Prophets or troublemakers?

I’D SAY to my friends and brothers in the clergy who figure prominently in some political issues lately to relax and take it easy. You’ve been causing distress, confusion if not scandal among the people.

Even young students in a technical school came to me to ask bluntly if these clerics were acting as prophets or as plain troublemakers fired up by some nasty bitter zeal.

I was happy to note that they appeared to have an understanding that priests carry out a prophetic or teaching mission in the Church. This is not common even among the professionals.

They’d been studying the catechism, bless their souls, and must have read about the role of priests in the Church and in the world. I learned later that they were studying the Church’s social doctrine.

It was not easy for me to explain, especially if you want to pair truth and charity together. And also to control surging emotions on the heels of some controversial clerical actuations and pronouncements.

Truth is these young ones have a point in asking and in expressing some discomfort. There is a growing perception that some clerics are abusing their position to get entangled in issues so complex they are at least debatable yet.

Aggravating this is the fact that these clerics have become media creatures playing media games.

Definitely we have a problem. Something has to be done. I hope some clear
indications from Church authorities can be made about this matter that is not anymore funny and is dragging stupidly.

One complained that the words and actions of the clerics did not correspond
to their dignity and neither were they proportionate to the gravity of the issues involved.

“They were shouting, and painting the targets of their complaints as if these were the devils themselves, incapable of doing any good thing,” he said. “It was just too simplistic, too one-sided, too opinionated.”

“I may agree with them in some points or give them the benefit of the doubt,” he continued, “but these do not entitle them to act the way they did. They were so self-righteous.”

I held my peace, waiting for an opening. I did not like to hear these words. But I was already amazed at how this 17-year-old, practically still a child, could already talk about serious matters.

Another student butted in to say that he was afraid the clerics involved might cause division among the people.

“Though they were saying they were doing those things on their own personal capacity as citizens, they acted and spoke as priests and bishops, just the same,” he said.

“They were even quoting Church doctrine which sounded out of context to
me,” he continued. “They sounded more like mother statements! Those who don’t agree with them in these issues, and with good valid reasons, would feel alienated from the Church.”

“Besides,” another one spoke, “there are clerics with clearly loose tongues who want to comment on just about any political issue. They only show their political leanings. It does not look good.”

I just told them to keep their views to themselves as much as possible. It’s not good to talk about them openly. I asked them to pray, and to understand that clerics—bishops especially—have a most delicate task of reading the signs of the times. That, I told them, explains part of their actuations.

These comments are actually quite widespread. No matter how I tried to avoid them, they just came, and continue to come, usually in tones of deep disappointment.

This matter ought to be studied thoroughly by our Church leaders to come up with more specific guidelines and corresponding legislations that should include appropriate sanctions.

I know that it would be much better if things are done in private and in confidence, away from the public eye. But if the actuations and pronouncements are made in public, I think the people are entitled to know whether something is wrong and if so, whether the correction is to be made.

This can very well be an SOS, before things really get out of hand.

Tower of Babel updated

IT’S obviously a Tower-of-Babel effect that many people nowadays, especially the young ones, are not aware anymore of the story, significance and unfailing relevance itself of the Tower of Babel.

We need to recall that story and, in fact, to familiarize ourselves with it since it’s a phenomenon that continues to affect us, especially as we march toward progress and development. It sure gives us a much-needed sense of prudence in life.

From the Bible’s first book, Genesis, we have this account of this story’s origin. The descendants of Noah decided after the flood to erect a tower in Babylonia. It was intended to reach heaven as a way to make them famous.

God was angered by this presumption, and caused among them a great confusion of languages before scattering them to different places.

The underlying reason for God’s action is that these men had the wrong understanding and intention in how to proceed with their life. They were more interested in themselves than in God, more in their plans than in God’s will.

The story is now the image of any human effort to pursue development without God or even in competition with God. Together with some signs of progress will be an accompanying state of confusion among the people. We can
call this the Tower-of-Babel syndrome, a cruel curveball.

It springs from ignoring the fundamental truth that everything comes from God, and therefore should be handled and used always in accordance to God’s will. It’s actually a ridiculous state of affairs, and yet it’s what commonly happens.

With it, we will get the sensation we are advancing in knowledge, skills and dominion over the world, but we cannot deny either that together with these gains, pursued without God, is a clear distancing we can notice among ourselves.

We can be close to one another physically, yet still far and remote spiritually and morally. We are not referring here to the legitimate differences we can have among ourselves, but rather to an abiding sense of alienation among us.

It’s a story that continues to be played and replayed even up to now. Not even our great strides in our communication technology have increased our communion among ourselves.

