After Ondoy: A Photographic Record

It has been 10 days since tropical storm "Ondoy" (international name "Ketsana") ravaged the central areas of Luzon island in the Philippines, and many of the worst-affected--who lost loved ones, or were forced to flee the rising waters--are still struggling to recover from the grief and the ruin. This is starkly clear from the following images taken in town of Marilao, one of the worst-hit areas in Bulacan province.

The recorder had accompanied family members who journeyed to Marilao to visit a relative and to donate sacks of rice and boxes of instant noodles to the Shrine of the Divine Mercy, which is located near the inundated areas. Hence, unlike when they had gone to the headquarters of a television network, going to Divine Mercy church gave them a chance to see at first hand the results of the storm.

In the residential area where lived relatives of the recorder, the most evident mark of the past disaster was the ongoing cleanup. Like an obverse of the typical Philippine fiesta, wherein the streets would be crisscrossed with wires bearing colorfully festive vexilla, the streets were filled with drying clothes hung from wires string from opposite sides of the road.

To explain: the floodwaters, in many areas rising higher than 3 metres, had left layers of mud on everything they had touched. Therefore the streets were filled with various items left to dry after heavy washing, from blankets and beds to bags and books and, of course, clothes of every perceptible variety. Added to these were piles of debris, trash, and items discarded after the waters rendered them unusable, tangible reminders of the other, more painful losses from the flood.

And the residents of this area were the fortunate ones by comparison. Others had lost their homes entirely and had been forced to live on both sides of MacArthur Highway (a short drive from a large shopping mall), with many, especially children, begging for coin from the passing vehicles. Their makeshift houses, with walls and roofs made of cartons, plastics, and wheels (the last to make the materials too heavy to be blown away) present a heartbreaking picture of poverty.

Many of them had formerly lived by the side of the river, and had therefore been the first and worst victims when the dangerously-risen waters of Angat dam were released into the rivers. In one instance, this recorder was told, the victims had been 3 children whose mother had left to buy rice from the nearby public market. She had returned amid heavy rain to find water overtopping their home, "at halos mabaliw siya, hanggang ngayon" (and she was driven next to madness, even until now). As seen from the photo on top, that riverside is deserted now, save for persons scavenging for whatever can be salvaged from the remains of their former homes.

The victims are struggling to repair their lives, and we should help them at every step; and if, some would persist in the capitalist line that they should lift themselves by their bootstraps, then we should at least give them boots. Indeed, we note with joy how Church and State, private persons, and various organizations have mobilized to take up the slack and give to the afflicted.

Thus, in but half an hour in our relative's area, we saw two vans--bearing no banners and flanked by no media persons--anonymously distributing small plastic bags with food and clothing, and as we left we saw various residents returning from yet another vehicle. These were private persons acting with no portfolio save an outstanding generosity. I only hope that we will continue to give and resist the onset of donor fatigue when it comes, for the afflicted will surely need help on the long haul, and not for a mere 10 days.

May God bless us all.

Quote for the day:

“The right to food, like the right to water, has an important place within the pursuit of other rights, beginning with the fundamental right to life. It is therefore necessary to cultivate a public conscience that considers food and access to water as universal rights of all human beings, without distinction or discrimination.” (Pope Benedict XVI, Caritas in Veritate, ii, 27)

*This will be re-posted on our main blog Scriptorium.

Capitalism is not the answer

The love of money is not the solution, but lies at the root of the evil... (First posted here on September 1, 2008, on our main weblog Scriptorium. As the shocks of the last month have shown, there was so much it had failed to say...)

I'm just sharing a comment I made on the weblog of Brother Bo Sanchez, a member of the one true Church and a leader in the charismatic movement. Brother Sanchez had asked (here) for opinions on why certain non-believing nations prosper while some countries filled with Christians seem mired in poverty. The full answer, of course, is extremely complicated, mainly hinging on the compatibility of a dominant social ethos with market-driven capitalism, but the answer I wrote focused rather on the ideological assumptions implicit in the question, thus:

"I’d like to answer the question from a “natural” or non-Christian perspective.

"Naturally speaking, the question may be premised on the wrong notion of progress, based on the industrial hyper-capitalism that came to dominate the West around the 19th century. This doctrine, a marriage of utilitarian economics and secularized Puritan ethics, prioritizes ever-expanding production and consumption over “intangible” values like art and meaning, and the demands of the market over those of family and community.

"I do not think this hyper-capitalism constitutes a valid standard of progress, for as the critiques leveled by, among others, E.F. Schumacher, Amartya Sen, Rachel Carson have shown, it is a disordered ideology that endangers human values and, by damaging the environment, even human survival. Keynes himself noted that the capitalist engine required the violation of “traditional” rules propounded by almost every religion and philosophy before the Industrial Revolution, which shows its inconsistency with the distilled wisdom of humanity.

