We Catholics Have Become Stubborn

“The great city split into three parts, and the cities of the nations collapsed. God remembered Babylon the Great and gave her the cup filled with the wine of the fury of his wrath.” — Revelation 16:19

Recent survey shows that Catholic mass attendance continues to decline. Based on the survey conducted by SWS (as read from ANC), among the things that discourage the respondents from attending the Holy Mass are sloppy homilies, the relentless opposition of the church on the issue of the Reproductive Health Bill, and just because some have already gotten tired of being preached at. While I wasn’t part of the sample who responded to this survey, I seem to agree.

“There was once a man who went to a hotel and upon entering the room where he is booked, he saw a lady lying on the bed. Outraged, he hurriedly made his way back to the hotel’s front desk. “I think we have a problem here. There is a woman in my bed,” he confronted the reservation officer. “Sir, in this hotel we don’t have problems. All we have are opportunities,” the man behind the desk answered calmly.”

Believe it or not, that is a story I did not expect to hear during a mass especially one that is watched by hundreds of thousands on live TV on a Sunday morning. I don’t know what was on the priest’s mind that time but his story left me questioning his integrity—and to think that he isn’t a rookie priest made me a lot more uneasy.

Lousy homilies also don’t necessarily mean boring. Sometimes, information overload kills it. Take for example this other priest who celebrates mass on the same TV channel on some other days. His highly spirited way of delivering his homilies seems not to help relay the real message behind the scriptures. His fondness of integrating stories from the telenovelas, maybe in his effort to enliven the churchgoers, and talking about investing in mutual funds don’t seem to impress me because I do believe that these topics just don’t fit in what is supposed to be a solemn ceremony meant to feed the spirit, at least just a day every week.

So my question now is “where have all the good priests gone?” In this world where we Catholics have become stubborn and most of us starting to think that we are smarter than the doctrines that we once believe to be true—just by sheer faith, we really need those good priests around again to get us back on track or else the next SWS survey will be worse.

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Honestly, I have been tempted several times already to change channel whenever I see this particular priest walk towards the altar to celebrate mass on TV. But just this last Sunday, something from his homily struck me. It is about focus.

“We should not focus on our problems but rather on its solutions because whatever we focus on to is greatly magnified.”

This one perfectly makes sense, right? If he makes more of these and less about Ser Chief and Bo Sanchez, I will be paying more attention.

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Bible passage from Biblegateway.com

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Mood: 2/10 Honks! (Watching The Three Musketeers on HBO while drinking gin. Alpha and Theta.)

Why Our Son Will Soon Be on Facebook

Do you know that creating a Facebook account for your young child is actually a good thing? Yes, that is what I have realized after reading the article 10 Ways to Future Proof Your Child. According to this Wired Magazine’s online article, opening a Facebook account as early as now prevents someone from creating a fraudulent account with your child’s name which could be used for malicious purposes. And by signing up on behalf of their child also gives parents a head start to place the appropriate filters and security settings, making the account safe and clean and ready to be used when their child starts to beg for his (or her) first Facebook access. All these with the assumption that good parenting has been established and that Zuckerberg’s site is still preferred over Google+ 5-10 years from now.

But the tip I like the most from this article is about getting a child his own domain name. It made me feel maintaining and paying a minimal fee for this blog site justified despite not being able to update it as often as I wished to. Although our son’s online activities nowadays involve frequenting iTune’s App Store in his hunt for games, his recent interest in writing/typing his own name with which his current favorite hero’s name is also attached is encouraging enough. I would love to see the day when our son becomes a contributor to the content of this blog and if ever that happens, watch out for the blog post author named Marcusben10. Oh before I forget, please like his own updates on facebook, just in case.

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Mood: 5/10 Honks! (Trying hard to get rid of writer’s block.)

Thank God, School’s Over

(Counterclockwise from top left.) Marcus and his awards; with mommy; cooling off at Pepper Lunch; Four Arms?

Classes are finally over as today starts Marcus’ official summer vacation. Yesterday we attended his school’s moving up ceremony wherein he brought home a couple of special awards for being the most neat and clean as well as the most improved nursery student.

So in the next two months new routines await of us. Besides his well-deserved break from books and stressful study sessions, it’s goodbye sleep deprivation for me due to driving and waiting for him at school–I skipped this for only a couple of days due to being sick; and it’s a big relief for wifey from worries if school uniforms have been pressed (or not) and if what food to prepare next for lunch, these among other things she need to take care of since class started in June last year.

