IN the gospel, there is a part where Christ drove out the demons from a possessed man but was accused by some leading Jews of driving out demons by the prince of demons, an obviously self-contradicting reasoning. (cfr. Mt 9,32-38)

On this occasion, Christ did not waste time defending himself. He proceeded instead to go around all the towns and villages, teaching in the synagogues, proclaiming the Gospel of the Kingdom, and curing every disease and illness.

This should also be our reaction when we encounter some contradictions in our efforts to do some good. We should just proceed to do a lot more of good. Let those who misunderstand us bear their own misunderstanding. Of course, if we have some time, we may do some gentle and charitable clarification or correction. But we should not lose sight of what is most important for us to do.

In the same gospel, it is said that when Christ saw the big crowd to be given attention to, he was moved with pity because he saw them like being troubled and abandoned, like a sheep without a shepherd.

That’s when he made this appeal to his disciples to “ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest,” because as he said, “the harvest is abundant but the laborers are few.”

Indeed, this is always the situation in our earthly life. It’s a big and continuing challenge. There are endless people to reach out to bring Christ to them, and those who have to do that very important task will always be few and limited.

We just have to realize that everyone of us, if we are to be consistently faithful to our Christian identity, is called to carry out this task. Thus, we have to realize more deeply that all of us actually have a vocation, since all are called to share in Christ’s mission to save all men.

We should all be concerned about this matter. We need to develop a sense of vocation, for the simple reason that everyone has a vocation. We come from God and we belong to him. He always calls us to himself and offers us a way to go to him.

The way to go to him, peculiar to each one of us given our different situations in life and God’s specific plan for us, is the vocation God gives us. We therefore should try to discover that vocation as early as possible and correspond to it as fully as possible also.

To be sure, no one comes to existence by mere accident nor by pure chance and divine caprice. God does not create us at random. Even a person who is considered unwanted by his parents or is conceived through rape is already a person planned and loved by God from all eternity. This is a fundamental truth about ourselves that we should never take for granted.

Thus, we should try to develop this sense of vocation as early as possible. And this can mean as early as when one is still a child, already beginning to be aware of what and who he or she is. This normally should start in the family, with the parents playing a major role in this affair since they are our first teachers here on earth.

The parents should be quick in sowing the seeds of this sense of vocation by making the child aware that he or she just did not come from them but from God. And that he or she also belongs to God. This basic truth should always be reinforced all throughout the process of bringing up and educating the child.

The riding public had been silently suffering from unjust fares that public transportation companies impose, in most cases without conducting the requisite public consultation. The fares are fixed by government regulatory agencies on the bases of fuel cost that varies with so many parameters, chief of them the foreign exchange that could hardly be understood by the hapless passenger. Such varying fuel prices are always to the detriment of the riding public who suffer from unfair fares that are adjusted on the upscale but are never reduced when fuel prices decrease.

Transportation operators could easily find flimsy justifications just to quell the outcry of the riding public demanding fare reduction. The factors to defend fare reduction are aplenty such as operating costs, wages of crew manning the vehicle and many other reasons just to outweigh the demand for fare reduction. The defense is made effective by strong lobby that transport operators employ to persuade policymakers that they would be at a great loss if fare rates are reduced. Such threat aims to condition the public mind that their loss would result in transportation crisis as they will be forced to reduce or even stop operations.

The situation is always in favor of transport operators who are organized and could show that their force to influence policymakers and defeat the outcry of the riding public. On the other hand, the riding public are a ragtag bunch of individuals complaining on their plight.
comments to alellema@yahoo.com

An energy company subsidiary of the Ayala Group called ACEN Corp. has poured in fund additional fund for the construction of its wind project in Ilocos Norte.

The ACEN fresh investment “will subscribe to 3.61 million redeemable preferred D shares, 2.97 million redeemable preferred E shares of Bayog Wind Power Corp. (BWPC) at P100 per share for a total amount of P677.36 million.” As reported, the subscribed amount would be used by BWPC for its on-going construction of the 160-megawatt (MW) Pagudpud wind project located in its Barangays Balaoi and Cauayan. The Pagudpud wind project had an initial cost of P11.4 million, started in May 2021

ACEN aims to meet the company’s generation portfolio to be 100 percent renewable energy powered by 2025. The Ayala Group subsidiary has earmarked P50 to P70 billion expenditures in 2023 to enhance its planned renewable energy transition. Also, it aims to be the “largest listed renewable platform in Southeast Asia, with a goal of reaching 20 gigawatts o renewables capacity by 2030.”

MY COMMENT:
News about tapping the renewable energy sources of the Philippines, I believe is key to the country’s quest for energy security. ACEN’s efforts to transition to renewable energy sufficiency is worth of emulation. Likewise, are the other domestically- and foreign-funded on-going R E ventures. Indeed, next matter I wished addressed is food security, especially availability of rice in the market produced by Filipino farmers. I despise the ‘knee-jerk’ solution to offset rice supply shortage by resorting to importation.
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NEXT TOPIC : “Meralco uses R E to power Atkins’ cold storage facility”
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I start talking about corruption – its direct correlation with poverty,” he told the PNP. “When I start doing that, they all start looking at their cell phones.”

Baguio Mayor Benjamin Magalong was featured on the news last week for the right reasons, but even though it was a just and appropriate story, it put everyone in an awkward position.

You see, Mayor Benjie discussed corruption as well as good government. He said friends have cautioned him that he is going to step on many toes and it’s better to just keep silent. Ina column , written by Philstar Ana Marie Pamintuan , Mayor Magalong said;

“I don’t think that’s the right attitude,” he said. “We have to do what is right even if it’s unpopular… it’s about time that people should now demand good governance from their political leaders. It will be difficult, there will be a lot of challenges along the way. It will become a journey. Sa akin lang, maumpisahan ko. I may not be able to finish it during my term and during my lifetime, but one way or the other we have started it and hopefully the younger generations will be able to continue and sustain it.”

The Chiefs TV Program interviewed and wanted Magalong to expound on a speech he made last July 3 before the Philippine National Police (PNP) at Camp Crame. The speech addressed proposals to make the military and other uniformed personnel contribute to their pensions to prevent what the economic team leader says is a looming “fiscal collapse.”
While Magalong, a retired PNP general and pensioner, says he is open to the proposal, he said government officials including lawmakers should also do their part in promoting fiscal prudence.

Magalong digressed from his prepared speech and recalled that in several of his recent speeches before mayors and vice governors, the audience listened enthusiastically when he discussed how technology could enhance governance.

“And then I start talking about good governance. I start talking about traditional politics. I start talking about corruption – its direct correlation with poverty,” he told the PNP. “When I start doing that, they all start looking at their cell phones.”

The Speech of Mayor Benjie Magalong created a stir and pointed out the naked reality that people refused to call out as downright obscene.

The unpalatable truth that most of our public leaders carry something that is tucked away in their stomachs, knowing that they are corrupt. And who can blame them—not the people who persistently solicit assistance from and receive endorsement from purported public servants, the public who receives substantial bribes during and in every election.

Magalong is a voice in the wilderness, but it is a voice that must be heard. Even if we have a detached attitude toward all of this, we are conscious of how this nonchalance will ultimately harm us. Our apathy and indifference will be the cause of the impending catastrophe.

Mayor Magalong may cut a strange figure since he is swimming against a powerful stream that is rushing in the opposite way, but his bravery and forward motion are exactly what we need in a time when corruption and the evil it has bred are the norm.