Christmas 2014

Maligayang Pasko po sa ating lahat!

Just a little share...

Just a little share...

2012, I had both Christmas and New Year's eve dinner at the steps of Puregold Molito having a sandwich and a soda by myself...

At the time, I thought I was kind of a tough s.o.b., roughing it for the sake of the job.

Now, when I look back, I still think it is awesome to be able to sacrifice for the sake of a good job but I no longer think I'm a tough s.o.b. for doing so.

Truth is, no one wants to be away from family on a Noche Buena or a Media Noche...

No one... including yours truly.

Even if I were to be throwing it down with the best team in the universe... no team beats the team you were born into... especially on Christmas or New Year's eves.

Thems the breaks though, as they say... Such is such, my darling dear, until such a time that it is no longer such... or until the last pence is paid.

In short, ganun talaga ang buhay, parang life lang... paikot-ikot... ang mahilo taya! Lol.

Life isn't giving anybody lemons because life totally sucks. Actually, when life gives one lemons, many a time life is only teaching one how to make good lemonade.

So here I am again this year it looks like... 

I'm going to make me some good lemonade.
---<--@

My mom and I did some Christmas shopping yesterday. We were on a meager budget but we managed to stretch it. We had a nice lunch after.

In the afternoon, my mom did all the wrapping for me as I was so tired. I came back from my Friday shift in the pre-dawn hours of Saturday, you see. Anyway, I didn't know my mom was really fast at wrapping gifts... she was like a gift wrapping machine! Lol.

Right now, when I think about it, I'm really glad I got most of my Christmas presents wrapped and ready. It makes me smile inside when I recall how my mom and I made it all happen in a day.

The gifts themselves are not that much but all my thought went into them with the simple hope of making my loved ones smile inside this Christmas.

I say they are "not that much" not because of what they cost but because I don't like giving gifts I myself do not like. When it comes to the principle of gift, my attitude is: If God decides that I should keep what I am giving, that I should be just as happy (i.e. in keeping them as I am in giving them away). For I would that I neither give nor like the act of giving rubbish gifts.

Because the giving is the gift. 

Therefore, if I were able to get what I really want to give to the all people I love this Christmas (and there are so many), I'd have gotten something different and incidentally, because the world is still the world, a tad bit more expensive. For now, however, such is such. 

Receiving gift is another matter, mind you, involving another aspect of liberality.

When the miracle of sharing is reversed and I am on the receiving end of gift, my focus when I meditate on those things is: That I should always be thankful as if the joy of the giver were added to my own.

(One can not fully "see into" the essence of these moments of sharing - in the exact moment - because these moments usually involve the welling up of many different emotions and therefore, are no so quiet... I guess that's why there's Boxing Day, December 26. To be thankful, save for pure miracles of grace, we often have to remember to remember).

In short, when on the receiving end, there is no such thing as an unworthy gift given in the true spirit of giving. There really are no rubbish gifts, both in giving and in receiving, only rubbish attitudes of sharing.

Because the giving is the gift. 

And this Christmas, the message shall be made known, once again, to all hearts of humanity that "The Giver is the gift", alleluia.

These things are a wonder to remember, are they not?

I guess this is the spirit of Gaudete Sunday which is the 3rd Sunday of the Advent Season. Joy in the midst of hope... Summer in the midst of winter...

Yes indeed, it's Gaudete Sunday today... it's going to be a great Christmas this year.

Thank You, Lord Jesus, for precious memories like these!
---<--@

Freedom for Sale

Corruption is not inspiration.
Corruption is trouble and ruin.

Do not give in to corruption!

Citizen, who you are is why you work.

So just be the best you can be... 

And it will be well for all in the world.
---<--@

Is your freedom for sale?

Do not sell your vote. 

Those who would buy your vote
would buy your rights and your freedom too
if they could...

So don't sell yourself out, Citizen - reserve the vote.

If you can't vote or if you feel disinclined to vote,
for any reason you may think compels you, abstain. 

Reserve your vote.

Vote only when you are convinced of the power of the vote.

- selah -

Your vote counts. 

So vote to win!

A single vote might seem to you insignificant
and should tomorrow you came to believe this true, Citizen,
then tomorrow our democracy too might perish.

Consider the reliance of the stars,
how entire stars rely on the action of their most fundamental elements
to complete their life cycles.

Can we not shine bright as those stars, Citizen,
through the Three Foundation Stars of our Country?

Therefore,
whoever one may choose to elect by way of the ballot,
understand that when we, the people, vote...

we vote to win.
---<--@

End Modern Day Slavery

The poverty of war
and the poverty of hunger...

