Category: In Focus

The 20th-century Catholic theologian Karl Rahner said that if the Church doesn’t recover its mystical dimension, then it has nothing to offer to the future. We are all called to be mystics. What does that mean? How could a mystic be characterized? Here is my list: The mystic celebrates relationality. The universe and planet from which we come are like woven-together fabrics, made up of interconnections, mutual dependencies and relationships. We exist in the midst of a living web. The mystic knows then the necessity of friendships, of the acceptance of brokenness and loss, of maintaining intimacy with the natural world that can teach important spiritual lessons. The mystic trusts that, since life is indeed a complex web of interconnections, nothing is ever really lost. Ultimately, every difficulty, too, is an opportunity.  The mystic is tough and soft at the same time. Tough in the sense that she/he does not deny pain, suffering and death, never seeks refuge in sentimentality, magic or hooey. The mystic holds a faith in life itself, one that can exist beyond despair. The mystic is soft when she/he nourishes a tender compassion toward all things and continues to love the silence, the dirt under her fingernails, the tangy bite of a fresh apple, the homely wild roses from a pasture, the sweet tiredness of the body after a day’s hard work. The mystic probably goes to some trouble to free a trapped moth in a window, yet is not overly concerned about her/his own comfort and convenience. The mystic lives imaginatively in the tension that exists between opposites.   The mystic cultivates his or her inner life and knows that the interior life exists not for his or her own sake but for the sake of the whole human community, for the planet. “What have you ever traveled toward more than your own safety?” asks Lucille Clifton. The mystic locates those fires inside her/him that burn in outrage for the injustices in the world. The mystic spends time with those passions inside her/him, that lust and thirst to restore beauty, equality and wholeness to a broken world. The mystic knows that spirituality is just a parlor game if it isn’t translated into action. She/he writes her/his congresspeople, volunteers at local soup kitchens. She/he organizes her/his neighborhood to buy from local farmers. She/he tutors high school kids who are having learning difficulties. In short, she/he makes connections between her inner stirrings and shiftings and the work that urgently needs to be done, in her neighborhood, community and bioregion. Her/his life is a wondrous braid.   The mystic believes deep down that it is, after all, okay to be human. We, humans, sin. We’re often afflicted with the most appalling shortsightedness. We are indeed capable of monstrous personal, systemic and societal evils. We are in constant need of redemption and renewal. Yet, at the same time, it is through and by means of the sufferings, deficiencies and limitations of being human that compassion is attained. We are

In a pastoral letter, released in November, Manilla Archbishop Gaudencio B. Cardinal Rosales and his auxiliaries, Bishops Bernardino Cortez and Broderick Pabillo, call on the government to address the “structure of sin” that lies at the root of the housing problems of the poor in the metropolis. The “structure of sin,” they explain, involves land values that are far beyond the reach of the poor and many in the middleclass; low taxes on unused land; and the use of vast amount of land for shopping malls, upscale residential subdivisions and golf courses.    The letter reminds that, to start the rehabilitation and rebuilding that follow the destruction wrought by typhoon Ondoy, a deep restructuring of society is necessary, beginning with the government’s urban land policy. To this end, the three prelates call for the following actions:    Ω Undertake urban land reform so that the poor may have the possibility to have security of tenure in our cities where their livelihood is found.   Ω Issue a moratorium on demolition of the dwellings of the poor if there is no humane relocation for them as our present laws require. Humane relocation would include accessible places of work for them.   Ω Make a follow through of the processes to allot public lands to the poor in the areas that have been given to them by presidential declarations. Let the public lands declared by the President be developed and effectively be made available to the poor.   Ω Enact legislations to raise taxes on properties that are idle, or to altogether expropriate them. The right to private property should not be given priority but be for the common good.   Ω Implement swiftly the Clean Air Act and other environmental laws by disallowing heavy and highly pollutive industries within our cities which are densely residential and commercial. The zoning ordinances of the cities should be reviewed. Heavy industries, and not the poor, should be relocated outside of our cities. If this is done, more people will move out of our cities to work in these industries.   Ω In resettling the poor and rehabilitating our cities, priority should be given to the employment of people. Informal settlers have grown in number because of lack of employment possibilities in places outside the metropolis. The “squatting” problem is not primarily a problem of housing; it is a problem of employment.   Ω Let us not blame the poor in the waterways for the flooding of our cities. Let us look beyond: the unabated logging in Sierra Madre and Mt. Banahaw, mining ventures in our mountains, haphazard collection and unplanned disposal of our garbage, irresponsible city planning and development of subdivisions, just to name a few. Together, let us take a hard look at our present practices and have the political will to reform them. In truth, we can say that the government officials and the rich have more to do with the destruction of our environment that aggravated the recent flood than the

Such commissions have largely served the interests of governments to take cover behind international and domestic criticisms of flagrant human rights violations, adds the 42-year-old who authored a report, “Post-War Justice in Sri Lanka: Rule of Law, the Criminal Justice System and Commissions of Inquiry,” released by the Geneva-based International Commission of Jurists (ICJ). The Sri Lankan conflict involving the secessionist Tamil Tigers saw over 70,000 people killed. The United Nations estimates that 7,000 civilians died during the final months of the battle, which ended in May last year. An equally disturbing number of victims were documented in another conflict in the battle-scarred island, which was waged in the late 1980s and involved the state and youth from the majority Sinhalese community. An estimated 40,000 Sinhalese youth ‘disappeared’ during that Marxist uprising to overthrow the government. “The lack of state accountability for human rights violations in Sri Lanka crosses ethnic divides and all governments and parties,” the 175-page ICJ report reveals. “Neither the regular criminal justice system nor commissions of inquiry have been able to satisfy the state’s obligation to its citizens.” The issues of justice have not been limited to the country’s Tamil and Muslim minority, says Pinto-Jayawardena, who is also an award-winning newspaper columnist. “It is a concern for the Sinhalese majority, too.” What is urgently needed, she argues, is a reform of the judicial system, since it has been ineffective to investigate and prosecute perpetrators of human rights violations, ranging from rape, torture, killings to disappearances since 1977.    

