Human beings are beings that motion through life in search for a purpose; beings that are in continuous search for the grand truth –the truth that will answer questions such as “Why do we choose to exist, if the alternative which is non-existence seems to be much less of a hassle?”
In our search for truth, one of the most common concept tackled is the concept of death. Since all human beings will cease to exist at one point in time, it would seem absurd to try to achieve so much just to render them useless upon our death in this material world. For if we believe that after our death in the material world there will be nothing more, even the argument that we live for the people around us or for the greatness we feel because of success would be futile because the bottom line would be that we will all die and our relationships nor our successes will not matter.
I would then think that it useful to believe that when a human being ceases to exist in the material world, it should continue its existence in another world, for only then would it still be sensible for us to continue living.
With this, I believe that the human being consists of soul and body, in which the soul is not separate from the body but is separable from it and by separable, I mean that it can be separated for a span of time, but not for eternity.
Following part of Aristotle’s idea, I say that the soul is not separate from the body because I believe that a human being consists of soul and body, and if they are already entities in themselves they can no longer be the composition of the human being as one entity. Furthermore, if the soul and body are two separate entities then they will not be able to occupy the same space at the same time.
Also, I believe that the soul is not separate from the body because if this is so, it would mean that the soul and the body can then operate even without each other. I would like to oppose the idea that they can operate separately using two illustrations. The first is that if the body is separate from the soul, then a cadaver, or a dead person’s body, should then be able to continue its bodily operations even after death of the human; that is it should still be able to continue at least the nutritive and sensitive operations. The second is that the soul should be able to continue to perform intellectual operations, operations of self-consciousness even without the body. We cannot know for sure what the state of the soul is after the death of the human person, however we can say that it cannot continue to be conscious of a self because in order to have self-consciousness, there must be a self to be conscious about and that self is the human being compose of body and soul, and not only the soul. We cannot say that we are conscious of our soul because it is not something we know of for sure, and therefore we cannot genuinely “catch” or find the concept of the soul alone when we try to be self-conscious. Unlike in the concept of the human person which consists of both soul and body, wherein we can at least be conscious when the body and soul operate together, for instance we can be conscious of the operations of sensitivity.
Saying that I believe that a cadaver cannot continue bodily operations after the death of the human reveals my position in believing that there is something that leaves the human person upon its death; and my understanding of this thing which leaves is that it is the soul. This would pose confusion because one can argue that if the soul can leave the body then it would mean they are separate entities. However this is where I would like to assert my earlier point that even as I believe that the soul is not separate from the body, I think it is separable for a certain time and it is important to emphasize that I believe that this separation is not for eternity. I believe they are separable only at the moment of death. That is to say that upon death of a human person the soul does not die with the body.
I would not be in the position to make a conclusion as to where the soul goes or as to what happens to it after the death of the human person, but I would like to posit that the soul is immortal. This is because I cling to my belief that the only reason for human beings to continue to choose life over death is the hope that there is a continuance of life even after the death in the material world.
When I say that the soul and body are not separate, I say this with regard to their operations, because the soul and body are not merely separate entities that help each other in their respective operations but are rather essential partners that need to be together in order to carry out their operations in the first place. Therefore, I believe that the nature of the soul is to be with the body and the body to be with the soul.
If their nature then is to be with each other, it follows that it would be against their nature to be separated from each other and more over to be separated for eternity. And this separation, I believe is precisely what death of the human person brings. Following Aristotle’s stand on the nature of things, that “nothing against its nature can exist forever” (Aristotle), it would then be only detrimental for the body if it will be eternally separated from the soul –which may explain the reason why that while the body continues to function shortly after death, it does not continue to function for long. At the same time it is also detrimental for the soul if it is eternally separated from the body.
Therefore, from this standpoint that nothing against its nature can exist forever, it would only be sensible that the soul and the body would reunite at some point in time in order for the soul to be truly immortal. That is to say that if the body would resurrect, it may either be because the body’s nature in itself is to resurrect so that it can be together with the soul again or it may be because by the sheer force of nature, it resurrects for the good of the soul; so that the soul can be immortal. With this, however we can only say that we cannot be sure of what the nature of the resurrected body is.
Having defined my understanding of what the human person is I now turn to considering the self in terms of not the soul and body, but as a bundle of perceptions. Hume’s idea is that human beings are just bundles of perceptions, of which perceptions are further broken down to impressions and ideas. He further reasons that we perceive through our five senses, namely the sense of sight, taste, hearing, smell, and touch, and that whatever we perceive or experience are the only things that can possibly be real. And since the “SELF” cannot be perceived by the five senses, then there must be no SELF.