These are forms of modern day slavery
that weaken and impoverish the life
of entire human communities.

The former is a wholesale form of bondage
arising from lack of spiritual remembrance,
the latter from a lack of temporal means...

Both are evils that lend their strengths to each other. 

We can not effectively defend against one
and forget the other.

Think about it.
---<--@


I am committed to ending modern day slavery.

Immaculate Conception 2014

Let us implore our Lady, the Immaculate Conception, 
to help see our Country safely through Typhoon Ruby. 

May the Blessed Virgin Mary watch over our communities 
and keep our families safe...

Tomorrow is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

---<--@

20141212 Friday 306H: Salamat po mahal naming Ina sa ibinigay ninyong awa, ang Bagyong Hagupit sa ami'y hindi naging sobrang lupit...

Thinking Forward 30 Years

So in a future world 30 years from now... 

When our technology has developed widely enough and deeply enough that the sum of all these innovations combined have become applications fully capable and mature enough to replace us in those fields of human endeavor traditionally reserved for the human professional...

What then?

If the maturity of our remembrances do not keep abreast with these advances, not to mention keep ahead of the evolution of the spirit of War, our own technology might eventually forget who we are and soon after become hostile to our common humanity.

Instead of being in our common service, our machines may become our masters and through them, War will gain another way of entering into our times.

The human realm is a temporal realm - time is for us what the timeless is for the angels. Time is the sea we human beings were created to swim in and prosper through - as a family of Nations.

Our exile was also a time not a place. Place is relative to time... 

Choice is important... The choice for peace. The choice to love. The choice to remember. The choice to accept. The choice to change and to be... The choice to say, "yes". 

Awakened freedoms awaken dreams and bring them forth in time.

These choices take us places... places arising from things we think about and do everyday.

Small indeed when compared to the immensity of the universe we inhabit...

A universe that itself was birthed from a single choice... a choice our Creator made for us... still makes with us and through us and for us - for the glory of His Name and for our good.

Here things rise and fall, but in the midst of all it's comings and goings, we know of things that stay and are for always - and these are not things.

Machines can never be made to understand or comprehend these deeper things of the Spirit. How can they? Our technologies are purely temporal constructs. But we human beings are not machines - a part of us shall always transcend, now and forever, of the physicality of all things temporal.

For we are the stewards of this realm of God's creation. This is how He made us. If we forget, it is our loss.

But how can we? All things seen and unseen proclaim His Peace.

Religion proposes this to our hearts - we react as if it were an expectation already in us, so that if we are generous to the call of faith, we are then made to discover the wonder of faith seeking understanding...

And we make a choice.

But even if one is not religious or have chosen to have no religion, it stands to naked human reason... If we do not take care of what we have on this planet, what little we do have left will soon leave us with the ebbing of the tides of time.

We are how we treat each other, and that is all.

- selah -

Here in the Philippines, our path in the short term as regards these takes us through to 2046... Half-way through, we have to prove our peace and pass the test, that we may carry on safely, assured of better times ahead.
---<--@

Bansa at Bukluran at Sambayanang Kanlungan

This is my most current attempt at expressing in the Filipino language, the key elements that by my accounting give rise to the particular character and sovereign being of our Republic undertaking of Country i.e Nation, State, Society = Country.
---<--@

Ating Pagka-Bansa
(Our Nationhood - Sovereign Foundation)

Pangngalan: Bansa na sa ati'y Sarili

Gawaing marunong: Pakikipag-kapwa tao (o ang Pagiging-makatao) at Pakikipag-diwang totoo (o ang Pagiging-makatotoo)

Lamang dunong: Kapayapaan at Katotohanan
---<--@

Ating Pagkaka-Buklod
(Our Statehood - Sovereign Expression)

Pangngalan: Buklurang Panglipunan

Gawaing marunong: Pakiki-bahagi (Pakikipag-ugnayan) at Pakiki-isa (Pakiki-atin)

Lamang dunong: Katarungan at Katiwasayan
---<--@

Ating Pagkikipag-Ayunan
(Our Society - Sovereign Motion)

Pangngalan: Sambayanang Ugnayan

Gawaing marunong: Pakiki-bayan at Pakiki-bayani

Lamang dunong: Kapatiran at Katapangan
---<--@

Bansa at Bukluran at Sambayanan ito ay ang -

Ating Pagka-Republika
(Our Country - the Filipino Spirit)

Pangngalan: Republikang Katigan o ang Republika ng Pilipinas

Gawaing marunong: Pakiki-baka o Pakiki-Pilipino

Lamang dunong: Kalayaan at Kasarinlan
---<--@

Pinoy Magiting

Sino ba ang mahal? 

