I REMEMBER a story when I was a kid: I was watching a concert of Michael Jackson from a VHS player in our family room when my father arrived. He saw what I was watching and he looked back at me and asked: "What is that guy? You call that a music? I'm hearing nothing but noise." And that's how I introduced the King of Pop to my dad; that there is a variation of genres other than his favorite songs of Perry Como.
The next coming days, he would sit with me in the living room, watching the guy on TV moonwalk.
I used to be a music junkie enjoying listening to the radio and watching Music Television or MTv with my cousins, the Marcelo brothers. The fact that I also have another cousin who's a radio DJ only boosted my interest in music. My cousin Elwyn and I would record our favorite songs from the FM radio to the cassette player through a blank tape, and we would play the tape (sides A and B) all day long. And when it's the Christmas season, he and I would play carols from the radio as early as 4 in the morning. Nowadays, I'm neither aware of the singers' names nor know the title of the latest hits anymore. I have no idea what Charlie Puth sings unless of course if I google him. My usual alibi for my sudden disinterest is that I have no time for it anymore, or that I'm too much preoccupied with other matters.
Will it be a trend? Is being a bit old or mature makes one too busy for modern music? A week ago, Bishop Ambo David wrote and shared Revelation to the Childlike from a mass of the Holy Spirit in Loyola School of Theology. In his writing, the bishop described a preschool whose main purpose is to make us properly mature from grownups to children and not the other way around. It is about exploring the deepest mysteries of faith like children having fun, singing and dancing in the rain, or playing with nature's small creatures. As a kid, I usually spent my summer vacations with my relatives. On those usual afternoons, hearing the bells from the Immaculate Concepcion Parish ring meant it's time for merienda. At night time, I would climb up to the roof of our bungalow and lie in that corrugated metal for minutes, staring at the night sky, gazing at the stars, admiring its beauty.
One of my favorite paragraphs on this particular writing was when Bishop Ambo said: "It's ok to babble like children or to speak in tongues. Isn't that what happens when you put children of various nationalities together who are unfamiliar with each other's languages? They'll communicate and play." I can relate to this whenever I observe my tyke mingle with other kids inside a playschool.
The Bishop also shared the three stages of human spirit evolution as laid out from the book of philosopher Friedrich Nietzche. The first two phases were the camel and the lion stages. The third and final stage of spiritual evolution is that of the child. David said that this happens when we stop being angry and allow ourselves to be truly delighted by life as it unfolds. Ask yourself, when was the last time you laugh at your blunder? Our children remind us about the greatness of life. They jog one's memory of how to be joyful and how to be grateful for even the littlest of things.
Bishop Ambo appeals.
"Today, I ask you to think of your theological studies as a task of learning the grammar and vocabulary of the Holy Spirit. Be open to the Spirit who alone can teach us to understand God's will and to respond with love to the God who loved us first. He alone can enable us to listen even to those who don't agree with us. Like the Father whose house has many rooms, he will teach us to make space for everyone, even those who may have wronged us. Yes, including fools and troublemakers, addicts, neurotics and psychotics."