The Most Important Thing the Church Has to Say to the World

This morning, reading the August 22 issue of Catholic San Francisco, the archdiocesan newspaper here, I was very struck by Fr. Ron Rolheiser's column entitled "Prophecy--Challenge and Comfort." Fr. Rolheiser is one of the best and most justly popular spiritual writers today. His column, which I shall attempt to summarize here, caught my attention, because he articulates simply and clearly what I find is my own conviction.

Fr. Rolheiser writes that, recently, he attended a conference in which participants were asked to discuss an important and intriguing question: "What is the most important thing the Church needs to be saying to the world today?"

Different groups stressed different "aspects of the Gospel." Conservatives tended to stress sound doctrine, family, marriage; liberals tended to focus on justice and peace.

Upon reflection, Fr. Rolheiser believes that, although truth and justice are important messages, there may be something more basic the world needs to hear from the Church. "One of the major tasks of the churches is to console the world, to comfort its people."

He recalls a conversation he had as a freshly ordained priest with an elderly, exemplary priest. When he asked this older priest (who had been in the ministry for more than 50 years) whether the older man would change anything about the way he had practiced his priestly ministry were he to be given his life to live over, Fr. Rolheiser received a surprising answer.

Rolheiser expected that the priest would not change anything really, since he has been such a faithful and holy priest. Instead the old man said: "If I had my priesthood to live over again, I would be gentler with people. I would console more and challenge more carefully. . . . I regret that sometimes I was too hard on people! I meant it well, I was sincere, but I think that I ended up laying added burdens on people when they were already carrying enough pain. If I were just beginning as a priest, I would be gentler. I would spend my energies more trying to life pain from people. People are in a lot of pain. They need us, first of all, to help them with that!"

I like the way Fr. Rolheiser, years later, approves the wisdom he heard as a young priest: "He's right. What the world needs first of all from us, the churches, is comfort, help in lifting and understanding its complexity, its wounds, its anxieties, its raging restlessness, its temptations, and its infidelities and its sin. Like the prodigal son, the world needs first of all to be surprised by unconditional love. Sometime later, and there will be time for that, it will want hard challenge." 

Fr. Rolheiser ends by wisely pointing out that the consolation the churches offer cannot be based simply on human empathy or wisdom. Rather, it must come from the churches' experience of God's all-compassionate heart. This is the only true and enduring comfort the Church can give the world: when, as Fr. Rolheiser eloquently puts it, "we show it [the world] that God feels for it more than it feels for itself, . . . that God always opens another door when we close one, that God is not put off by all the times when we are too weak to do what is best, that God understands our complexity, our weaknesses, our anger, our lusts, our jealousies, and our despair."

The Churches must tell the world that "God descends into all the hells we create, stands inside our muddled, wounded and guilty hearts and breathes peace."

I think Fr. Rolheiser's question and his answer deserve reflection and discussion among my brother Jesuits and other pastoral ministers in the Philippine Church today.

Redemption and Conversion: Remembering Ninoy

An insightful, inspiring homily by Fr. Provincial Jose Magadia, S.J., on the 25th anniversary of the assassination of Ninoy Aquino. I woke up this morning to a sad text message from Fr. Tony Moreno, President of Ateneo de Zamboanga, about grenade blasts and fear in Zamboanga City. Two nights ago, I was awakened by a text from a young priest from Lanao, about brutal killings and the hostage-taking of the priest in his hometown. During these sad times for our country, perhaps these thoughtful words can help renew our hope, courage, and commitment.

Homily for the 25^th Anniversary of the Death of Senator Benigno Aquino, Jr.

Church of the Gesù, Ateneo de Manila University, 17 August 2008

 

When I was telling a group of friends about this Mass for the 25^th anniversary of the death of Ninoy Aquino, the common reaction was disbelief: “Twenty-five years? Already?”

 

Even more striking was the conversation that followed. One said, I was driving my car when I heard the news and I felt so heavy and distressed and sad, and there was this strange emptiness inside. Another said, I was just coming out of class, when word spread on the crowded corridors of our school, and many were stunned and confused and outraged. A third one said, I was at home, and a friend called me, and as I heard the news, the tears started coming for reasons I could not understand.