Hume’s ideology is appealing because it does have truth in it; what we call the SELF has never been, in human history, perceived through the five senses. For Hume, whatever idea we have of unperceivable things would just be our ideas and impressions of perceivable things that are stocked in our memories so that we can recreate them as simulations in our minds. This is much like the idea of a pig that flies using elephant ears where we have a concept of the pig from reality, and the concept of the flying elephant ears from the Disney movie, Dumbo, which in itself is actually a non-reality already. And with these two ideas we come up with something that is non-existent which is the flying pig with elephant ears. No matter how real we think the flying pig is, it can never be real because we just made it up with our ideas and impression of different realities. With this, Hume suggests that whenever we refer to a self, we also just create this idea of an actually non-existent SELF in our minds, with the help of our memory, as it puts together our ideas and impressions of other real things.
I would however find some confusion in his ideology because if Hume says that we are but bundles of perceptions then he is suggesting all human beings are merely perceivers.
However the mere fact that we can recreate different ideas and impressions we have perceived shows that we are not merely collectors of perceivable information. We also have a function that puts these ideas together and in turn, enables us to recreate something else in our imaginations.
Furthermore, the concept that we are merely bundles of perceptions overlooks the fact that people may perceive things differently and therefore discounts the fact that human beings are also capable of analyzing. Surely it is not one of the five senses nor is it the five senses working altogether that analyzes because analyzing is not the function of any of those senses. What then is this thing that analyses? Is it not precisely the SELF?
If one would pursue the argument that there is no basis for the SELF because it cannot be perceived, I would argue back that this idea reduces the human being to only being a body. This is probably why Hume’s idea that human beings have no identity came up, for the body on which we attach an identity to, is always changing. Because at every moment whether humans are conscious of it or not, something changes in the compositions of the human body such that it can no longer have the same identity before this moment of change.
I believe however that the human being is not merely a body that can be perceived neither is it only a composition of the senses which perceive. There is something more to the human being than the five senses alone, something that perceives but is simultaneously capable of analysing.
I further believe that perception can be done with the senses as made possible by the body and the analysis can be done by the self, or if I may call it the soul, which performs intellectual operations. Without perception, there can be no analysis and without the analysis, the perception will not make sense and will therefore not matter if it is perceive or not in the first place. Therefore, the human being cannot be just a perceiver. The human being must simultaneously be a perceiver and analyzer, not functioning separate from each other because the human being is both body and soul and they are not separate for they are partners which need to be together in order to be able to operate.
One of the biggest problems one can find in taking part in this phenomenon called group sex is its threat to how one understands sexual satisfaction. In today’s world, the phrase “more is always better” has been accepted as a custom. And this is not to be contested with regard to things that truly better the lives of people. However, there has been a lack of discernment on what is really beneficial and because of this many have wrongly believed that more of anything and everything is always better. This mentality, when placed in the wrong context, can easily cause damage to the lives of people. Take for instance the frequent example of alcoholic beverage consumption, while it has been evidenced that moderate drinking can lower risks of heart disease, overconsumption can actually cause death because of the same disease. Over indulgence of anything is harmful, and it is not a different story when it comes to matters of sex. The nature of sex is to be that which deepens the relationships of couples. By engaging in sexual intercourse, a new dimension in the relationship is opened, one which includes an elevated sense of satisfaction and comfort with your lover. This however is only precise when in the context of marriage – for it is not enough to only claim that sex is best situated in the context of marriage; rather the claim should be that sex is to be situated solely in the context of marriage. Therefore it is tragic when people engage in sexual intercourse outside marriage for they miss the precision of this supposed satisfaction that marital sex can give. The sad truth is that non-marital sex is prevalent in this day and age. Digging deeper we will find that in the different degrees by which non-marital sex is practiced, the degrees of the consequence it garners also vary. For instance, when a woman engages in group sex, she is probably more inclined to feel guilt than when engaged in non-marital sex with her boyfriend. Group sex has high degrees of consequences, and involved in it is not only guilt but also deeper issues such as a distorted view of sexual satisfaction that God intended for human beings to experience.
