Sunday, August 10, 2008 Estremera: Listening, hearing, understanding By Stella A Estremera Spider's web
BELIEVE it or not, I'm still taken by surprise every time somebody says he read my article.
Much more that he was surprised at how I was able to put all those facts into one apparently logical and understandable whole, especially when I've just whipped out one of those difficult topics that Weekend is known to tackle every once in a while because we strongly believe an intelligent nation cannot continue to be so with just a daily dose of Wowowee. But I'm digressing...
What really surprises me is how people are surprised at logic, understanding, and the very skeleton of journalism -- imparting correct information.
But then I guess that's how it is.
People, including journalists, do have biases, and to most, their understanding of any information should fit into that bias.
We only hear what we want to though, that is all right, because that's a personal choice. The problem arises because we tend not only to hear what we want to, we also presume that what we want to hear is what others want.
Much like the preachers who ride buses from Digos, that is. And of late, they have been really tenacious about it; opening their Bibles and preaching the word to a bus full of people who may not even be Christians, or of the same denomination.
I don't have anything about Christians, I am one. It's just that we do have to recognize that there are other people too. Our love for our Creator should manifest in how we treat His other creations -- people with different beliefs included.
I guess it's all right if you preach by the sidewalk. At least, people have the choice of walking away, stopping, or giving you a really wide berth.
It's even better in a Temple, Church, Synagogue, Mosque or whatever you call your place of worship because people will have to come in to listen to you.
In a bus that's speeding off to its destination where the only escape is through the window, which in an air-conditioned bus is just fixed glass, is definitely not a place to preach your beliefs.
But they're there, pounding on their bibles, making the passengers feel unworthy because there they are, so neatly dressed, while most of the passengers have muddy shoes, sweat-streaked t-shirts, or ones that bear the mark of an ukay-ukay. Woe to us, ordinary mortals.
Which brings me to a never-ending discussion about that spirit that resides in me, which I refuse to name.
But, my friends, Romans, and countrymen how they love to insist that it's the Holy Spirit. Oh dear... Again, I don't have anything against the Holy Spirit, I was born and raised a Christian, and so I believe in it. I just refuse to call it that! Period.
Now if you want to argue on... then think. You were named, not by yourself.
You were born, a squirming, crying baby, not even in full control of your abilities yet, and you were baptized, named by your parents.
As you grow old enough to own a pet, you name your pet. And while you learn to interact with other people, you give names to people you don't like behind their backs, like Petrang Chismosa, Amorado Champorado (oops!).
Then when you become President of the Philippines, you name someone as Secretary of Whatever, while the Professional Regulatory Commission allows you to add Engineer, Architect, Doctor, whatever to your name, which without their certification and license you are not allowed to add.
Consistently, in our world, a name is bequeathed, given by someone who has more power than the one who is named -- either because the named doesn't have any choice, much like a dog, a newly-baptized baby, or the one you named behind his back; or because you have the authority to give a name.
Now the question, am I more powerful than that spirit I refuse to name, which you insist is called the Holy Spirit? I am humble enough to admit, I do not have even an iota of the spirit's power. And so I opt not to give it a name.