 

One after another, my friends and I recalled, how each one remembered that day so vividly, where we were, what we were doing, the thoughts and the feelings that hit us when the news broke out, what we did after, how we all found time to fall in line with the millions of Filipinos from all walks of life who paid their respects at Santo Domingo Church, how some of us joined that unforgettable twelve-hour funeral march from Santo Domingo, down España, crossing Quiapo and Luneta, and all the way to Parañaque, singing and praying, as millions more lined the streets in solidarity, chanting “Ninoy, Ninoy!”, dressed in the signature yellow.

 

I remember feeling so proud of being Filipino and so proud of Ninoy Aquino, and so emboldened by his death, to continue the fight, and to take part in the next three years of nonviolent struggle, and to join the Filipino people in assuring each other with Ninoy’s immortal words, “Hindi ka nag-iisa.” Yes, those were graced days of unimaginable courage, and I consider myself so blessed to have been part of that.

 

As I look back, I ask myself, how did Ninoy Aquino do it? How did he leave such a mark on many of us? Was it the disbelief and shock that blood was spilled? Was it the incredible audacity of a man who knew he was risking death, and yet went on with such determination? Was it the sacrifice that was so strikingly and powerfully communicated? Was it the dignity that came with courage recovered?

 

I suggest that there were two fundamental experiences that marked those days--REDEMPTION and CONVERSION.

 

First, Redemption.  In the Old Testament, the idea of redemption boiled down to something quite simple. It had to do with the payment of a price, in order to release the enslaved or imprisoned or oppressed. It had to do with ransom, in order to liberate and grant freedom to one who is held captive. It had to do with setting free from a power that controls, that burdens, that possesses and imposes and dominates, that makes people unable to take their lives into their own hands, and determine their own futures with dignity. The sacrifice of Ninoy Aquino left such a mark on us because it redeemed us who witnessed the boldness and bravery of someone who was willing to give up his life for those he loves.

 

The Filipino is worth dying for, Ninoy said, and that anchored our actions in those days. It gave us a share in his vision, his daring, his tenacity. It gave us a spirit that was so fresh and infectious. It made us creative, thinking out of the box, in our ways of fighting the injustices of those days, to the point of being playful and even enjoying ourselves. It gave us a staying power that didn’t give in to petty discouragements, through three long years of seeming impasse. It gave us energy and faith to just hang on, no matter what and no matter how long. Ninoy’s death was our ransom, our redemption.

 

We were saved, because through his sacrifice, we felt a new strength. We were won over by the power of good and righteousness that Isaiah speaks of in today’s First Reading. Observe what is right, says the Lord, and do what is just, for my salvation is about to come. And Ninoy’s sense of what is right and just gave us a new vitality.

 

Second, Conversion. In that most touching 1973 letter Ninoy wrote to Senator Soc Rodrigo, he recounts his experience of solitary confinement. He was already in prison, when on March 12, 1973, he and the late Senator Pepe Diokno were ordered to get dressed, and thereafter, the two were blindfolded, handcuffed, and flown by helicopter to an unknown destination.

 

In that letter, Ninoy writes: “When my blindfold was finally removed, I found myself inside a newly painted room, roughly four by five meters, with barred windows, the outside of which was boarded with plywood panels. There was a six-inch gap between the panels and the window frame to allow slight ventilation. There was a bright daylight neon tube that glowed day and night. There were no electric switches in the room, and the door had no knobs, only locks on the outside. The room was completely bare except for a steel bed without mattress. No chairs, tables, nothing.

 

“I was stripped naked. My wedding ring, watch, eyeglasses, shoes, clothes were all taken away. Later, a guard who was in civilian clothes brought in a bedpan and told me that I would be allowed to go to the bathroom once a day in the morning, to shower, brush my teeth and wash my clothes [two shirts and underwear]…. the intention was to make us really feel helpless and dependent for everything on the guards.”

