Valedictory

With this article I bid farewell to my readers. This will  terminate not only this column but also 50 years of involvement with the press – an involvement that has been merely marginal.

Some of my readers have been kind enough to say that this column has helped them. Recently a letter came from a person of note: "I’ve been reading your column and have been wondering where all those precious decent days you remember have gone to. I open the newspaper and feel overwhelmed with confused and confusing reports … Your column is an oasis of calm and quiet."

Let us just say that in a much humbler way and with much fainter voice this column has tried to echo "the glad tidings of great joy" proclaimed by the Angel to the shepherds of Bethlehem.

But the time has come to stop. Moreover, it has apparently become difficult to find space for a column that does not deal with politics or with the affairs of every day, but with the less visible values in human life, like those dealing with religion, education, culture and history. There is still much to be said on these matters, but there are younger voices that can say them better.

I wish to thank the STAR that has hosted this column for the past 20 years (from the first year of the newspaper’s existence). And I wish to thank the editors and publishers of other publications that in the last half century have published my writings.

My deepest gratitude however is to my readers, particularly to those who have read the column regularly, and who have shown anxiety whenever the column did not appear.

To them, and to all my friends, I wish a blessed Christmas, a bright new year, and a future full of hope.

Mailing address: Xavier University, Cagayan de Oro.

E-mail address: [email protected]