Last week I talked about how Simon Anholt designed a way to measure a country’s contribution of “goodness” to the world. I also reported on Ferenc Gyurcsany, a former prime minister of Hungary, and how he fed some international refugees in his own home. Anholt is a visionary and Gyurcsany a practitioner, both doing their share to make the world a little better.

I also like to tell you a short story about Master Cheng Yen 證嚴法師, the founder of Tzu Chi Foundation 慈濟基金會, a hugely successful charitable organization in Taiwan. (Don’t be alarmed. I am not a Buddhist and I am not about to sell you religion here.) I don’t know the Master herself, so I’ve never verified with her the authenticity of this piece of lore. But looking at what her organization is doing all over the world, I think it is quite credible.

It goes something like this. When Cheng Yen was a young Buddhist nun she had a conversation with a few Christian nuns. The latter, in polite and sincere words, told her that Buddhism tended to be a passive religion, that most followers of that faith cared more about their own solitude and inner peace than the people around them. Christian missionaries, the nuns continued, traveled to places to help people. In other words, the Christians took a much more active role in benefiting those needing help. That seemed to make a lot sense to Cheng Yen. Shortly afterward she started recruiting volunteers to help with small local projects such as feeding the poor and helping out at at schoolss and hospitals. The rest is history. Now Tzu Chi is running a hospital, a college, free clinics and all sorts of charitable activities in Taiwan and outside of Taiwan.

Again, I don’t know how reliable the above story is. But it really doesn’t matter because whether she borrowed the idea from the Christian women or not, she has been doing it for the last few decades.

That brings me to what I am trying to advocate here. If you have done something worthwhile, no matter how big or small, it’s okay to tell people about it, like the Christian nuns did. And look at the ripples of goodness from that simple conversation with a young and inexperienced Cheng Yen.

Now it’s my turn to “brag,” having justified why I wanted to tell you about myself. What have I done lately? One, I did volunteer work for Tzu Chi in a free clinic twice before. I liked it so much that I am going to do it again this Sunday. Two, one of my favorite secondary school teachers, Miss H is doing a fund-raiser for her church. I put some spare change in the collection box. Three — and I am really excited about this one — my old friend BL introduced to an 11 grader in China via e-mail. This young man has the ambition of going to college in Canada. He needs help in his English writing skills. BL “volunteered” me to look over some of his essays and I agreed to do it. I already made some suggestions to his one composition titled “My View on Studying Abroad.” Jokingly I told BL that even if I couldn’t help this student substantively in terms of improvements in his English, at least he’ll know there are people in this world who are willing to help other people.

I came to America as a young and innocent nineteen-year-old. That was more than four decades ago. I still remember how uncertain I was being here for a good many years. I was lucky. An older brother Gregory was already here and we went to the same college for a while. He held my hand for a couple of years. He taught me to drink coffee in the morning and drink wine with dinner at night. On my own I learned to consummate a divorce in between. So my acclimatization to the American culture was quite well-rounded. Greg, I am paying you back, in paying forward to my new pen-pal overseas. Thank you, brother!

*** The End ***

 

(The dissemination of this writing is for non-commercial enjoyment only. The author reserves the copyright for himself)

 

Note: Click here to continue browsing other writings and works of Camillus Chan within this site