Early Sri Lankan chronicles bear evidence that much before Arab seafarers were driven by stormy winds to this tropical isle which they fondly referred to as “Serendip,” or European navigators discovered Ptolemy’s “Isle of Ceylon” (1500s), learned scholars from the Orient had frequented the land of the Sinhalese to further their study of the Buddhist doctrine. (A recent mural painting at the Katunayake International Airport depicts the scene from the legendary arrival of Prince Vijaya and his team to whom the Sinhalese trace their origin – picture on far right.)  Sri Lanka today is a predominantly Sinhala-Buddhist state. But since past ages, the land of the Sinhalese has attracted and unified together a varied mixture of Christians, Hindus and Muslims whose descendants today comprise over 30% of the country’s total population. In spite of the dramatic recent civil disturbances – primarily caused for advancing political supremacy – all of the nation’s ethnic peace-loving communities, i.e. Burghers (descendants of European colonists), Moors, Sinhalese, and the country’s second largest community of Tamils, are now trying to thrive harmoniously side-by-side as has been for hundreds of centuries ago. Their present mixed generations manifest a bold blend of the diversity and richness from the cultures, traditions and religious beliefs that their ancestors have proudly upheld in spite of the nearly five hundred and fifty years of domination by European colonial powers, viz. Portuguese, Dutch and British.    A rice culture Apart from the Muslim traders and the communities of Tamil marine fishers who settled along the coastal belt, the native Sinhalese (whose language is Sinhala) have given much importance to irrigation, rice farming and community-based agriculture since very ancient time. Thanks essentially to the wise and tolerant reign of early Sinhalese kings, Sri Lanka gained fame as “the Granary of the East.” Even the twelve months were aptly named to capture and reflect not merely the essence of a season’s idealistic charm but to identify each month distinctly and differently from the other. December, for example, in the Sinhala lunar calendar was named “Unduwap.” In later years, with Christian conversions following the arrival of the Portuguese (1505), the twelfth month became popularly christened by the Sinhalese as “Nattal mase,” literally meaning the month of Christmas. (Initial converts to Christianity included both the Sinhalese and the Tamils. Though a majority of the Sinhalese are Buddhists, and many Tamils are Hindu, a prominent characteristic that continues to bind the two converted communities together is their common Christian faith. Alas, the same cannot be said of either of these two communities whose Buddhist or Hindu members even rarely accept to follow the religion of the other.)   “Nattal” in Sri Lanka ushers in a festive season, traditionally celebrated throughout the island. People look forward to this year-end festival. Christians use the season to observe and spread the wonderful message of Christmas: sharing with their poorest neighbors and spreading the message of goodwill and peace among all. For children, it means the end of school, completion of terminal examinations

Although Christian Arabs make up a small minority in the Holy Land, they could be an important bridge in the conflict that has divided the region for too long, says Patriarch Fouad Twal. The Latin Patriarch in Jerusalem laments, however, that as the international community is slow to take them into consideration, the numbers of Christians are dwindling. Part of the problem, he notes, is the Israel’s 20-foot-high wall around the Palestinian territories that has made daily life for many almost impossible. There are approximately 50,000 Christians living in the Gaza Strip, East Jerusalem and the West Bank, with a further 200,000 in Israel. In this interview given to the television program “Where God Weeps” of the Catholic Radio and Television Network (CRTN), in cooperation with Aid to the Church in Need, the patriarch discusses the many challenges facing Christians living in the Holy Land. He also makes an appeal for three “P’s”: Prayer, Project, and Pressure.   – Can you tell us what is the situation of Christians in the Holy Land today?  We have to remember that the Latin Patriarchate covers three states: Jordan, Palestine, Israel, and even Cyprus. So it is not easy to speak about one state because situations change from state to state. Generally, as we know in the world, there is one state with many dioceses; in our case, we have one diocese within many states.  The fact that we are living in conflict means borders between these states create problems; to cross the borders means problems, to assign priests from one parish to another parish is not easy. We need allowances – permission – from Israel to move within these three states, which is within one Patriarchate of Jerusalem.    – How would you describe the feelings of the people in Jerusalem, in the Holy Land, particularly Christians?  It is a special city, a beautiful city and a dramatic city over which even the Lord wept. And we are still weeping. It is not easy. Jerusalem unites all the believers – Jews, Muslims, Christians – [but] at the same time, Jerusalem divides all the believers – to [the] death. Everybody wants Jerusalem to be their own capital, and Jerusalem, for me, must be the mother of churches, mother for all believers, and not for one people.  It is a pleasure, from one side, to see these people coming to visit the holy places and, on the other side, it is painful to see the local church, the local Christians, not being able to visit these holy places. A parish priest from Bethlehem cannot bring his faithful for a pilgrimage to these holy places. The same situation is seen in Ramallah, and Jordan, and other parishes; they cannot move easily with so many checkpoints and the wall separating them.   We Never Give Up Hope – This is a key question. Has the situation worsened now for Christians in the Holy Land as a consequence of the construction of the wall?  For sure, the