AT the moment, we have a raging controversy over our rice supply. Different, occasionally enlightening views are aired. As a result we get to know more about the intricate business of our rice and food supply.
This, I think, is good for all of us. It’s part of our continuing education about our social and political life. Discussions like this facilitate our sense of solidarity as a people. Let’s try to keep it that way.
My prayer is that the discussion be kept at the high level of dialogue, especially in terms of range, content and quality. As much as possible, we should avoid partisan politicking, which usually distorts the issue, dragging it to the gutter.
The media should be particularly sensitive to this need. People are already developing a keen sense of discerning what truly has a bearing on the matter and what is extraneous to it, what is spin and what is reality.
They now can easily distinguish between chaff and grain. They can smell a rat from a distance, seeing through the hidden agendas and ulterior motives. More importantly, they know who they are.
Those who have something to say about the issue should purify their intention, and organize and express their position well. They should intervene for the sole purpose of helping solve the problem, and not just to score “pogi” points.
Thus, they should study their opinions thoroughly, verifying their data, checking their theories and hypotheses, and being open to other views. They should always be courteous and cordial in the discussion.
In short, please, let’s do away with reckless commentaries and shooting from the hip. Let’s tone down our emotions and inflammatory language. Let’s hear all sides calmly.
Politicians and media people should submit themselves to a high standard of discretion and sobriety when expressing their views. They should avoid sowing intrigues and witch-hunting.
There obviously can be persons, offices, social practices, etc. that can be blamed for something. Let’s go easy on this, refusing to get stuck there. We should always be constructive in our approach, convinced that solving problems is more important and urgent than blaming some people.
That’s why it saddened me to note that in all this exciting discussion about the rice issue, a nasty topic was made to cash in on it. I’m referring to the attempt to link our rice problem with our supposed overpopulation.
It’s true that everyone is free to bring out anything for all of us to consider and discuss. It’s just that with all our exchanges through the years, we should already know what are the real issues and what are mere myths.
Blaming our population level for our rice shortage is painfully an uncalled for, anachronistic tearing of one’s hair. Like, hello, this kind of thinking has been debunked ages ago.
This is the classic Malthusian fear whose proper place is the museum or the history books of fascinating but failed theories and fallacies. Are we to be told again that we should have a so-called optimum family size, say, of two or four children only?
And that to achieve this population level, we can use any means, mouthing again the mantra of freedom of choice that justifies the use of clearly immoral means of family planning and population control?
This is what the persistent advocates of population-control-at-all-costs are still doing. In our Congress today, there are pending bills meant to legalize immoral means of family planning, sugar-coating them as part of reproductive health.
The sponsors of these bills, who have no qualms both in presenting themselves as devout Catholics and in violating Church teachings, even have the gall to pontificate on what is now the moral way to tackle our supposed population problem.
Everyone knows that there are problems everywhere—food, water, air, our politics, etc. With respect to our food problem, only ideological crackpots believe it’s a problem without solution, or that the world is running out of resources to feed us.
We will always find solutions, and solutions are fit for us, who are not just economic entities, or purely material or social beings. that There are solutions that are fit for us who are persons and children of God.
Friday, April 11, 2008
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Work and rest
THIS is the regular rhythm in our life. Sorry for sounding dated, but work and rest are, as an old Sinatra song renders it, like love and marriage that should not be decoupled just like the horse and the carriage.
But if we have to understand this life pattern of ours in the context of our Christian faith, as we should, we will realize that they necessarily have to be spent always with God, never away or independently from him.
This point is echoed abundantly in many epistles of St. Paul. “Whether we live, we live unto the Lord; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord. Therefore, whether we live, or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.” (Rom 14,8)
Another one: “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God.” (1 Cor 10,31) Yet another: “Whether we watch or sleep, we may live together with him.” (1 Thes 5,10)
Since our life is supposed to be a life with God, we should do everything to keep our Christian bearing even in our work and in our rest.
This is no easy task, of course. A good grounding in right doctrine is required. A lot of discipline is involved, plus, certain skills with the necessary attitudes and dispositions.
Our problem is that we tend to scatter our attention to the wind. We are easily dominated by tunnel-visioned passions.
The theology behind work and rest is quite known already. And yet I wonder how many of us seriously take it to heart, and really live that theology.
A friend, who manages a call center with some 200 young men and women under him, once expressed the concern that some of these young professionals do not have the proper work attitudes. They also have dubious ways of resting.
A housewife sometimes asks me how she could relate her household chores to God. How can she find God in her dish-washing and house-cleaning, in her cooking and laundry?
A college student tells me that he is so caught up with the pressures in school that the only thing that drives him is the need to pass his subjects and to eke time to unwind with friends, like having night outs and other gimmicks. God becomes a formal ornament with hardly has any impact on his life.
Of course, many professional men—imagine the businessmen and politicians—exposed to many temptations and perplexing moral predicaments in their work wonder how God can be made realistically relevant in their work.
I’ve also met quite a number who have tried to live in God’s presence, striving to put love into their work, but with very varying degrees of success.
