Latest learnings

Year 2011 closes and Year 2012 opens. Here are some of the latest learnings gathered in this transition time:
1. Assessing the events of last year, including the many disasters and catastrophes that happened here in the Philippines and abroad, I can only say: Life hurts, life heals. It sometimes strains my eyes to see how God writes straight with crooked lines but he does really. I guess it’s because while there happened to be original sin, there was even earlier than that and after that, original grace.
This is taking place very concretely in Cagayan de Oro and Iligan City where the disaster of typhoon Sendong left a thousand people dead and several thousands homeless. Amidst this experience of death, there is also the solidarity of the people which can be likened to a foretaste of the resurrection.
2. The latest movie I saw is entitled Ice Princess. It’s a movie about best science and best art. What makes them both best is the acknowledgement of the gift-seed planted in the person as well as the passion with which a person nurtures the growth of the gift-seed.
There’s a side theme to the movie: adults are usually jaded because of their unrecognized frustrated dreams; young people, instead, are more honest in their search and acceptance of what they can and cannot do and be.
3. A long standing tradition of my Congregation is to open the year with a “Saint Protector”. Interestingly, in the morning of January 1, I had a pose with St. Scholastica in the garden of the St. Scholastica Retreat House in Tagaytay (see picture). In the evening, when we had the distribution of the Saint Protectors, guess who I got: St. Scholastica! Serendipity anyone?
Scholastica means “disciple” or learner. So I think the year 2012 for me will be another intensive year of being a disciple, a year of intense learning, thankfully, with a great disciple St. Scholastica.