Manicure Nightmare

I am trying to learn classical guitar so I grew my nails long so that I can finger pick the strings. My nails are thin; that is my problem. The thickness of the nails affect the sound (or is it the tone) of the strings played. If the nail is thin, the sound produced is…hmmm...thin, metallic like, and nylon classical guitars are not supposed to sound like steel stringed guitars; although there are pieces for classical guitars that need that steel like sound (or is it tone), still, I don’t want my playing (which is not that good) to sound like I’m playing a ukulele (I have nothing against the ukulele; I play the ukulele too).

I saw my wife having her nails done. I looked at my nails and it looked like the nails of a grave digger. There’s black matter inside it, although I clean it all the time with toothpicks, but the ever present dust and soil and all that matters that creeps under one’s nails keep getting under my nails. So, I thought why not have it manicured. After my wife’s nails were done, I had my nails done too. I am not a manicure or pedicure guy. God has gifted me with nails that do not grow inward. My nails behave nicely, no problem with them. I thought of having that manicure because I want my nails shaped and then applied with natural colored nail polish to thicken them. That’s the reason. Now, I didn’t know that (or somehow I knew it but I thought that manicurists don’t do it with guys) manicure is not just all about cutting nails and polishing, I mean, the way I see it, manicure is, from what I experienced, a surgical operation. The manicurist looked at my hand, put a towel under it, scrubbed it with some pink colored liquid, then she got out this scalpel like thing and started ablating my nails, then she took out an instrument that looks like a miniature scissor and started cutting around my nails (it was painful but I’m a big boy so I didn’t even wince) removing I don’t know what, then she started cutting my calluses. I was thinking, “In the name of Odin that’s my guitar calluses!” But I didn’t complain, the calluses are, aesthetically speaking, ugly so removing a few layer will not be bad. After these procedures were done, she scrubbed my hands again. I looked at my nails and I am surprised because they looked the nails of an educated man—clean and shiny and without calluses.

The thing is, a day after the “operation” the edges of my nails especially my thumb felt tender—they were infected. Although they healed a few days after, I can’t still use my thumb efficiently in playing the guitar finger style.

I haven’t played the classical guitar for almost five days now. I’m back to using pick and playing power chords. (Power chords are chords used by rock guitarists. It uses only two notes, the root and the fifth—no minor and no major. When played using a pick it sounds like this: chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug…good for people with broken eardrums… chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug…)

I am passed playing guitar that way.

Anyways, I told my wife that I’m not having my nails done again. My wife looked at me and said, “Tell that to the manicurist.” Ouuuch…I don’t know which is more painful.

My Senior Year

My college senior year
Is proving to be the most boring
Because most of my teacher
Were recycled
They were the same old faces


It’s not that I hate them
In fact, I love some of them
It’s just being with them
For the last six sem
Is beginning to feel like
I am married to all of them

My wife and I
Only meet at the end of the day
While these teachers of mine
I meet almost everyday
In the classroom or on the hallways
Or in the comfort
Of our uncomfortable comfort rooms


It’s not that I hate my teachers
In fact, I love some of them
It’s just being with them
For the last six sem
Is beginning to feel like
I am married to all of them

Subconscious Expression

Sometimes…err… most of the times I write in a conscious- subconscious mode (I don’t know if that makes sense). That is, I sit in front of the computer, type anything I can think of, anything, and then just let it flow (I have this fantasy that I’m Doogie Howser M.D. making entries in my computer log) and sometimes some sense come out and sometimes nothing comes out but words and words. I don’t think of any topic to write, although sometimes I do write for a specific purpose and theme. Okay to cut the story short, this process sometimes brings out my conscious-subconscious negative thoughts.

Unfortunately I can’t help it and that is specifically became the purpose of this blog—to air those energies. I know some posts here are offensive and some are just plain non-sense while some are good (according to my brother).

Our resident pastor reads this blog and when I found out that he does, I told him to be…err…not to pay attention to some posts about worship, church and theology. I mean…he’ll think very differently of me. Of course I dare not ask our senior pastor if he was reading this blog because I don’t want him to read this blog because if he do read this blog and found out some posts are about his preaching and his Sunday school lessons (every first Sunday of the month he teaches in the men’s Sunday school)…If he found out that I’m being irreverent… I’m dead. I mean not literally dead, just dead as in dead…hmmm…like…he’s not only our senior pastor; he’s also my uncle. (I meant that in a nice way, of course.)