Ano ba ang minamahal?

Galit ba o Pagmamahal, Pilipino?

Katapangan sa Pilipino'y
bunga nitong puso na sa ati'y likas
may bisa at bigkas, may ganda at lakas
kung mag-alab ay wagas...

Puso na sa ati'y
kung magmahal ay mabagsik,
na sa mata ng lupa't langit ay tunay,

at sa isip ng mga makakata'y napakakulay, 

na kung magpatunay ay masipag at mahusay 

pero kung magbigay ay mapag-angkin...

Dahil ang kagitingang taglay
ng ating pusong mapagmatunay,
marami man niyang anyo
ay mula lamang
dito sa iisa nating puso.

Pagmamahal Pilipino
na sa ati'y laging sumusubaybay
ang sa puso din sa ati'y pumipintig;
pagmamahal na sa para sa Minamahal
pa lamang palaging pinahihiwatig...

Dahil kung sa galit at kabuktutan
tayong mga Pinoy ay likas na sa puso'y dala,
wala na ring lungkot na dapat
sa puso nating mga Pinoy bumibisita.

Kung galit ang sa puso nati'y mas likas
at kung galit na rin pusong Pinoy
dito sa lupa pinaglihi't ipinanganak,
marahil ito'y isang bulag.

Dahil puso na sa galit lamang nakalagak
kailan man ito'y sa atin ay mag-alab
ay puno ng dilim na mapagwasak
at hindi ng mapaganking liwanag
na sa pagmamahal natin ay puno.

Sa minamahal ito'y bulag,
sa pagmamahal ito'y duwag,
sa sarili ito'y huwad.

Pero kung sa puso tayo'y sa pagmamahal
nang Minamahal nating Diyos ay itinagi
sa tapang ang giting ng Pinoy
kailan ma'y di pahuhuli.

Tapang na sa ati'y
may dalang bait at dunong,
tandaan natin na sana
kung mula saan isinusulong
dahil ito'y mula sa puso natin
na kung magmahal...

Ang paalala na lang sa Pilipino ay ganito -
parang alab na kung araw ay matindi uminit
at kung gabi nama'y liwanag na matahimik.

- selah -

Tapang nati'y pinapayagan
ng puso na rin nating
pagmamahal ang dahilan.

Hindi ito nadadala ng bilis
at hindi ito parang walang tulis,
malayo't maluwag magbigay tanaw
at walang kasing tindi ang tamis...

Dahil hindi kailanman sa galit
ang puso ng Pilipinas naging tapat,
ni kahit minsa'y hindi iyan naging
sapat sa puso nating lahat.
---<--@

The Illusion of Race

Race is an illusion, an artifice of a species of nationalism that is not ours. What is proposes is the division of the Nation according to tribal distinctions. What this means is the subjugation of the soul of its peoples by the temporal powers of this world.

Race is a social construct purposed to be divisive of unity and disruptive of harmony among Men. This is so because the concept of race is meant to fill an ideological necessity (that upon our needful earth gave rise to a domination of evil we have together fought and prevailed against in the last age).

It is a thought prejudicial to our Liberty!

For the Nation that is ours is a soul that dwells in and among our peoples, and through it stirs the spirit that gathers our generations together and sends our generations forth into forever.

No human being or temporal power hath placed and purposed this Nationhood in our souls.

The belonging that calls to each of us within our souls is issued among us by neither man nor angel.

Nor may our citizenship, one with the other, be received by any earthly or temporal dominion save our own love and remembrance of all the good and blessed things that made us accountable to the God in heaven for the peace and good will that we are made freely and humanly responsible for together here upon this earth as a sovereign undertaking of Country.

We are made equal in dignity and promise - before God and the assembly of the Nations - not by virtue of external appearances or the whim of fashions temporal but by the truth of what is permanent in our spirit and what is for always to us in the truth.

Race hath no place among us. We are all the colors of life.
---<--@

November Thoughts

Today morning, an interesting thing happened to me. A good citizen of our Republic asked me out of the blue if the Zodiac sign, Scorpio, is good luck. To which after a moment's thought I replied, "It is".

One has to be gentle with the truth... And truth for me is this: Though I do not personally subscribe to horoscopes, I respected that he might.

So I affirmed it for him and told him it is also my Zodiac sign. November is also my birth month, you see. In a small way, I sought to bless his day. That he may carry on his labors happily for the rest of the day.

