Not uncommon these days that we may see video clips of departing OFWs at the airport with their family. It is particularly heartbreaking to see little children crying & clinging to bid farewell to their beloved parent who may have been with them for awhile and now will be absent again, all because of the sacrifices-needed for the greater good and better life to be accomplished.
In our gospel today, it is said that “As he has blessed them, Jesus parted from them and was taken to heaven.” Our Christian faith proclaims the Ascension of the Lord into heaven whenever we profess in our Apostles’ creed, ‘He ascended into heaven and seated at the right hand of the Father.” In claiming His rightful place in the story of our salvation, Jesus also has to leave us behind, depart from us & distant away from us. For God’s salvation be fully revealed & fulfilled, the risen Lord Jesus & His Easter disciples then must go through the process of goodbyes, letting go and distancing, which only an OFW family, both parent & children can understand by experience.
But beyond the heart-breaking consequences of departure & distancing in life, the risen Lord’s Ascension & perhaps the flight of an OFW migrant is all about our rising above to the special mission & particular plan God has in store for us in life. Over and above what happened to Jesus & His disciples at the ascension, we give importance to what Jesus said: “As the Christ would suffer & rise from the dead.. would be preached to all nations, You are witnesses of these things… and I am sending upon you the promise of my Father.” With these words, Jesus attests that He has done His mission and now is for us to do our Mission – our Part in His mission.
The Lord’s Ascension then is the moment when Jesus commissioned His disciples to continue the Mission he has begun. It is the very time when Jesus entrusted to His disciples all the good things he had done. And Jesus is handing on the responsibilities now to us His disciples.
Not unlike a departing OFW parent saying parting words of love & encouragement to children left-behind, in His ascension, Jesus may have been saying these words, “Hey, I have done my part. I have nurtured & formed you right. This time, do your part. Go now, go ahead, move on to the world and proclaim – that is, I’ve given you the authority & responsibility to share what you have experienced and learned from me, so that others may also enjoy what have you have enjoyed with me. By the way, don’t forget to believe that I have sent you, for we can continue to do great things, if you believe in me and remain in my love. Go now and do your part, for I have done my part & will continue to do our part in this life and beyond”.
Like the disciples of old, ours is a life commissioned by Christ. As baptized Christians, we are commissioned by Christ to continue and to do our part in the Mission of Christ. As we live our lives in faith of the risen & ascended Lord, we are entrusted also now do our part in building a Christian Nation as well as building God’s Kingdom in the here and now. Jesus continues to send us today in various ways to fulfill our respective life-missions as media of His offer of salvation to the world. During ordination, priests are commissioned to sanctify our Christian faith & life. During profession, religious are commissioned to consecrate & witness our response to God’s bountiful graces. During their wedding day, married couple are commissioned to love God in their marriage & family. During their commissioning, church lay ministers are commissioned to distribute communion, publicly read the scripture, give catechesis on neophytes Christians, on their own capacity. And above all, after Mass, we are all commissioned to “Go in peace, to love and serve the Lord.”
It has been said that at the hour of his death, Jesus did not say: “I am finished”, but rather He said: “IT is Finished”. Thus, With Him & with us, there is more yet to come & more yet to happen as we do our now our part in His mission.
As sent & commissioned to be His media & witnesses of the God’s kingdom, may we continue to respond & do our part in His ongoing plan of salvation.
This is a reflection of Fr. Ramon Fruto, CSsR – He is currently based in Iloilo City and the Director of St. Clements’ Retreat House.
“ Recall your ‘shrines’” was an exercise given us in a joint seminar on “elderhood” for us who belong to the senior and the golden age generations. To the outsider, this opening sentence at once asks for enlightenment. What is “elderhood” and what are the “shrines” we are asked to identify?
