, Day 177: The Thick and Thin of It

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Service Activities, Social, Spiritual, Striving

May 24, 2025- At Bellemont Baha’i School today:

In the midst of a pile of pine needles, my co-worker found a bright, shining earring. It seems to me that one of the campers last year did lose one, so that is probably the beginning of its reunion with its owner.

At lunchtime, part of the conversation was relative to the thinness and thickness of various piles that were raked up and ready for bagging. By 3:30, virtually all the piles were bagged and ready for next week’s removal to a dump site. Fourteen of us produced 85 bags of needles. That is no “thin” effort!

The connection between our little group and the growing Bellemont forest community is also getting thicker. Our closest neighbour, an ordained minister, has taken it upon himself to provide security for the camp, when no one is around. He also did an extraordinary amount of clean-up work-and over the past thee days. He will finish up the rest tomorrow. A good part of this is because he feels the spiritual energy of the camp.

Commitments can be thick or thin. I have, in the least popular of my posts, addressed the matter of home bases. My commitments to places in general, however, matter less than those I have to people in my life. There ought be no one “thrown under the bus”, as it were. So, while the “thickest” of my commitments are to my Faith, little family, beloved (who is halfway around the world), and community of residence, appeals for help from someone elsewhere also matter. My only caveat is that I have enough time and energy to meet that appeal.

That brings me to a broader place, with regard to commitments: My own are based on helping meet the actual needs of my loved ones, and not in feathering my own nest. Those in government, and elsewhere in public life, be they Right, Left or in the Center, whose every-other decision is based on self-enrichment are going to be found out, if that hasn’t happened already. Those whose public service is genuinely focused on the common good, be they Right, Left or in the Center, deserve our gratitude and support.

Be discerning, with regard to commitments, whether your own or those others have made to you.

The Fast: Day 18-Continuity

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Posted by on in collaborating, Education, Personal Values, Service Activities, Striving

March 19, 2018, Prescott-

Today found me back at work.  Spring Break was restful, if as fast-moving as the Academic Year itself.   No matter who a person is, how old one gets or where s(he) finds self, there are certain constants.

Mine are waking at or near dawn, careful bathing and grooming, devotions, nutrition, focused prayer, communication with friends and family and some act of daily service.  Work, in the Baha’i Faith, as in Christianity and several other religious traditions, is an act of worship, when performed in service to humanity.  This goes for manufacture, public service and parenting.  That implies a goodly amount of integrity, in all one’s acts while on the job, or while representing one’s place of work, or one’s employer.

Continuity is also a sign of cognitive awareness, when performed in a logical and mindful state.  So, as my sixties roll on, I’m glad to be at work, winding down my third-to-last physical 19-Day Fast and being in good company, wherever I happen to be.