Having been in Ireland now for three years, (the longest continuous time I’ve spent here since 1982), I offer some impressions of the culture in the Philippines, where I spent almost 30 years – and hope to return to again. I begin with an aspect of life there which I find somewhat disturbing, and then proceed to what I have found memorable and, finally, satisfying.
I was sitting on the porch of a house in the rural Philippines, and my companion was the woman of the house, a most placid woman in her late-50s; the village had seen its share of violence. Sometime before I arrived, a single woman in her 50s had been raped and subsequently died. On another occasion, two friends were drinking, but the atmosphere soon turned sour and one died of machete blows, the other was taken to hospital. (This last incident exhibited a colour I hadn’t seen before: the family of the deceased painted his coffin red, to signify that the blood feud continues). So now some police and village militia are present at the weekly market, which draws quite a crowd from neighbouring villages.
As one of the militias passed by, I asked the housewife what weapon was slung over his shoulder. Without a moment’s hesitation she said “it looks like an Uzi, with a silencer”. Well I was completely flabbergasted. Not because a farmer-militia with almost-zero training in firearms was carrying such a weapon (I only know the name of the gun from the movies); no, I was shocked that a housewife who, not only hasn’t a violent bone in her body, but who has never even entertained a violent thought, would be so instantly familiar with such tools of aggression and destruction. No woman in Ireland, of any generation (apart from paramilitaries), knows what an Uzi is. Jacuzzi yes, Uzi no. And a silencer is what goes on a motorbike to dull the sound of the engine. The other silencer is limited to slick Hollywood assassins.
Our popular media is saturated with the glorification of mindless violence, the proliferation of all kinds of weaponry, movies demonstrating gratuitous cruelty and gore. Furthermore, this (the Philippines) is a country saturated with weaponry, with everyday incidents of violence – from alcohol-fuelled domestic disturbances to a pretty constant reporting of killings nationwide. This dark side of Filipino culture, coupled with our being followers of the Lord who shunned violence, makes it urgent that we should live peaceable lives. In a culture where calm enjoyment between friends can, in the blink of an eye, and the clink of a glass, turn to seething, manic resentment and deadly bloodshed, any effort at peace building is to be lauded.
I myself had a brush with violence – or possible violence, at any rate. With two of my lay companions, as well as the driver, we were going uphill on a motorbike. The road was very muddy, so progress was slow. As we rounded a bend, there was a fellow at the side of the road, and he flagged down out bike. The driver stopped and the other asked to be driven somewhere. I said that we were heading further uphill and we couldn’t delay. He then brandished a home-made gun, remarking on my talking back to him (he had clearly been drinking). The body of the gun is made of wood and the live bullet is held in tension using strong elastic bands; pressing on the trigger would obviously release the round. My male companion whispered to me that we should get off the bike, which we did, and we walked in among some nearby houses and made our way to our destination on foot. It turns out that the lad with the home-made gun was indeed something of a local trouble-maker, but we had met him at a time when he was acutely upset. His father had died that very day and he had requested the use of the village truck for various tasks, but had been turned down as the muddy conditions prevented any such use. To be fair to him, next morning he was at the parish house when I arrived, and he was most apologetic for his behaviour. We parted amicably.
Some of my most memorable experiences during my mission work were the various processions held at different times of the year. As I wrote in an earlier Gript article regarding our Advent procession: “And for children walking in “The Way of the Crib”, with their parents and friends, holding their candle, looking with eyes full of wonder at the crib held aloft on the men’s shoulders, with blinking Christmas lights draped over the figurines in the crib – all this is like an acorn of happiness and contentment which will grow into an oak of gentle, serene memories, to soothe them when life has lost that lovely childhood aura of endless excitement, adventure and ever-new delights, and instead treads the somewhat wearier, more serious path of adulthood”.
