I have this entry in my book, “Censuring Back the Supreme Court”:
“I was already in college and writing for the Bicol Mail, a local newspaper when I encountered with my angel again. In September 1972, few days before I was arrested by the agents of Philippine Constabulary I was on the wooden Colgante bridge that connected the Penafrancia Avenue to Tabuco Avenue awaiting the fluvial procession of the Lady of Penafrancia. The water procession must pass under that bridge. It was an ideal spot for a reporter covering the fluvial procession.
People were jostling and pushing in that crowded bridge. I was very uncomfortable in that bridge and felt that I was being pushed and led out of the bridge. I left the bridge and had tried to look for another spot where I can observe the fluvial procession but I found none so I proceeded to downtown and tried to skip the procession by the Lady of Patroness. After spending sometime at downtown and looking at the thriller photos outside the movie house, I went back to Colgante Bridge.
There I saw the collapse bridge and bodies of people being fished off from the river one by one pinned under the collapsed wooden beams of the bridge. My angel has not only spared me from certain death but also from the trauma and agony of being to find a vantage spot near the bridge and saw people drowning and going helpless under water as they gasped their last breath. Bodies were piled at DZRB radio station at Concepcion Pequeňa where they could be identified by relatives and friends. I proceeded to the radio station and had to hop from bodies to bodies laid on the dusty hall which by count rose to about 50 bodies or more to find out if I knew someone from among the dead. Yes, I knew one, the security guard of the local branch of the Philippine National Bank, whom everyone kid as a Jess Lapid, look alike.
It was the first time in the history of the Penafrancia Fiesta celebration where the Lady, halfway to her voyage back to her shrine, has to be transported by land. I was not able to draw any meaning from this tragedy. Was it her way of communicating to the people that the ritual be discontinued? For after all, the voyadores that came to worship her and carry her from shrine to the cathedral and back to her shrine after nine days of novena were mostly drunk, rowdy and wild. The atmosphere was far from contemplative yet joyous and spiritual event. Some voyadores might have been motivated by joyful spirituality when they have devoted their lives of being the Lady’s noble escorts year in and year out, but their meaningful devotion is oftentimes diluted by others who had been there by sheer fanaticism and fun.
Another objection that the Lady of Penafrancia could justifiably make was her being paraded on stretch of water desecrated by spillage of sewage from business establishments and residential houses that lined the river banks. In the seventies, Naga River already smelled filth and garbage and it needs a miracle to make this river clean and worthy of the passage of the Lady of Penafrancia. Unfortunately, the Lady of Penafrancia is not a Patroness of Garbage Collectors, nor was she a Rain Saint that could pour torrential rains to wash away those filth before she makes her eventful voyage every September. And it is not always good to have miracles so we can flaunt our total contempt towards mother earth and excuse our indolence and lack of urban planning. But if the message was clear and correct, nobody was getting it for the Penafrancia fluvial procession will be there for centuries to come.
Naga City councilor Gabriel H. Bordado, Jr. wrote about this event this way:
“The scene was almost surreal: thousands of barefoot men, their bodies bathed insweat, pushed, shoved, jostled, wriggled and kicked their way into the vortex of yet another mass of anxious humanity. Their objective: to touch a tiny image, if only for a few fleeting seconds. They then let out hair-raising cries of “Viva La Virgen” to the applause of about a quarter of a million spectators who jammed the old Naga City’s edifices and narrow streets. For the uninitiated, the scene would appear to be a throwback into the days of anito (local deity) worshippers. The primeval cries, the element of machismo, and the frenzy fit well into one’s concept of an ancient religious rite as described in some scholarly tomes.”
The Virgen of Penafrancia or the Lady of Penafrancia or the Patroness of Bicol, or simply Ina, (mother) as she is reverently called by the Bicolanos, is said to be a healer of the sick and the comforter of the afflicted. Hundreds would flock to her on Sunday masses and thousands during the Feast of Penafrancia to pay homage to her miraculous feat.
Devotees would patiently line up beside her platform and wait for their turn to wipe with their handkerchiefs, the Lady’s feet or the pedestal of her tiny statuette, one at a time then they would kiss this piece of cloth, tuck it in their purse, wallet or pocket as some treasure to behold or amulet of sort against sickness or evilness or for some other expectation of indulgence or blessings. To be able to walk up to the Lady’s platform and wipe her feet or her pedestal is symbolic enough of the person’s affinity with the divine and the holy and a testament of his indisputable faith that though he may not receive a swift response for his supplication, Ina would nonetheless keep tab of his presence and grant him his wish someday, sometime.
