Kagitingan summarizes the best in a human being--nobility, courage, integrity, strength of character, greatness of spirit. It derives from the word magiting.
What does it mean to be magiting? Filipino hero Emilio Jacinto defined it in the cartilla for wanna-be Katipuneros: ``…may magandang asal, may isang pangungusap, may dangal at puri, di nangaapi at di nagpapaapi, marunong magdamdam at ginugugol ang buhay, pagod at talino sa pagiging mabuting anak ng bayan at ng Diyos.’’ (…of good character, has word of honor, integrity and purity, does not oppress and does not allow oppression, sensitive to others and dedicates his/her life, energy and talent toward being a good citizen and child of God.)
Last June 12, 106th anniversary of Philippine Independence, Bishop Julio X. Labayen, retired bishop of the Prelature of Infanta in Quezon received the Gawad Kagitingan Award. The venue couldn’t have been more appropriate—the Bantayog ng mga Bayani in Quezon City where the names of those who served and died for freedom are etched.
Behind the award was Management and Organization Development for Empowerment, an NGO working for the emancipation of farmers.
This year’s honoree is certainly most deserving. He has served the cause of the poor of Infanta and various sectors in the field of social action. In his response speech at the Gawad rites, the bishop, now in his late 70s, retraced his steps in the battlefields.
Who is Bishop Labayen? Many years ago, I wrote: ``Bishop Julio Xavier Labayen, a member of the Order of the Discalced Carmelites, is viewed by many as `controversial’, having figured in clashes with the Marcos dictatorship. In a sea of conservatives in the Philippine Church hierarchy, the bishop is considered a voice in the wilderness.’’ I had mixed the metaphors there but the bishop seems to have been pleased with it because he used it as a blurb in his book.
If you want to get to know the bishop more, read his book, ``Revolution and the Church of the Poor’’. This is about what the bishop thinks is an all-important ingredient for a revolution to work--spirituality. The other day I pulled out the book from the shelf to refresh my memory.
I stress the bishop’s being a Carmelite--steeped in the spirituality of Carmelite mystics John of the Cross and Teresa of Avila--to contrast with his being perceived as a ``leftie’’ by right-wing military elements and even by his mitered colleagues.
In his treatise, Labayen does not make an apologia or defense of church people romancing Marxism and so-called liberation movements. Far from it. What Labayen wants to see is ``a letting go of what has become irrelevant and obstructive, a going beyond…a dying to what has ceased to serve life.’’ He points out the failure of revolutionary movements to deliver. Some things just didn’t work. Or don’t work anymore. Or were bound to fail. So, hear ye.
Labayen speaks, drawing from his almost four decades of pastoral experience as bishop prelate of Infanta, interwoven ``with the dark strands of trials, crisis, harassment, persecution and marginalization, and also with the bright strands of pastoral breakthroughs, deep insights, qualitative turning points, reassuring faith-experiences of the living God of history.’’
Labayen presents two models of the Church: the ``imperialist’’ Christendom model and the Church of the Poor. He points out that ``while the Church may be historically shaped and conditioned by history, the same Church was founded by Jesus Christ to shape history.’’
And so where did revolutions go wrong? He cites Europe and China and lingers in Latin America, Nicaragua especially, where the Church played a vital role in the revolution. The outcomes, he says, either fall short of the initial noble intentions or, sometime after victory, short-changed the masses.
At home, he scores the Christians for National Liberation for failing ``to influence the revolutionary process to make it more humane, compassionate and less rigid.’’ He notes that cultural and psychological perspectives are often not taken into consideration in revolutionary affairs.
It cannot all be politics and economics, Labayen points out. The human heart and the human spirit, he argues, also seek to be liberated.
And so he does not tire of presenting another paradigm--Christ. Not the Christ conveniently portrayed as a radical to polarize social classes, but the Christ who preaches an interior revolution in the human heart and spirit.
He dares suggest that activists ``understand the contribution of the mystics and psychologists…It may well be that here we encounter a yet untapped inner resource that we have not harnessed for revolution. Could it be that herein lies the ingredient that is lacking for the satisfactory and fulfilling outcome?’’
I was stumped by that. For I had long waited for someone to say that.
Dig into your inner well, the bishop exhorts and offers words from John of the Cross’ Spiritual Canticle: ``An then we will go on/to the high caverns on the rock/Which are so well concealed;/ There we shall enter/ And taste the fresh juice of the pomegranates.’’ Ah, the pomegranates.
If, as they say, John of the Cross, if peeled and stripped of the Christian layers, is really a Buddhist monk, I think, Bishop Labayen, if stripped of his activist label, is truly a contemplative, a monk at prayer, on his knees in the bloody fields of battle.
A few days from now, for the first time ever in the Philippines, more than 3,000 priests and 100 bishops will gather for five days in intense prayer and reflection on their life and mission, as brothers in communion, responding to the call to discipleship under ``the one, true Shepherd.’’
Posts
