Let me drive my car

Let Me Drive My Car

I and a deacon were on our way back from the Aéroport de Ndjili in Kinshasa after having brought a fellow SVD for his trip to Burundi.  I accelerated to 90KpH the brand-new Land Rover when we hit the highway undergoing some widening. The truck all of a sudden swerve to the right, I panicked turned it quickly to the left and the truck in high speed rolled over thrice before skidding upside down and stopping on the other side of the road. Me and my companion still buckled up on our seat with bruises on the arms, while the car was wrecked.

There was no one else hurt on that vehicular accident of 1992 except me and my companion. However, it has caused a deep mark in me. Although after a month I resumed driving with more caution, the accident remained in my bones and flesh. I could feel how my body would react unconsciously by any sudden and unexpected movement by the car, reminding itself of the past accident. Many times, I was silently blaming myself. I should have not accelerated, I should have not tested the speed of the car… and many more I should have nots.

Time heals they said. It is true. But a deep would lingers even if it is forgotten. I almost have forgotten this accident, had it not for another accident with the same vehicle that happened in 2015 on the same national road. It was no longer I on the driving seat but I was behind the driver buckled up. We were driving for almost 30 minutes, maneuvering a newly asphalted road and climbing uphill to overtake a ten-wheeler truck hauling a five-meter wagon when all of sudden the vehicle started to lost direction smashing itself against the pulled wagon at its right and afterwards lunging itself on the hillside to its left and stopping on top of a hill stuck in the ancient dessert sand of Africa.

With this second accident involving the same car, it all came clear to me that this vehicle is defective. It loses direction and has the tendency to rollover because of the high center of gravity when driven at higher speed. Another vehicle of the same model, did just the same almost killing the bishop who was a passenger.

Driving a car is something many people do everyday unmindful of safety issues. In fact, any product can be harmful. But products known to be harmful are used with precaution, lest we get hurt, like knives and guns. Cars do not normally induce caution in its use because they are seen or are made to appear to be without danger because what is seen with them is luxury, prestige, sophistication, technology at its best hiding the fact that they are with security issues.

I will not discourage people from driving cars in the same way that I will not discourage people from using knives. Cars are products of technology and human intelligence to provide us with convenience and elevate our efficiency. But like any other products, they must be used with precaution, with awareness that it has its limits.

I will not also blame automobile manufacturer for the two accidents. Certainly, I have the right to claim compensation for the damages and loss caused by those two accidents. But I choose not to pursue it. Besides, all the troubles of documenting the accident and of filing the claim in Congo are not worth the prospect of compensation. Yet, I must insist on the assurance of safety and reliability of the product, while on my part exercising caution and prudence in its use. Let me drive the car…

Dirty Money

Dirty Money

The world is all up against dirty money coming from drugs, gambling, corruption and other illicit activities. Various countries around the world put up legal structures to control and minimize the flow of money acquired through unlawful and morally unacceptable means.

But the truth is, there are plenty of dirty money flowing out of morally deplorable sources  and legally   questionable means. Surprisingly, from such sources, money flows easily more than it does on sources and means capitalized with human sweat and immortal intelligence. Take as an example how much money is produced in drug trade and in gambling in our country. Its no secret that drug and gambling money has bought protection of police and secured the election of many local and national candidates.

Governments, by taking gambling and drugs as social problems, declared war against these problem by using the military and police forces. However such approach did not stop nor reduced money flowing from these sources, but only triggered rivalry and competition for control over them. It then appears that, criminalizing these act does not deter people from gaining access to them. Instead, government tried the opposite approach by putting them at the mainstream of society, legalizing them.

This latest trend and approach to decriminalize and impose more government control seems to work especially in the case of gambling. Besides, it has brought economic impetus to host cities and provided government with the much needed revenues to finance many of its social projects. It has also lessen the stigma labeled against it, making it "acceptable" and less reprehensible. A visit on many of this entertainment city will make a great impression that the strategy is working.

Certainly, legal cloak and government's acceptance do not and cannot resolve the many ethical and moral issues inherent in drugs and gambling as social problems. Numerous families have been shattered by the (to be continued...)