My Son a Miracle Baby

By Nori dela Paz-Lacquian


(This testimony appeared in the ninth anniversary issue (Jan - April 2007) of Moms and Kids, aparenting magazine.)


P’yaise Him, p’yaise him, all ye lit’a chi’dyen God is love, God is love.
A sweet voice singing these words woke me up early one morning. My son was still asleep, but Jimmy had recorded Ycoi’s song and used it as his ringing tone. Ycoi is only two years old but he can carry a tune and pronounce words clearly except for some letters as important as r and l.

For these past two years, I have developed an addiction for staring at my son’s face every morning and marveling at God’s handiwork. My son is a beauty…and certainly a miracle baby.

I got pregnant two months after Jimmy and I were married. I was 38 then. After five

months, an ultrasound showed that we were going to have a baby boy. Jimmy and I agreed to name him Franz Yven a.k.a. Ycoi. He seemed big for his age. A routine check-up showed that I had gestational diabetes. I went on a very strict diet and water therapy.

Ycoi was 26 weeks old—still in my tummy—when I was rushed to the hospital for extreme abdominal pains and vomiting. The initial diagnosis of Dr. Gazelle Baysa—Pee, my ob-gyne, was premature labor. She gave me a medication and a pain reliever to make sure that the baby would not be aborted. After a few hours with no improvement, she decided to give me MgSO4, after first discussing with me its possible side effects which include damage to reflexes and kidneys.

Interns came hour after hour to hammer my joints and check on my reflexes; a kidney specialist visited me three times a day and another doctor monitored my blood sugar. Medical technologists came and took blood samples hour after hour…after hour.

My tumme got bigger and heavier. The doctors came to the conclusion that my intestines were collecting fluid and had grown in size. They had to insert an NGT (nasogastric tube) into my nose and down through y esophagus to suck the fluid out of my stomach. I accidentally pulled this tube out twice so new ones had to be inserted. They were such a terrible source of discomfort.

After five days, my ob-gyne called for gastro specialist to check on me, but she was delayed in coming. Already worried about my supply of potassium and other nutrients detrimental to the baby’s health, Dr. Gazelle consulted her husband, Dr. Gene Pee, a surgeon. With just one look at me he requested for an x-ray to confirm his diagnosis that I might be having an intestinal obstruction. He was right.

An ultrasound was immediately done to check on the baby’s condition. He was as healthy as he could be as shown in the way he moved a lot.

The medical couple prepared me for surgery. Dr. Gazelle asked her husband to talk with Jimmy while she would counsel with me. She said that I needed to have an operation to correct the intestinal obstruction and that she would inject me with antibiotics and change some other medications being given to me. She also gave me a certain kind of steroid to help advance a bit the development of Ycoi’s lungs.

An anesthesiologist came as well and discussed the anesthesia he would use on me. He said that he would be attaching a spider’s web-like device to my spine and that it would have a small ampule where he would inject the anesthesia. The web, which looked more like guitar strings to me, would distribute the medicine to my spine. He said that it was important that I stay awake and cooperate during the entire procedure. My feelings of fear, excitement, and worries would affect mt blood pressure, blood sugar, and other chemicals in my body that would endanger my son’s life. I needed to cooperate with him. I agreed.

When Dr. Gazelle saw Jimmy, she asked if Dr. Gener had talked with him and he replied in the negative. She found her husband still contemplating how to tell Jimmy that this situation left him without any choice at all. If he were to lose me, he would lose the baby as well. So Dr. Gazelle volunteered to discuss the circumstances with Jimmy and told him the urgency of his making a decision. Jimmy asked for my opinion, and those of our immediate family within reach. After receiving emotional support from them and assurance from me that I would be okay, he signed the hospital waiver. The discussion was done at 4:00 in the afternoon and at 7:00 in the vening I was wheeled to the operating room.

My husband and I are both instructors at a Baptist Theological Seminary and when students heard that I might need blood donors, they flocked to the hospital hallways offering their blood in case I would need it, and offered prayers as well for me and my son. Text mesaages went flying to friends and churches for prayer and support. My brother, Joey, donated blood. During the surgery, the problem was discovered at the very end tail of my large intestine. Uterine surgery done when I was 25 years old left my intestine stuck to the portion where the cut was done. It was like that for more than 13 years but the problem only showed up when the fetus reached a certain size. To put simply, the intestine, iriitated with its attachment, caused it to contract, giving me labor pains at one-to-three intervals.

