The Sun That Never Rise

When the blades were green and full of vigour,

When it stood facing the rays of the sun,

When the gentle breeze of the wind blew gently its leaves,

When together with the butterflies it joyfully played with the rhythm of the nature,

When it added to the glorious ambiance of the panorama,

Everything was alive.

When the green blades were removed and the total vigour were changed into frailness,

When it cannot anymore stood with the rays of the sun,

When the gentle breeze of the wind that blew gently its leaves were turned into a storm of mourning,

When the butterflies that played with the rhythm of the nature

Became gigantic vultures that consumed the corpse,

When the glorious ambiance of the panorama turned into a sorrowful grief,

Death replaced life.

When death replaced life and everything you were fighting for came into nothing,

When you needed to bid farewell to the point of no return,

When you saw your love ones shed their tears unceasingly,

When you needed to face the reality that you cannot anymore laugh with them,

Eat with them and cry with them,

When you needed to accept the fact that you cannot anymore protect them,

Then that is the most sorrowful moment.

Yet, like grasses, we should not lose hope

That someday the sun will rise in the horizon of the east

That the ferocious waves of the ocean turns into tranquillity

That the vicious storm turn into a gentle breeze

That the farewell that you feared of, turn into a welcoming embrace

That the tears that you shed turns into wide-ranging laughter

That the fear of not experiencing the laughter and companionship

Turns into horrible nightmare

That you will wake up and everything is just a dream

I hope it is…

That like the grasses on the ground,

Your dreams, hopes and other aspirations will slowly sprout in the surface of life

That you can say again to yourself this is another beautiful morning in my life

But that is not the reality of a man grieving for the loss of his beloved best friend

Of the loss of the person whom he considered as his standing colossal that protects him,

That loves him tenderly

The loss of his father

I am grieving, I am grieving, I am grieving

Until when?

Only God knows

I hope everything is just a dream.

THE FACES OF CHOICES

In my elementary, high school and even college years, my most favourite type of exam is the multiple choice type. This is because for sure the answers are already laid in front of me and all I have to do is to choose and if I did not study—to make a lucky choice. My life also is governed with an unending choices. Every step I take I am confronted with a choice—to choose to step or not to step. From the time I open my eyes after sleeping I have to make a choice—to get up from bed or to remain cuddling with my pillows. Even at the time of eating, a lot of act of choosing happens. From the decision to eat or not to eat and to choose on what set of menu to eat. Everything is a choice.

Our life is determined by our choices. Confucius once said, “People's lives are the result of the choices they make-or fail to make”. Each of us, as we live our lives, the path that we decided to take is not arbitrary, it is our choice, yet, in every choice, a consequence awaits us. That is how our choices determine the kind of path that we want to take in life. All people, whatever their circumstances, make the choices on which their lives depend. 

My seminary formation is also governed with choices—from the very moment I decided to enter in the college seminary in our diocese is an act of choosing. Even the act of continuing my seminary formation in the formal theological level is another manifestation of how choices govern my life. William Shakespeare in “Hamlet” made an immortal line that perjures even today and perhaps in the coming tomorrows—“to be or not to be: that is the question”. The image and the entirety of our being depends on how we want this being to be.

As a Roman Catholic Christian I also that in the creation of man by God being an “Imago Dei” is the foundation of these choices. We have choices because we are gifted with the freedom to choose. If we are not free, then we will not have any choice at all. We are free because according to 2 Corinthians 3:17 “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom”.

We are free to choose but in every choice lies a consequence. That is why we have to be mature enough to be accountable to our choices. As the Galatians 5:13 says “You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love”.

We seminarians call the seminary as our home, yet it is always our choice to stay in the place we call our home or to leave. To be good in the seminary or to be wild as much as how we want it to be. To cooperate or not to cooperate with our seminary formation or, to do or not to do what we ought to do. We are free to make choices, yet, after all lies the consequences of our choices and as a seminarian, I believe the most painful part is when we are remove from the place we called our home. In this situation is it still our choice? I believe so, because in this situation although it is the decision of the formators and somehow not directly our choice, but I believe, we somehow indirectly choose it. In the very first place, it was our choice to do things which we knew very well that it was not in accordance with seminary formation.

All of us have our freedom to choose and how we live our lives depend on our choices, however if we get strayed because of our choices, we still have a chance to choose again—now to choose for the better. It doesn't make us a bad person if we make wrong choices, rather, it makes us a bad person if we never learn from our wrong choices and continue to choose it again and again.

It is not yet too late, let us make a right choice in the name of God. AD MAIOREM DEI GLORIAM. 

Amor Vincet Omnia

Amor Vincet Omnia

When a father loses his job, his children, his wife and the entire family, what can he hold on to? Can he still hope that there is still tomorrow and that the sun will rise again in the east and when the evening comes the bright stars will again entertain his wounded heart? At times of uncertainties and doubts, one word can be our armour and shield—Amor. Amor is a Latin word for love. When a heart is still capable of loving, even how great is the challenge, “Amor vincet Omnia”—love conquers all.

The servant of God Archbishop Teofilo Camomot once said “God is in each and every one of us and we can find Him in our hearts”. Our heart is also the locality of Amor, the locality of love. That is the reason why I would say instead Deus Vincet Omnia, I would say Amor vincet Omnia, because I believe that when I start to love, I also start to recognize that God is present in my heart.

