The priests

-->Why is it that almost always, during communion, people tend to prefer receiving the Body of Christ from the priest instead of the special ministers of the Holy Eucharist?  Even when the queues for the latter are getting shorter, few of those lined up for the priest would bother to switch lines.  With bishops it’s even worse—nagsisingitan pa.  A survey on this phenomenon—paging SWS and Pulse Asia!—would certainly yield interesting results because (according to my private mini-survey) people “feel it more” when the Host comes from the hands of a priest.  Somehow they perceive the priest as “closer to God” while the special ministers of the Holy Eucharist are just…well, special. 

The thing is, people look up to priests.  They like to think that these men in cassocks are their links to God, and therefore, holy.  They believe priests have “clean hands”.  Thus, when they find out that priests can have soiled hands or feet of clay, or somehow fail to live up to their expectations, they get disappointed. Not seeing Christ in the person of the priest, they walk away—their fervor cools off, they stop coming to church, they convert to other religions.  (I know, I know, it all sounds so unfair and unjust, for priests are human beings, too, but wait—I’m just mirroring the truth for everyone.  Walang personalan, trabaho lang).

This lady I know—a most congenial person, being in the PR business—tearfully admitted to me that she used to be a devout Catholic.  Raised a colegiala she fulfilled her religious obligations as expected of her—until she fell in love with a married man.  Head over heels in love she said she was “in bliss” with the guy but her conscience bothered her.  For a long time she inhibited herself from communion because she was aware she was in a state of grievous sin.  The day came when she felt she had missed communion for too long, and so she desired to receive Him. Soon.

Resolute and unswerving, she decided to “return to Jesus”.  She hadn’t broken off with Mr. Married Man but she intended to, soon.  She went to confession, seeking forgiveness and hoping to be strengthened by the priest.  Instead, she got bawled out of the confessional box.  “I had barely begun my confession,” she said, weeping bitter tears, “why did he shout at me?  He said ‘That’s a mortal sin, get out of here, get out!’ and slammed the window shut.  It was so loud everybody heard, I was sooo embarrassed!”  Sobbing, she left the confessional in shame as “everyone stared at me as if I’m naked”, and she never went back.  Soon she joined a “born again” community.  “I went ready to give up the man.  I needed guidance and to be led to God’s forgiveness, but instead I found condemnation.  At that moment I felt God didn’t love me at all.”

“Linda”, an active parish worker, middle-aged female, witnessed something that disillusioned her about their “beloved parish priest”.  Linda had been a cheerful volunteer, helping out in so many ways in the parish activities despite the lower class status.  For the priest’s birthday that year, she had trained a group of women from the parish’s depressed areas to do a musical number with which to serenade the priest.

At the appointed time their group got to the church, excited in their costumes, complete with guitars and tambourines.  Since she had access to the convent she went in while the group sat in the church, waiting to perform for the birthday boy.  The priest, apparently irritated, told her, “I can’t stay, I’ll be late for a meeting with the bishop. Tell them I’m already out.”  With a heavy heart, she did as told; the group left crestfallen. Linda said, “All those hours practicing went to nothing.  These were poor women, it was the only gift they could give to Father, but he had no time for it.”  But it wasn’t the end.  Linda discovered that very afternoon that “Father didn’t have a meeting with the bishop, he played tennis with his rich friends.  And to think he even made me tell a lie!” 

Now don’t get angry yet.  We’ve only just begun.  There are more stories to tell.  Wait.  As Pope Francis likes to say, our God is a God of surprises.  Who knows what awaits you in the end?

(To be continued)

'Same-sex synod' what?

They are at it again—those who have an axe to grind against the Catholic Church are finding media morsels to feast upon at the ongoing Synod of Bishops in the Vatican.  Further exploiting Pope Francis’ most misconstrued quote “Who am I to judge?”,  these people with special interests label what is actually a synod on the family as “same-sex synod”, a “novelty”, an occasion for “hundreds of celibate men” to display once more their “obsession with sex” colliding head on with their “puritanical idealism”.  It is high season for optimistic militant LGBT entities to repackage and resell their pet theories while judging the bishops and the Church as being “outdated” and woefully out of touch with reality.

