Spiritual Genius 10 Masters and the Quest for Meaning

Chapter 1 BROTHER It's immediately clear that waiting is an agony to Brother James Kimpton, a restless, rangy Englishman uniformed in what look like blue surgical scrubs. His long, lanky frame and fidgetiness give him an adolescent air that belies his seventy-six years. It's barely ten in the morning, but the sun has already turned the flat Western Ghats of Tamil Nadu, one of India's poorest states, into a griddle. Car troubles of a complexity perhaps unique to India have stretched a two-hour trip into four, making me late for our meeting. Having written me off, Brother James is just about to depart in his Jeep to visit a "children's village" for orphans recently built by Reaching the Unreached. This nonsectarian antipoverty organization, which he founded and directs, serves some sixty small villages in the district of Periyakulam. Brother, as he is called, bids me welcome but clearly wants to get on with it. He beckons me toward the Jeep, but after hours on the road I'm desperate for a washroom. Perhaps offering up this small torment to God, Brother white-knuckles it and leads me to the guest quarters. James Kimpton belongs to the De La Salle Christian Brothers, a Catholic religious order founded by a seventeenth-century French aristocrat to educate the poor. Brother James, who began his career as a teacher, has spent forty years in India, which is home to a full quarter of the world's poor. The country's average per capita income is $350 per year, half of its children are malnourished, and half of its rural students, particularly girls, drop out of school. Brother is no longer simply an educator, however, any more than he is a traditional missionary who trades goods and services for conversions. He is a pioneer in the ongoing transformation of the whole concept of charity. Reaching the Unreached, which is supported by both secular and religious sources, neither provides handouts nor proselytizes. Its purpose is to help poor rural communities develop the housing, schools, medical facilities, and employment they need to become self-sufficient. The organization serves and is almost entirely staffed by Hindus, and the only Christian teaching Brother James offers is that of example. From RTU's headquarters Brother guides me next door to Ambu Illam, or Place of Love. The organization's first children's village is an oasis of trees and gardens that's a stark contrast to the baked barrenness beyond its gates. As we speed-walk down neat paths bordered with flowers, Brother observes that this natural beauty is good for the children, of course, but also demonstrates what elbow grease can do with the area's surprisingly good soil. When I say that Ambu Illam's abundant water, spraying from garden hoses and gushing from faucets, must help, too, Brother explains that he's a diviner. Assisted by donations from the American Society of Dowsers, he has sited and drilled safe deep wells in all RTU's villages. This effort has eliminated not only an enormous amount of disease, he says, but much backbreaking drudgery for women, the poorest of whom often walk miles daily for water. Orchestrating such benign "twofers" seems to be Brother's specialty. As we tear past some of the thirty whitewashed masonry cottages that house "families" of five or six children, he explains that each is headed by a foster mother, who's usually a widow, abused wife, or other woman who would otherwise be homeless and destitute. This particular twofer illustrates Brother's theory that when a poor community does good by, say, helping orphans and other disadvantaged members, it will also do well, notably by creating much-needed jobs. In addition to the foster mothers, teachers, and healtGallagher, Winifred is the author of 'Spiritual Genius 10 Masters and the Quest for Meaning', published 2002 under ISBN 9780812967180 and ISBN 0812967186.