“Elderhood” seems to be a more compassionate and sensitive way of saying “growing old, the same way that we are now asked to call “suspects” as “persons of interest”! Growing old used to be taken for granted and even with a sense of pride and mission accomplished. Growing old gracefully was a lesson all those who have crossed the 60-year line were expected to learn. But with today’s sensitiveness to cultures and subcultures, “growing old” is something that the “ageing” wish to varnish over the way we ageing males try to comb our hair so as to hide the balding patches of our pate and the ageing females undergo a “Dr. Belo” on their wrinkling cheeks. And so in the retreat-seminar for us ageing Redemptorists, we are asked to reflect on our answer to the reflection-question: What do you consider as your great challenge in growing into being elderly/”Elderhood”? That is certainly a sensitive way of asking a question that could be put more brutally – and truthfully – as “What do you consider as your great problem in growing old? “ Then we would more truthfully answer: combing our hair which is no longer there, brushing our teeth which are not our own, forgetting where I placed my eye-glasses a few minutes ago, getting cantankerous at the slightest provocation, feeling forgotten and useless. Then we can talk about “growing old gracefully” and not euphemize it with “coping with elderhood”!
Anyway, here are the four of us among the most elderly, if not THE most elderly among the ageing confreres of the Province. Hopefully we are able to face “growing old” with equal grace as facing the challenge of “elderhood”. During our senior-golden agers’ seminar, one of the exercises we were given was to get in touch with the “shrines” of our life’s journey. By the “shrines” were meant experiences or events in our pilgrim journey that had an impact on our lives. The shrines varied in kind as our experiences were varied, and varied in number with the length of each one’s life’s journey. But the four of us portrayed here had one “shrine” in common: our life in Bangalore, India where the first batches of us Filipino Redemptorist vocations were sent for our studies in philosophy and theology. We made our groping way to India, the land of magic and mystery, after a novitiate in Cebu shared with the novices from the northern vice-province of Manila. To India, we winged our way not on jet airliners but on four-engined DC-6es. In the studentate in Bangalore, we lived in harmonious co-existence with Indian and Sri-lankan and Irish students. Asking for no special diet, we survived the years of Indian curry and learned to like it after getting over the initial conflagration of our palates. During our years there, we neither got to visit home nor got visitors from home. Long before the age of the internet and cell-phones, our only contact with our families was by an “air-form” letter once a month. Those of us who were ordained there were ordained without anyone representing our family. At my ordination I sent my blessing to my folks by telegram – in Latin! The only “exposure” to the outside world we were given a glimpse of was limited to the studentate house in Bangalore and the holiday house in the hills a train- and bus-ride away from Bangalore. The five-week holiday in the hills after each school year was something we all looked forward to. We took all this in stride because this was part of the life we had applied for without anyone forcing us to enter it. Processing was unknown to us, the only process we underwent was the once-a-month colloquium with our Prefect. Yet we lived in reasonable contentment, which was probably one reason we had little difficulty adjusting to different personalities and places and ministries of assignment in later life, and lasting longer in the active apostolate than expected in retirement years.
Over the span of ten years, Cebu Vice-Province had sent to Bangalore a total of 9 newly-professed students. There was discussion among the Superiors as to where the Filipino students might be sent for their studies in philosophy and theology. There were three openings: Ireland, Australia and India. Back in 1925 a Cebuano student (John Corominas) was sent to Australia though he left after his first vows expired. In the end the decision was for India, the studentate in Bangalore then being conceived as a possible regional studentate for this part of Asia. So, with no other student before me to tell me what life in India was going to be, I was sent there alone in 1951, before my 20th birthday, a raw, untraveled Filipino to a country I had only read about my school’s geography book as a land of mystery, of magicians and snake-charmers. When I arrived there the students stared at me as a nine-day wonder never having set eyes on this creature called a Filipino before. Later, they would share with me the questions making the rounds before I came: Does he speak English? Does he eat with chopsticks? Does he sit on his haunches? By the time the subsequent batches would arrive, they realized that we were as human as the rest of them. Despite the world’s impression of India as the home of the caste system, we felt as welcome as members of their family and in our years there, we learned to look on Bangalore as our second home.
After my coming in 1951, Fernando Yusingco followed in 1952, Abdon Josol in 1956, the famous four (Louie Hechanova, Fil Suico, Willy Jesena, Ireneo Amantillo) in 1957, then the final batch of Juanito Caballero and Rudy Romano in 1958. The student professed after these two, Joelito Seyan, could not get a visa for India. His father was a citizen of Nationalist China and India only recognized Communist China. Consequently, Joelito was sent to Ireland, which started the sending of Filipino students to Ireland. All those sent to Bangalore reached ordination, though in later years some of them would leave the Congregation.