I follow with mixed amusement and compassion the ways anti-Church advocates—claiming “human rights”—manipulate mainstream and social media to advance their agenda.  They start with looking oppressed—as though gays were the most tyrannized people on Planet Earth.  But are they, seriously?  At least in the Philippines, they are far from oppressed—they are not only accepted, they are loved, adored, and some are even envied for their wealth and popularity.  And their gifts and talents are not just acknowledged by the Church but are welcomed and utilized in its ministry.  I have heard of gay boys being rejected by their fathers, but only in the movies.  All the gay persons I know have no problem with acceptance.

The earliest memories I have of gays are those about the two men in charge of our town’s Flores de Mayo.  “Dalawang bakla lang ang gumagawa ng lahat diyan,” my mother would admiringly inform us, referring to the two middle-aged unmarried men—with soft wrists and hard core devotion to the Virgin Mary—who would virtually bloom whenever santacruzan time came around.  They recruited  sagalas, assigned Reinas their consortes, supervised the makeup, the flower arrangements, the carroza decoration—everything!  It never occurred to me that they were different—maybe I was too naïve to notice, just as I was too innocent to appreciate the biggest role in the santacruzan given to me—Ang Babaeng Samaritana.

No, I think the LGBT champions want more than mere acceptance—they want “gay rights” to be recognized as human rights.  They want marriage (just like the straights), they want their own “family” of adopted kids, and in the process they try to “revolutionize” Church teaching in the name of human rights.  What’s sad is they don’t seem to understand that by fighting for “gay rights” they are seeking affirmation based on mere sexuality.  In a sense they are actually asking people to measure their worth by the yardstick of sexual preference, thereby wasting their own potential as human beings. 

Claiming that the only natural love they know (and the act that accompanies it) is one for and with another person of the same gender, they argue that they have a right to find happiness in love.  “Kasalanan ko bang ipinanganak akong isang sirena?” (Is it my fault that I was born a mermaid?), a lot of gay men I know have jokingly asked.  Like any other person they look for someone to love and to be loved by, and when they do, they have sex without babies (to put it bluntly).  It’s sex to please oneself and the beloved.  Pleasure blinds the indulgent, and this is where their problem worsens.  They drop out of Church, or in any case stop listening to “God talk”—instead they choose listen to “the other side”, and from there it’s a slippery slope to perdition.

Somebody has to remind them of their “divine rights”, to convince them that they are—like everybody else, inside or outside the Catholic Church—children of a kind and loving God.  As such we have a right to ask for strength from our Father in times of temptation.  As His children we all are bound by love to listen to God’s voice, to seek His will in everything we do—and certainly, wasting sexual energy is not one of them. 

“Who says you have to have sex with your boyfriend to express your love?”  I tell this to my gay friends who seem to flit from one fling to another in search of happiness in love.  (They keep getting brokenhearted anyway).  “Happiness in love is not found in human love alone—perhaps, in ‘making you a sirena’ God wants to be your siyukoy (merman)!  But if you keep complaining and marching in the streets for your gay rights, how can you hear the Father telling you He loves you?” 

It is said that hope springs eternal in the human breast.  And so my gay friends still hope that with such a dynamic pope as Francis at the helm, the ongoing synod of bishops will maybe allow same-sex marriage.  “You see,” I tell them, “you’re just listening to the noise!  The Church will continue to love you dearly but it will never bless your same-sex union and call it marriage.”  And that’s the truth.

War and the Silence of the Cross

In a recent homily in Edipuglia, Italy, honoring all victims of war, Pope Francis said “War is madness.”  I agree.  War is big business, too—that’s probably why there seems to be no way to stop it.  And irony of ironies, the world’s loudest champion of peace is also the biggest trader in arms.  You’ve guessed it right—the US of A.

