At the impulse of faith

THIS is the ideal situation in our life. It’s when we manage to shape our life according to the behest of our faith that we attain this ideal. Faith is a gift from God that enables us to start living our life with God which is how our life should be.

                We actually have been made for a life of faith. If we look more closely at how we are, we will see that are made for believing, more than just for reasoning or, much less, for feeling. We are in need to make acts of faith, because no matter how much we reason out and feel, we will still realize that the reality goes beyond what reason and feelings can discern.

                Of course, faith always goes together with hope and charity, all of which assure us that while we still are journeying toward our final destination in this present life of ours, we somehow are already there in that destination. 

                That’s the mysterious beauty of these three theological virtues. They make us be both here and there, in time and in eternity, on earth and in heaven. They make us realize we are never alone, since with them we will feel we are with God and also with everybody else. They connect us with God and others.

                How important therefore to take good care of these divine gifts! And among them, the first one to get our attention should be our faith, since our life with God and others begins with it. Faith somehow acts as the foundation for hope and charity, although the three work together in mutual, vital relationship.

                While faith is a gift from God, it is also the response and the care we give to that gift. While it is a matter of grace, it is also a human act and responsibility. As the Catechism says, “believing is an authentically human act. Trusting in God and cleaving to the truths he has revealed is contrary neither to human freedom nor to human reason.” (CCC 154)

                We ought to feel the need to constantly sharpen and strengthen our life of faith, because many now are the elements and factors that can undermine it. It’s not so much the outright rejection of faith, like when one falls into formal atheism or agnosticism, as the subtle but continuing neglect of our faith that constitutes its gravest danger.

                We have to be wary therefore when we just allow ourselves to be led mainly by our feelings, moods and passions, by social trends, cultural and historical conditionings, or even by mere ideological factors, since these do not bring us to our ideal way of life.

                Yes, we have to use them—and, in fact, we cannot avoid them—but we have to make sure that they are always infused by faith. Otherwise, they can lead us to some exciting adventures or drift us aimlessly in life, but they, alone without faith, can never bring us to where we should be.

                Especially in the beginning, we have to make deliberate acts of faith, much like a child learning how to eat and write properly. We should not make a big fuss about this awkwardness or even difficulty. It’s all worth it. The important thing to keep in mind is that these acts of faith will hopefully become second nature to us.

                We need to trust God, his wisdom and his ways. Especially when things look like impossible to do or accomplish, the more we should trust him. We have to be convinced that with God, nothing is impossible.

                How many episodes in the life of Christ as narrated in the gospel attest to this fact! It’s God, it’s Christ, it’s his Church and the many instrumentalities the Church has made available to us where we can have what is essential, what is ultimate in our life.

                Let’s go beyond but not discard our tendency to rely on some human and natural sciences and arts alone as means to achieve our ultimate goal in life. We need to use our faith!

                Look at the lives of saints. In spite of their human shortcomings, it’s their faith that made them do impossible things, even to accept martyrdom. Besides, as St. Paul said, “the foolish things of the world has God chosen, that he may confound the wise. And the weak things of the world has God chosen, that he may confound the strong.” (1 Cor 1,27)

                Let’s make our faith burn, making many acts of faith, studying the doctrine, and doing things with magnanimity.

Lawyers and ethics

MY father was a lawyer, and as early as when I was in Grade 5 or 6, I already started helping around in his office which actually was in our house also. 

                That’s when I discovered I was pretty good at typing some papers, but quite a disaster when it came to filing them. My father finally gave up on me in the latter, but was happy with me in the former. He had a good typist who offered his services gratis et amore.

                Those where very memorable years when aside from learning things in school, I had the feeling I was learning a lot more in my father’s office. I felt I had the edge over my classmates in school because of what I got from my father’s office. 

                There were times we had to sleep late to finish some job, and I sacrificed a little of my youthful preferences just to be with my father whom I idolized. But I was convinced it was all worth it. I actually did not miss anything from life in the streets and moviehouses with my friends.

                There were also amusing moments. Many of my father’s clients were simple people from the towns and mountains of Bohol. They even would often stay in our house and would take their meals with us. 

                So, I got familiar with all the idiosyncracies of the different places, especially their accents, their sense of humor, their simple ways, etc. I laughed most of the time with them, but there were times when I also cried with them. The human drama of their cases was more absorbing than what I read in novels or saw in movies.

                The evening before a trial, my father would usually rehearse the clients on how to answer the possible queries during the hearing. In this area, most of the time I had fun just watching the simple folks grapple with the intricacies of logic and legal defense. But there were also moments when I asked myself whether what my father did was right.

                I was not at that time into spiritual exercises or pious practices, and much less was I clear about moral principles. But something told me there were things that did not sound quite right. 