In Richard M. Stephenson’s article, Social Problems, he cited a research that was conducted to find out what types of people are actually involved in group sex. It was discovered that a significant number of those who engaged in group sex were regularly conformists (whether married or not) to other aspects of life – that is to say that they were the kind of people who followed norms or even rules set by society. One of the reasons they gave for involving themselves in group sex was that one of the satisfactions group sex gave them was that of “increased quality, quantity and frequency of sex”. Some couples even attributed their improved sexual performance because of the new experience they have encountered in engaging in group sex. Some of them claimed that they found it as an enhancement to their relationships because it spiced up their otherwise “conventional” sex lives. (Stephenson, 1973)
What is the conventional sex life? Is it not the kind of sex life that is was supposed to be? That is to say, isn’t it that the conventionality of sex life is its actual nature? This nature can then be traced back to how God intended human sexuality to be – one which radiates a “language of love”, as Lauren Winner would put it. Group sex definitely goes against this conventional nature of sex because not only does it demote that language of love that was meant for spouses, it also damages the view of the joy of sexual intercourse the spouses supposedly share. In saying that people who are involved in group sex get satisfaction from increased frequency of sex is an indication that they are no longer adequately satisfied with the normal, intended frequency of conventional sex. This in turn has consequences in marriage.
In Duane Denfeld’s article, The Family Coordinator, another research was conducted for the counselors who have had patients that quit the lifestyle of group sex. From the nine hundred and sixty-five questionnaires that the counselors answered, some of the reasons for their counselees’’ quitting were: the feelings of guilt, emotional attachments that were developed outside of the committed relationships, fear of discovery, threat to marriage, boredom, and many more. Even if the reasons why the couples quit are not really surprising, it is noteworthy that those reasons were precisely a contradiction to the opinions of the people mentioned in Stephenson’s article. The couples engaged in group sex soon found out that the activity was no longer exciting enough, no longer satisfying enough. Many of the couples also found the activity leading to a threat to their marital bond because of jealousy that caused more fighting between them. (Denfeld, 1974) This is not unlike the example of overconsumption of alcoholic beverage. Engaging in sexual intercourse was supposed to be in the context of marriage so when these couples went overboard, they suffered the consequences. According to the Christian teaching, the grace of God in terms of sexual intercourse was only available for those who were in the sacramental marriage of which conditions was that those who are part of it are a man and a woman, and that their relationship is shared and approved with and by the community of Christ’s body.
Denfeld, D. (1974). Dropouts from Swinging. The Family Coordinator , 45-49.
Stephenson, R. M. (1973). Involvement in Deviance: An Example and Some Theoretical Implications. Social Problems , 173-190 .
On The Sacrament of Confession:Even if I am not a Catholic Christian and am not asked to partake of the sacrament of confession, I do believe that it may have positive effects for human beings for several reasons. The first is that because human beings are indeed communal. I attest to this by my own experiences. No man is an island. I have had many problems with my ex-boyfriend when we were still together, and one of those problems is that I had to keep our relationship a secret because my family and friends did not agree about it. Handling problems within our relationship became a lot harder because I had no one to talk to about it. With this, I realized that in many aspects of my life, I actually face challenges with more courage and make better decisions even just by being able to share my sentiments and experiences to and with other people. The next is that I believe confession is not merely trying to get away from the guilt (which might be apparent in the face of abuse), but it can also be a means to express the sincerity of the one who confesses. I think that a person who confesses his sins to another human being subjects himself to a vulnerable position. No matter how much assurance one can get that his confession will be kept secret, who he is confessing to is still a human being capable of flaws, for instance the tendency to judge or the slip-of-tongue. This is not to say that those confessed to should not be fully trusted, I’m just trying to point out that as a person to confess, I would probably have at least some amount of fear of being “exposed”. Therefore, I believe that confession is not just a bed of roses where one hopes to have their sins just washed away and be again guilt-free but in some sense a test of sincerity. I also believe in the idea that whatever an individual does will inevitably affect others. Therefore in the face of sin, not only does a person affect his relationship with Christ but also with his body, the Church. Therefore, aside from Christ, it is only right to also make amends with the Church through the sacrament of confession. The latter is most important, however upon damaging one’s relationship with the Christ’s body, one eventually becomes an ineffective part of the body because of his separation from it. I realized this during the times when I was very distant from my home church. For some time, I experienced a “backslide” from my faith and just cooped myself in and away from the church and from most of my friends. By God’s grace, I was able to get back on my feet and my faith. However, it was admittedly hard to reconcile with my church family and I strongly felt how distant I still was from all that was going on in the church. It was not until I joined a small discipleship group (D-group) that I again felt the sense of belonging to the church family and function in it effectively again (I’m not sure if the activities of my D-group is an appropriate comparison for confession, but since I have never experienced confession, please allow me to express my reflection in such way).