The Lady’s healing power must be for real as devotees have not let up going to church on Sundays and other church holidays and especially during her annual feast. As a catholic who believe in angels and miracles, I have no reason to doubt that Ina has the power to heal the sick and console the troubled souls. And as we aged and look to the sunset in the horizon that may not be that too far after all, we assured her that she could also count on our souls as we pray for our own intentions and salvation.
Contributing Writer: Jose C. Camano
Popularity: 2% [?]
DJB,
One from Jeg that highlights the discussion: “You are doing the faith community a great service” because of your view. Your anti-thesis on theology and religion provides the synthesis for the believers.
I would have swooned to your side and bedazzled by your arguments but my faith is strong enough to resist the temptation. But I would not characterize your discourse the way Bencard would describe it, “pompous verbosity”. The elegance of your writing or lack of it means nothing to me. I am after the substance of what you write.
I look at you as the mini-version of Richard Dawkins, and I am a disciple of Francis Collins. But our disparate views, I am certain will not descend to incivilities.
Let me quote a Time Magazine article on Francis Collins:
“In America’s ongoing and sometimes rancorous discussion about science and God, some stock characters have evolved. There are the vocal proponents of creationism and intelligent design who storm school boards in hopes that either science or local government will conform to their beliefs. Then there are academic atheists who claim increasingly aggressively that science is in the process of proving religion a delusion. But few of the polemicists have the authority to preach beyond their own choirs. Most believers don’t care to listen to an atheistic scientist calling the idea of God a mythology created to explain what humans don’t understand, and academic atheists are just as uninterested in scientific lectures from Bible literalists.
Collins, however, has both the standing and the desire to promote a third way. At 56, he is an unassuming 6-ft. 4-in. stork with a reedy voice, a techie’s el cheapo digital Timex and–his one touch of flash–a wide silver ring emblazoned with a cross. “I think the majority of people in the U.S. probably occupy a middle ground but feel under attack by the bombs thrown from either side,” he says. To some, the mere fact that he is effectively outing himself to the secular world as a man of faith warrants celebration. “Just that he’s written the book is important,” says Randy Isaac, head of American Scientific Affiliation, a professional group for conservative Christians. “It will help convince Christian young people that science is a viable career, and scientists to recognize that Christian faith is a relevant option.”
But Collins has more in mind than being a role model. The last celebrity scientist to suggest a middle path in the creation wars was Stephen Jay Gould, who argued that science and faith could coexist because they are “non-overlapping” domains with no common ground on which to clash.
Yet Collins insists on overlaying and intertwining them. He starts from a very Gouldian premise–”Science is the only reliable way to understand the natural world [but] is powerless to answer questions such as ‘what is the meaning of human existence’”–but he tracks it to a different conclusion. “We need to bring all the power of both scientific and spiritual perspectives to bear on understanding what is both seen and unseen,” he writes, maintaining that those perspectives “not only can coexist within one person, but can do so in a fashion that enriches and enlightens the human experience.” And without seeming particularly immodest, he offers his own experience as Exhibit A.
Collins’ life, although told many times in the press during the genome race, remains appealingly weird and inspiring. He was born on an outhouse-equipped Virginia “dirt farm”–but his Yale-educated parents had earlier returned to the land as part of a rural-community experiment under Eleanor Roosevelt’s patronage. Home-schooled and solitary, their brilliant fourth son pursued his inclinations through a Yale dissertation on quantum mechanics–but then swerved, first to an M.D. and next to the field of genetics, whose astonishing precision and lifesaving potential were becoming manifest.
In 1993, Collins’ trailblazing work identifying genetic defects that predispose to cystic fibrosis and other diseases led to his succeeding double-helix discoverer James Watson as head of a 2,400-scientist, multination project to map all 3.1 billion biochemical letters that constitute the human blueprint. In 2000, Bill Clinton honored Collins and his private-sector competitor Craig Venter in the White House, crediting their complementary genome work with uncovering “the language in which God created life.”
Jcc,
Thanks for posting the excerpt from TIME Magazine. In order to address what seems to be your question or topic, let me paraphrase this excerpt as follows:
Stephen Jay Gould argued that Science and Religion have non-overlapping domains and hence they COULD NOT clash. (“… argued that science and faith could coexist because they are “non-overlapping” domains with no common ground on which to clash.”)
