The Simple Notes

This article will show a short explanation on the raison de etre of the blog, its content and methodology.

The intention of the blog is for purely personal consumption. All the articles posted here are products of the author’s personal readings in philosophy and theology. They are his SIMPLE NOTES. The author is not an expert but rather licensed to teach on these two fields. He finished his undergraduate and master in philosophy, and another master in theology.

The author wishes not to waste his time and energy in doing his personal readings on those fields. Since this site is free, he preserves his understanding by keeping all readings in one single file, instead of keeping them in his personal computer. Wherever the author goes, he may have access over them anytime and post other new articles too.

How do these published articles appear? They are written in condensed form, and structured how the author understood the flow of their ideas either in inductive or deductive way. The author himself is not an expert on those disciplines. Instead the author is trying his best to summarize the thoughts of the philosophers and theologians in fragments. It is not scholarly done but the essential thoughts are there.

At the end of each article is the acknowledgement of the source where it is taken, to give justice to the original writers of those topics. No footnotes and bibliography are used, because they are too short. A maximum of one page – letter-standard size – is the size of the content. To reiterate, this blog is for the consumption of the author when he needs them in the future. But the author is willing to share it to any reader who happens to surf this site if he finds them helpful.

What’s on your mind?

The title above is taken from FACEBOOK, a common social networking site today. It has been loved and patronage by many people around the globe. That title is displayed on the homepage of site where one has all the chances to shout at the top of their lungs what they want to say to the world. It is a new phenomenon.

Some may say, and I am not exempted from being one, people who are fond of writing on the space of What’s on your mind are being unnoticed (ta pidi attencion). But that is not all the case. In reading Emmanuel Levinas’ ethics, the face of others tells something about our human existence. Two things I would like to point here. First, a person is a reflection of our own self. He may have come from a distinct family upbringing but how we understand him is not far from what we are. Second, the person whom we have spent a lot of time, though it is not limited to friendship and lovers, is calling the significant other of being heard. This reminds us of our duty in Kantian sense to fulfill for the sake of the good and well-being of the significant other – our ones a fellow member of the community – in this case, the Pastor Bonus Seminary.

In line of this thought, this site will serve as freedom wall where each one can express one’s opinions, ideas and perspectives in life, for we are all graduates of philosophy, which is the unending search of meanings in life. Each contribution will manifest what’s in our mind, and it will be treated with utmost respect, understanding, and most of all, acceptance where each one is remembered in history as brothers. From this I do believe unsolicited but authentic assistance and wisdom will pour down the way.

The One-Sided Speaker

In the previous article that I have written, the whole point of it is to shed light on the role of lay-teachers in the life and mission of the Church. This will bring us to consciousness of many religious people who are being one-sided. An instance of this is the way the speaker neglects the fundamental importance of why these lay-teachers applied in their educational institution during the seminar on the WBLS and RCC.


If I am correct, the speaker began the talk with an introduction on two premises. First is that every Catholic school is founded on the mission of Christ – the reason of its being. And secondly, teachers applied in their institutions because of the need for money. But what happened eventually is that the flow of the exposition is now focused on the mission and not money. The speaker has intentionally separated mission from money.

Of course many are indignant in what they were listening. We could not believe that what the speaker was trying to say, and to support the claim, writings from the documents also been cited. But from the very beginning, the audiences were already following to where the flow of the talk would lead to. And many were expecting that there will be fusion between the two premises. But the speaker has gone beyond the boarder that if the lay-teacher still living with the idea of expecting more and living on compensation, that teacher, according to the narrow-minded speaker, has not imbibed the true intention of the Church – mission.

The speaker has missed two importance matters. To enumerate again, those two things are: the lay-teachers are not compensated through the generosity of the Church’s leaders, and the lay-teachers are front liners and great benefactors of the Church. It is not the other way around because they are not self-reliant. They have not read in one of the encyclical letters that salvation is not only an aspect of spirituality but on the totality of the person (Sollicitudo Rei Socialis). Thus these lay-teachers are not to be fed with purely spiritual matters. Even the speaker herself has already forgotten the second premise that they hire these people because they need money for survival. I just hope that every religious speaker should always bear in mind that no mission has ever survived without the involvement of money, lest there would be no tuition fees to be collected from the students and no payment for the reception of the sacraments in the parish.

