We need a map for our life. We need a picture of our final destination. Either we are studying, starting a new doing business or planning to establish educational institution, we need a map. CEO and Top Management need it for company they lead. We need a tool that will give the direction of our life or company; we need to know our mission that will help us focus on what we should be doing.

What is a mission? In Webster’s College Dictionary (Random House), there are several definitions: “a specific task that a person or group of person is sent to perform; the place of work of such person, or the territory of their responsibility; military operational task, usually signed by a higher headquarters; an aerospace operation designed to carry out the goals of a specific program; an allotted or self-imposed duty or task; calling.” “Mission is a written reason behind an existence- either for an individual or for an organization. It is the key to finding our path in life.” wrote Laurie Beth Jones on her book, The Path.
A good mission statement, said Jones, has three elements: 1) it should be no more than a single sentence long, 2) it is easily understood by 1-12-year-old boy, and 3) it is easily recited by a memory. It requires action verbs, value or principle that we are willing to devote our life to, and a group of people or certain area that we are going to help. In addition, a good mission must be interesting, clear and inspiring. It is related to our natural gift and personality.

I have been working for oil companies for more than twenty years. I had been assigned to different departments- Engineering, Field Operation, Production, Human Resources, Business Excellence, Internal Control, Finance, and Management. The Management decided most of the rotations. But, in 1996 I evaluated myself: my education, interest, personality, experience, and dream. I considered the risks of changing my profession. I thought I was not on the right ‘track.’ Then, I proposed to the Management so that I could be transferred to Human Resources Department. The Management gave their approval. It was one of major decision in my life.

Even though on the last seven years I have enjoyed my career, still I think there is a need to find my ‘true’ profession. I am preparing for that. I do this because I need to accomplish my personal mission.

You may have been on the right track on your career. If you have already, great! If not, it is time to think about your mission. Take time to think about this. I would suggest you develop your own mission. Let’s think what we should be doing, either as an individual or a group as company. And please remember, your job, role, position, and ‘to-do’ list are not your mission. Just like my friend, Harry Prabowo, Petroleum Engineering graduate , ex-Unocal’s Reservoir Engineer and now having his own business, said, “Life is more than calculating gas reserve.”

You may need to read book such as The Path, written by Laurie Beth Jones. She said , ‘to develop your mission, you just need to select three verbs which excites you most; select value or principle that you are willing to devote your life to; and choose whom are you going to help.’

I hope you will find your mission and find the ‘true’ journey in this life.

Warm Regards,
Hildegard

Dear Hildegard,
I am very pleased to hear that you now understand a proper approach when talking about religion. I will answer your question about the starting point.

The starting point to understand religion is a great question. Actually, great theologians recommend that we start from God Himself. I am actually in favor with their opinion. You may not accept this. But, let’s try to understand this great subject bit by bit. I would like you to follow the logic and sequence so that finally we know the starting point as recommended by great theologians.

The first question we should ask is about ourselves; the simple one is ‘Who are we? Where do we come from? These questions are relatively easy to answer. But, if we keep asking, there is a lot of questions that may arise. To this question, you may say ‘I am Hildegard. I am a teenager; I am from United States o f America.’ Even to these simple statements, there are possibly questions that may arise. One may ask a question, ‘which Hildegard is she?’ Does she have a character of Hildegard of Bingen that lived in the 12th century? Other questions, where is the United States of America located? How big its country is? What is the population? Who is her ancestor?

To question ‘who are we?- we could answer, ‘we are from our mother’s womb; we are the product of our father and mother.’ Some chromosomes of our father and mother are in our body? But still there is a question to that? How one becomes a man or woman? Who are in control to make a man or a woman? These questions could invite long debate.

Let’s follow the logic of our question; where did we come from? We will say that we are from out father and mother. Then, we ask question again, ‘where my father and mother did come from? We will answer again they came from their own father and mother. Where their father and mother did come from? We will say that they come from their grandfather and grand mother, and we ask the same question to their grand-grand father and mother and then at certain point, we don now who they are. Now we ask a question, how the first man and woman did exist in this world? This is a big question.

Answers to this question could be many, but to make it short, there is a book that clearly explains our existence. Christianity called it the Holy Book or the Bible. It consists of 66 books; 39 of them were written in the Old Testament; 27 of them were written in the New Testament. So, the answer to our basic question could be found and only be found on the Bible; no other books that could give a comprehensive answer about the origin of man. Other books just make us confused, but the Bible make it clear; woman was made from man and man was made from dust. It makes it clear where the root of our existence is. It tells everything we need to know about life.

I hope you have that Book. If not, try to buy one from a close bookstore. Please try to get to know and read that Book.

Regards,
Radot

I really thank for your letter about Religion and Society. It is interesting to know that a society is dictated by belief(s) of its people. I did try to make a small study on several religions and which countries that are affected by each religion. I made a brief study about religion that had impacted the history of my country. I also did make a quick comparison between my country and countries in Southern part of America. There is a clear difference on the way people live. This led me to a question, ‘what caused this difference?’ Could be this an example of how religion impacts a society?

 Another question, there are several religions on this world? What is the approach in discussing religion? Any thought?