On the contrary, what we notice nowadays is greater misunderstanding, envy and even conflict and division. There is widespread distrust and easy, almost automatic mutual suspicion.

Part of the concern we have to tackle is precisely to hitch our development process to God’s plans. It is to inspire, leaven and drive it with God’s truth and spirit.

This is not easy to do, of course. Our tendency is to misappropriate and misuse things that actually come and belong to God—all things do—to be simply our own.

We easily succumb to this vicious virus, plus, the fact that we also get easily intoxicated by any power we enjoy in life. With this potent combination of factors, we effectively have an epidemic of confusion. This is what we see around.

For example, our capacity to know, quite powerful given our intelligence and will, can tempt us to know things simply on our own. There’s hardly any effort to relate such knowledge to God.

This really looks funny, because we fail to realize the basic truth once eloquently spelled out by St. Paul when he talked about knowledge and charity.

“Knowledge puffs up, but charity edifies. And if any man thinks that he knows anything, he has not yet known as he ought to know.” (1 Cor 8,1-2)

As a result, we cannot help but get into useless quarrels among ourselves. We have to be most careful of this fine distinction.

While the pursuit of knowledge unleavened by charity can yield some material gains, it can also sow the seeds of discord among us. It will just be a matter of time before things explode.

We need to strongly remind ourselves that in every affair or concern in our life, in every step of the way, we need to refer everything to God and to his plans. Otherwise, we’ll just be building our own version of the Tower of Babel. Let’s stop acting funny!

Cultivating the Christmas spirit

AGAIN it’s Christmastime, which, Pinoy style, starts way earlier and ends much later than what the Church calendar says, and expresses itself more elaborately than liturgically indicated.

I don’t know whether it’s age catching up or due to external causes that I don’t seem to notice much Christmas décor around nowadays and to feel that palpable excitement I as a kid used to pair the season with.

I remember suggesting to the janitor to put new decors in my office, since I’ve been seeing the same ones for years now. He told me that they may look old to me but they all appear new and beautiful to the new students.

Rather than arguing, I chose to be happy with that smart reply, actually a cover for some budgetary limits. I just have to find a way to make the old look new. Problem is I’m creativity challenged in this area.

Anyway, I felt high when the other day a priest-friend, who has a raging passion and with matching skills for making Christmas crèches, showed me his latest version.

It’s a very beautiful “belen” done in cool architectural artistry and landscaping, with playing fountains and dancing lights, with angels floating on air, and together with the usual cows and sheep, little pet dogs and cats accompany Mary and Joseph to adore the infant Jesus.

All of a sudden, I became a kid again, launched in a sparkling flight into the world of Christian mysteries, but still inflated by childish fantasies. Then I remember the duty we all have every time Christmastime comes around.

The Christmas story is actually a very beautiful story worth repeating endless times. Of course, each time it is considered, we are meant to plumb deeper into its significance and relevance, and to incarnate the lessons.

The Christmas story is about God who loves us so much that he sends his own Son to be like us to save us. And the Son’s work of our redemption is the best that any attempt at saving anyone or anything can ever be.

For the redemption Jesus does is not simply personal but also social, not only material but also spiritual, not only in the human level but also in the supernatural level. It’s a redemption complete, total, and forever. He gives us the fullness of life.

This is all because we are God’s children, created in his image and likeness, and meant to participate in God our Father’s supernatural life. But in achieving that, our redemption presumes the fulfillment also of our human potentials.

We cannot fully attain our supernatural goal without being fully human. Of
course, what is to be fully human is something not quite easy to know, since it is part of the mystery of Jesus’ life. We have to continually deal with our Lord to get insights of this mystery.

In other words, Christmas is a reminder that Christ wants to be born not only in the world, but also in the heart of each one of us. He wants to take hold of us, of course, with our cooperation, in order to reconstitute us, since we have been deformed by our sins.

He wants to be born and to live in our mind, our heart and even in our body. He wants to be in our thoughts, desires, feelings, words and deeds. He wants us to make us like him, precisely to recover God’s image and likeness in us.

The true spirit of Christmas can only take place when we allow our Lord to be truly born in us. This requires tremendous effort and the full exercise of our freedom. This is because Christ cannot enter into our life if we don’t want him.

And wanting him is not just a matter of feeling and desire. It has to involve the whole of us: our mind, heart, body and everything else.

Thus, Christmas invites us to make our faith more and more theological, and to incarnate that theological faith in our life. Every time Christmas comes, we need to make a step further in this direction, such that with St. Paul we can say: “It is no longer I who lives but Christ who lives in me.” (Gal 2,20)