Lay-Teachers: Partners in Church’s mission

This article will focus on the lay-teachers who are working in the Catholic educational institutions. This thought has been circulating in my mind after attending various seminars given to the teachers. We, the delegates of representing schools, cannot help but express to our dismay that most of the speakers, usually appointed religious people, are one-sided. The content of their talk is substantial for our professional growth, but somehow detrimental both to the lay people in general, and to the Church, whom we dearly loved most, in particular. What I want to explain here are of two things: the lifestyle of the lay people is different from the religious men and women, and the crucial role of the lay in the mission of the Church. Hopefully, in the end, this will help us enlighten that lay people and religious are unique partners in being the hands of Jesus in spreading the Gospel values.

Objectively speaking, the lifestyles of the lay people and the religious are different. What makes the two peoples different is not their status of life like being single or married. It is because some lay people are also internally professed celibate for Christ like the religious. However, lay people have so many responsibilities than the religious. Lay people, either single or married, have to support their family members and loved ones. Of course the religious people are not exempted from this duty. But the lay people have to divide their meagre salary for his self, and for others. Who is this ‘his self?’ A teacher whose work is far from his hometown, has to divide the monthly salary for the boarding house, for food, and other basic needs like cellular phone load, cosmetics, etc. If the teacher is married, his self is his own partner in life, his children, housing loan, and other basic necessities. On the other hand, the religious people, although they do not receive single peso as his salary, he is provided with everything, from shelter, food, clothing, and other basic necessities too. And somehow they are free from manual work, because they have hired people to do those things. Thus we cannot, and will not ever be, put these two peoples on the same footing.

The role of the lay-teachers in the Church is so crucial for two things. First is that lay-teachers are part of the definition of the word ‘laity’ as members of the Church whose mission is to sanctify all temporal realities. This people are indeed part of the world, immersed in the world, struggling in the world, and spreading the Word of God in their respective places and real-life situation. An example of the crucial role of the lay-teachers, and the lay in general, in the Philippine setting is during the conduct of local and national elections of choosing leaders-to-be of our country. The religious people, who are part of the Church hierarchy, are in neutral status or non-partisan. As part of the mission of the Church, these religious people are giving political education to the lay, because change in the society can be done with them as front liners of the Church. And secondly, the Catholic Church needs the help of the lay people particularly their financial assistance to support her projects and activities. The Church, objectively speaking, cannot survive solely on spiritual assistance alone. An example to this is the dissemination of Mission Sunday envelopes, because financial assistance could not be provided by the Church’s hierarchy alone. Thus there is the existence of benefactors and generous donors.

The invited speakers, who belong to any religious groups, have to understand better their vocation within the Church and the position of the lay-teachers in their educational institutions. Being one-sided is tantamount to say as being insensitive to the realities of life. Religious people have to care more these lay-teachers who are front liners and supporters of the Church, lest they become too narrow-minded, selfish and day-dreamers of the impossibilities.

‘Reason ought to be slave of the Passion’ – David Hume

The month of February is known to many as the month of the hearts. During these times, people who are full of love and who are loveless are meditating on how they are going to celebrate love. Love, as we know it, is not only intended between two lovers. Love is for everyone, between family members, classmates and schoolmates, girl or boy, rich or poor, elder and younger people. The effect of love is to spread and to share it to all. As they say, love comes from the heart. But love is now being manipulated by reasons. It is not that bad at all so long as it does not go against the nature of love.

As expected by many, the fruit of love is good. This good comes from favourable actions done by anyone to anybody. And since everyone is good, this goodness would naturally come out from everyone. When the result is bad, then, that is not the manifestation of love, but rather a manifestation that reason or the manipulator is using love for other purposes, and their intention is artificial – flowing unnaturally. And they would remark proudly that ‘we are doing it in the name of love.’ But the right thing to say is ‘we are doing it with the use of love.’