The surgery was a success. It was not that bloody and complicated after all! Two days later, the plaster on the wound was removed and I was told to move around to make sure that my intestines get back to their normal function. That was also when Dr. Pilit told me that I would have to stand the pain and avoid an overuse of pain reliever because it also had an adverse effect on the baby. Slowly he lessened the dosage. I told him I could stand the pain and would request for it when badly needed. I did not ask for any pain reliever after that. He came one morning and said, “You and your baby are our hospital miracle for this month.” He was right.

The NGT stayed attached to me until the 12th day. Imagine that for 11 days I could not eat or drink. I can stand some days without food, but there were days when I dreamt of swimming in a pool of mineral water with floating ice cubes. Sometimes I imagined the water had turned blue and tasted like Gatorade!

After the NGT was removed I started eating and went back to a normal diet. I left the hospital on the 14th day.

As we waited for Ycoi’s due date, I regularly visited the laboratory for my sonograms. Dr. Mapili, the ob-gyne who was doing the sonograms, showed me what was going on in my baby’s world. Each week I saw my baby on the monitor. I saw the face though I couldn’t quite make out the features yet. I counted his fingers, saw his legs kicking, and understood the bulges he was making on my tummy as he moved, stretched, and yawned.

Dr. Mapili constantly reminded me to prepare for a possible Caesarian Section to avoid my having to push or bear down (“ire” in Filipino) which would put much pressure on my wounds from the very recent operation.

Two months after my surgery, Jimmy brought me to the hospital at 7:00 in the morning for labor pains which had started four hours earlier. Dr. Gazelle believed that I could deliver the baby normal way but also took necessary measures as advised by Dr. Mapili. At 9:30 AM on my way to the operating room my water broke…and after a few minutes, Ycoi was born without any fuss at all! The sight of my baby made me totally forgot all the pain we both went through. The chance to hold him in my arms at last was worth it all.

Today, Ycoi, sings, “Praise Him, Praise Him,” the same song I was singing when I first saw him. Indeed God is to be praised.

( Nori dela Paz-Lacquian is my older sister-George)

Business out of the ministry: Christ's Vission of a Church?

(It's sad when Christ's vission for the church is twisted for selfish reasons. When Christ's vission for the church became man's opportunity for business gains. The church's business is the ministry but it seems that it's the other way round now: Get business out of the ministry. This is not only a mega church problem but even small churches become victims of unscrupulous pastors. This is why sometimes atheism seems to be a good alternative. well, that's life. I'm sure God knows what He's doing. Perdition is reserved, may i say, God will be the judge.)

Excerpts from Earthly Empires

Similarly, the so-called mainline Protestants who dominated 20th century America have become the religious equivalent of General Motors Corp. (GM ) The large denominations -- including the United Methodist Church and the Episcopal Church -- have been shrinking for decades and have lost more than 1 million members in the past 10 years alone. Today, mainline Protestants account for just 16% of the U.S. population, says University of Akron political scientist John C. Green.

In contrast, evangelicalism's theological flexibility gives it the freedom to adapt to contemporary culture. With no overarching authority like the Vatican, leaders don't need to wrestle with a bureaucratic hierarchy that dictates acceptable behavior. "If you have a vision for ministry, you just do it, which makes it far easier to respond to market demand," says University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill sociology professor Christian Smith.

Especially controversial are leaders like Osteen and the flamboyant Creflo A. Dollar, pastor of World Changers Church International in College Park, Ga., who preach "the prosperity gospel." They endorse material wealth and tell followers that God wants them to be prosperous. In his book, Osteen talks about how his wife, Victoria, a striking blonde who dresses fashionably, wanted to buy a fancy house some years ago, before the money rolled in. He thought it wasn't possible. "But Victoria had more faith," he wrote. "She convinced me we could live in an elegant home...and several years later, it did come to pass." Dollar, too, defends materialistic success. Dubbed "Pass-the-Dollar" by critics, he owns two Rolls Royces (RYCEY ) and travels in a Gulfstream 3 jet. "I practice what I preach, and the Bible says...that God takes pleasure in the prosperity of his servants," says Dollar, 43, nattily attired in French cuffs and a pinstriped suit.

So adept at the sell are some evangelicals that it can be difficult to distinguish between their religious aims and the secular style they mimic. Last December, Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Tex., staged a spectacular Christmas festival, including a 500-person choir, that attracted 70,000 people even though the cheapest ticket was $20. Throughout the year, some 16,000 people take part in its sports program, which uses eight playing fields and six gyms on its $100 million, 140-acre campus. The teams, coached by church members, bring in converts, many of them children, says Executive Pastor Mike Buster.