"We must ask, therefore, how did “progressive” nations emerge from poverty to wealth? Most often, it happened because of the possession of a strategic location or natural resource; through the use of surplus capital created by exploiting a subject people or the working class (e.g., [the way] white Anglo-Saxon Protestants stole a resource-rich continent from Native Americans and Mexicans); by adopting ideas of envy and greed destructive of communal ties; by having a work-ethic that prioritizes production over “intangible” happiness; or because of a social indifference to the needy that compels them to adopt industry.

"None of these are the result of “virtue” and “goodness”, and all of them lead to ecological destruction. In response to flavoredwater [a commenter on the same blog page] and others, I must point out that the earth can sustain even a population 10 times bigger than today’s, if people will moderate their greed for wealth and products they don’t need; but it cannot survive even a population 10 times smaller with our current average energy consumption.

"The problem then is not poverty, but greed and social injustice; and this can be solved not by envying the disordered systems of others, but by spreading Buddhist spiritualism or Christian social doctrine or eco-humanism; for the love of money does not point out the solution, but constitutes the root of the evil." (Links supplied.)

The answer is deliberately premised on strictly natural or "secular" bases, for non-Christians who might have difficulties identifying with supernaturalist reasoning. However, my current adherence to what I call rational or humane economics is premised on both natural (not-specifically-Christian) and supernatural (Christian) grounds. These grounds have been amply explained by G.K. Chesterton, Hilaire Belloc, and Dorothy Day, as well as by contemporary proponents like Pope Benedict XVI (see John Allen) and Eugene McCarraher (see Vox Nova); but see also Mark and Louise Zwick, Stephen Hand (whom I deeply admire, and hope and pray may return from the edge of schism), and Anthony Basile's combative but incisive Crucified Between Two Thieves.

For a general introduction to the debate, please see E.F. Schumacher's Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered (which deconstructs the ideology of modern economic theory from a personalist perspective) and Robert Nelson's Economics as Religion (which does the same, but from a wealth-is-better viewpoint). Christians may also compare Laborem Exercens by the late Pope John Paul II (which affirms that labor is more important than capital), with Michael Novak's The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism (which defends capitalism as being consistent with human values); and among online essays, "Capitalism is not Catholic" from Athanasius Contra Mundi and "Three Catholic Cheers for Capitalism" by Thomas E. Woods, Jr.

May God bless us all.

"The Western Air Temple" is finally out, and online!

Everyone who loves Avatar: The Last Airbender as much as I do has been subsisting on the spoilers of "The Western Air Temple" posted on the various sites and fora; and a lot of us have been victimized by the annoying--actually, homicide-inspiring--fake videos going around, but this is the real deal! The episode was uploaded to Youtube from Canada (I think), where it was first shown, and watching it feels like seeing the Nile after crossing the Sahara. See it now!

Part 1 of "The Western Air Temple"

Part 2 of "The Western Air Temple"

Part 3 of "The Western Air Temple"

• Brief comments follow (WITH SPOILERS--you have been warned):

• I repeat, WITH SPOILERS! In accordance with normal practice, I posted this review only now, but if you haven't watched the episode, STOP here, now...

1. Katara's confrontation with Zuko is fascinating. The only times anyone else in Avatar uses that tone with anyone was when Azula terrorized her ship's crew in "The Avatar State" (Book 2, chapter 1) and, later, the Dai Li. The parallelism is uncanny, and seems to point to an important Katara-Azula plot element, maybe a water-fire confrontation.
2. Zuko's transformation from the Prince of Darkness to the Royal Wuss is very funny, and allows him to displace Sokka as the main comic relief in the episode. This actually accentuates his strength as a character, since it shows that he has the moral and emotional courage to do everything necessary--i.e., shed his pride and abase himself before the utter mistrust of former enemies--to become a better human being. Perhaps his character will turn out to be the best-written in the series.
3. I hope that's not how Combustion Man ends. It seems pretty unimpressive concerning his lethal power, and unworthy of the danger he poses to the Gaang. Here's hoping we'll see him again, and watch him have a more epic exit.
4. On part 3, pause the vid at exactly between 6min 28s and 6min 29s. Trust me, it will blow your mind...
5. And finally, the episode feels incomplete somehow, and a bit rushed. My brother (who introduced me to the series) says it seems less like an independent episode and more like Part 3 of "Black Sun"--kind of like George Lazenby after Sean Connery: good, but the predecessor set the bar a bit higher. It's not the best chapter, in other words, but then again, after a long drought, even lukewarm water is good water.