Before I decided and proceeded to the theological studies of my seminary formation, a lot of fears confronted my entire ontological existence—the fear that I may not be able to endure the intellectual rigor of theological courses, the fear that I may not sustain to the end until the time that I may finish my theological studies, the fear that I may not be accepted by the new community, the fear that I may not be able to adjust to the new culture that I may encounter and so on and so forth. A lot of fears that if I am going to concentrate myself into, I may be drowned and perhaps may banish into the nothingness and the absence of my treasured existence. Yet after all, I am here because I still love, I love God and I believe that although I can express my love  for him in many different ways, it is in priesthood that I can best express this love to God.

However, love has a very staunch anathema that is not hatred but fear. Once a person is enslaved of fear, authentic love will also be enslaved and worst, it hinders the intimacy of our relationship with our fellowmen and women.

FEARS subtle attack on man

Our fears can be our hindrances towards living life authentically. Fear can also hinder the intimacy of our relationship with others and with God. These fears of ours attack us subtly. These fears are like shadows, they are part of us. We cannot go away from these fears. It is already part of us. Each of us have our own fair share of fears.

This is the reason why we should not confront and fight back with our fears because they can never be defeated nor can be removed away from us. These fears will always haunt us unless we recognize that indeed we possess these fears, that indeed we are afraid.

We need to be vigilant when will these fears comes out or manifests their existence within us. We can only do so if we name our fears, if we own our fears, if we forgive ourselves and others who in one way or the other contributed to the fear that we possess and finally accept that indeed we are afraid. We have to name and own our fears. Our fears are like shadows hiding in the dark. These fears must be brought into light because if not, then these fears will sabotage us when they are triggered in the near future.

Befriending our FEARS

David Richo in his book “Shadow Dance: Liberating the Creativity of Your Dark Side”, mentioned about “befriending our shadow”. It is not that we have to defeat our shadows but we have to befriend otherwise we will always be repeating the same process again and again as we try our best to liberate the creativity of our dark sides, the creative energy that can be drawn from befriending our fears.

This is also the way how to conquer our fears, a very clever way of conquering our fears. We do not have to suppress nor fight against our fears, rather we just have to befriend our fears.

Fr. Richard Rohr in his book “The Wild Man’s Journey: The authentic experience of masculine initiation towards masculine journey” said we have to “secretly steal the key from our mother’s pillow”. What does it mean? Our mothers are symbols of our comfort zones. Most of us if not all are pampered by our parents especially our mother. If we are going to remain at our comfort zones, we will not be able to name and own our fears. But like in our relationship with our mother, if we are going to go out from the comfort zones that our mother gave us, we will incur a wound in our mothers’ heart that is why we need to do it cleverly in a way that she will not notice.

According to Fr. Rohr in his above mentioned book, “each male must be initiated to the masculine spirituality” after we lost our “golden ball”. The “golden ball” that we possess can be our comfort zones in life. When we are in the bosom of our parents especially from our mother, we were in our individual comfort zones. Yet, when we were spank by our mother because we did not follow what she want, we lost our golden ball. When we were carried by our fathers in their shoulders, that was our golden ball, yet, when we got his sermon in front of our friends and we were shamed, we lost our golden ball. Each of us, in many different ways possess our comfort zones, yet when we were forced to get out from that comfort zones, then that is the time that we need mentors to accompany us towards the process of our masculine journey.

In the many oriental practices, masculine initiations happened many times with Buddhist monks, with the masters in other cultural and ethnic denominations. Even in our own native practices as Filipinos like circumcision, I believe it is also our own way of masculine initiation towards masculine spirituality.

Perhaps seminary formation is also like that. We were removed from our individual comfort zones for us to be initiated into the spirituality that we may wish to follow for the rest of our lives.

Masculine initiation is very painful and not rushed. It is “slowly, persistently bucketing from the pond where the wild man is” as Fr. Rohr would say. It is very stingy because the wild man is very dirty that we don’t want to touched but when we were able to bucket the pond and we get hold of the wild man and we tamed the wild man, then that is the time that we get hold of our own very self because that wild man is in us. It is in each and every one of us. Each of us have the wild man with in that we have to take hold on to, to master and to tame because if not, then it will sabotage us in the near future.

The wild man in us represents our individual issues in life. Each of us have our own issues by the time we lost our golden ball in many different ways. If we will not recognize, master and take a hold on our issues, time will come that once those issues are triggered, then those issues will explode like atomic bombs that are very difficult to control and perhaps will hinder our authentic relationship towards the people around us.

I believe that is also the rationale behind why we have to cooperate and be honest with ourselves in our seminary formation particularly in human formation, so that authentic guidance towards the initiation to the masculine spirituality will authentically happened. That for me is the most crucial part of seminary formation, once we are not ready, once we are not honest with ourselves, with our issues, with our struggles, then the dilemma of seminary formation starts.

This is a very tiring and rigorous task, yet, we should not be afraid because after all “Amor vincet Omnia” love conquers all. In the eyes of God we are all wounded but in our woundedness, that is where God meets us, that is where we need him most. St Paul would say I boast with my imperfections, with my weaknesses because in my weaknesses that is where that I am strong, and I would say in my weaknesses that is where that I am ultimately strong because the power of God is more than enough to make me strong amidst my imperfections, amidst my woundedness, amidst my brokenness, amidst my weaknesses. After all Amor vincet Omnia—love conquers all.