Keys Me by Alyssa Alano

This old but the fun is still there!

Star Spangled Banner-Jose Feliciano (story and 1968 video)

Below is a part of my April 30 post, a few days after the Pacquiao bout. I found the Jose Feliciano on You tube interview and it's tragic that a talented guy's career floundered because of his soulfull rendition of the "Star Spangled Banner." Jose together with Carlos Santana paved the way for Latin artists in the pop world. So before Ricky Martin and his pompoms and JLO and her pampams, there was this small blind guy who can play the classical guitar like a bumblebee.

Geneva Cruz’s performance of the National Anthem created a lot of stir because of the way she sung it. The National Historical Institute blabbed about the law against the desecration of the National Anthem, and prescribed how the National Anthem should be sung complete with a CD playback how the National Anthem should be performed. Good! But why not prescribe a standard size for mangoes also? If the size of a particular mango does not meet the standard size promulgated by law, then the unlucky mango should be declared a non-national-mango and the planters and harvesters sued for desecration of the national fruit. Why not limit it to mango? Why not prescribe a standard weight for carabaos? See, if the National Historical Institute prescribed standard forms for our national symbols, the law of consistency dictates that we apply it all our national symbols. I was reminded of an article on Jose Feliciano (the blind Latino singer and guitarist famous for “Feliz Navidad” and “Once there was a love”…etc.) about the controversy he created when he sung “Star Spangled Banner” in his soulful vibrato de legato de nata de coco style. (The guy is cool. He is a flamenco guitarist and flamenco is all about speed, rhythm and lots of passion.)

Thoughts on the Trinity

I am preparing for my next Sunday school doctrinal class and the next lesson is the doctrine of God, theology. Of course under theology is the study of the doctrine of the Trinity and that is a challenging doctrine to tackle.

The number one problem of the doctrine of the Trinity is that it’s too complicated to explain and to understand. I was reading the historical models of the Trinity and history shows that the problem of the Trinity has hounded Christianity since the church’s existence. Sabellus expounded and espoused the modalisitic model of the Trinity where in the Father became the Son and then became the Holy Spirit successively. Then, there’s the adoptionist view that states that Jesus became the Christ only after his baptism, and there’s the Arianist view that Christ was a created, minor god. The orthodox formula is one God in three persons which is theologically more correct than the other models but it is, unfortunately, the most logically incomprehensible of all the Trinitarian models.

The Athanasian creed gives a summary of the early Church's teaching on the Trinity :

We worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the substance. For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost; but the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one, the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal. The Father is made of none, neither created nor begotten; the Son is of the Father alone, not made, nor created, but begotten; the Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son, neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding.

(Something in my head shouts: What?)

The church’s visual representation of the Trinity does not help either. Like the Triangle with the eye in the middle, or the three overlapping angels, or the three heads of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit etc. This confounds the problem of the Trinity because it attempts to visualize what should not have been and could not be visualized in the first place. These representations turned the Trinity into creatures, into logos and emblems or signage.

I have been thinking and reading, and I think the problem with the explanation of the Trinity is when it is explained ontologically (I don’t know if that’s the right word). The Trinity is explained in terms like ousia, personae, substance etc. These terms does not convey any meaning at all. Even scholars today are having difficulties because the way these words meant and used during the days of the council of Nicea may not mean as it does today! Our ontological explanation of the Trinity today may not be what the church fathers meant during the formulation of the doctrine of the Trinity.

Here, Hippolytus and Tertullian’s economic view of the Trinity may be the best way to explain the Trinity. (A bit vague, one theologian says, but the orthodox formulation on the other hand is, if not vague, is impossible to understand.) Hippolytus and Tertullian viewed the Trinity according to the triune God’s functions and work in the salvation of man. There was little attempt to explore the eternal relations among the three; rather there was concentration on the ways in which the Triad were manifested in creation and redemption. (Erickson). This is easier to understand and this is also Paul’s formula: 2Co 13:14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen.

The difficulty of the doctrine of the Trinity is that it’s explained and taught in a way that is too abstract, although this exploration of the Trinity is important but, unfortunately, for ordinary Christians this is too heavy. The doctrine of the Trinity musty be understood experientially and this is the advantage of focusing on the Trinity’s activity rather than on their ontology.

__________________________________

How many God fearing and loyal orthodox Christians have died without knowing that their view of the Trinity was “heretical”?

One of my friends, a good Christian, understood the trinity using the analogy of water: ice, water and vapor—Sabellian modalistic model.

