A BLOOD DRIVE ON CHRISTMAS DAY, 2007 at Michigan Community Blood Centers (MCBC) in Grand Rapids, Michigan brought well over 100 Hindu visitors from the Detroit area and Canada, marking the first time MCBC, normally closed for the holiday, ever has conducted a drive on December 25. The drive boosted the holiday season blood supply by 83 pints, and also provided a new cultural experience to Blood Center staff.

As their first blood drive ever, it was a new experience for the visitors, too, a group called Devotional Associates of Yogeshwar (DAY), based in the Detroit area. They were taking part in a nationwide DAY blood-drive effort to demonstrate devotion to God and the principles of swadhyay, a global Hindu movement that emphasizes doing good in the world as a way to express and honor the presence of God everywhere and within everyone. Giving blood celebrates the life force and generosity of spirit that DAY participants associate with God, according to DAY representative Alok Rathod, who worked with MCBC staff to set up the drive.

Although Hindus do not worship Jesus, Christmas Day was chosen because, according to the originator of swadhyay, Reverend Pandurang Shastriji Athavale, Jesus represented an embodiment of selfless love; DAY devotees who organized the blood-donation campaign decided that the day when Jesus’s birth is celebrated would be an ideal time to try to better understand and express selfless love through acts of giving such as donating blood.

In all, 102 DAY associates signed in to try to give blood. Many wore traditional Indian dress, adding colorful and unusual visual highlights to MCBC’s environment. The group brought their own snacks, not because there was anything wrong with the refreshments MCBC typically serves, but as Mitesh Patel, one of the DAY organizers, explained, “we are doing this out of devotion to emphasize the importance of giving, so we don’t want to take anything, not even food. We just want to give.”

Besides canteen snacks, drive organizers and participants also brought more substantial dishes to serve to group members in the MultiPurpose Room. DAY devotees who wished to pray or meditate before donating could go to the library, where drive organizers had set up a temple-like space. Down the hall, near the staff elevator, other group members gathered in a circle to sing Hindu hymns.

© Michigan Community Blood Centers