Service
With Kidder’s book Mountains Beyond Mountains in mind, post a thoughtful 1-2 paragraph response comment describing your current beliefs about the nature of service: what is service, in your view? Are all kinds of service equally valuable? Should one’s service help one’s own community, or meet a greater need in other parts of the world? Is service the highest good on one’s life, or is living one’s own life in the best possible way equally valid and meaningful? Your response should be personal, but you may wish to include ideas or material from MBM in your response. I will also include here, as food for thought, Kahlil Gibran’s “On Giving”:
You often say, “I would give, but only to the deserving.”
The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture.
They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.
Surely he who is worthy to receive his days and his nights, is worthy of all else from you.