 Sincerely,

Hildegard

Dear Hildegard,
I appreciate your effort to make study on religion. As we will see, religion affects society and state. An example of this impact could be seen on the way people live or culture of any country. We could observe the difference between your country and those of Southern America’s, between the United States of America with countries in Europe, between a country in western and a country in eastern part of Europe, between your country and my country, and between your country and other countries in Asia and Africa. For a while, I am not going to discuss this subject, but I will answer your second question- approach in discussing religion.

My personal advice is that we discuss this subject academically; try not to emphasize or avoid discussion on how one applies one’s belief on his daily life. Let his performance be his personal accountability to his God. This does not mean that we can not talk our personal experience on how we apply our beliefs. It could be encouraging to others when we share our experiences if it builds others. But, I will urge to talk about the core belief of religion, its teaching, its hope and its impact on society.

The reason for this is simply to minimize unnecessary arguments. When people discuss religion, often they quickly jump from its teaching to its practice; they quickly talk about how one applies his belief before having discussing a lot of the teaching or belief. They are in a hurry to judge people through their conduct and evaluate how consistent one is in obeying the teaching of his belief.

When we discuss the topics about religion, we should focus on what each religion teaches, what its core beliefs are, why one religion differs from another religion, what its impacts are in a society, and what makes one religion works well in a society or country.

I hope you will take a proper care when talking about religion with your friends. Topic about religion is a life and dead matter. Be careful in sharing its teaching.

Sincerely yours,
Radot

Warm Regards,
Hildegard

Dear Hildegard,
It is encouraging to read letter from a teenager like you. It is a rare occasion. At this IT environment, people may prefer e-mail to personal letter.

I also glad that you are interested in the subject of religion and society. Many teenagers do not pay much attention to it. Other people or older ones also may not have interest in this subject as you do. For them, this subject is not an easy one to talk about, especially when they hear terms like God, heaven, sin, and other terms on the field of religion. People in general avoid such terms in their daily talks. Talks are dominated by secular subjects, with no strong connection to religion.

But, it will be good news if more teenagers or young people like you paying attention to religion and society. It will be a blessing to one’s family, society and state and if more teenagers have interest in religion and society, it could lead to a better society and state. Because if they really search for the true religion and they search it with their heart, they will find a ‘true knowledge’ that will lead them to greater understanding about the purpose of life.

The phrase- Religion and Society- was inspired when I herd the plan to establish a Reformed Center for Religion and Society in Jakarta, Indonesia years ago. There are many institutions in Jakarta that may have a vision to improve the state and society in general, but the institution that bear phrase Religion and Society capture my mind. I think it is the proper order of subject if we want to discuss about religion and society in general. Our thought and actions are the reflection of our belief. It does not matter whether one choose to be a follower of Christianity, Islam, Confucian, Hinduism, Buddhism or follower of other beliefs- all his thoughts and actions will be regulated by his belief depending how consistent one follows his belief. So, I choose that phrase on my blog just to remind any reader and me that religion has a central role in society; it is a driving force of any society.

About your request to translate my writing from bahasa into English- I will translate those that are relevant to your context. My writings in blog named Radot & Polin are written for the Indonesian context which may not be relevant to yours. In the mean time, you may start to get to know each religion and make priority which religion you want to study.

I would suggest that you start making a study on Christian religion. It is a great religion; it is just like other great religions: Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. I say it is great because Christian religion has a root to a teaching of Moses that has age of 3500 years old; quite old. It should fascinate us why religion with age of thousand of years still exist and keep influencing the society around the world.

I hope you will share my blogs with your friends, family, community or any people you may know and get benefits from my writings.

Before I finish my letter, let me summarize that a society will be dictated by the belief of her people. The more people believe in a certain religion, the more that religion will influence its society.

Sincerely yours,
Radot

The Meeting Guideline issued by CEO this morning was due to many ineffective meetings. As I observed, too many meetings that I attended were not effective. Agenda was not communicated. There are a lot of technical discussions occurred on the meeting that should occur prior to the meeting. People just said as he liked about the subject. The information shared not complete. We tend to cut one’s talk when someone is still talking.

The Meeting Guideline issued today is quite informative. There is a preparation before a meeting, things to do during and after a meeting. I am not going to cite all of them. What I want to stress on is just three things if we organize or attend a meeting.

Firstly, make sure that we have an agenda. The meeting which I always attend does not always follow this rule. No preliminary information about the agenda. The meeting invitation does not state about it. People are just invited to come, attend and give the schedule: date, time, and venue. If there is an agenda, it is always often stated on the meeting and people discuss about it. It is impossible to discuss many things at a time with relatively good results. We don’t have time to discuss many subjects for a 2-hour-meeting.

Secondly, make sure there is facilitator for a meeting; someone that will manage and arrange the talk during the meeting; a person that able to point out and control the direction of the meeting. He or she should manage whose turn is to speak or give time to someone or ask someone to speak on the subject discussed. He should maintain so that the participants always discussed the subject and focus on what to be expected from that meeting. We need this type of person on each meeting we attend. If not, we may be just waste a lot of time; we discuss something which there is no path forward or ending.

Thirdly, make sure that we take important notes during the meeting; something that required us to act. We want to have action as a result of the meeting, when such action to be taken, defining action required, who is to take, when must be done, and when is expected to be completed. Often, we forget this and we just enjoy talking during the meeting without being aware of the purpose of our meeting.

I hope when you have a meeting, you would remember these three things. Of course there are other things about a meeting, but the above I think will help each of us to get the most from the meeting we attend. (JM)