There’s definitely a great need to sustain some kind of campaign to inculcate in people the spiritual and supernatural character of our work and rest, no matter how mundane, insignificant or full of moral dangers they may be.
The usual problem is that many do not consciously conform their work and rest to the requirements of their faith. They just flow in some kind of a groove and routine, moved simply by some vague inertia that has hardly to do with faith.
We have to remind ourselves very often to break away from this inertial frame of mind. We have to remember that our work, as long as it is not a sin, is part of God’s providence in which we are asked to participate.
Our work has to be done always with love for God and love for others. It’s love that brings us closer to them and will make us understand more deeply our work’s importance and relevance in everybody’s life.
Our rest should also be resting in God, for our Lord himself said: “Come to me, all you that labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Mt 11,28)
What actually tires us is our pride as manifested in getting increasingly absorbed in our own selves, weaving all sorts of pressures and anxieties, and forgetting there’s only one thing necessary—to be with God in order to be with others in intimate communion of life and love.
We have to continually check ourselves whether unknowingly we are drifting toward self-absorption. We need to pray and to offer sacrifices to purify and discipline our flesh that tends to make war with the spirit, and with God.
But if we have to understand this life pattern of ours in the context of our Christian faith, as we should, we will realize that they necessarily have to be spent always with God, never away or independently from him.
This point is echoed abundantly in many epistles of St. Paul. “Whether we live, we live unto the Lord; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord. Therefore, whether we live, or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.” (Rom 14,8)
Another one: “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God.” (1 Cor 10,31) Yet another: “Whether we watch or sleep, we may live together with him.” (1 Thes 5,10)
Since our life is supposed to be a life with God, we should do everything to keep our Christian bearing even in our work and in our rest.
This is no easy task, of course. A good grounding in right doctrine is required. A lot of discipline is involved, plus, certain skills with the necessary attitudes and dispositions.
Our problem is that we tend to scatter our attention to the wind. We are easily dominated by tunnel-visioned passions.
The theology behind work and rest is quite known already. And yet I wonder how many of us seriously take it to heart, and really live that theology.
A friend, who manages a call center with some 200 young men and women under him, once expressed the concern that some of these young professionals do not have the proper work attitudes. They also have dubious ways of resting.
A housewife sometimes asks me how she could relate her household chores to God. How can she find God in her dish-washing and house-cleaning, in her cooking and laundry?
A college student tells me that he is so caught up with the pressures in school that the only thing that drives him is the need to pass his subjects and to eke time to unwind with friends, like having night outs and other gimmicks. God becomes a formal ornament with hardly has any impact on his life.
Of course, many professional men—imagine the businessmen and politicians—exposed to many temptations and perplexing moral predicaments in their work wonder how God can be made realistically relevant in their work.
I’ve also met quite a number who have tried to live in God’s presence, striving to put love into their work, but with very varying degrees of success.
There’s definitely a great need to sustain some kind of campaign to inculcate in people the spiritual and supernatural character of our work and rest, no matter how mundane, insignificant or full of moral dangers they may be.
The usual problem is that many do not consciously conform their work and rest to the requirements of their faith. They just flow in some kind of a groove and routine, moved simply by some vague inertia that has hardly to do with faith.
We have to remind ourselves very often to break away from this inertial frame of mind. We have to remember that our work, as long as it is not a sin, is part of God’s providence in which we are asked to participate.
Our work has to be done always with love for God and love for others. It’s love that brings us closer to them and will make us understand more deeply our work’s importance and relevance in everybody’s life.
Our rest should also be resting in God, for our Lord himself said: “Come to me, all you that labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Mt 11,28)
What actually tires us is our pride as manifested in getting increasingly absorbed in our own selves, weaving all sorts of pressures and anxieties, and forgetting there’s only one thing necessary—to be with God in order to be with others in intimate communion of life and love.
We have to continually check ourselves whether unknowingly we are drifting toward self-absorption. We need to pray and to offer sacrifices to purify and discipline our flesh that tends to make war with the spirit, and with God.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Divine Mercy and saying sorry
WE recently celebrated Divine Mercy Sunday. It reminded us of the extent to which Our Lord went to show his abiding love for us, a love that perfects itself in mercy.
He just didn’t love us by creating us, endowing us with the best of things, such that we become the masterpiece in his world of creation.
In spite of our sin and infidelity to him, he continues to love us by forgiving us. He keeps loving us even if we have stopped being lovable. That’s what divine mercy is all about.
It’s good to point out some details of this divine mercy. God has to send his Son to become man to share our plight as sinners even if he did not sin, and to show us the way to get out of that predicament.
He preached, performed miracles, did all sorts of good things to win us back to him. Finally, he offered his life as ransom for our sins. Even if we have not asked for forgiveness, he already forgives us and as our mediator he asks for forgiveness from his Father on our behalf.
Then he tells us to follow him, offering his own self as “the way, the truth and the life.” We have to learn how to forgive others always—from our heart--because that’s how God also forgives us.