I tried explaining the orthodox view and all he can say is: What?

But most Christians will always think of the Trinity this way:

2Co 13:14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen.

I think this knowledge of the Trinity is a sufficient knowledge of the Trinity that saves.

Forgiveness and Mental Health

In God is healing and riches of the mind for man. Paul tells Timothy that God has given His children a “sound mind.” The great fact in the life of man is sin, which has separated him from God. Of all human needs, the deepest and the most fundamental is man’s felt need for reconciliation with God. In the final analysis, all the problems of the mentally ill are probably problems which arise out of fear and guilt resulting from the presence in their lives of that which they are afraid to face. This statement of Leslie D. Weatherhead expresses well the basic effect mental health of the lack of fulfillment of man’s deepest need: “At our clinic we have had more cases of neurosis due to repressed guilt than any other cause. Whether you look up to the heights to which we have climbed spiritually, or whether you look to the depths in which men wallow in unhappiness and misery, you find the importance of forgiveness. In the end, God’s for everybody is to make him one with Himself. If that is so, then we more and more need forgiveness. If there is any hope of people like you and me ever attaining union with God in any sense of these words, then we realize how we greatly need forgiveness. In fact it is a very interesting and remarkable thing that the greater the saint the more conscious he is of his need for forgiveness. Paul called himself the chief of sinners. John Wesley on his deathbed asserted his sinfulness and prayed, ‘God be merciful to me a sinner.’”

The great over-all fact is the greatness and goodness of God who loves us better than we do ourselves and whose concern for us is far greater than our concern for ourselves. For mental well-being we must have that lessening of tension resulting from calling wrongdoing by its real name and taking it to the cross of Christ. We must judge our self in His sight. It is impossible to have in our life that which cannot be brought before His eyes without condemnation and be free from the sense of guilt which is the source of most mental illness of the functional variety.

God is concerned about the inner life of the spirit, the state of the heart, which is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.” Before God we are what we are and are known in our good or evil, love or hate, cleanness or uncleanness, purity or lasciviousness, honesty or dishonesty, sincerity or insincerity, sanctity or sin. Between what we are as God sees us and knows us to be, sinners by nature, and what He has made it possible for us to be, “sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints,” is a great gulf fixed by man’s sin. This gulf has been bridged by Him whose name is “Jesus: for he shall save his people from sin.”

--C.B. Eavey

Monday

This is one of those when all I want to do is leap and fly. No, I’m not into drugs but sometimes I have this feeling of just wanting to leap and fly. No, I’m not into drugs; this is just of those days when I feel like leaping and flying. No, I’m not being redundant, but this is one of those days that I felt like I want to fly. No, I’m not into drugs; it’s just one of those days.

I want to fly. I want to do something but I can’t; I feel like a catatonic cat. Now why is that?

It’s Monday and it’s cloudy.

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I was looking at my instructor’s grammar book and I read this passage about writing.

“As a writer, you will never be judged by your private vision, only the part of it which shows on paper. It is a mistake for writers to sit around admiring their mental processes, their extraordinary insights, their captivating ideas. Readers are not sitting around in such admiring state. Their demand is “show me,” and they are justified in their insistence…

…..Men and women are first of all interested in themselves…”

–Complete Freshman English Textbook, Shaw.

So true…I’m speaking for myself of course.

Deconstruction

Every year there’s people building drainage, every year and the most mind boggling thing is they do this during the rainy season, they do all the diggings during the rainy season when school’s on and the rain is on. Where are the tomatoes of these government people?

Why don’t they just build one giant drainage system under the road and save money and traffic with all these seasonal diggings?

Why don’t they lay the pipes before paving and concreting the road?

Our roads are like a motocross track. There are humps. There are big holes because when the road was repaved, the engineers didn’t cover the hatches of the utility companies underground lines, so what you have are dangerous crater like depression that can throw unknowing motorcycle riders to their deaths, or destroy a car’s suspension system.

Our electrical posts looked like black spaghettis because of the amount of wires in them.

My friend said that it is in inefficiency that government people get rich. Imagine if there will be no diggings, no maintenance, and no calamities where would our Satanist politicians get their kickbacks? (Not all of our politicians are Satanist, some are comedians, some are athletes foot, some are dancers, there are also atheists and some are good Christians.)

Tango in D

This is my "reinterpretation of Isaac Albeniz' Tango in D. I love the melody becuase it reminds me of our very own"kundimans." If you listen very carefully you can hear in the background my audience cheering--"the frogs and the crickets.