On the Life of Saint Jean Baptist de la Salle

On the Life of Saint Jean Baptist de la Salle

Saint Jean Baptist de la Salle was an innovator and a risk taker. He exhibited this trait while introducing a new educational approach opening access to education for all children during the time where education was private and individual. He risked by going against the standard practice to provide the youth and children wider access to education. Such high appetite for risk had brought to Jean de la Salle many serious troubles with the patrons of the old system whose influence and place in the society is threatened by the innovation introduced in the sphere of education. De la Salle was falsely accused of wrongdoing and has to leave the city and spare his community of further troubles.

Saint de la Salle was also Servant-Leader. He was motivated by service. He saw the need to give children access to quality education and consequently provide them with many opportunities and wider possibilities in life in the future that are absent in the standard practice. He pursued this life-goal not for any monetary and personal gain but to be of service.

Furthermore, Saint de la Salle was a mentor. He allowed others to find satisfaction and self-fulfillment in what they do. He did not insist on what he know and think is best but engaged, guided, and supported the members of the community he established for the education of the youth.

Above all, and this is what underlies all the rest, he was zealous and truly dedicated to what he found and embraced as his life mission. Spiritual writers and theologians will call it his deep faith, a personal attachment to God. Where will a person get the strength to sustain him during the many struggles and pursuit of his mission to provide education for the youth? Not money, not fame, not power; but simply because of his deep faith in God.

I am a missionary priest working since 2008 in Congo.  I am not alone nor the first in this chosen life-mission. I believe, our lives are not different from Saint Jean de la Salle. We all work not for any material or personal gain, we all work because of our faith in God. Faith drives us to be servant leaders, innovators, risk takers and mentors of others. Here lies the greater challenge: how to mirror our faith in the different roles we assume.

The Church values people and the planet but not as much the profit or say the material resources entrusted to its care as if afraid that doing so will ruin the importance it gives to people and the planet. Oftentimes, the result is a disaster for people whose source of living is taken away. I have seen this happen in Congo and in our country. Failures in management and decision-making in concerned institutions resulted to bankruptcy or stop of operation and eventually loss of job for many. Responsibility and accountability to as many stakeholders are not exclusive obligations of the business sector. Rather, they are the shared responsibility of all, namely, the private sector, the church and the government. Hence, the Church cannot not only call the attention of others to the need for ethical responsibility but must lead in concretizing it in its financial and economic activities.

This is where our role as priest-administrator comes. While strongly advocating the great values of people and the planet, we also maintain a level of efficiency managing the material resources given to our care. In so doing, we continue to pursue giving value to our people and our planet. Like the rest, management for the Church pursues the triple bottom line objectives.

Free Market

Free Market

Business prosper in an open market because of healthy competition and of profit motivation. Enterprising individuals find great rewards as they maximize the use of their skills and take advantage of their unique product or service. It is not their fault to have created wealth for themselves in use of business acumen, and in providing the market with the best product suited for its need. Many things we enjoy today find their origin from creative individuals who risked time, effort and money to make them available for us.

Free market fueled by competition and freedom to innovate is such a wonderful economic arrangement. In this economic set-up, goods and services, people and capital, ideas and skills flow and are exchanged freely to create. They go where they are needed and most useful, where there is also higher incentive and bigger chances for profit. As a result, new products are created, and more varied services are offered for the benefit of those who has means and need of it.

In a free market, despite of competition and because of the freedom to innovate, a person can realize full potentials and contribute to the economic progress. A person normally finds fulfillment in his achievements and success. In free market, through hard work and skills, a person can succeed and create enormous wealth.

Free market favors the person by making available what he needs. It promotes the person by giving him freedom to create and have the best. Yet lately it is being condemned for being against the person, for the destruction, for the loss, for the marginalization and alienation of the human person. How can the free market admired for the best and the wealth it creates becomes demonized for the problems it did not intend?

They said, Brexit was a choice against the free market and Trump won due to the sentiment against the imbalance created by the free market. Its like hearing Bicolanos throwing away that famous saliva inducing Bicol Express. It is not possible, its unimaginable. But the point is, not everything is beautiful in a free market economy. Oftentimes, many are there for nothing but money. In effect, abuses happen, people felt neglected and nature ruined. This latter situation calls for ethical examination, to find out what went wrong and how can this be avoided and be made better.

Ethics for free market is a self-correcting mechanism. Like anything else around us, free market has its own failures that must be corrected. The Paris Climate Agreement, the Sarbarnes-Oxley Act, Anti-Money Laundering Law, Gina Lopez of DENR attempt to correct what is wrong in free market, and cry for the necessity of ethics in business.