We only have to say, yes, to this divine indication, and that’s how we recover our dignity as children of God, meant to live not just our own life, but to share the life of God, no less.
A necessary consequence to all this is that we as sinners should try our best to ask for forgiveness. It’s true that God always forgives—not only seven times, but seventy times seven, meaning always—but we should try to ask for forgiveness also.
If we truly have to follow the example of Christ, then we need to ask God our Father for pardon for the sins of all, ours and those of others. He asked pardon for our sins not only implicitly, but explicitly; not only in desire and words but also in deeds, in fact, by offering his very own life.
Thus, saying sorry to God and to others should be habit for us. Even in the human level, such practice does a lot of good. It reduces and even eliminates tension among ourselves, it dissipates conflicts and hostility, it creates a good atmosphere around, facilitating our human relations.
We can confirm these effects in our daily life. Even if we have not committed big offenses, when we are quick to say sorry, how drastically the atmosphere improves! But when we keep quiet instead, we surely would be building up tension and resentment.
In the spiritual and supernatural level, saying sorry immediately brings us close to God, provokes great joy in heaven—“There will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.” (Lk 15,7)
We have to learn to say sorry often, even if the offenses we commit are minor or are more imagined than objective. We have to make use of every opportunity to say sorry to God and to others. This is good breeding, a true mark of a child of God with a most delicate conscience.
Thus, it was a big letdown when recently we learned through the media of the unchristian behavior of two leaders, one in politics and the other in the Church. Both refused to say sorry, but rather added insult to injury when their attention was called.
The political leader rationalized by saying we are not anymore in the medieval times when we have to ask pardon from kings, and anyway the one concerned is far from being a king.
I don’t know, but in my book, this reasoning reeks of arrogance. Politics often distorts Christian values and maddens people, considering saying sorry as sign of weakness.
The Church leader, reckless with words, offered no apology either, because he claimed he was misquoted. But he worsened it by saying that the misquote was very understandable. And he continues to dig in, daring his complainants to bring the matter to the Vatican .
When we have leaders and arguments like these, I think we have reason to be very sad. Our future looks dark indeed! God tell me, what’s happening?
He just didn’t love us by creating us, endowing us with the best of things, such that we become the masterpiece in his world of creation.
In spite of our sin and infidelity to him, he continues to love us by forgiving us. He keeps loving us even if we have stopped being lovable. That’s what divine mercy is all about.
It’s good to point out some details of this divine mercy. God has to send his Son to become man to share our plight as sinners even if he did not sin, and to show us the way to get out of that predicament.
He preached, performed miracles, did all sorts of good things to win us back to him. Finally, he offered his life as ransom for our sins. Even if we have not asked for forgiveness, he already forgives us and as our mediator he asks for forgiveness from his Father on our behalf.
Then he tells us to follow him, offering his own self as “the way, the truth and the life.” We have to learn how to forgive others always—from our heart--because that’s how God also forgives us.
We only have to say, yes, to this divine indication, and that’s how we recover our dignity as children of God, meant to live not just our own life, but to share the life of God, no less.
A necessary consequence to all this is that we as sinners should try our best to ask for forgiveness. It’s true that God always forgives—not only seven times, but seventy times seven, meaning always—but we should try to ask for forgiveness also.
If we truly have to follow the example of Christ, then we need to ask God our Father for pardon for the sins of all, ours and those of others. He asked pardon for our sins not only implicitly, but explicitly; not only in desire and words but also in deeds, in fact, by offering his very own life.
Thus, saying sorry to God and to others should be habit for us. Even in the human level, such practice does a lot of good. It reduces and even eliminates tension among ourselves, it dissipates conflicts and hostility, it creates a good atmosphere around, facilitating our human relations.
We can confirm these effects in our daily life. Even if we have not committed big offenses, when we are quick to say sorry, how drastically the atmosphere improves! But when we keep quiet instead, we surely would be building up tension and resentment.
In the spiritual and supernatural level, saying sorry immediately brings us close to God, provokes great joy in heaven—“There will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.” (Lk 15,7)
We have to learn to say sorry often, even if the offenses we commit are minor or are more imagined than objective. We have to make use of every opportunity to say sorry to God and to others. This is good breeding, a true mark of a child of God with a most delicate conscience.
Thus, it was a big letdown when recently we learned through the media of the unchristian behavior of two leaders, one in politics and the other in the Church. Both refused to say sorry, but rather added insult to injury when their attention was called.
The political leader rationalized by saying we are not anymore in the medieval times when we have to ask pardon from kings, and anyway the one concerned is far from being a king.
I don’t know, but in my book, this reasoning reeks of arrogance. Politics often distorts Christian values and maddens people, considering saying sorry as sign of weakness.
The Church leader, reckless with words, offered no apology either, because he claimed he was misquoted. But he worsened it by saying that the misquote was very understandable. And he continues to dig in, daring his complainants to bring the matter to the Vatican .
When we have leaders and arguments like these, I think we have reason to be very sad. Our future looks dark indeed! God tell me, what’s happening?
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