I think it is an empirical fact that Science and Religion DO clash, so they must have some overlap. But maybe this is just SJG’s way of saying that IF they do overlap, even he fears there would have to be a cataclysmic clash.
Francis Collins essentially disagrees with SJG! — believing that scientific and religious domains are intertwined, but he concludes that therefore they SHOULD NOT clash — and instead work together (“We need to bring all the power of both scientific and spiritual perspectives to bear on understanding what is both seen and unseen,”)
I agree with Francis Collins and disagree with Stephen Jay Gould. I also believe that Science and Religion have definitely overlapping if not congruent domains! But I also agree with SJG that this means there will be a cataclysmic clash between the two. I think even Francis Collins agrees with that, and that is why he prescribes cooperation, instead of confrontation.
But let us look at what he might actually be talking about by urging that we “bring together the power of scientific and spiritual perspectives to bear on understanding what is seen and unseen”.
It is quite evident that “understanding” and not salvation is the target of Francis Collins suggestion to bring together scientific and spiritual perspectives.
Now the word “spiritual” is quite different from “religious” and refers to a much broader category of human experience. Indeed, I have always thought that moments of great scientific discovery–both original and learned–are spiritual moments–if by this we mean we are momentarily more than human, or that by scientific discovery we are making what it means to be human that much greater. Consider too, that BEFORE something that a scientist is doing actually becomes science, that is when a scientist is trying to solve a problem or discover some fact about nature, the techniques he uses can be of rather mysterious, random, or indeed “spiritual” nature.
In this sense I cannot disagree with Francis Collins, because, as I’ve just mentioned, his entire goal is in fact a scientific and not a religious goal: understanding what is seen and unseen. As long as he faithfully seeks that goal, preconceptions about what constitutes science and what spiritualism may only obscure the way forward. Even to scientists a hundred years ago, cellphones and computers would appear to be magical or spiritual.
But “Understanding” is not the goal of religion or theists. Their goal is salvation, which they believe can only be achieved by us, when we are convinced and believe in their God. Not just some God, but their God.
I’ll be sure to look into this ‘emergence’ theory, DJB. Thanks.
But just so we’re clear, are you with me in calling bullshit on Dawkins’s assertion that there is no free will and that we shouldnt be held responsible for our actions? See this is why science doesnt get the respect that it should. I dont blame science. I blame media. The Dawk wouldve been done if it werent for media. There are better scientists out there, but theyre not too mediagenic like he is.
Jeg,
Charles Dickens cannot be held responsible for what remains Dickensian in Englishmen. If atheism becomes militantly Dawkinsian, I would however prefer it to a pusillanimous, impotent, insecure, in-the-closet kind of atheism in people who should come out as Richard Dawkins dares them to.
But I shall concede to you gladly that Richard Dawkins is neither inerrant nor infallible. Or even impeccable. He can be so risibly…Dawkinsian. In some sense however, Richard Dawkins has already done grievous damage to a certain part of the modern culture, mainly in the direction of organized religion.
The call for ordinary people to come out, and forthrightly admit or proclaim their atheism or agnosticism (it comes to the same thing, really) — this is a cultural revolution or social movement much like the gay rights struggle to come out of the closet.
In the ultimate analysis, both movements are really about freedom–freedom from ignorance and hypocrisy.
I think Dawkins has successfully launched this movement, and has done his job as Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford.
Remember when you discovered that there were GAY people in the world? Well, there is a kind of mental gender that like the gay population has been in public denial and in-hiding. I refer to an unknown but I believe ponderable fraction of human beings who just know or believe deep in their heart and mind that Religion’s claims to a divine origin are false and that “GOD” himself is man-made.
Their MORAL instinct however prevails over their sometimes limited means of intellectually rebutting a dogmatic theology that has outlasted the millennia. I think a majority of people are actually atheists or agnostics. Most suppress expressing their deepest conviction because of social pressure to belong to the Faith, or at least acquiesce in the fact that others do.
This does not mean I want a society full of Dawkinsian militants, only upending idolatry and magical ritualism (I will take care of these tasks myself!). I believe practices like Sunday Mass are wonderful cultural, even theatrical artifacts of our past. Everthing can remain, even liturgy and the living theatre of the priesthood, but what mankind can no longer be held hostage to, or in thrall of, is Theology itself — philosophy without the questions!