No reward, no pleasure - but what of gratitude?

BY ANTON J. Jesuthasan (sajj)

CHRISTMAS and New Year are a time of reflection and resolutions.

The President led the Nation appropriately on Tsunami Remembrance Day with reflections on the tragic events of yesteryear, with hope and aspirations of righting wrongs and rectifying omissions at an early date.

The incidental uptake from this is the useful sprouting of speakers on public platforms, highlighting over again, the plight of many Tsunami victims. These speakers' voices will hopefully not still until remedial action is truly in place.

Religious leaders on Christmas Day and Christmas Eve remind the thronging faithful of their bounden duty to God and Man - of LOVE for the Creator and for his creations, ' love your God, and love your neighbour as you love yourself'.

Our resolutions for the New Year largely hinge on the exhortations we receive or the needs that we perceive over mainly the pre-Christmas/New Year season.

Whilst our urgent need for a just and lasting peace now dominates the minds and thoughts of individuals and institutions at the more serious and graver level, the chief ingredient for peace which is LOVE, floats amongst us on a more joyous and lighter level, in the form of the greetings exchanged, gifts bestowed, visits made and concerns exhibited, beginning with families, and extending to the larger social groupings.

Parents demonstrate their love and concern for their offspring, children seem more solicitous of their parents, especially the ageing and aged parents, and the less fortunate in society see an occasional thought spared for them by the fortunate.

This is also a time when we exhibit our nobler feelings of appreciation and gratitude to those around us. But does this extend far enough, beyond family, friends and associates?

This should be a time when we should also extend our thoughts of gratitude to the many unsung and unappreciated heroes in our society, the Services that safeguard law and order in our country, men and women in medical and ancillary services who sacrifice their leisure and comfort to cater to the health needs of the Nation in all seasons and at all times, the public and private services that stand by ready to respond to our every call for help, the religious, the voluntary societies and many others, too many to mention, that make our society be what we desire.

No doubt there are the black sheep who seek to serve their own interests and none else, but they should be recognised as such, and the many selfless should not be tarred with the same brush.

We do not need sages to tell us that the society that we create or achieve for ourselves is the cumulative reflection of every man's desires, wishes and resolves. If most persons desire peace and prosperity for our country, the negative elements in society will not succeed in destroying the prospect.

When in the past war and victory and domination pervaded people's thoughts, we had a destructive war. The irony of it is that, in the end, there is no victory, no defeat, no domination, only destruction.

Today though, people in every spectrum of life crave PEACE, and it is lasting peace that we shall soon hopefully achieve.

But Peace doesn't come easy, without sincere and untiring effort, especially when it has once been lost and needs to be restored. Our first effort in this regard could be our New Year resolutions, to work towards peace, in our homes, in the community, in the workplace, in society at large.

Another resolution that we need at all levels of society, in all its hierarchies, is to act with honesty and integrity in all our dealings; the mental satisfaction derived is reward enough.

Finally, to parental love and filial piety. Most parents lavish great deal of love and concern on their children from infancy to adolescence to adulthood and beyond, for the mere pleasure this gives them, which is a great reward in itself.

When parents reach their second childhood and need love and care from their children in turn, without being able to generate any pleasure or reward in return, shouldn't gratitude alone be sufficient reason for that care and concern and filial love to be forthcoming without demur? Our resolutions at this time in this respect shall not be out of place.

To borrow that all-encompassing word from the President, this is a time of 'Chinthanaya or Chinthanai'. In the New Year, let's resolve to 'think', before we speak or act.