Congrats Marcus! Congrats wifey, we made it. God is good.

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Mood: 2/10 Honks! (Can’t wait for our first summer outing.)

Why The Pope’s Name Rings a Bell

The white smoke from the most-watched chimney in Rome came out a lot sooner than most of us have anticipated and the BBC breaking news confirmed my gut-feel. Someone has been chosen but he is not our own Cardinal Tagle. I watched the TV disappointed like most Filipinos.

“Now what? Next controversial news please,” I was saying deep inside as I return to my station after grabbing a cup of free coffee from our pantry’s vendo. “We can now move on,” I conceded with the thought that this hype about the papal election is now over and to be forgotten.

It wasn’t the case.

More news about the new pope eventually spread and it caught my attention. Along with billions of Catholics and the rest of world, I soon learned that the newly elected pope is the first ever Jesuit and the first one from Latin America who will assume the highest seat in the Catholic Church. He will also be known as Pope Francis I in reference to one of the very few saints I can recall in a jiffy—St. Francis of Assisi.

Though I cannot remember every detail of St. Francis of Assisi’s life as told years ago by my mother, and religion teachers, its essence that despite being privileged he has chosen to be poor, to serve the poor remained in my memory. It made me a silent fan.

In fact, the story of St. Francis of Assisi has stuck in my mind that his name was the only one that immediately came out during our son’s christening ceremony. “Give me a name of the saint whose footsteps you would like your child to follow,” the priest asked. “Saint Francis of Assisi,” I answered without hesitation.

If I remember it right, that was the last time I heard about him and our son is now more likely following the path of cartoon characters—lately he asserts that he is Ben 10 and every now and then my wife and I believe that he is one of the monsters.

But five years later I didn’t expect that I will hear the word Assisi again. And what the Argentinean pope has told during his first press conference have been inspiring so far, just as inspiring when I first heard about St. Francis of Assisi’s meekness and compassion more than 30 years ago. So even if I am probably among the least vocal about religion I just might keep track about what will happen in the next days to come. The best of luck to our new pope.

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Mood: 2/10 Honks! (This weekend is a whole lot better than it was a year ago. Wifey’s in the hospital during this time last year.)

Micro-love

“Love can’t be seen but it can be magnified.” — Me (wink wink)

 

Many years ago, I created this and gave it to my girlfriend–now my wife. Can you guess how it’s made?

The original copy is currently posted on our cabinet’s door and it was only now that I noticed it was made exactly 16 years ago. We were young, ‘slimmer’,  and so in love then. Ha-ha.

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Did you know that there’s such thing as microchip art? Click here.

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Mood: 2/10 Honks! (Marcus has no class. So this is how it will be like for him this summer.)

10 Types of Facebook Likes

(Image from Google.)

Not all facebook Likes are the same and here are 10 types I have defined. Now see for yourself if you can relate to some of it.

  1. Peer-pressure Like. There  are days when you realize that you are the only one left who has not liked a friend’s status or post and you have no choice but to follow suit, else risk being called anti-social or worse, unfriended.
  2. Boss-says-so Like. (Not so) surprisingly, **s-kissing, like other one-celled organisms, has evolved with technology and it is now part of social media. And along with this Darwinian process are some people who came out thinking that their job performance depends on how frequent they have liked their boss’ status. They do this either consciously or unconsciously.  (Note: This person is usually the first ‘Liker.’)
  3. Contests Like. It is one of those Likes you do, just because a friend asked a favor to like a picture of his/her friend (including son, daughter, and other relatives)  who joined a photo contest, despite believing that the photo was badly photoshopped.
  4. Country’s-pride-at-stake Like. (Similar to Contests Like but in broader context.) In the spirit of unity and nationalism, you do this or—again—face the risk of being tagged as unpatriotic or apathetic. This has been a proven formula in winning Ms. Photogenic or Ms. Social Media awards.
  5. Finger-twitch Like. Usually happens when one is bored, annoyed, drunk, or just simply fidgety  and as a result has unintentionally clicked on the Like button. (Tip: Make someone smile, do not unlike.)
  6. Self-centered Like. Trust me, everyone has at least one friend who Likes his/her own status. (Please be cautious around them.)
  7. Commercial Like. Thanks to Zuckerberg’s need to maintain investors’ confidence, and stop facebook’s profit from dwindling any further,  ads and commercial pages have become so common. The number of Likes on these pages have been useful in measuring demographics and pinpointing market niche. (Someone somewhere out there knows that your 8-year old plans to buy next Fifty Shades of Grey. Be warned.)
  8. Poser Like. Sadly, there are people who exploit the Commercial Like by clicking on pages with the only intent of letting their other friends know that they have just liked branded products such as Apple, Nike, Subaru, Louis Vuitton, etc.
  9. Pure Like, Rejoice! The good news is that this Like still exists although  leaning towards rarity or extinction. Until when this type of like will remain, I don’t know.
  10. Unlike. Period.