Oh, and P.S., I vote for Zutara and Tophaang:)

Of Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy: Which is the true Church?

Both sides share the blame for the separation; and yet there is still only one Church, hence Pope John Paul II’s fervent wish that the Church breathe again with her two lungs...

I'm just sharing a short essay I wrote on Yahoo! Answers, where an inquirer named David recently asked whether Catholicism or Orthodoxy represented the "One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church" founded by Christ. Briefly stating the differences, especially as to Papal authority and the filioque, he said: "I want to know what Catholics, Orthodox and I guess Protestants think about this. Who abandoned whom?"

My reply was as follows:

"The answer is somewhat complicated, so this'll be long...

"It's true that the early Church always believed in the existence of a single universal Church composed of a set of particular churches. According to Irenaeus of Lyons (c. 180 AD), the "credentials" of [the] Church [as Church] could be verified through a twofold test: (a) Apostolic succession through the bishops, of which the main illustration he used was the Roman succession from the Apostle Peter, which would then guarantee (b) the faithful transmission of Apostolic tradition (see also 2 Thess 2:15).

"However, the traditionalism of the 2nd element did not mean mechanical repetition, but an organic development of the Faith as its understanding was deepened through the centuries (cf. the Commonitorium of Vincent of Lerins). By the time of the early Councils, this meant the use of both old & new philosophical terminology (e.g., homoousios, hypostasis) to define what Christians believed on the nature of God, Christ, and salvation; hence the progressively modified formulations of the ancient creeds (or "symbols"), as new questions and disputes arose.

"Herein lies the 1st major Catholic-Orthodox difference, for by the mid-1st millenium, Western thinkers came to see a major, even fatal problem in the early theology of the Trinity: Given that the Divine Persons have one being and substance, so that they are distinguished only by their relations (the Father begets the Son, the Son is begotten by the Father, etc.), then how are the Son and the Spirit to be distinguished if both of them directly come from the Father alone? Also, if the Son is equal to the Father in Godhead, how can He not share the power to generate the Spirit?

"When the western churches (and lastly, Rome) incorporated this insight/innovation into the Creed of Constantinople, the eastern churches viewed this as a corruption of the Faith of the Eastern Councils. This was strange, in view of the frank innovations made in those same Councils (one thinks that the East stopped favoring development when the West started doing the developing), but understandable if we remember how lowly the half-barbarian West and its theology was viewed by the civilized East. In fact, even before this doctrinal controversy had erupted, the East had declared canonical war on the West when, in the Quinisext Council under the East Roman Emperor, it condemned Western customs of prayer that differed from the Eastern and [the Emperor] even sent an army to compel the Pope to submit.

"This leads to the 2nd major Catholic-Orthodox difference: on the role of the Papacy. In the early Church, Rome was accorded a passive primacy (i.e., in "soft" power); hence Irenaeus' dictum that the whole Church must agree with Rome--"which presides in charity", according to Ignatius of Antioch. Active primacy (i.e., in "hard" power), however, was another matter; for while Eastern patriarchs like John Chrysostom, Athanasius, etc. would appeal to, and be championed by, Rome when beleaguered by secular and ecclesiastical politics, they would often resist Papal authority in other times. In practice, real control was held by the Emperor, who thus presided over the disagreeing bishops; and Rome, though given "primacy of honor", was a spare tire when it came to "primacy of jurisdiction".

"The major break came when, in the Reform of the 11th century, the Church in the West attempted to break free of the State control that had characterized both East and West for centuries, which attempt meant, among others, a shift in central jurisdiction from Emperor to Pope. This was resisted in both East and West, for it amounted to revolution, and the established bishops didn't take kindly to the confrontational tactics of Reformers like Hildebrand and Silva-Candida. The East-West estrangement was formalized as a result, and the attempted unions of succeeding centuries failed because of Eastern hostility and Western stupidity--though the West would still send an army to help the East against Muslim attack as late as 1396.

"In short, both sides share the blame for the separation; and yet, based on the foregoing, I'm of the opinion that there is still only one Church, with its main body centered on the Roman See, but with its particular churches jurisdictionally divided into several pieces; for Roman doctrine is more consistent with the tradition-development and faith-reason pattern of the early Church, and with its recognition of Papal primacy, of which universal jurisdiction is an organic but historically-influenced development. Nonetheless, one cannot deny the value of the conservatism of the East, which helps anchor the Church in times of intellectual ferment; hence Pope John Paul II’s fervent wish that the Church breathe [again] with her two lungs.

"Sorry for the length, but I do hope it helps. For further discussion, you could email me if you like, but in any case, God bless you."

