Rotary, the Reverence for Life and The Glory Road

By Dr. Martin C. Taylor, Rotarian

Rotary started in 1905, in Chicago, when four fortunate businessmen decided to meet weekly to overcome social and personal isolation and to discuss business in a landlocked but pivotal center of commerce, midway between two oceans. Paul Harris and his three companions, after much thought following years of joining hands, realized that social isolation was a dilemma that affected others in other cities and decided to incorporate and expand their message.

They added--and this is central--a moral and ethical dimension to ease the societal dilemma: Voluntarism and charitable works to the less fortunate. Meetings enabled organization, and organization is power. But offering material assistance without expecting a return on investment enabled hope for all concerned: The givers and receivers.

By 2019, that founding quartet’s ideology of “Service above Self” now embraces about 1.3 million committed men and women in 160 countries. In South Florida’s District 6990 (three counties and the Bahamas), some 2,000 persons in 50 clubs join hands and hearts weekly over breakfast, lunch, or dinner to plot out avenues of charitable service to local, national, and international persons and places in desperate need.

Long-range, Rotary International’s eradication of polio project in Africa, India, and the Middle East has been 99% effective, after millions of Salk vaccine doses were administered door-to-door and in soccer stadiums. Recently, Rotarians in District 6990 organized immediately to send plane loads of food and supplies—and hope—to the victims of Hurricane Dorian.

Rotarians worldwide live aware of the reverence for life, the sense of life’s fragility, and the fleetingness of time. They overcome their own fear and anxiety by doing unto others and not expecting a return. In this vein, I conclude with an abbreviated invocation given at The Rotary Club of Weston called “The Glory Road.”

“Rotarians, today’s message is that time is fleeting for me and for all of us. A pope, in 1401, expressed this idea in a pithy Latin phrase, which has been echoed over the centuries by philosophers (Thomas a Kempis) and writers (Emily Dickinson). The pope said: “Sic Transit Gloria Mundi.” Two translations: So passes worldly glory. Thus passes the glory of the world.”

Glory for most of us means time remaining to continue embracing family and friends and to keep on improving our own small portion of the world. This invocation is not an appeal for meditation and philosophizing, but a call for action. What mark are we as Rotarians going to make before the glory of the world slips away?

⊲ The Rotary Club of Weston is back meeting weekly in person at 7:30 AM on Thursdays at The Club at Weston

Hills located at 2600 Country Club

Way, Weston, FL 33332, and via

Zoom & streaming live on Facebook.

For more about the Rotary Club of

Weston, visit www.westonrotary.com to learn more.