PAN DE LA SEMANA

16 th Sunday in Ordinary Time (B) July 22, 2012 We all know what this means …  what St. Paul refers to as “the dividing wall of enmity” is so real, so true, so rampant, even in our times. We see it in the media network wars. We see it in the battle of the giant retailers, and shopping malls. The one which “got it all for us,” obviously wins hands down, with a 44 th poised to be built in a province that already boasts of two. We see it in the warring artificial “parties” in both houses of congress, and the equally artificial unity blocks born of convenience, rather than principle, of compromise, rather than moral conviction. We are a divided nation and people. We are a great lesson on how not to run a country, and a telling icon of perpetual divisiveness and disunity. But if the story that unfolds in the prophet Jeremiah’s book is an indication, then we ought to know that God is never happy with such a state of affairs. According to Jeremiah in today’s ...

16th Sunday in Ordinaty Time (A) July 17, 2011 CALLED TO BE, CALLED TO BECOME IN THIS VALLEY OF TEARS! Patience is what the readings lead me to reflect on today, even as I wait patiently for a delayed flight to Cebu, where a task awaits me over the weekend. Patience is what I needed to have all through the week, as once again, I saw how a powerful PR machinery has all but reduced the Catholic Church to a humiliating, defensive stance, beset by unfair, and, for the most part, untruthful, accusations involving two separate issues: SUVs or so-called luxury vehicles, and supposedly illegal receipt of funds from the state-run and state-owned lotteries. The accusations later turned out to be duds, inventions and machinations of a PR team that was apparently well-funded, who did their homeworks, and almost succeeded to pull off a caper consisting of half-truths and suggested associations with a much-hated and also much maligned former president. Despite the clarifications that ensu...