ON the Solemnity of St. Joseph, celebrated on March 19, the readings of the Mass highlight the importance and indispensability of faith, which is first of all a gift of God who starts to share his life, nature and power with us. With faith, we can start to have hope amid the confusing elements of our life, and to have charity amid the many challenges we are sure to encounter in life.
As long as we are receptive to this faith and act in accordance to it, we can be sure that we would be doing the right things, and what would seem hard or even impossible to do, can take place.
The first reading, for example, from the 2nd Book of Samuel (7,4-5.12-14.16), talks about how God told Nathan about how the kingdom of David will stand firm forever, thus showing how God shares his plans for man and with man. The second reading, from the Letter to the Romans (4,13.16-18.22) brings up the great faith of Abraham who hoped against hope in believing what God promised him.
The gospel (Mt 1,16.18-21.24) talks of the great faith St. Joseph had in the word of God. He immediately changed his plan of not proceeding with the marriage with Mary when he learned Mary was on the family way before they lived together. Even if it was only in a dream that he was told about the whole story of Mary’s condition, he just believed and took Mary to be his wife.
We should try to replicate this great faith of St. Joseph. Like him, we can be sure of receiving and enjoying God’s great love for us and many other benefits and privileges as long as we obey and follow God’s will, as long as we make ourselves available to that will even if some drastic efforts and sacrifices may have to be made.
We have to realize, though, that faith is a very dynamic thing. We can never say that we have enough faith. We should never be complacent in this regard. Faith needs to grow and grow as well as to inspire us more deeply, thoroughly and consistently.
We need to make it grow to cope with our natural needs. In this level alone, we always need faith to make things very clear for us, even if in theory we can handle the natural challenges and difficulties we can encounter in life.
We cannot deny that there are just too many of these natural challenges and difficulties for us to handle with a certain ease and confidence. Especially these days when the pace of development is faster, and the developments themselves are more complicated and tricky, we need the light of faith to see things properly.
Besides, it is faith that gives the ultimate meaning and proper direction to all our human knowledge and endeavors. It is what gives the original perspective to all events, good or bad, in our life. Otherwise, we would end up confused and lost.
We also need to make our faith grow to cope with the multiplying infranatural consequences of our human condition that is weakened by sin. There’s no other way to manage and survive the consequences of sin, ours and those of others, personal as well as the collective and structural, than by relying first of all on our faith.
We also need to make our faith grow to cope with the tremendous goal of attaining our supernatural goal in life, that of becoming the true image and likeness of God in which we have been created.
For hire?
A fast growing business is going unregulated by the authorities. People are not complaining for it somehow serves their needs. There are risks involved that put to peril both lives and properties. But people care less about the dangers for they are satisfied with the convenience it affords to the public. This is about the proliferation of motorbikes in almost every place everywhere. These vehicles had been flooding the market and the end users are rising every minute. We saw in the recent past motorcycles being used as engine for tricycles, some use the vehicle as a single unit to carry both passengers and cargoes. Such vehicle is ideal in places accessible only by feeder roads that are mostly macadamized or simply graded with aggregates.
Places connected with these types of roads are hardly passable by automobiles, buses and cars because of the rough road conditions. But motorcycles can easily navigate the tough rough road conditions. Some years ago, roads that are not passable by motor vehicles are the domain of bicycle-driven cabs. Many places in the rural areas had resorted to these modern carts that are powered by man. The cab moves faster than the obsolete carts pulled by carabaos. But the shift of power from carabao to man has demeaned the dignity of humans are being dragged to the level of working animals. But there is dignity in the hard labor of pushing cabs by the power of the feet for it earns an honest living for the driver and his family.
However, the slow-paced pedicabs proved a bit inconvenient to the hurrying passengers. It takes too much time reaching their destinations aboard pedicabs. But during floods when motor vehicles could not pass through deeply inundated streets, the pedicad gains recognition as a good transportation alternative. Under normal circumstances however, motorized transport is still better than animal driven ones. Fast movement from place to place is a primary consideration in the choice of transportation. People would always opt for the faster unit in order to arrived at the desired destination with less time consumption.
Because people are getting the convenience of moving through rough roads on motorbikes instead of hiking, they do not mind whether these vehicles are complying with public safety laws and regulations. Surely, these are not public utilities for hire and do not have certificates of public convenience that is required of vehicles for hire. Worse, these single motorcycles are not even registered as for hire in the localities where they operate.
In most cases, these vehicles are driven by unlicensed drivers who can afford to pay the low down payments for these easy installment motorcycles but could not obtain a driver’s license. We do not know how aware are government agencies are about these fast growing business that is being conducted not like a business but in the guise of mere public service. People are exposed to dangers that are not even covered by insurances because the trade of this mode of transportation is being made to appear as personal service of the owner but in fact, such vehicles are unregulated but serves the riding public for hire.
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