The Banglore Survivors (Fr. Fil, the late-Bishop Ireneo, Fr. Ramon and Fr. Willy)
The photograph here represents the survivors of the Bangalore “shrine” of the Filipinos. Five of the Bangalore-Filipinos have died: Fernando had left and died outside the Congregation, after doing monumental work on the missions and in community organizing among the depressed area population. Louie died as vice-provincial superior, Abdon went to his reward after years of service as a missioner, vice-provincial and provincial Superior and moral theology professor and formation director in our studentate in Davao. Rudy Romano, activist and defender of the oppressed and the poor has been unheard from since he was abducted and tortured by the intelligence agents of the martial law regime, and Juanito Caballero having left the congregation and served first as chaplain in the armed forces and later as officer in the martial law armed forces has since died.
I asked the other three “golden agers” in the attached photo for a few words born of their reflection on the shrine of our pilgrimage that was Bangalore: Here are the gems coming from their memories:
Bp. Amantillo (who died in 2018):
“To live in a country rather than your own, would make life so lonely, unappreciated and forlorn, but with the ‘ shake of the head ‘and welcome of Tamilnadu, those glorious days, fifty years can never undo”.
Fr. Fil Suico:
“There is no death though eyes grow dim, there is no fear with your everlasting smile with me.”
Fr. Willy Jesena:
Looking back over 55 years of Redemptorist life, it is a great source of joy to me to recall the many blessings of our Holy Redeemer. I have engaged in parish mission work, retreats, parish apostolate, spiritual direction, migrant workers’ apostolate and formation work. I see thousands of faces of people who in one way or another I have served. It a great grace to be a servant of Jesus Christ for his own purpose, to touch the lives of people. I thank Mary who has always been a perpetual help and inspiration. I like to say to our seminarians: ‘Together let us face the future, and continue to accept the challenge of Jesus’ mission for the abandoned poor. Let us take the words of Pope Francis with enthusiasm: ‘Go, fear not, serve!’”
For me: summing up my fellow survivors’ golden journey, as we pause in prayerful reflection at this shared shrine of our Redemptorist pilgrimage, our Bangalore experience, these verses I have treasured from my high school days:
“For yesterday was only a dream and tomorrow a vision, but today well lived makes yesterday a dream of happiness and tomorrow a vision of hope.”
From my pauses at my journey’s shrines, this brief reflection:
HOPE springs eternal in the heart that does not cease to dream.You might say that we old-timers past our golden of ordination are dreamers without end!!!
“They said if you love someone, you set them free. If they come back again, till the end you are meant to be.” Words are from the popular song sung in duet by Barbara Streisand and Barry Manilow.
So, How’s your love-life? More than having someone to love, love-life is all about having a life of being loving of and being loved by others. And in love, would you agree to these words that, “if you love someone, set them free; if they come back again, till the end you are meant to be?”
When we really come to think of it, for those who have love-life, love harshly teaches us how to let go and set free of one another. For our love to grow and mature, we need also to learn how to let go and set each other free. True enough in loving others, we know that part of it is the experiences of letting go as well as letting grow – of saying goodbye and saying hello – of departure and arrival, of going away and coming back, of leaving behind and starting again anew, of distance as well as closeness. And we learn & experience growth in this kind of love along the way, not without difficulties.
Last Sunday, we heard again the commandment of Jesus: to love one another as I have loved you. He wants us to learn how to love and be loved in return, to share love with one another, same as the way He loved us. Today, Jesus is teaching us His tough kind of love – His way of loving that requires setting one another free. He said, “I am going away and I will come back to you.” Meaning, for His love and our love to grow, we must learn how to let one another go and set each other free. This is the kind of tough love Jesus is teaching and requiring us in loving one another. Part and parcel then of loving like Jesus is our capacity to let go, set free, leave behind, and say goodbye so that our love for one another to grow and mature.
As part of his last words, last farewell, mi ultimo adios to his apostles, Jesus is also trying to tell us that because of his love for us, he has to leave us not to forsake us, but to give us a chance to practice the love he has taught us, and to experience for ourselves the Father’s love he shared us. In other words, as he goes back to the Father, Jesus has given us the opportunity to grow in our faith and to witness and share that faith to others. His commandment of love to us is His kind of loving, that we are to be set free from our kind of loving so that we may grow in Our Father’s love. Out of love and for us to grow in that love, Jesus, as parent, guide, leader, good shepherd, Himself has to distance Himself, step back, let go, say goodbye, & set us free – so that we can love God for ourselves and help others love God for themselves.