I know though my Christian faith what decides destiny is freedom, truth, and spirit in the soul not in the temporal stars. So if I should not respect and love my fellow human beings, I'd be a liar to myself and to my God. (Moreover, as temporal heaven has fallen, those stars above us won't care. So I must.)

Life can be harsh. It is a hard battle for everybody, daily living. Indubitably.

Struggle makes all men ordinary. It makes successes extraordinary. And makes community necessary.

Across our needful world, human beings scramble about struggling to make do, looking for better and better forms of wealth, health and happiness.

It is not easy... But whatever lies ahead for anybody is better faced than not at all, easily. Because none of us can navigate through what lies ahead with our backs to the future.

This is the essence of these November thoughts. That 'tis the season to be forward facing, bravely dealing, humbly accepting in the following to follow through.

November folks know winter lies immediately ahead. Wiser ones see through what lies beyond the winter.
But the best of us November people understand (or are doggedly trying to learn to understand) that facing up to life's difficulties in a posture of faith, trust and perseverance always eventually lead to the enjoyment of better climes and brighter times. That after November... June.

Happy birthday to all of us, November folks. =^.^=
---<--@

To Christmas, and beyond!

Love of Family, Love of Community

Self-interest is an exact definition of national interest. 

The national interest as self-interest is intrinsically selfish but the center of its will lies illumined in the life of the national community. A community must be self-interested else it shall not last long. 



All human beings are naturally self-interested creatures the same with all creatures in God's creation. 

We must be or else, we have a problem. There is no backing out of being. No physical coming back to the womb. Else, life and living itself can not progress and evolve. 

Self-interest here is not an evil, lack of it is.  

Now, there are forms of self-interest greater than the person of the self. 

An example of this is the institution of the family. Man and Woman as a unified whole is invested in a form of self-interest that is distinct from Man and Woman as their individual persons.

Religion regards this union as sacred and it is. 

Religion blesses those who bless life even at its conception and regards with holy esteem those who receive with the welcome of peace the life of those who are born to this world.

Nations regard this union as necessary. 

Ours is the trust that protects and prospers the life of the family and the communities that bless, provide for, and accept tribe and family with a greater welcome of peace. 

- selah -

Family is our basic introduction to life in the national community. 

It forms the ground of our civics. 

As individual citizens we must know without our fathers and mothers who as Family gave to us the choice we could not make at birth, we would simply not be. 

No babe is born with a freedom that is complete. In fact, we were the least free among God's creatures at the very moment of our birth. As babes, not one of us could even make the choice to live.

It is family who gave us the choice to live. 

And these choices often come at the expense of other choices that our fathers and mothers willingly subordinated to that form of self-interest greater and maturer than what their persons usually demanded of them as individuals alone. 

Regardless of how everything proceeded from that moment therefore, to honor thy father and mother is pre-requisite to the knowledge of life in the national community. 

The common instruction to the value of the choices we make in community - we learn simply from the action of family and as not all families are the same, we honor father and mother still for that one choice they had to make for us as babes. 

For none of us could ever truly make that choice. Nor boast about it without sin.

So in civics it is the same; that those of us who are without choices is served in society by those of us who are able to make those choices - to live - so that none of us should ever be so poor so as to live without liberty or be so fated by the random nature of this world to endure without hope or live without peace. 

- selah -

I think the saying that those who have least in life should have more in law is one better illumined by the first principle of sufficiency through reliance. And this principle better understood simply by honoring our fathers and our mothers in the light of the right remembrance.

Through life in the family, love and memory is from generation to generation brought forth into the nation so that in our civics, we may make good choices in each other's behalf - that all of us in the land may live long and the nation prosper in peace.
 ---<--@

Judge not

When you can hold back the water from these falls and stop it all from falling... 

You can be judge above all men and women. (not just among)

Judge not

Don't say jelly before the jelly sets...

Let's allow something wonderful to happen first. (better yet, let's help it along)

Liberality of the Filipino Spirit

Filipinos, they say misery deserves company. But not from ours.

We in the nation deserve happiness.

In all its wondrous shades of diversity, happiness and the paths that from it lead all to human progress and achievement to us is possessed of one ageless color - gold.

This splendid color for our nation is the color of imperishable treasure.

Therefore -

Let us trust ourselves to be happy for the good fortune of our fellows.

Liberality of the Filipino spirit is thus:

Generosity exercised not so much by the hand than by the heart.

And forget crab mentality.

Just do it.

---<--@

Fossilized remains of Filipino crab mentality.