I was extremely touched by an incident during a similar procession. Using Redemptorist funds, I had been helping a young mother called Jenafe to get treatment for cancer. She was from a southern island, and had come to Cebu for treatment, and to be with her husband (Michael), who worked there. They had one child. The Advent procession wound along the city roads, and various families were tasked to prepare altars at certain points. Many put great effort into their altar, seeing this as an honour, and Jenafe & Michael had accepted the task for their location. I could hardly hold back the tears when we reached the place of their altar, because Jenafe, Michael and their baby formed a live tableau of the scene of the crib in Bethlehem. They stood there stoically as the prayers were recited, maybe hoping beyond hope for a Christmas miracle for Jenafe’s health. Then the hymn-singing resumed and the procession continued. She continued her treatment, but the insidious cancer had ravaged her young body; Jenafe died some months later.
Mind you, even the more sombre atmosphere of holy week has produced gem-like memories. In previous years, I had always had 12 male apostles for the holy week ceremonies, but one year I said to myself “why focus on the gender?” If we are to be literally true to the gospels, then our apostles should be fluent in Hebrew, have among them a few fishermen, a former tax-gatherer, a traitor and a denier (among other traits). I didn’t think the good folk in the Philippine hills were going to be too literal on all those points, so we ended up with more female than male apostles. And it was a superb group! Not only did they participate with solemn dignity in all the ceremonies, wearing their named sashes and carrying their bamboo torches with a touching formality, but each day of holy week (starting on Palm Sunday until the morning of Holy Thursday), they visited practically every home in the mountainy village – and the village is 4,800 hectares in size (7000+ acres). I found them to be a tremendously inspiring group. I knew them all from visiting their homes: ordinary housewives, hardy farmers; and every day there was not a single demur, as they set out in pairs, in sauna-like heat to go from house to house, reading their prayer-blessing, then sprinkling holy water on the family members. We’d meet for lunch at a pre-arranged location, and there would be mighty laughter as they recounted their adventures: how, for instance, one fellow had to jump, with lightning speed, up on a fence to avoid ferocious dogs. They’d set out like post-modern apostles, the women with eye-catching earrings and lipstick, the men with shades, looking like Arnold Schwarzenegger in “The Terminator”. And they would return, tired but satisfied, mission accomplished.
Finally, among the very many satisfying moments during my years in the Philippines, one of the choicest is the knowledge of the scholars I am helping to finish their courses, whether secondary school or university (through the generosity of donors in Ireland & the Philippines). The support for the scholars is based on the old adage: if you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day; if you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime. Surely a solid education is a good preparation for these youngsters as they face into a very uncertain future.
These recent trying times (pandemics, and so on) might have weakened lesser mortals, but this current group of scholars seems to have been inspired by the various trials. Many of them, while still attending their classes virtually, managed to hold down a part-time job, so as to bring in, not only pocket money for themselves, but also income to help their families. These are valiant warriors, so any help my fund gives them is, to use a phrase from “The Big Issue” magazine, “a hand up, not a hand out”. In another earlier Gript article, I wrote about “Operation Second Chance”, a government program to help youngsters in trouble with the law. Well, most encouragingly, one of the present batch of scholars was recently an inmate of that very programme. His future looks bright.
The other two beneficiaries of my fund are easier to summarize. First are people in a crisis: either medical, or resulting from some natural calamity (e.g., typhoon). These can often be most pitiful: people, already in hard circumstances, run up against a wall of almost hellish proportions – whether through accident, or natural catastrophe or just random fate. In these cases, what is needed is emergency support, to help rebuild a home or to provide medical help for those in serious need. And fortunately, the funds are there, and a trusted friend to administer them.
Finally, the fund is used simply to give an occasional “bundle of joy” to certain families in need. This is the equivalent of our “Christmas hamper”, but it is far simpler, and far less costly. It consists of a collection of the basics (rice, sardines, noodles, coffee) and a rarity (an apple or a few grapes for the new year). Filipinos have a belief that you should have 12 rounded fruits in the house on New Year’s Eve, so as to ward off any evil influences and to prepare for a prosperous year ahead, hence the grapes & apples (both imported).
Whether helping students in their studies, or rebuilding a home or providing a bundle of joy at Christmas, the money in the fund is well used, thanks be to God and the donors.