On The Importance of Holy Mass:
“From God’s perspective, the heart of the man who responds to him is greater and more important than the whole immense material cosmos, for all that the latter allows us is to glimpse something of God’s grandeur.” I think this excerpt summarizes in a worthy manner how important the Holy Mass is. It reiterates the idea that the land is given to human beings as a space to worship the Father and also as a space to receive his abundance. We are in awe of all the things we encounter in the land given us but they are actually nothing compared to the actual purpose of the Creation. And this purpose, which is to be in communion with God, his people, and his creation is achieved in the Holy Mass. Even as it is true that we can in fact commune with the Father when we are alone, the potential of the gift of being able to be in His presence is reached when in communion with others to whom He also graced the Creation. God’s magnificence is only seen because He allows it to be seen and because man allows himself to see it. Often times it is us who blinds ourselves from this grace. For me, this is striking because it is funny how most people search high and low for things better, things to excite or thrill themselves with. But it is actually in the Church, in communion with Christ’s body, where human beings can find the cure for the deep longing of that ultimate breath taking experience which all along can be achieved just by allowing ourselves to be absorbed in God’s presence in its full potential in the Holy Mass.
When I was younger, the idea of following Christ was very nice. For me it meant doing nothing but be of service to the Father. However, as I grew older and acquired more responsibilities, I started having ideas that “following Christ” entailed literally dropping everything I had –my family, my responsibilities, basically the life that I’ve known and lived. This idea made me very uneasy and therefore reluctant to actually follow. I even debated with myself of how this might actually “just” mean escaping from the difficulties of my present life. This was really a strain to my relationship with the Father, and it was so hard to actually understand what I was supposed to do thus made me to always push the issue aside.
Little did I know that following did not mean to just apathetically drop everything and turn my back on my life. My existence is a gift from God and there must be a reason why he gave it, there must be a purpose why we are all leading different lives and realizing different specializations. Although for some, following Christ might mean actually dropping everything and lead a life of holiness untouched by the world if possible, for others it also meant to take the path that Jesus was taking. Following meant walking side by side with Him throughout my life and strive to live the way He did when He was still on earth.
We do not have to stick to a preset method as to how we should follow, rather as people have differences then also are the differences in the manners of following. However, no matter how different the ways are, the most important is the wholehearted pursuance for the Father. The differences between peoples which includes the differences in the specializations achieved was not meant to make pride for ourselves, rather it meant to make ourselves and others marvel at the greatness of the Father as it radiates through our differences. Thus, it is the purity of the heart in doing that counts and not the manner in which it is done.
So if I was asked now to if I would follow Christ, even as I know that it is easier said than done, I would wholeheartedly strive to do so. As the concept of the original solitude tells us, we came from the Father and our end goal is to return to the Father. Since our likeness to Christ brings us neared to the Father, I now realize that following Christ is not a means of escaping, rather a means of getting to the end goal which is to be with the Father.
Unlike the families of most of the students in the Ateneo, my family does not have its own company or business. For this reason, I entered Ateneo de Manila University with the hopes of already having acquired valuable knowledge and experience in the field of business once I graduate. This is how I saw my future; I believed that every venture started from a goal no matter how vague or clear and that these goals change overtime – adapt with acquisition of new knowledge and fresh ideas.
Even as a kid, I have always been interested in business; I read books about strategies, watched videos about how-to’s, and attempted to sell random things to my schoolmates. But never have I been exposed to any form of legalities in business as closely as I am now, and I can say that I was very surprised to be presented with a different face of dealing with business.
As I read through the essay by Richard Goossen, I realized that an entrepreneur can learn so much from a lawyer. Not only because of the legal matters that entrepreneurs need to take note of but also because of the seemingly opposite mindset entrepreneurs have with lawyers.
In the essay, the importance of the fact that aspiring entrepreneurs should have a balance between being positive and realistic in business ventures was stressed out. I am now aware that I should carefully examine future consequences of each business undertaking not only because of the marginal risks, but now also because of the legal matters that affect, and without proper knowledge, probably even complicate the business endeavour.
I was also continuously taken aback while reading through the essay because there was so much to take into account. I thought that handling entrepreneurship is already tricky on its own, what more that there are now law related matters that I have to carefully consider.
Another thing that caught my attention was what should have been an obvious realization that the world is imperfect and that lawyers too can make mistakes, give wrong advices, and possibly lead their clients to worse directions than where they are, or simply be ineffective. Taking this into account, I recognize more the importance of being familiar with the legalities of business as to not completely rely on lawyers.
However, regardless how great some lawyers are, given the imperfect justice system we have, even the best are liable of defeat form injustice. With this realization, I found a sensible reason for following the adage that I should not put all my eggs in one basket in case things should go wrong.
By these new acquisitions of knowledge, my simplistic views of my entrepreneurship goals have significantly changed. At this point, entrepreneurship for me is not only starting a business, running it, dealing with risks in between, and eventually either ending up bankrupt or creating a cash cow; I realize now that entrepreneurship is so much more – much more complicated and even much riskier.