How about you? What other types of Likes can you define?

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Mood: 3/10 Honks! (Had adobo for lunch. Pure Like.)

11 Random Facts About Me

Another blogger sent me a message on facebook saying that she tagged me as one of her Liebster Blog Awardees. Basically (ugh! I used the word, and another ugh for using the word ugh), I soon discovered that it is one of those chain thingy that I am not aware still exist. But since lately I’ve been full of excuses and out of writing ideas, I will gladly entertain the invitation. To start with, I am to write 11 random facts about me. Here goes:

1. I don’t dig piracy. I haven’t had a bootleg product since I stopped buying any of it more that 10 years ago. If I remember it right, the last pirated copy I bought was Tom Hanks’ Castaway and that crappy VCD was my turning point. By the way, software included. So please don’t be offended if I ignore any offer such as installing the latest Photoshop or Windows 8 for free. It’s just me.

2. I have to use my pants at least twice. If there’s one habit that I continue from my juvenile days, this must be it and the lazy bones inside me plus my drive to do my own share to conserve water compel me to do so. Save water, wear the same pair!

3. I have guested on Mornings @ ANC. There was a time when ABS-CBN badly needs patrollers to talk about BMPM. Back then, the acronym stands for Boto Mo i-Patrol Mo and despite not submitting an election-related video I was among the three who talked about the station’s citizen journalism program. BMPM now has thousands of active volunteers — my interview must have encouraged people to think, “I can speak a lot better than him.” Well, actually…

4. I love strawberry shakes. With or without pizza, I would always welcome the opportunity to drink strawberry shakes. So far, the best among the rest is the one made by Shakey’s. Others, even from pricey restos, don’t come close.

5. Believe it or not, I hate lightning. And I have this unexplained feeling that it can find me if it strikes in the morning. I get comfortable though watching it streak across the sky at night.

6. I love getting extreme. Back in my younger days, I did BMX flatland. When I got employed, I went bungee jumping with friends in Subic. About a year before I got married, I skydived in Batangas. Me thinks, however, that zip lines are boring.

7. To future-proof myself, I invested time, effort, and money and eventually earned a Masters degree in Ateneo Rockwell. That experience made me rub elbows with great professors, managers, entrepreneurs, and people from different professions like lawyers, soldiers, priests,nuns, and doctors — among them, Dr. Kho. I am yet to apply what I learned.

8. Thanks to Top Gun, The Righteous Brothers’ you’ve lost that loving feeling is the likely karaoke piece I’d sing when cornered…and drunk. I’ve annoyed some colleagues once though by singing The Proclaimers’ 500 Miles.

9. People think I am opinionated, assertive, and conceited. Often times I believe them.

10. I have been in the US once. And I accidentally deleted all of my pictures. Thankfully, I emailed some to my friends and sister and these copies are all of what’s left of my week in Wisconsin.

11. I was once a spy, technically. I reported to HQ if the pizza was served cold, and if the chicken had a sloppy breading. The job was also my passport to free Haagen Dazs ice creams.

11. I laugh at simple jokes. Among my favorites is this: There are only three people in this world, the one who knows how to count and the one who doesn’t.

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After the 11 random facts, the chain require me to answer 11 questions by the person who tagged me and then post 11 questions for the bloggers I will be tagging. Well, here’s another random fact about me: I really hate chain (but I have I have a separate blog just for it — Myspamblog.wordpress.com) so I will stop right here. Oops, my bad.

Sheila, my apologies for breaking the chain but thanks a lot as it has been my plan to write random facts about myself. And again, please give my regards to your sister Keren. The Peets coffee she used to send have been very helpful during the times when I have second thoughts of buying even a Nescafé.

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Please visit Sheila’s blog, Domicile Passion.

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Mood: 2/10 Honks! (Will be attending a kiddie party later. Note to self: don’t wear white.)