I RECEIVED my first Camma (Cebu Archdiocesan Mass Media Award) for Best Column Writing in the year 2000. Then, I was living in the People’s Republic of China.
My dear mother told me she beamed with pride every time someone congratulated her. But she was immensely annoyed when someone remarked, “I wonder who your daughter takes after?” The memory of this conversation still makes me smile.
I can’t believe it’s been two decades since my first Camma. Well, I haven’t been counting. I had to look it up. But my mother might have been counting. Looking back, I can’t count the number of times she practically begged me to stop writing columns critical of the Catholic Church.
“They’ll never give you a Camma again!” she’d tell me.
She was right. I served an almost 20-year sentence. And perhaps, rightly so.
I’ve been offered money in the past to write positively about particular products and services. I’ve politely said no. I’ve made endorsements but I did so, gratis, and because I truly believed in them.
I may opt not to write negatively about a product or experience. I may choose to inhibit myself from an issue that involves someone close to me but I will not write a false review or fake opinion.
If I chose not to heed my mother’s advice, it was not because I wanted to defy her but because she had taught me better—to never sell my soul to the Devil.
I do not write to pander to anyone’s wishes. I do not write to win awards. I write to express an opinion borne out of of my heart’s desire and my mind’s quest to seek the truth.
Pablo Picasso said, “Every act of creation is first an act of destruction.”
Destruction can be incendiary but sometimes, it is necessary—not just in art, but in life as well.
It is not my nature to accept things as they are. I always believe in the possibility of a better way, a better plan, a better path. One does not grow by accepting the status quo. One grows by finding the courage to see that light doesn’t come from the end of only one tunnel.
Faith cannot be handed down. It must be fought for. Faith must be forged from the fire of one’s questioning and the embers of one’s experiences. It can only be birthed from the struggle within one’s soul.
I thank the Archdiocese of Cebu for this second Camma for Best Column Writing. I chose to defy my mother because I want to win for a body of work that comes from my heart, mind and soul and not from my desire to covet an award.
I wish my mother could have lived to see me win this second Camma but as I chose to take the painful path, it is no longer possible. But I know she smiles from up above. Nevertheless.
I received the news while praying for the sick and suffering inside the Cathedral of St. Domnius in Split, Croatia. This award arrived in God’s time. And I am deeply humbled.