I bear in mind that the sense of being spontaneous is critical in building the foundation of entrepreneurship, but I am also aware this can also cause be the downfall of each business venture. I consider the need to keep being positive but also consider instances where being safer than sorry is a better option. I will continue to be concerned about being constantly updated with the trends of the market but now I also am concerned with the movements of the law. For now, all these might seem overwhelming to a college student like I, but I have to accept that this is how the game of entrepreneurship works and make every effort to adapt if I really want to succeed.
Most people who have not yet ever encountered Chinese writings in the past would be overwhelmed by the complexity of how Chinese characters are written. Chinese characters have acquired many names, some of which names are squared characters, squared graph characters, or tetra graph. As seen by its complexity, Chinese characters do have a hefty history of which’s development can be dated as far back as 4000 t0 4500 years ago. This was when the Shang dynasty flourished, and from that time were many writings found in oracle bones used for such things as prescriptions.
It has been found that a considerable amount of Chinese language developed from pictograms or symbols that convey pictorial resemblance to the particular action, thing, event, et al. However, this presented a problem as language expanded and more vocabularies were learned by the peoples. This then pushed the establishment of words formed through rebus, or the usage of pictures and different devices to represent parts of a word instead of the whole by itself so that a whole new meaning can be derived from the combinations. Today however, the pictograms of which some Chinese characters have originated from are not anymore as obvious as before. This is because as words became many, the pictograms have been simplified and standardize overtime for the convenience of writing. It is interesting to take note of how even in simplification; there were cultural reasons as to why the written form of Chinese language looks like the way it is. During the earlier times when the Chinese would write on printing blocks made of wood grain, they had to be careful not to break the grains as they write and therefore they patterned their writing to adapt thus giving them a kind of typeface characterize by strokes that would be thinly horizontal and thickly vertical so as to protect their printing blocks from easy wear and tear.
It was also seen from archaeological research that however the spoken form of Chinese language could have been somewhat unintelligible from one area of Chinese people to another and from one instance or event to another, the written form was universal. It was also seen that each Chinese character often represented a word or idea than just a sound which is commonly seen for the characters of other languages. This however caused a hindrance to mass literacy as people needed to learn a considerable amount of Chinese characters just to be able to read newspaper, books, or writings that entailed more prestige. Thus, as compensation before the Chinese alphabets were created, in 1956 simplifications to common words used in Chinese language were introduced. To establish a more standardized spoken and written language, in about the same time as the establishment of simplified Chinese, mainland China started using Pinyin, not to replace but rather to transcribe Chinese characters from its original form so that the use of the language would be made known to foreigners as well.
As I have mentioned awhile ago, each individual Chinese characters usually represented one particular meaning or even more than one as opposed to foreign languages whose individual character (letters of alphabet) represent only part of a whole word of which’s combination would be needed to get its full meaning. It is of advantage that foreign languages, for instance English, would use alphabets to create words and thus which alphabets would be very flexible and innovative in creation of new words and therefore concepts. However the Chinese characters of which some originally derive from pictographs, no matter how minimal is left from the representation of the original pictograph may be, still is a close preservation of the original written form of Chinese language. This is important, as in general knowledge, preservation of culture is one of the main factors needed for a nation to prosper. And since language is a primary vehicle for culture, the preservation of the written form of Chinese characters at its least may be a suggestion why Chinese people within and out the country are much rooted to their culture.
The next idea to take note of is that how different the grammar and usage of the Chinese language is from the English language. As English language emphasizes on structure to be able to clarify what they mean, the Chinese examines the meaning first in order for the structure and the grammar of their language to be put together. For instance, the character hou from the word houmien in Chinese which means “behind” is also used in the word yihou which means the “future”. It would be confusing for some foreigners to understand this because the future is not usually associated to the word behind as the logic is that a person walks toward the future which therefore makes it be in front. However, there is a logical explanation as to why the Chinese uses the word the way they do. This is because, for the Chinese the future is unseen and since it is illogical to say that something in front of you is unseen they used the word behind to signify the invisibility and unpredictability of the future.
Another example would be the sentence construction of Chinese language as opposed to English language. The sentence “I will eat breakfast this morning” is an example of how westerners would construct a simple sentence; they use the sentence pattern of S-V-O. If translated in Chinese, this particular sentence would go like “I, this morning, will eat breakfast”. The pattern is still the same, S-V-O, however the answer the question when is placed in a different position. The logic behind this for Chinese people is that one cannot know what transpires before all the details have been laid out. In this case, one cannot know if it is breakfast, lunch or dinner that is being eaten before they know when it is being eaten.