Jose Rizal and me

The study of the life of Dr. Jose Rizal, RP’s National Hero, is a required course in college. I’m in my senior year now and whether I like it or not, I have to take the subject. It’s a good thing that our instructor has a more appropriate approach on the subject, she meets us only once a week for discussion and evaluation; the other days was spent on reading and writing essays about Rizal’s life. A far better approach than torturing students with reports on the life of Rizal (a very boring subject) without anybody listening, might as well evaporate the student to smithereens. Of course this approach is more difficult for the instructors since it is they who will read all the essays and grade them.

Anyway, I am elected by my classmates to write the script for Rizal the play, our final requirement. The prelim is almost over and I still can’t think of when and where to start.

Funny thing is I learn to read by reading Rizal’s childhood biography “Nung Bata pa si Rizal”. This is through the coaching of my eldest sister. All my life I thought reading was inborn because when I entered school I can already read. According to my eldest sister, I learn to read at the age of three (or four). A testament, not of my reading ability, but of my sister’s teaching ability. My eldest sister is now a principal of a small Baptist elementary school in Alaminos, Pangasinan,

I wished I saved the book lots of memories in there.

Champurado Overdose

Last night it rained heavily and our tin roof, as always, leaks, so like most Filipinos, what I did was put pots and pans under these leaks to catch the rainwater. I don’t know, I had the roof “bandaged” but somehow rainwater has this ability to create holes in our roof.

I fetched my wife from work and on our way home, I was thinking of food, comfort food to cure that feeling of dampness and sluggishness that the rain brings. Rain plus champurado (rice cooked in chocolate) plus tuyo (dried fish) or dilis (dried anchovy) equals heaven. So I bought half a kilo of sticky rice, 15 pieces of dried fish, and sugar and chocolate and cooked champurado.

The problem was, because of the sticky rice, when the champurado cooled, it became so sticky that I’m thinking of putting the left over champurado in a baking pan, sprinkling some dried anchovy on top, I would then go around the neighborhood shouting, “Bibingka especial! Bibingka especial! Chocolate flavored, topped with dried anchovy!”

Naahhhhh…my neighbors knew better; they’ll know immediately that I’m selling brownies.

Sunday Schools and those strange feelings

My first PowerPoint presentation about Sunday School went well, I think. Last Sunday, I concluded the series on Sunday school and in the next sessions we maybe proceeding to other areas of Sunday school work that needs attention, like teaching and counseling. I pray that this will be a consistent activity. Maybe next time we will be having other resource person from the group. It’s a strange feeling lecturing people who are more able than me.

My first men’s Sunday school class, I think, also went well. The class asked me to discuss doctrinal stuffs so I started the Bible doctrinal lesson series with the study on revelation. I discussed general revelation and special revelation etc. I am apprehensive because theology uses technical language and the members of my class are from diverse profession and with different educational level, so the difficulty is the language. Anyway, I thought they would sleep on me while I droned on with the lecture but the discussion and the sharing went well.

Teaching these things is dangerous, I believe. The danger is that I may turn these people into theologs…he, he, he…

Anyways, the class is composed of more mature and stronger Christians than I am. So, but, hmmmm…but I still have…I don’t know…I enjoy theology and a little philosophy and I also enjoy teaching them but…hmmmmm…dangerous.

Pray, reflect, meditate and be careful and be very sensitive to the leadings of the H.S….

It’s a strange feeling teaching things about things I once hated. Strange.

Next lesson: The scriptures. I think they will like this topic.

Rated G?

http://mingle2.com/blog-rating

I am surprised that this blog that talks about nothing got a rated G while M and TH got a rated R something must be wrong with the rating system.

F4 and those Never Ending Meteor Garden Reruns and Why I sometimes Contemplate Committing Suicide by Bashing my Head with the TV

I don’t know if this is real. I don’t know if this is the work of some genius malignant, insidious super political villains bent on turning all the Filipinos into a walking, drooling Pavlov’s dog like creature mesmerized into thinking that their existence depends on the ringing of bells and TV reruns, salivating, howling, barking asking for more and more, conditioned to respond to stimuli, conditioning my countrymen and women to vote for political reruns the likes of politicians who always got re-elected despite the fact that these politicians looked like mad scientists bent on destroying the environment and the Filipinos…tra..la…la…la…blah…blah…blah…

Wake up my countrymen and women! Wake up! The prophecies are coming true. The science of subliminal suggestion is now at the level that can only be imagined by science-fiction writers a few years back. These prophets, science fiction writers, have seen things before they happen. They are gifted by with a foresight that only caffeine and lack of sleep can provide. Jules Verne, the father of science fiction, has prophesied travels underwater and on the moon and now we have underwater stations and space stations. H.G. Wells has written about food of the Gods and now we have Promils, food for the gifted child. How about D.F, Jones and his colossus computer, now we have the internet? The late Isaac Asimov, in his Foundation Trilogy, has written about a prophet, a savior who once in a while pops up in a computer screen (hologram) in times of crisis to guide humanity on the challenges and problems that they will be facing and heavens…(sign of the cross)…could this man be Bill Gates?