C'est tout, and, if you were also asking about these or similar matters, Dear Reader, I hope this illuminates the subject somewhat. Deus vobiscum.

History as Christian Vocation

Every Christian is by necessity a historian, a student and transmitter of history, for her Faith is at heart, a historical religion. At its core lies the affirmation that the eternal, trans-historical God, the Maker and Sustainer of human history, became a part of that history, a human being named Yehoshua (or Yeshua), Son of Miryam, in a specific place and time within a particular socio-cultural milieu --1st century Palestine, with its syncretism of Hebraist, Persian, and Greco-Hellenistic elements within the political framework of Roman clientship, Herodian dynasticism, and Judaeo-ecclesiastical power.

Christianity therefore calls her to believe not merely in a series of abstract intellectual principles and moral precepts--the existence of God, human dignity and freedom, the demand for justice--but in a constellation of historical assertions, centering on Yeshua, but extending to preceding Jewish and Gentile history, and to the subsequent history of the Church, the community of Christian believers.

So long as there is an unreserved "obedience of the understanding", a knowledge of that history is not deemed absolutely essential to salvation, save as to the central facts of the life of Yeshua; but belief in every article of the Creed, obedience of every commandment, the conduct of every act of worship, is rooted in that history and contains an implicit affirmation of its truth; and every explanation, defense, deepening of Christian religious heritage requires, at some point, a return to the historical foundations of Christianity.

The vocation of the Christian historian, the believer who makes it a point to study and understand the temporal roots of her Faith, is therefore a vital munus, a mission and ministry, within the greater munus of the Apostolic Church. Being mission and ministry, it therefore implies a twofold dignity that is both freedom and responsibility: The Christian historian must remain a Christian, and must affirm the historical and trans-historical assertions upon which her Faith rests; this provides freedom from needless doubt, freedom from the need to speculate on the origin, meaning, and purpose of human life, but entails the concomitant responsibility to stand by that Faith and proclaim it without compromise or question.

At the same time, she must be truly a historian, basing her historical findings on the evidence and method of her research; this provides an intellectual freedom to speculate and explore, but also imposes the responsibility to adhere to historical methodology, and to stand by the historical conclusions that are thus reached. These are both based on her Faith, which calls her to fearlessly believe that its assertions will stand the test of inquiry, and that the conclusions of doctrinal tradition and historical science can therefore never truly be inconsistent.

These, in turn, are ultimately based on the ancient idea that truth cannot contradict truth, and on the likewise ancient Christian notion that the same God Who created the capacity to believe also created the capacity to think, that the same God, the source and standard of truth, revealed both the data of Faith and the facts gleaned by Reason, and that Faith and Reason can hence never truly be contradictory.

This does not mean, of course, that apparent contradictions will not come into view. Indeed, they have often appeared in the past, in those days when Babylon and Assyria were both believed to be myth for lack of independent (i.e., non-Biblical) verification, when Pontius Pilatus was considered a figment of Christian imagination, when St. Augustine's theory of the evolution of germinal to higher forms was considered errant nonsense, when Creation from nothing contradicted the apparent eternity of the world.

Consistently, those doubts were later resolved in favor of the traditional Christian assertions, after archaeological, palaeontological and astrophysical exploration uncovered evidence-sand-covered cities, etched names, evolving animal forms, and cosmic expansion from a primeval Big Bang-that showed the lack of any real contradiction. There is no sinecure, however, in the triumphs of the past, for history moves forward, and new questions will arise to which Faith and Reason, following their respective methods, will initially give inconsistent answers.

In those times, the Christian historian must be faithful to the dual dignity she chose, and must strive to reconcile both; but when that is impossible with her methods and the facts at her disposal, as a Christian first, she must acknowledge the supremacy of Revelation: she must affirm the truths of Faith, which have the infallible guarantee of God's direct revelation and guidance, over Reason, which is subject to human error in method, ignorance in premises, and prideful obstinacy or innocent mistake in conclusions.

At the same time, she must faithfully record her findings as a historian, explaining the methods of her search and the bases of her conclusions, explaining too that they apparently contradict the infallible content of her Faith, always confident that better methods, new data, and wiser minds will someday prove that history and Christian belief actually express the same truth. Till then she must bear with the criticisms of both her fellow historians and fellow believers, endure even the anguish of doubt in her soul. Such is the price of truth; and to be Christian is to affirm the truth even at the cost of death, in union with Yeshua, the Logos made human flesh, Who spoke truth even in the face of execution. Such would be the cross of the Christian historian; and given her task, such too would be her salvation.

(From an unpublished essay. All rights reserved.)