The Chinese language definitely takes complexity as one of its trademarks, nevertheless, it is always fulfilling to know and understand the language because it is one of the most used language in the world and also because as we have seen how prosperous the nation as a whole is, we get a glimpse of how their majestic minds think through their knowledge.
Aside from all the other things He is, all the other titles He has acquired, to me God is the Father of all.
When I was six years old, my biological dad started having stroke and because of his sickness, I did not get to spend much time with him. You can say that even when he was around, I did not feel the secure fatherly presence and this made me different from most of the kids I knew. I excelled in school not because I was smart, I was actually a slow learner but I had the determination. I became more serious and responsible than some kids my age because people kept telling me how my mom relied so much on me. But even though I had a tough facade, in reality I was very sensitive and I thought a lot about what it would be like to have a father. Whenever I saw my friends' families, I could not help but be envious of them. Sometimes, I even questioned God why He had to do this to my family, and sometimes I even utter such questions as why I had to be in this family. I love my family and i have no problem with them perse, but this issue was a serious strain to my relationship with God, there were even times when I refused to believe that He existed.
When i was in elementary, I rarely went to Sunday school and when i reached high school, i dropped it completely because I thought that the explanations of Bible stories were already being too shallow and I was not getting anything from them anymore. I still prayed at home before sleeping but for me it was just like a routine I had to follow. For many years, i lived as if i did not have a true, personal God. When I stepped into second year high school, we started having these 3-day retreats and I started attending the Summer Bible Conferences of our school; by this time, I was already hungry for answers to the many questions that kept lingering on my mind about who God actually was.
i immediately felt how these retreats were true blessings that on my first retreat, when I was listening to the speakers, it was as if the ears of my heart were opened for the first time to the word of God. Whenever we came home from the retreats, I would feel energized and excited to do my daily devotions, but this enthusiasm faded away along with time. At first I did not understand why my fervour for the Word would just not stay permanently, until I slowly became disheartened and felt like these feeling were just fake spurs of the moment. Not for long, I started to become more lost in my walk of faith than ever.
On my fourth year in high school, a few days before my graduation, my dad passed away. He was not getting better during the past years and our family has already been physically and emotionally drained. The loss even drained us emotionally more, but even if we were emotionally drained we felt comfort in knowing that my father has finally gone to the better place, free from suffering and serving the God he loves. My dad was actually a devout Christian. On the earlier days of his stroke when he had difficulty walking and talking, he diligently went to church when we who were perfectly healthy were too lazy to go. We were amazed by how until his final breath, he would not hold any grudge against God even if he was afflicted with such sickness. To me at that time, my dad was an enigma. At the same time, I kept questioning God why he had to be like that to my dad and how my father kept His faith on God even during his weakest moments.
On my dad's funeral, while I was looking at him in his coffin, I was suddenly overcome by a peace I could not understand. It was as if a voice whispered into my ear a very clear answer to both of my questions. The voice told me that I should've seen the real importance of life while looking back at the life of my dad. I should’ve realized that my father saw this importance and lived by it even when everyone else ignored it.
The importance of life was not the wellness of an individual based on the standards of the world but the wellness based on the standards of God that which could only be attained by having a Father-child relationship with Him. Trusting that all He plans for my life is at the same time for his own good and also for the greater good, which includes the wellness of all His children, was what kept my dad’s faith going. And by God’s grace, i am seeing the light that my dad saw, acknowledging that God knows what He is doing and i simply have to trust in Him.
I have to admit that now I still have moments of weakness in faith. I am actually ashamed how easily I fall into temptations even after such a powerful testimony of my dad's life. But I also know that God, my Father loves me, provides for me and will not forsake me. The life of my dad and my whole family is a testimony to this in countless ways and we could not just appreciate enough how merciful and graceful God is no matter how unworthy we are.
By His grace, I am continuously being moulded into a new person, I am not a lost sheep anymore; I now live for Someone great. He all along was my greatest and most effective refuge in this dangerous world. He will constantly mould me into the person he plans me to be and I am thankful and blessed to be His child.
I can eat pasta baked, boiled, sauced or tossed. Some of my favourites are the carbonara and lasagna. When I was younger, I was accustomed to eat at birthday parties that served tomato based spaghetti and because parties and pasta usually went together, I probably had a positive association of my emotions to pasta. I went through my childhood eating the famous jolly spaghetti from Jollibee as my favourite and from there, my taste preference matured from only enjoying jolly spaghetti to enjoying all kinds of pastas.