I read a sci-fi short story a couple of years ago; I forgot who the writer was, but the story was about TV. It’s an old sci-fi story, times when TV was not that influential. The character in the story came back from the mountains and upon his return he was surprised to find the destruction, the corruption and the deterioration in the environment and the people—bleak world. When he entered a bar he found the people happy in a dazed like manner looking at a giant TV screen. He went outside and looked at the people; they were oblivious to their condition. Then he looked at the TV, looked at the people, shook his head and went back to the mountains. (This is how I remember the story.)

This is happening now. I have the feeling that some powerful Filipino mad scientist and malignous politician is trying to liquefy the minds of the Filipinos. I haven’t done any serious TV watching for long time and one morning, I heard from the TV that there will be another re-run of Meteor Garden. This means that I will be hearing those alien songs again! (Waccchingchong cha hay dimmm) My daughter was two years old when this chinovela was first aired on Philippine TV and then there were many reruns, and now there is another rerun in another channel. Some evil mind is behind this. The youth will once again be numbed to the happenings around their community and their country because most of them will spend their time fantasizing about love and romance and looking at the sky trying to find meteors.

This is not an isolated case. Reruns abound in Philippine TV. A Rosy Life, All About Eve, Marimar (an adaptation), Betty la Fea, Full House etc.

Wake up my countrymen and women, wake up.

(Dosemuh wahay wa waching….) In the name of Odin and all the fatalist gods of Valhalla there’s that song again!.....Wahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

This kind of TV programming is in preparation for the coming election. Haven’t my countrymen and women noticed this?

My gulay and vegetable please see the pattern!

I’m afraid that the time will come when the people in prisons, in mental asylums, the rebels in the mountains, people isolated from TV will be the only sane people left sane in the country--people who we all think are evil and insane.

Morning sickness and history

I was woken rudely by my daughter asking me to bring her to school. I hate mornings; mornings make me sick; I feel nauseated, and hazed as if I had taken ten tablets of Benadryl AH. Anyway, I’m trying not to go back to our papag (cot). I have nothing to talk about in this blog because I’m a little busy, hmmmm…not really that busy but the anxiety of school zapped the typing energy out of me. I haven’t read any good books; in fact I haven’t read anything except a few glances at Jose Rizal’s, the Philippines’ national hero, biography. I am not a Rizal guy; I am a Bonifacio guy. Bonifacio is the founder of the Katipunero, the revolutionary movement that fought the Spaniard and was later executed by his fellow revolutionaries. He is my national hero. The problem is that Filipinos think that having a genius national hero like Rizal will make them a genius. (No, I’m being mean again!) There will always be controversy surrounding Rizal’s selection as the country’s national hero because in the first place the guy was really not a revolutionary he is more of an assimilationist (I don’t know if that’s the right word). He wants equality with Spain and not independence.

Anyway, I can’t do anything about it except accept the fact that even in selecting national heroes the Filipinos like branded goods. Rizal was a genius, surgeon, writer, magician, humorist, philosopher etc. –reminds me of Lex Luthor.

I like my heroes to be simple guys, like Bonifacio, a warehouseman during the day and a brave revolutionary organizer and soldier at night, like Superman.

(Must be that darned pirated CD of the movie Superman Returns.)

Anyways, Teodoro Agoncillo (The historian who is pro-Bonifacio. Just look at the cover of his book”The History of the Filipino People” and you’ll know what I mean) is a better writer of history than Gregorio Zaide (Rizal’s biographer).

I Hope I will not be sued.

Mere half

We discover that we do not know our role; we look for a mirror; we want to remove our make-up and take off what is false and real. But somewhere a piece of disguise that we forgot still sticks to us. A trace of exaggeration remains in our eyebrows; we do not notice that the corners of our mouth are bent. And so we walk around, a mockery and a mere half: neither having achieved being nor actors.

--Rainer Maria Rilke

(Why am I attracted to the bleak writings of these existentialists?)

