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106 Readings for Theology 141: A Theology of the Catholic Social Vision
108 Readings for Theology 141: A Theology of the Catholic Social Vision
110 Readings for Theology 141: A Theology of the Catholic Social Vision
that one ought to share with ones fellows both the burdens and the
rewards of association.True enough; and because pakikisama is human,
it is also Filipino. Filipinos are human beings, after all.
But this also might be said, that when we give our own name to
a human condition, we also give our own nuance to it. What, then,
does pakikisama add to the general notion of sociability? Perhaps
this, that helpfulness, neighborliness, is expected of everyone; but it
is never forced on anyone.
It is expected of everyone; that is why we have an instinctive
aversion to rugged individualism, to being malakas at the expense of
others, which is the operative principle of the free-enterprise society.
We cannot accept the survival of the fittest, because we do not consider
survival a matter of fitness, but a matter of right. We are sceptical of
the famous hidden hand of Adam Smith, whereby if I simply and
single-mindedly sought my own self-interest in everything, I will be
found, in the long run, to have contributed to the welfare of everyone
else.We beg leave to doubt this, not so much because we believe, with
Keynes that in the long run we are dead, but because we tend to
put our faith in the helping, rather than the hidden hand.
Only, we do not force the helping hand on anyone; this is the
other nuance of pakikisama.We make a distinction between makisama
and makialam, between helping and meddling. Help should be offered,
but should await acceptance.A man should be allowed to make up his
own mind as to what is good for him. He may have lost everything
else; let him not lose thatthe right to decide whether he wants to
be helped, and in what way.
This being the way we are, I suspect that we would resist
collectivization with the same angry vigor that we are now trying
to shake off laissez-faire. We simply refuse to be organized, either by
the Left or by the Right, and least of all by experts. If there is any
organizing to be done, we would like to do it ourselves; and it will have
to be organization that allows for a large measure of individuality. By
all means let us have community but let it be a community of persons,
not units; people, not masses. Tayoy makisama upang ang bawat isa ay
makapagsarililet us help one another to possess himself.
But is this possible? Freely to organize; to organize for freedom;
to fashion unity out of diversityis this possible? Possible or not, it
is what we want. It is the whole movement of our history. Of seven
Freedom does not mean that we are to obey no one, for freedom
itself demands that we conform our conduct to the guiding light of
reason and the commanding voice of justice. What freedom does
mean is that we ought to obey, not anyone, but only and always that
person whom we ourselves have chosen and acknowledged as the
most capable of leading us; for in this way we are but obeying our
own reason. An army that becomes insubordinate and disobeys its
commanders really loses freedom, because it subverts the order and
attacks the discipline imposed by reason, which shows that a body
of men becomes incapable of action if it has no unity of movement
and purpose, if one pulls this way and another that.
112 Readings for Theology 141: A Theology of the Catholic Social Vision
Reason tells us (he wrote) that we must not waste our time
waiting in vain for promises of felicity that will never come,
that will never materialize. Reason tells us that we must rely
upon ourselves alone and never entrust our rights and our life
to anyone else. Reason teaches us to be united in sentiment,
thought, and purpose, so that we may acquire the strength
necessary to crush the evil that is affecting our people...
Mabini was a man who wanted to get things done. And the only
way he saw things could get done was by concerted action under iron
discipline; in a word, pagkakaisa. But you will observe that no matter
how much he wanted pagkakaisa, he did not thereby jettison freedom.
What he said was that freedom itself demands that we conform our
conduct to the guiding light of reason and the commanding voice
of justice.
It is interesting to note how much reliance the founders of our
nationalist tradition placed on reason. Rizal, of course was always
appealing to reason, Mabini here insists that freedom must be
reasonable, else it is not freedom. Jacinto, in a passage quoted earlier,
makes true piety consist not only in pakikisama, but in making right
reason the rule of every action, work and word.And when Bonifacio
asked the self-same question that Lenin askedWhat then, must we
do?It was to reason that he turned for a reply.
114 Readings for Theology 141: A Theology of the Catholic Social Vision
The General has given me the pick of all the men that can
be spared and ordered me to defend the Pass. I realize what
a terrible task has been given me. And yet I feel that this is
the most glorious moment of my life. What I do is done for
my beloved country. No sacrifice can be too great.
Goiti that he was pleased to be the friend of the Spaniards, but that
the Spaniards should understand that the Tagalogs were not painted
Indians; that they would not tolerate any abuse, and that they would
repay with death the least thing that touched their honor, And
certainly not Gregorio del Pilar, who, on the very day he died at
Tirad Pass, wrote the following in his diary:
All men are equal, whether the color of their skin be white
or black. One man may surpass another in wisdom, wealth,
or beauty but not in that which makes him a man...
116 Readings for Theology 141: A Theology of the Catholic Social Vision
These, then are the principles and values we derive from our
national tradition. Pagsasarili: the will to secure for every Filipino the
means to develop himself as a responsible human being. Pakikisama:
the willingness to share with one another the burdens as well as the
rewards of living together. Pagkakaisa: the building up of an articulated
national community through forms of social organization understood,
accepted, and undertaken by the people themselves. Pagkabayani: the
readiness to put the common good of the nation above the private
interest, whether of ones own person, group, or class. Pakikipagkapwatao: human solidarity but human solidarity understood as, first of all,
a dedication to the development of ones own nation, so as to enable
it to participate on free and equal terms in the total development of
mankind.
The past, they say; is prologue. If we seek to retain remembrance of
the past, and employ historians to help us to do so, it is not so much to
indulge in the barren delights of antiquarianism, as to derive from the
thoughts and deeds of our predecessors a better understanding of our
present concerns. And so we must ask ourselves what enlightenment
we can draw from our national tradition with reference to our present
national task.
But before we do so, a previous question should perhaps be
moved, namely, whether it is to our national tradition that we should
go for enlightenment. For this is an assumption that has been and is
being disputed.Whether explicitly or by implication, in theory or in
practice, it is being asserted that either we have no national tradition,
or if we have, that it is not relevant to our present concerns. And
therefore it is proposed that we look for the solution to our national
problems elsewhere, to some foreign ideology; whether it be the
118 Readings for Theology 141: A Theology of the Catholic Social Vision