The most famous variety of pasta in Philippine urban areas is the long pasta, spaghetti and the short pasta, macaroni usually served in fast food places and parties with tomato based sauce or white cream sauce. There are different kinds of pastas; special pasta, egg pasta, diet pasta, fresh pasta, wholemeal pasta, durum wheat pasta, and a whole lot more. Both spaghetti and macaroni we are accustomed to eating are usually made of durum wheat flour which is a natural element that tightly holds the pasta together and is high in protein content. Another thing to take note of is that we usually prepare our modern day pasta boiled and drenched with sauce and eat it using forks, but this was not evident in the early development of pasta. In earlier times pasta was usually fried or grilled and eaten using bare hands either plainly or with sprinkled cheese. In fact, it was found in the 1st century writing by the Roman poet, Horace, that there was a certain food that was described as fried, fine sheets of dough called lagana which might have been the ancestor of our present day lasagna. Boiling pasta can actually be traced back as a devise of the Arabs so they can carry along with them dry pasta and reconstitute it into hot meals, while drenching it with sauce was introduced centuries much later.
Making pasta can be a very tedious process. Even in earlier times, pasta making was labour intensive; the Sicilian term “macarone” meaning making dough forcefully was used to actually depict the hard labour. Pasta can be done home-made or in an industrial scale.
A basic process in making pasta is mixing and kneading the flour with warm until the dough gets lumpy, then rolling out air bubbles and excess water to flatten the dough, pasteurizing it and finally cutting it into its particular shape. After all these is the vital part, drying the dough that can last for hours depending on its shape, because this can determine how easy the pasta will spoil or break. Before the invention of mechanical drying, the first large-scale production of pasta was in the early 1500s during the industrial revolution in Naples, Italy because the fluctuating temperature of site was suitable for the drying needs of pasta. This kind of production then enabled pasta to have a longer shelf life and can take credit for bringing Naples out of economic depression.
But, Italy was not the only country to benefit from the invention of pasta. Though there are numerous variations of pasta dough mixtures, pasta is generally composed of simple yet important ingredients: flour (usually durum wheat flour), salt, and usually eggs. This might be one of the reasons why pasta had become favoured, because its components were not really hard to find. Pasta then had become one of the staple foods for the poor and the rich alike throughout centuries when meat and other fresh produce have become expensive or scarce.
Like many other foods, pasta has a long and confusing history. Contrary to popular belief, pasta was not introduced to Italy by China via Marco Polo; neither did it originate from Italy although they might have been the first to serve pasta as a main dish. There really is no clear origin of pasta since a good number of locations around the globe seemed to have discovered and use it, without foreign influence. Even today, different countries use different ways to cook and serve their pasta.
But regardless of different forms, different processes of making, or even different ways of eating pasta, I think pasta is one of the dishes that carries on the adage that food is a global language. Although we know pasta only by the dishes familiar to us as presented by our location, we all agree to enjoy the moulded dough as a scrumptious delicacy.
I’m a full blooded Chinese, and just like my parents, I was born and raised in the Philippines. This being, we’ve been detached from the traditional Chinese culture and have been used to some of the Filipino (and Western) customs. Nevertheless, our family, and particularly I took great pride of our ethnicity and have always been convinced that our race was the best there was. One of the biggest ethnocentric attitudes I had was that when people complimented me for my complexion, I felt really proud; I thought being “white” was the standard of beauty and people who were darker were plainly unfortunate. There were even some moments of my life where I considered not marrying Filipino men as to not “taint” the complexion of my bloodline. To my surprise, skin colour apparently plays a big role in health; and in terms of being prone to skin cancer, darker people are at the advantage.
Another thing that caused me to think ethnocentrically was because apart from the Filipinos I knew from the limited society I revolved in, I had stereotypical ideas about the rest of the Filipino people –the labels of being lazy, inferior, and lowly. Being in this age and society where multimedia access can give you information regarding just about everything, I was conditioned that I had the power to be familiar with everything, therefore I had the notion that the simplistic things I knew about Filipinos enabled me to truly understand the entirety of the Filipino culture.
I now realize that I’ve just been exposed to a very little fraction of the culture and its people’s fascinating nature – to say at the least, their exotic beauty and sophistication throughout generations. I’ve never known enough because I’ve always been in my comfort zone- my home, my school and my routine schedules, all this has deprived me from seeing the bigger picture. When I became aware of the world beyond me, I realized that the even the rich culture of the Philippines by itself can be very overwhelming, what more for all the other parts of the world. Now I just regret that I can only experience so much. If I could, I would marry myself into each and every culture, live in each era there will be even if it means to just to have a glimpse of the world’s rich diversity. I know now that one life time is not enough, and I certainly would not want to waste it by confining myself in my comfort zone. Indeed I want the world to be my oyster.