                Like when the client would earnestly give his answer to a question my father asked, which I considered to be the real answer, and my father would tell him to modify it or simply to keep quiet on a certain point.

                I didn’t like the idea that my father would earn his living for us, a big family of 11 children, by tampering with the truth. I preferred to sell fish in the market than to do that. But I did not know how to confront him.

                Finally, when I gathered enough courage, I asked him about my doubts, and surprisingly he was very happy to engage me with what I considered as a very paternal explanation of his legal profession. My father also had a very tender heart.

                He assured me everything was ethical, and that he was not doing anything wrong just to provide for the family. And then very patiently he told me about what lawyers were supposed to do with their clients, especially those whom my father already suspected or was even sure were guilty of the accusation.

                He told me everyone has to the right to be defended, even the one who is guilty. And the lawyer’s job is to help the client defend himself along the technicalities of a legal trial.

                He told me the lawyers, like everybody else, should not tamper with the truth, but neither is the accused client obliged to incriminate himself. The burden of proof lies on the accuser. The accused is always presumed innocent unless proven otherwise. This is a legal process, my father said, not the Last Judgment before God where absolutely everything would be in the open.

                And so the accused client may not have to say everything that he knows, and when asked directly about something that might incriminate him, he can remain silent, which should not be automatically interpreted as incriminating him.

                I must confess that it took me time before I could feel at ease with this explanation. Even up to now I feel a little discomfort. But I can see the validity of the lawyer’s job to defend his client, however guilty he may be or not.

                Given this predicament, the ideal lawyer should be no less than a saint, otherwise, the temptation to play around with the truth would just be irresistible. 

Not meant to be a dead letter

OUR laws should not be left alone to dry up and deteriorate into a dead letter. We need to give them life always and revive them from time to time when they show signs of flagging. They need to be nourished, purified, attuned and adapted to situations as they flow in time.

            I wonder if we, as a people, as a nation, are aware of this responsibility. We make laws, usually worded very beautifully with all the legal jargon we can get from all sources, but then we scarcely make any effort to enforce them, much less, to make them grow and flow with the times.

            We have to remember that our laws are at best our estimation of what is truly good and fair for us. They can’t help but be reflections of the ultimate law, which is the eternal law of God, our creator.

            Unless we understand that, we would be suffering from a fundamental infirmity, if not a radical error, that would surely drift us to all kinds of dangerous destinations in life. Yes, they are mere estimations, which presume that they are supposed to be a living, dynamic phenomenon that needs to be handled accordingly. They are estimations in constant search for perfection.

            Thus, they always need refinement and polishing. They are a letter that constantly requires to be animated by the spirit proper of us as persons and children of God. Our laws cannot just be a matter of words. They have to have the spirit, otherwise, they would denature themselves.

            And their perfection is nothing less than love, just like what one liturgical prayer puts it: “Law finds its fulfillment in love.” Of course, love here means everything: truth, justice, affection, understanding, sacrifice, patience, etc.

            We have to have a very clear idea of what this love is all about, because all sorts of definitions that spring mainly from the emotions, fashions, and very partial ideologies, are now being presented to us and we need to be discerning.

            Our laws should become more and more humane, more and more able to bring us to God as well as to serve the common good.

            Thing is if we individually make some kind of periodic self-assessment or examination of conscience to see if we are still on the right track, to see if what we are now approaches what we ought to be, then all the more reason should we as collective body, as a people and nation, need to have the same regular self-examination.

            Business companies, for example, take pains to take care of their bookkeeping, lest they would fail in their business. They institute all sorts of check-and-balance mechanisms just to see to it that things are working as they should.

            But do we do this? Frankly, I don’t see much of these things around. If ever there are signs, they remain signs with hardly any substance to back them up. They are just for show.

            We need to have a radical conversion to attend to this basic need of self-examination. This obviously should start in the individual level, but it should spread to an ever-widening circle of entities—family, schools, offices, communities, towns, cities, provinces, private and public sectors, and other areas of human concerns.

            This need should be able to count on an adequate plan of practices and structures in all levels of human life, seeing to it also that the coordination among the different parts and levels is well delineated and executed.

            Are we able to pinpoint the gaping loopholes that exist, for example, in the area of how our public officials are using the public funds or approving contracts or identifying projects to be done?

            Are we growing toward a greater and more effective participation of the constituents in making decisions that affect a certain community? How are we improving our electoral process such that the true common good of the people is served and not perverted by certain machinations of politicians?

            There many other questions that can be asked, and they all show that we have to be always watchful with regard to our public affairs, and the appropriate laws should be made and improved to effectively pursue the ideal situation for us as a people.

            The problem is that our politicians in general are distracted by their desire to remain in power or to get even more of it. So we have lawmakers who, instead of making laws, more busy going around practically campaigning.

            We need to have living laws, that dead ones.