Somehow Jesus is saying to us now, “Guys, I have already taught you, guided you what to do. I have already done my part. Now is your time to do your part. Just carry out what I have told you: Love one another just like as I have loved you. By your love and loving, others may believe in God. Yes, I am going away, and I will come back to you. So, don’t worry. I will never abandon you. As you love one another, in Holy Spirit, I will be always with you.”
To us Christians who loves Jesus, this tough Christ-like love that requires distancing in order to grow is very familiar – as well as with our OFW Migrants who loves their family back home. By their love for Christ, their family and loved ones, Filipino Christian migrants find themselves physically distant but still personally close with their family & loved ones, regardless of absence and distance. As I have once ministered them, somehow their example of Christian love-life is a story of being distant yet intimate, of setting free yet coming together again, of departures and arrivals, of goodbyes and hellos. And all of these are not for the sake of preserving good things in life but to make them grow and do their part to be better versions of themselves and others in faith & life so that all may glorify God, and others may believe in Him through Jesus Christ.
In whatever time & situation we are in – here or abroad, normal or new normal, may the love of Christ continue to inspire us to intimately lead our lives in loving God and one another in life – even if at a distance. Amen.
Whenever we are asked with the question: “How’s your lovelife?” most of the time we find ourselves with an awkward smile, pondering whether we have someone loving us and/or have someone we are loving now. But over and above the person – subject and object of our love, “How’s your lovelife?” posts a deepest inquiry about our life of love and loving others. It asks us personally: “Have I been loving others, and have I been loved by others lately? Have I been loveable – able to love and beloved by others?” Meaning, beyond the answer of having or not having someone is the challenge of our being and having love at all in life.
Simply put, regardless of having or not having someone, such question confronts us to examine ourselves: “Have I been loving to others, or have I been loved by others lately?” Love then is more than just having someone in life, but moreso about having a loving-life with others. Lovelife is thus our life of loving others, and loving one another.
Jesus in our gospel today once again reminded us of His commandment: to love one another, as He has loved us. More than just having someone, Jesus is challenging us here to have a love life – i.e. to lead and live our lives of love with others. He also reveals us that by our lovelife with others we glorify God in Jesus and we are known by others to be His disciples. Loving one another then is our way of loving God and of being loved by God in Christ. And above all our love life with others should be Christ-like, that is the same way as He loved us. Here Jesus offers and calling us to practice Love as patterned in His way of living-life of love with us and others.
Reflecting on our Christian life as being beloved by God in Jesus, modern-day psycho-spiritual director Henri Nouwen in his book: “Life of the Beloved” gave us a glimpse on Jesus way of loving us, i.e. On how are we to love others like Jesus. Nouwen pointed out that Christ-like lovelife consists of four elements. First, loving others like Jesus must be a chosen and committed life. Our love then is never just a consequence but a choice and commitment-we made for life. Second, Christ-like love of others must be Blessed and Sanctified. Our love must not be limited to our human ways but be offered and made holy and sacred in God ways. (Ipinasa-Dios). Third, to love others like Christ is also to be broken, formed and transformed by our love of others. Our chosen and blessed love then is meant not only for its own sake but to make us to be better version of ourselves and of others person. And above all, Christ-like love must not be exclusive but be shared to grow and unite with others.
Like the Bread in the Eucharist (bread-chosen, bread-blessed, bread-broken/transformed, and bread-shared), simply put, “To love one another as Jesus loved us” is to lead a life of love being-chosen and committed, of love being-blessed, of love being-broken and transformed, and of love being-shared with others. This is Jesus way of loving us, and we are commanded to do the same, as He said to us: “I give you a new commandment, love one another as I have loved you.”
Perhaps we ask ourselves now: “How’s my lovelife? Have I love others as Jesus loves me? Have I been loveable – able to love and beloved by others? Is my love like that of Jesus (love-chosen, blessed, broken and shared)? What areas of my lovelife is still lacking and needs improvement? How should I grow better in my lovelife and Christian life?”
