Friday, October 12, 2007 Roperos: Reviving the Cursillo By Godofredo M. Roperos Politics Also
TODAY, Friday (Oct. 12) at the Eco-Tech Center, should be marked as a day that the revival of the Cursillo en Cristianidad in the Philippines is celebrated. Cebu is where the Christian renewal movement in the country started sometime in the ‘60s.
The Cursillo is a unique seminar about Christian living done in short courses and based on the basics of Christian beliefs and practices. These are imparted to the participants with the vow to live by them.
Participants of the three-day activity absorb Christian thought against the backdrop of their own personal lives and unique experiences. It is a leveling seminar, where social station and profession were not factors for admission. Each is asked to admit his failings as a Christian, and commit to change.
I took the Cursillo in the late ‘60s under Batch 127 at the Betania, when the place was just starting to attract investors. The Cebu Plaza Hotel was still to be constructed, as well as the other medium-scale firms.
The experience was memorable if only for the fact that, not being allowed to talk with anyone on the first night, I was unable to warn my roommates about my terrible snoring, which drove about half of them outside the room and sleep along the aisle.
There was a men’s Cursillo and a women’s Cursillo. Trainors wisely grouped participants according to sex to attain some kind of privacy.
Indeed, I have never seen men who cried openly at certain points of the lectures, like when they are encouraged to face the realities of their existence and confront their failings, vices, and weaknesses.
But the problem then, as it probably still is now, was that it takes a lot of human will for one to stay “changed” amidst the forces whirling around him, like in his own family when his wife has not yet taken the course.
Remission from vices and sin may be short lived, but many did prevail. It was a question, really, of will power and discipline on the part of “graduates.”
In a way, the Cursillo paved the way for the emergence of religious movements, from the Charismatic to the Couples for Christ. The format and the religious essence all appear to be influenced by the Cursillo, which ironically got pushed to the background.
Now, however, the trail blazing Cursillo en Cristianidad is staging a comeback.