David Hume, a British empiricist, asserts that reason ought to be slave of the passion. Here one may think of him that he is the promoter of pleasure. The connotation of the term passion is related to it. But following his thought in one of his writings Enquiry on Human Understanding, he has that good intention of saying it. And what is it? He says that No amount of reasoning can persuade evil people (those with evil desires) to any course of action except that which already attracts them. Two points can we get out if this statement. First is that many people are manipulating the objective meaning of love and their true calling to love others. These people have evil desires, for the result of their action is not good. And the second point is that, being intelligent and possessing intelligence is not a guarantee that he is formed to be loving person.

The resolution to this scene is right for Hume. A person with evil intention could not produce good results. It is because that person thwarts the real nature of love. It is only when that person, having the right intention of loving, could produce hundreds of positive relationships. A piece of advice to intelligent people is: follow your passion to love, and not waste your intelligence on your unreasonable reasons of being unloving.

Being broken...

Broken family may be defined when a parent left his partner and children and cling to another partner. This may be easily said that the person has left one’s family and built another family. It happens because of various and unavoidable reasons and we cannot confine only to a particular reason. It is a reality that cannot be denied that it breaks the family as an institution – the societal unit and cell of the community. Thus when one belongs to this institution, one cannot help but he or she is also broken in one’s personality.

Effects of being broken

Let us focus on the person who is part of the broken family. That person is in one way or another is broken. There is a leak or crack in one’s personality, an imbalance self. It affects too one’s perspective and principles too. The worst is that it affects in dealing with another person the way we deal that hurts others as well. Here the hurt dominates, and so it blinds him from not hurting others. Unless one is ready to face and figure out the source of this hurt, one cannot move on in his life but continually hurting innocent and wonderful people especially when the subject of conversation is about family.

Remedy

Only in being conscious of one’s brokenness can help remedy the situation, and then healing begins to take place. But being conscious is not enough. One needs to exert extraordinary effort in getting healed by accepting the reality. It will be of help when one develops a positive attitude and value towards human relationship especially family relationship. The consequence is this that wounded person becomes defender and protector of family.

Is it possible?

Yes, it is possible, even the wounded or broken person did not experience having a complete family; so long our willingness to live in the realm of possibility is present. Our brokenness must not hinder us from taking good care of others, lest we scar others with our own wounds. Just live life with acceptance, and by treating each other as brothers and sisters, and the older ones as if he or she is one’s mother and father. If one strives and believes in making this messy world like heaven (like St. Therese did), why can’t the broken?

The simple way of being a true Christian

Who are Christians? Christians are those who professed their belief in the Son of Mary as the ‘one sent by God’ to be the savior and liberator of mankind from the bondage of sin and death. Every Christian has gotten his identity on the savior and liberator of the world, whose name is no other than Jesus the Christ. Each Christian should anchor his life on this significant person. It means that one’s life should be patterned after the life of Christ, i.e. following his examples by living a simple lifestyle amidst the materialistic world (not by being one of them), and being close to the poor by giving much time and attention to these little ones (not the rich ones that makes each Christian bowing down before them because of their wealth). This I believe is what makes each followers of Christ true Christians.

 

The goal of this article is not theological by giving high-sounded and academic approach, but by simply showing the basic means on how to be a true Christian. This item is timely as the world joyously waits for the second coming of Jesus into our hearts. Being authentic Christians should live up one’s life according to the patterns of Jesus’ life – simple lifestyle and close to the poor. What mars the face of Christianity is the absence of the two, mostly done by our leaders in the Church. It is undeniably a fact that when our lifestyle is one with the affairs of the world, it follows that one is also worshipping the false God – money – at the expense of the rich. Even the rich become their own God to these people of cloth who values and loves money at the expense of the Church.

 

This season of Christmas is the right time to renew our faith in Jesus by welcoming Him again into our life. Jesus has become poor for us to see the real essence that life on earth is not all that is the case, i.e. there is only one life and world to live forever. Thus it is an opportune time for each Christian to make Jesus again rich in the hearts of many. This is the best Christmas gift that we can give to Jesus. To all of us, have a blessed and merry Christmas!!!