Sai Inspires - 18th December 2005 from Prashanti Nilayam

[Guest guest]

organs of a human being. They are as essential for a human being as the head,

heart and hands for the body. Without these attributes, no one is completely

human. - Divine Discourse, 13th Jan 1984. Do not follow the Body, Do not

follow the Mind, Follow the Conscience. - Baba

Sai Inspires" hspace="0" src=" "

align="baseline" border="0"> “Adding Life To Our Years…” Loving Sai Ram

and greetings from Prashanti Nilayam. People often say that Science is evil.

This is not true because Science is just knowledge. However, knowledge can be

used for either good or for evil purposes; this is the choice that humans make

and therefore it is wrong to blame Science as such for many of the problems we

face today. There cannot be any question that Science has conferred many

benefits on humanity, one of these being the increase in longevity. Way back

around 1940, the average life expectancy in India was just 27 years but today,

it has climbed to well over fifty. In the advanced countries, it is quite

common to see people live beyond 70 and even 80. This is good news no doubt but

there is also, unfortunately, a flip side to it. Late President Kennedy called

attention to it in his

own characteristic way; he said we have added years to life but we still have

the task of adding life to years. What exactly did Kennedy mean? That is what

we wish to reflect on presently. It is nice to live longer but old age also

brings its many “gifts”, like arthritis, hip fracture, and so on, all of which

handicap a person. And this precisely is where the problem starts. Who takes

care of the old, especially those who are not keeping in good health, are

disabled in some way, are infirm, suffer from dementia, etc? This problem is

at once an individual and a social issue, an issue that is rapidly becoming

more and more critical as the number of aged people in many

societies is constantly increasing, even as the birth rate is declining

perceptibly. Let us start at the level of the individual. Every individual

on earth exists because of his or her parents. It is the parents who bring the

person into the earth. It is they who take care of the person in infancy, when

the baby simply cannot survive on its own. Particularly the mother, who most

lovingly makes an enormous sacrifice to take care of the child, not content

with the enormous difficulty she had to bear while carrying the baby in the

womb and the pangs she suffered at the time of giving birth. All this is

well known, but unfortunately quickly forgotten by the children when they grow

up, especially these days. For thousands of years, people in all societies

regarded taking care of parents in their old age as a mandatory responsibility.

True the going was not always smooth, but for the most part, old people were

taken care of and not discarded like worn out socks. Things changed drastically

when children started going away to other places for work, settle down in big

cities where accommodation was limited and so on, making it difficult to

maintain old people. Added to all this, the lady of the house was often a

working-woman and that compounded the problem. In the affluent countries,

the problem was partially solved by the emergence of Retirement Colonies, into

which old people could move in without botheration to their children, with

their offspring making occasional visits. But this system is running into

problems of its own, with many in the lower income bracket having little

savings to put away for old age and retirement homes. Often such people have to

survive by becoming baby sitters for their grandchildren. In other words,

instead of being taken care of, they have to bring up children once more. In

India, there was an ancient tradition according to which mother was regarded as

God. Not any more, with many sons abandoning their mothers and leaving them to

be cared for by the daughters. In one house, the daughter-in-law was so

hostile, she would lock up the refrigerator when she went for work; the poor

aged parents of her husband would be left hungry throughout the day till the

husband and wife returned in the evening. It was only then that they got some

scraps as the evening meal. The son’s home had thus become a prison. Swami once

narrated a story concerning this sad state of affairs but we shall not go into

that now. However, we would like to draw attention to what Swami says about the

debt everyone of us owes to our parents. Swami says that if a person borrows

from a bank say, he has to settle the debt; if he fails to, he would be in

trouble and would have to face action. It is the same with parents, especially

mother. Swami says every human being, whether it is a man or a woman, occupies

the mother’s womb for nine months. What about paying “rent” for that? Swami

adds that is why mother is called a parent – the word is a reminder that one

must PAY RENT to one’s mother! This is typical of the way Baba plays on words.

But behind that is a serious message. Paying rent to the mother means taking

care of her in her old age. If one defaults, one will get paid back by destiny

for sure – that is what the Law of Karma is all about. In a home for the

aged in New Zealand regularly visited by Sai children, the inmates were very

happy whenever the children came because they gave the old people the love that

the sons and daughters ought to have offered but failed to. There was one

particular lady whom the children loved very much. One week when they came,

they found the bed occupied by the lady was empty. When they asked where the

old lady was, they were told she had passed away. The children sat there and

wept. One wonders whether the sons and daughters of the old lady grieved as

much. We would do well to remember that the Love a mother selflessly showers

on her young baby to nurse and protect is actually the Love of God – the

physical mother is merely a proxy for God. That is why in ancient India, it was

mandatory to regard mother as God. As Swami says, there is no mother who hates

her son but there are many sons who, when they grow up, develop an aversion for

their mother because mother is now a drag. Can one afford to forget who gave one

one’s life, besides providing so much love and protection?

AR-SA"> Yes, people are no doubt living longer but unless life is made

meaningful and pleasant for the aged, the extension of their life might well be

worthless. This enrichment of old age can be done not by

machines, not by technology, but only by humans, especially sons and daughters.

Is this asking for too much? Or should parents also should be disposed off when

they become old like old TV sets, cell phones, computers and cars are got rid

of? Is that what progress is all about? Think about it! Jai Sai Ram.

With Love and Regards, "Heart2Heart" RadioSai e-Journal Team, In Sai Service.

To see the complete schedule of today's RadioSai programmes, click

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