 

In those days of solitary confinement, Ninoy reached a point of desperation and desolation, as he questioned the justice of God. He told Soc Rodrigo, “I remembered your famous words: Hindi natutulog ang Diyos…but I felt, at that moment, he was having a very good sound siesta and I was afraid when he finally woke up, I would have been gone! … Would God allow me to die without seeing my family? What terrible crimes have I committed to deserve this fate? The magnanakaws are living it up and I who tried to walk the narrow path of public service with integrity am now about to meet uncertain fate? Is this justice?

 

And then, something happened. “Suddenly,” Ninoy relates, “Jesus became a live human being.” And he awakened to the truth that in Jesus was “a God-Man who preached nothing but love and was rewarded with death…. who had power over all creation but took the mockery of a crown of thorns with humility and patience. And for all his noble intentions, he was shamed, vilified, slandered, and betrayed.”

 

“Then as if I heard a voice tell me: Why do you cry? I have gifted you with consolations, honors and glory which have been denied to the millions of your countrymen. I made you the youngest war correspondent, presidential assistant, mayor, vice governor, governor, and Senator of the Republic, and I recall you never thanked me for all these gifts. I have given you a full life, a great wife and beautiful lovable children. Now that I visit you with a slight desolation, you cry and whimper like a spoiled brat!

 

“With this realization, I went down on my knees and begged His forgiveness. I know I was merely undergoing a test, maybe in preparation for another mission. I know everything that happens in this world is with his knowledge and consent. I knew He would not burden me with a load I could not carry. I therefore resigned myself to His will.”

 

This, my friends, is conversion. And it is this conversion that we were invited to in those three years of struggle against the dictatorship--a conversion that meant working and giving it our best, but in the end, knowing that we could only depend on God. It was a conversion that meant accepting our limitations, and allowing the Lord to move in and fill in the blanks, and bring all the loose ends together into some unity. It meant surrendering everything, and then allowing ourselves to be surprised by the Lord’s ways, as he would later show so wonderfully at EDSA in 1986.

 

For Ninoy, and for those who saw his conversion, it also meant embracing the ways of active non-violence, which called for courage and daring. It sought reconciliation, and not the defeat of an adversary. It was directed at eliminating an evil, not destroying an evil-doer. It entailed a willingness to accept suffering for the cause, should it be called for, but never to inflict it. It rejected hatred, animosity or violence of the spirit, in addition to renouncing all forms of physical violence. It demanded a fundamental faith that in the end, justice would prevail. And that is why, the conversion to non-violence also means an openness to even the inclusion of the dogs who depend on the crumbs that fall from the master’s tables, an openness to receiving the aggressor who turns away from his old ways, an openness to reconciliation and forgiveness, after repentance.

 

As I look at the Philippines today, I feel sad. I am sad about the brazen corruption of many who are supposed to serve in public office.

 

I am sad about how we Filipinos have become so tolerant of injustice and oppression, and how we do not challenge ourselves enough, and easily let ourselves off the hook. I am sad about how many have given up integrity to claim their share of the booty that the powerful dangle before them.

 

I am sad that so many of our people have to leave their homes and their families, in search of employment overseas, because the country could not offer them opportunity.

 

I am sad about the acts of violence all around, from the violence of the criminal, to the violence in Mindanao, to the violence of poverty and hunger and inequality and miseducation. This morning we received news from the Assumption sisters, asking for prayers because of the war that has just begun again inLanao del Norte.

 

I feel sad about the greed of those who abuse power, and selfishly cling to it at any cost. And through all this, it is so easy to be discouraged. But if we were to give in to this discouragement, then this commemoration of the sacrifice of Ninoy will have been merely ritual, and nothing more.