Why an “irony”?  Hear what Dwight Eisenhower said to the American Society of Newspaper Editors on April 16, 1953:  “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.  This world in arms is not spending money alone.  It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.  This is not a way of life at all in any true sense.  Under the clouds of war, it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron.”  The current figures in the arms trade point to his own country, the United States, as the Number One “thief” of the top five arms traders in the world. 
The Grimmett Report released (August 24, 2012) says the world spends a thousand billion US dollars annually on arms trade.  The period covering 2004-2011 shows the United States capturing 40% of the total in sales, followed by Russia taking 17%. France gets third place with 8%; fourth is United Kingdom, 5%; and fifth place is a tie between Germany and China, getting 4% each.

From 2005-2009, the order in arms exports was: US, 30%; Russia, 23%; Germany, 10%; France, 8% and UK, 4%, according to a report of the independent Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).  It’s interesting to note, too, that in the same period, the US’ top customers were South Korea, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates, while Russia’s biggest clients were China and India.  Germany sold mostly to other European countries such as Turkey and Greece; France’s main clients were United Arab Emirates, Singapore and Greece; while the bulk of UK’s sales went to the US.  (OhmyGee, what a crazy merry go round, a contemptible circus!)  If you consider who sells to whom and who buys from whom, and link your observations to border conflicts and regional wars currently filling up the news, you can more or less predict who will side with whom when these conflicts escalate.  Indeed, there is truth in Pope Francis’ words about a third world war that may have already begun—“one fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction.”

Pope Francis continued, “War is irrational; its only plan is to bring destruction: it seeks to grow by destroying.  Greed, intolerance, the lust for power—these motives underlie the decision to go to war and they are too often justified by an ideology… When man thinks only of himself, of his own interests and places himself in the center, when he permits himself to be captivated by the idols of dominion and power, when he puts himself in God’s place, then all relationships are broken and everything is ruined; then the door opens to violence, indifference, and conflict.”

War dehumanizes man, the Pope said, as to be human means to care for one another.  “But when harmony is broken… the brother who is to be cared for and loved becomes an adversary to fight, to kill… we bring about the rebirth of Cain in every act of violence and in every war… we continue this history of conflict between brothers… We have perfected our weapons, our conscience has fallen asleep, and we have sharpened our ideas to justify ourselves. As if it were normal, we continue to sow destruction, pain, death! Violence and war lead only to death, they speak of death! Violence and war are the language of death!”

Is there a way out?  Is it possible (as the hippies used to chant) to give peace a chance?  True peace, the pope said, is born of the human heart reconciled with God and with one’s brothers.”  To get off from this “spiral of sorrow and death…” the Pope believes all men and women of goodwill, regardless of religious affinity or whether or not they profess any religion, must enter what he calls the silence of the Cross.  “My Christian faith urges me to look to the Cross. There, we can see God’s reply: violence is not answered with violence, death is not answered with the language of death.  In the silence of the Cross, the uproar of weapons ceases and the language of reconciliation, forgiveness, dialogue, and peace is spoken.”

The silence of the Cross can make the “noise of weapons cease,” help one leave behind the self-interest that hardens the heart, overcome the indifference that makes the heart insensitive towards others.  “War always marks the failure of peace, it is always a defeat for humanity,” Pope Francis said.

True, nobody ever wins a war.  A Pentagon official reportedly explained why the US military censored graphic footage from the Gulf War:  “If we let people see that kind of thing, there would never again be any war.”  Fact: the US became the prime supplier to the Middle East after the 1991 Persian Gulf crisis.  Do you see a connection?

But now, nearly 25 years and monumental information technology leaps later, we do see such war footage.  Tortures, beheadings, mass graves, suicide bombings, child soldiers—we don’t just read about the cruelty of war in history books, we see the graphic images on our tv screens and computers.  What do we do about it?  H. G. Wells once said, “If we do not end war, war will end us.”  And that’s the truth.