We just came from the hospital to visit my uncle. He was confined because two of the bones in his spinal cord were broken. It had been four months since he had been attacked by stroke and he has been recuperating, but it was this morning when he fell down the floor while he was trying to get up from bed. As I went in the hospital room, I saw him lying down in the infirmary bed as his wife, my aunt, was standing beside him. I stared at him sleeping soundly and immediately remembered my father.
My father and my uncle looked very alike now more than ever. They were brothers after all, their ears were both humongous and their eyes were both chinky, their cheeks were equally rosy and their smiles both seemed to stretch their entire faces from end to end – well at least that’s what I saw in pictures. The memories I can recall of my father did not seem to have the image of that winning smile he used to have in his photographs from before. I was six years old when he started to suffer from stroke and had to retire from his job. Because of his ailment, he had a tendency to get mad easily and throw some fits, but I as a child, never got to or tried to understand that. He would get irritated and mad at the smallest things. I hated him for that. I can even remember taking the side of my yaya whenever they had quarrels. I always thought my father was the villain inside our house. I never really had a chance to get to know him, more over get close to him. Whenever I would be asked if I loved my father, I would never know what to answer. I knew to say yes was the right thing to do and i knew deep inside i must have that love for my father, yet I just did not feel the words coming out from my mouth. I can say that was never a good daughter to my father, even when he was already bed-ridden, I would be the most useless person in the family in terms of caring for him.
When my father was dying last March, just before my high school graduation, realizations started to set in and it seemed like emotions deep down from the abyss of my cold heart started to pour out. During his hospitalization, I would be at school and my friends would always be taken by surprise on how I would abruptly cry without warning. I cried continuously until my eyes would swell, my nose turn red and my voice become hoarse. People would think that the fear of losing my father was the reason for my emotional hysterics, but they did not know that there was much, much more than to just that.
All throughout the ten years my father had been a stroke patient, my mother would always tell me what a good man my father iss. She would always tell about how much my father loved our family but most especially, loved me. The way my mother tells it, even at my birth, it seemed like I was the most valuable treasure of my father. At times I would be touched and would feel bad for treating my father the way I did, but after awhile I tend to keep my ears shut and hide away the guilt that stabbed me. I now wonder why I chose to suppress my emotions. Perhaps because it was too much shame and remorse than I was able to handle, that I shrunk of fear of facing reality.
But as I held my father’s hand at the hospital room while he was dying, tears gushed from my eyes, as if trying in vain to spell out the thoughts that I wished to articulate but wasn’t able to. All that came from my mouth were snivels and sobs of mortifying pain. I tried to tell him so much, so much that I didn’t know how or where to even start, so much that I was afraid if or not he would still understand, so much that time ran out and I didn’t get to tell him at all how much I did love him and that I was just really afraid to show my emotions. What irony it was; I had so much opportunities but still I had none, I had so much to say but still I kept mute, I felt so much love to give but not anything was I able to give.
In his epitaph, we wrote “a kind husband, a loving father, a good provider, a devoted Christian.” Yes, he was that and more. My father loved our family so much. The only reason why he was attacked by stroke was because of over work and the reason why his condition worsened because he did not want our family to spend money for his medications. He never had vices in his life; smoking, drinking, fooling around, even gluttony– name it and I can tell you that he hasn’t done any of it. His life was a mere cycle of work, family and spirituality. He would not even allow himself to leisure because he thought spending for the needs of his family was more important than spending his time and money on other things. He was a truly devoted Christian, even in the earlier parts of his ailment where he found it hard to walk; he would still diligently go to church. Even if people around him would think it was unjust that he of all people should go through this suffering, he would still whole-heartedly thank the Lord for the blessings of which he can count. My father would be by far the best example of the best father.
Recently, my friends looked up the meaning of my name, Abigail. They Googled it and found many different interpretations, but one the written etymologies that caught my ear as they sped through the words was, “Father’s joy.” My friends taunted me for the different interpretations of my name and I forced myself to smile and laugh with them as they did, but as soon as we parted ways I immediately ran home and cried. I was supposed to be the bearer of love when my father lost hope but I never fulfilled my purpose. I was supposed to attend to him whenever he was in need but I ignored my responsibility as a daughter. I was supposed to understand him the most but I abandoned him in his suffering. I hated myself for how I treated him, I felt unworthy to be even called his daughter. I know these regrets will haunt me to my grave; I lost those many opportunities that I could have taken. What has been done cannot be put right. All that is left for me is to do is to never allow an opportunity like that be foolishly missed again.
My uncle finally woke up. He yawned and rubbed his face with his right hand, just as my father used to do whenever he woke up. My aunt immediately attended to him. There was so much love and care in the air that my eyes felt like tearing up again. I wish I had the chance to show my father how much I loved him; how I wish I had another chance.
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