 

Instead, today, I suggest that we are asked to step back for a moment, and look back to the life of this man, twenty-five years after the great sacrifice of his life. We are invited to consider that what Ninoy’s experience really tells us is that the struggle is really not meant to end, that the true offering of self is a daily and ongoing oblation that can only last a lifetime, and that the fight for justice must go on, ever-renewing itself, and ever re-creating itself in the face of new injustices. We are challenged to re-tell the story of Ninoy to our young, those who did not see, firsthand, those years of amazing spirit, and to rekindle in them that fire that burned so strongly in many of us.

 

My friends, if we are to live through all the difficulties in our country today, if we are to persevere with dignity and determination, we can draw our strength once more from Ninoy, by reclaiming the redemption he offered, and the conversion he shared. This day, we thank the Lord once more for all our Filipino martyrs and heroes, men and women, known and unknown, whose lives have been a great light and a source of hope, that feed into the work of continuing national transformation.

 

Today, we pray very especially for President Cory Aquino, for healing and for strength. We pray for peace in Mindanao. We ask Ninoy to pray for us and intercede for us, for we know he is with the Lord he sought to serve, the Lord in whose redemption Ninoy participated, the Lord in whose hands we entrust our lives and our loves, confident that he will bring us his peace. Amen.

- Fr. Jose Cecilio Magadia, SJ
Homily for the 25th Anniversary
of the Death of Senator Benigno Aquino, Jr.
Church of the Gesù, Ateneo de Manila University,

17 August 2008 

The Ones You Leave Behind

I wrote this on the evening of Monday, the eve of my departure for Hongkong (and from here, the States). 

So, tomorrow, I finally head off for my sabbatical. I should be happy, and I am, but there is the ache left by the knowledge that my going is causing some pain to loved ones.

I am thinking especially of Mom. Last night, after the Province celebrations for the feast of St. Ignatius, I went to say good-bye. When I got home, the house was dark. She was already in bed. She looked so frail, so vulnerable, lying there. I woke her up and we talked a bit. I tried to reassure her that it was only two months, that I would call and email.

But I guess she knows that these first two months are the start of my leaving the country more or less for good. I will return in October for her 80^th birthday, but will leave for Rome soon after that. And even though I will come back from time to time, my home will be in another country for the next few years.

So no matter how I tried to be cheerful and casual, as though this was just one of my short trips abroad, I guess both of us knew that there was a qualitative difference to this parting.

Chinese Filipino families are not demonstrative where feelings are concerned. There is much left unsaid, unexpressed--simply felt, guessed, intuited. So when the frail, ailing woman who is my mother lifted a hand from her pillow to touch my cheek every so briefly, something she has never done before, I knew and felt all her unspoken tenderness, sadness and love in that brief caress.

And so I am writing this, because my brothers will print this out and let her read it, and so she will know that I know and am so grateful for the sacrifice she is making in letting me go, without question or complaint, as she has let me go time and time again in the past twenty eight years of my Jesuit life.  I can only imagine that it’s gotten more difficult, not easier, over the years. When I first left home to enter the Novitiate in 1980, Mom was only 51, only two years older than I am now, with a full and active life and many other children to keep her occupied. Now she is turning 80, and because of her Parkinson’s disease, she doesn’t get out as much as she used to, but rather spends most of her time alone at home, with TV game shows and soap operas as her only companions.

What is so clear to me this evening is that, while those who leave home because of the Lord’s call sacrifice something, those who are left behind, like Mary, like Mom, also make an enormous sacrifice.

I went back home briefly tonight to bring a couple of framed pictures of myself with the Holy Father. I know they will make Mom happy and proud. She asked me to write out my new “title” or position in the Society, because she finds it hard to remember (and let’s face it: “General Councilor and Regional Assistant for East Asia and Oceania” is a mouthful). I know that she will want to tell her friends and our relatives about me. If that makes her happy, I am glad.

Before I left, she asked me to bless her. I said a prayer aloud while I lightly placed my hands on her head, and I was grateful that, after the blessing, the mood lightened, and she smiled as she told me to go and get a good night’s sleep before my trip the next day. When I blessed her, I asked God to keep her in good health, to give her peace of heart and mind, and to help her always to trust in his love. It is a prayer I will make very often and with much love and gratitude in the days to come.