Remember: By our love, we glorify God in Christ and we are known by others as Christian.
We pray that we may never lose sight but be rather committed in our Christ-like lovelife, “Loving one another like Jesus” as our way to God’s love and salvation. Amen.
The late-Philippine lady senator while once giving a graduation speech, Miriam Defensor-Santiago made this joke. She said… Beside a swimming pool, two girls are having this following conversation. G1 said to G2: Know what? you are going to float (Alam mo. Lulutang ka). G2 to G1: Why? Is it because I’m getting slim, light & sexy? (Bakit? Dahil ba, magaan, slim at sexy ako? G1 replied: No, it’s because you are Plastic (Dahil plastic ka). Funny & rude it maybe, but it tells a lot.
Now, how do we distinguish a GOOD parent, teacher, friend, politician, leader, mentor, or coach from a BAD one? How do we know if that person is real, true, authentic, deep, honest & trustworthy? How do we know that person is fake, shallow, liar & unreliable?
Nowadays it is normal for us to suspect things, simply because it is not easy to know whether it is real or fake. Because it is difficult to detect the authentic from artificial or plastic, the durable from disposable, nowadays we do tend to be suspicious of things & even of one another. Same way with our relationships with others, we rather suspect, doubt, and distrust one another, than believe and trust others because it is more challenging to distinguish who are real, honest & smart from fake, deceitful, & shrewd people.
Jesus in our gospel today introduced and made Himself known to us as The Good Shepherd who knows His sheep and His sheep follows Him. As Jesus distinguished Himself from a Hired Worker who work for pay and no concern for the sheep, He reminds us here that as OUR good shepherd He is a hands-on and committed caretaker/caregiver of His sheep who maintains a personal intimate relation with His sheep, and will commit His life to live and work with His fold in life & we, His sheep has a deep faith in Him, our Good Shepherd.
Be reminded the risen Lord reveals Himself in Person & in Flesh for real. In last Sunday gospel, as the risen Lord reveals Himself in the midst of the disciples, he showed and asked them to touch and see His wounded hands and feet. Thus, the risen Lord reveals Himself not as ghost but in flesh and bones with wounds. The risen Lord, our Good Shepherd thus knows us & we know Him personally for real, & not for fake or as plastic.
We Christians proclaim that our risen Lord Jesus Christ is OUR good shepherd. We believe that He is our Shepherd, who knows and loves us personally. We also believe that we know Him personally for we know His voice & we follow Him faithfully in life.
Particularly For us Filipino Catholic, we do have special or unique take in knowing our Good Shepherd. We know Him not only because Kilala natin siya but because Dama natin siya – not only because we know Him but moreso because we feel Him. Culturally sense-feeling perceptions are important to us, Filipino Christians. Like,… I may know you, but I may not feel you. I may feel you though I may not know you. (Kilala kita, pero di kita ramdam. Ramdam kita kahit di kita kilala). This is how we distinguish real from fake & how we discern good & bad.
Same way as we Filipinos have this natural felt-instinct & sense to distinguish the real from fake, to discern the good from evil, we also come to be familiar with & know more the shepherd’s voice through our gut-sense and feelings. Same way as the mother knows the child instinctively & the child knows the mother by sense & instinct, we do come to know the risen Lord as our true Good Shepherd in life not only by our volition, consent & reasonings, but most of all through our sense & feeling perception (damdamin at kalooban). Feel/Ramdam ko Siya. Feel/Ramdam natin Siya.
By our sense-perception & feeling-gut insights, we come to know the risen Lord with us – in person & in flesh. Knowing the Shepherd is thus not only for us an intellectual or cognitive familiarity but more so a deep felt-sense knowledge and insight of His presence, love & blessing.
Same deep-sense knowledge and insight would also guide us in tomorrow’s National & Local Election as we choose & vote for our coming political leaders. By the same gut-feeling insight, we know who will be good or bad, real, or fake, sincere or corrupt for the future ahead of us.
We pray then that the Easter Season this year be our moment to enhance and improve our special felt-sense of knowing our True & Good Shepherd, so that we may not be gone astray from His fold but rather have a much deeper relationship with Him, and be always attuned with His will & plan for us now, especially during these pandemic times & for the future of our society, nation & world ahead.
A DOSE OF GOD TODAY 