Thoughts on Doctrines

Somewhere in the back of head, there’s this feeling of uneasiness, of hmmm…like I was scratching a galvanized corrugated iron sheet with my finger nails, (the Filipino word is “ngilo” I don’t know the English translation) whenever bible doctrines is discussed. It’s not that I hate Bible doctrines, it’s just that sometimes, just sometimes, okay, always, I have the feeling that people who thinks they know the Bible (like that preacher from channel 37 who claims the his doctrines is original) also knew God, also grasped God, can also manipulate God, can explain God. Of course I will also be teaching doctrines, that is if our pastors will trust me that what I will teach is what I believe in and not what I explore and asks, so, I will be...hmmm…uneasy about myself too.

If we encounter first century Christians, I think we will condemn them as not Christian because of the simplicity of their faith, of their doctrines (or the lack of it). And if we encounter first century Christians, they will call us Pharisees admit it or not, our dogmatism will be so rigid, legalistic and anti-Christ, and our churches so organizational to them that they will not recognize us as Christians at all. And they are nearer to the historical Christ and his teachings than we could ever be.

They don’t even have Bibles and yet they were able survive even before the earliest attempt to create a cannon of the Bible by an, of all the people, heretic named Marcion during the second century began. What they have really is not a bible at all but loose letters and manuscripts with questionable claims of authorship. We are blessed to have the Bible; then again, are we?

I love the Bible. I read it. I study it. I learn from it. I believe it is the word of God. I believe that it is divine. I believe that it’s inerrant in its original autograph. I believe in its revelatory power. I believe everything in it and I’m willing to accept its literalness in the name of orthodoxy.

But I also believe that God is greater than any book, even the Bible. The Bible reveals what God thinks about God that God thinks we are capable of processing, and even in a simplified revelation as a book, Christians can’t even agree on simple terms like “disciples” and “followers.” How much more about…the nature of God.

The Bible is not God. The Bible does not contain God. The Bible is not an operating manual of God. Unless these things are understood, bibliolatry (worship of the Bible) perils faith.

The Bible should lead and guide us to God but if it becomes a stumbling block, a whirlpool of inane and insane wordplay and games of logic and etymologies and what have you…it’s time to be a Quaker. Nahhh…just having fun.

(Quakers are pacifist, philanthropists and good Christians. Pennsylvania was named after their leader William Penn. They are famous for their religious piety and independence. They believed that divine revelation is immediate and individual. The Bible is secondary source of revelation for them.)

Don't Cry Joni and Songs and names

(This is a good song.)

What is it about songs?

“Maybe it’s wrong to say you love me too cause I know you never do. Somebody else is waiting for you…”

This song was originally done by the Neocolours (remember Jamie Rivera and Jimmy Antiporda, Neocolours’ chief songwriter, and how they parted ways because of Jamie’s obsession to be the next Leah Salongga of the Philippines). That song was later revived by Side A. Believe it or not during my freshman year one of my classmates, Benito from auto technology, wrote the whole lyrics of that song and passed it off as an essay piece for our English one class. I was laughing when I read it, but after the semester, when our graded class cards were returned, to my chagrin and joy, I saw that he had a better grade than me. So whenever I hear that song, I remember dear old Benito. He graduated two years ago and I sometime see him in Taytay, Rizal. Last I saw him is he’s planning to add education units to his degree so that he can teach.

“Well, I don’t know how I knew it. But I knew it somehow. You’re the answer to the questions, no one answered till now. I don’t know what you see, or what you see in me. There could never be what you are to me…..Starts that glisten, lips for kissin’. Honey listen its true…”

The title of that song is “Simply Jesse” by Rex Smith. I love that song and I told myself that I will name my child after it. After a few years I got a daughter named Jesse Faith. Jesse is from that song and Faith was the name given by my wife. So whenever I hear that song I would tell my daughter, “Hey, that’s where you got your name.” I don’t know if when she grew up she’ll still appreciate the connection with that song.

I knew a bass player named Joni and whenever we asked him where he got his name he’ll be quiet. But then one of his friends would sing,

“Joni, Joni don’t you cry. I’ll….by and by….” Then they would all laugh. He nodded. “Yes, that’s where I got my name.”

I am thinking what if my daughter is already a teenager and some of her friends asked her where she got her name and then someone would sing,

“Stars that glisten lips for kissin….”

Don’t ever, ever name your children after a song. Tsk, tsk, tsk…anyway I can always say that I named her after my neighbor.

Me, I was named after the doctor who commandeered me out of my mother’s womb.