To the Christian world, spring as a symbol of a new life also helps us prepare for the Lenten Season – whose climax comes on Easter Sunday.
When Lent comes, I try my best to spend a few days to reflect and meditate upon what is truly important in my "celestial investment portfolio" and re-evaluate my "pre-departure luggage" for that afterlife journey, especially now that I have passed the half-century mark.
At an evening retreat in Santa Ana, California, I got to meet Sister Mary Beth of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Like Jesus in His teachings, the outgoing and artistic sister Mary Beth uses photographs that she herself has taken for her very interesting presentation.
She had lived in Taiwan, learning about the slower pace of the East while falling in love with lotus flowers. In a slide presentation she showed retreat participants growth of the lotus plant from its bareroot stage during winter to the time blossoms in summer. She said that people often see the lotus flowers that grow with joy and radiance often in a pond of stale water that is left alone till it dries up. Many people are oblivious to the fact that the lotus grows naturally in murky water with dirt and debris. Sister Mary Beth said that God in His loving ways allows us to grow like the lotus plants. However, this growth becomes stunted when we listen and follow when the generally materialistic world defines what or who we are.
Most of our waking moments and working years, I think, are spent in the dogged pursuit of the three worldly P’s – possessions, power and prestige. In a fast-paced society like that in the USA, we enter the rat race and often become "rats" ourselves which never find that elusive dream of tranquility. Remember that in every rat race, the rats always win. Seldom do we find quality time to invest in other equally, if not truly more, important endeavors. A philosopher’s quotation in my library says it all: "The poor want to be rich, the rich desire paradise, but the wise simply choose tranquility."
This Lent, many symbols of our faith are shown – the cross, the cloth, the nails, the blood, tears and the entire journey to Calvary. But the greatest is the Resurrection – when Christ conquered death and rose to heaven and redeemed us from our sins with his life. What a symbol of love!
But without faith, we cannot see this obvious gift because other trimmings of life’s successes (or excesses) blind us. We cannot hear the message because of the barrage of noise from all the infomercials in TV, media and shopping malls. That’s why many religious people in many religions of the world, like the Buddhist monks, priests and nuns go on regular retreats to meditate, reflect and pray to grow spiritually. The Lenten rituals can help the faithful develop a more forgiving and meek but loving heart to enjoy that tranquillity in their souls. Jesus, as the greatest revolutionary radical of His time, loved to go to the mountain and pray, but He always came down to walk with the people. Praying is easier to do, but living it and giving witness to the world is the challenge. But Jesus’ life can be our living model. The story of the passion of Christ with all its many colorful symbols can serve as the lighthouse to our destination.
Many smaller Christian religions or denominations have a more disciplined approach to Bible study compared to students in Catholic schools. Looking back, it seemed to me that it was wrong for my Church (comprising of you and me), through their self-anointed leaders not to allow the faithful to have hold Bible studies and spirited discussions with the apparent belief, perhaps, that only the priests and nuns are the only intelligent people that should read the Bible and understand its teachings. Open discussions of many biblical issues were never encouraged. In my visits to the Philippines, this educational and cultural way of teaching and indulging in open, spirited and intelligent discussions has apparently remained unchanged vis-a-vis the standards that I have seen here in the United States.
Religion, the way it is being practiced in the Philippines, and the widespread poverty of the Great Unwashed have a distinct common denominator – ignorance. In my heart, I think that most schools and the churches in the Philippines (including the Catholic Church) share in the blame. They have failed miserably to truly educate the people to question critically and to think for themselves. The Church has been quite protective of its centralized authority and therefore, has unwittingly controlled the dispensing of knowledge. This atmosphere gave rise to the predictable influence and psychological power of some charismatic, "religious" but mansion-loving leaders like Mike Velarde of El Shaddai, (with the imprimatur of the Catholic Church?). I dare say that in an ideal planet of critical thinkers where accountability, transparency, integrity and credibility (ATIC), to borrow the acronym from my political activist-friend Roberto "Bobby" Mercado Reyes, the founder of the Media Breakfast Club and www.YIMBY.COM online magazine, are a must. Velarde’s EL SHADY will never mushroom and prosper! It is said that only in darkness can mushrooms grow. Did you ever ponder what happens to the mushrooms once they are brought into the light? They wilt and die! Unfortunately, many Filipino "mushrooms" flourish and one even became president!