Yotsuya Church

They say the churches of Europe, where religion is declining, are sometimes filled to the brim not by Europeans but by Filipinos. This is true also in Tokyo. There is Yotsuya (四谷, Yotsuya) Catholic church in Shinjuku (新宿). Shown in the picture taken sometime in 2006 were our kababayans and their half-Filipino half-Japanese children starting to come out of the church after the Sunday English mass. I don't go to Yotsuya to hear mass. I go there to see people or accompany my family there. I usually just stay outside the church ogling the pretty girls that pass by, and which by the way has become so rare now that the Japanese government has come under fire from the US government on the trafficking of women. I saw one statistics some years ago that say nine out of ten Filipinos in Japan are women, most of them working or has worked as hostesses in Filipino bars. Filipino bars aside from Filipino stores is where you can find the Philippine flag displayed. My poor countrymen who are so devout believers will brave the uncertainties of life in a foreign land of heathens and yet their god seemed to have chosen to make the heathens to be more economically free than the devotees who work and pray for a life that's a little bit better than a life of poverty. Such irony for the believing Pinoy!

The Power of Prayer

Everytime I leave the office, I say my goodbyes to the people who are still working. In IT, you know a lot of developers do it as programming is a creative process. I have a few colleagues who are Pinoys and I always make it a point that I'd drop by their cubicles before I leave. My favorite expression to them is Magpakabait ka (be good). This evening, it's my turn to be left behind and W, my Pinay colleague who sits next to me, said the same thing. "Yes, I will," I replied. Then put my hands together as if in the act of praying. She said, being good is doing good not in praying to be good. Now, this is what I also believe. Being good has got nothing to do with praying. She said, it's like praying to be rich. You can pray all you want but no amount of praying, if praying is all you do, can make you rich. You have to work (hard) for it. That is obvious of course. What is not obvious for the believers though is this: you need not pray at all in order to accomplish anything, including getting rich. Prayer has got nothing to do with work. I asked her if she's heard about Occam's Razor. She said she haven't so I proceeded to explain it to her. What you have just told me is practical Occam's Razor. I will give you another example. I have this paper cup on my table. I placed it in front of me and pretended I was praying. I told her, I can pray all I want but the paper cup wont move, no Divine Intervention coming my way. I know it and she knows it and you know it but if you are a fanatic, you wont be able to accept it, but it's true nonetheless. What I can do is use my hand to move the cup, which I did. Normally, one would not see anything unusual in this simplistic exercise. It's not an issue as moving the cup is a straightforward undertaking where there are not much unknowns involved. But as more unknowns are added into the situation, as more ignorance is involved, bigger and bigger portion of the exercise are attributed by the religious that a Cosmic Force is out there helping us thus, "sa awa ng diyos, nailipat ko yung tasa." Such is the supposed power of prayer. To me, it's nothing but a function of the believer's ignorance and misguided belief.

After Holy Week

Somebody commented that Holy Week must be the happiest holidays in Paete. I can only agree with him. It's during this time of year that friends and family alike gather together like that other holiday - Christmas - only better: no pesky ina-anaks. LOLs. The good part of Holy Week is that Christians or more precisely the Catholics and Aglipayans are not supposed to be obviously happy during this time and must pretend that they are grieving, and hence must not be somewhere else having fun like the heathens in Boracay. So your typical Paetenian Catholic family finds itself holed up in a small town of about 20,000 people with nowhere to go but in spite of it are genuinely happier. What I like about this special week is that people are up and down around town on slippers and pambahay endlessly checking the on-going preparation for the evening prusisyon. Most probably I'd bump into somebody I haven't seen for years. This year, I couldn't take a break since I have a more important reason to take my vacation next month. I wish I can take my usual vacation during next year's Lenten season. Until then, belated Happy Holy Week to the Paetenians!

Pesky Born Again Christians

Once again, in a public forum, I found myself at odds with a born-again Christian who is so "sure" he holds The One Truth(tm). The discussion was for awhile about why the woodcarving industry of Paete has been on the decline while at the same time that of Betis (Pampanga) is slowly taking the title away from Paete. The first post was by a young priest commenting on the quality of religious carving from Paete in particular, based on a recent personal anecdote. Then out of the blue, this born again Christian, like a true disciple of his faith, started preaching on the Catholic "sin" of idolatry supposedly by commissioning graven images. While I would say the born again Christian have some small plus point on this issue (if the god of the bible exists of course) about what the bible say about graven images (of dead people also called saints by the Catholics) even if it's just for "veneration" (what does it really mean anyway), I find it funny only because I think both Catholics and born again Christians are arguing about something, in my view is completely worthless. At least some believers are honest to admit what is essentially very close to agnosticism. For example, one wrote

"sa pagkaka alam ko walang sinuman ang nkaka alam kung sino at saan ang daan para maligtas" [AFAIK, nobody knows who (will be saved) or which way is salvation].

And another replied:

"Base sa likas na kakulangan ng tao, ay totoo ang sinabi mo na walang sinuman na nakakaalam kung sino at kung saan ang “kaligtasan. Itong kaisipang ito ay “pinagtitibay” (?) ng seglar (secularist/humanistic/anthropological/rationalistic) na kabihasnan." [Based on the limitation of humans, what you said is true that nobody knows... This is reinforced by secular (humanistic/anthropological/rationalistic) civilization]

If only they can translate that "nobody knows" into something else altogether and stop arguing about it since if "nobody knows" about the topic, how do we suppose the discussion will be meaningful? You will find the rest of the postings here.

Deja Vu

A few hours ago as I just stepped into the elevator at the train station, I had my book (The World Is Flat by Friedman) ready on this page with my index finger acting as bookmark. I had been reading the book in my commute and it was such a good read I could not close it even as I walk to the turnstiles. Just as I stepped into the lift, I opened the book to continue reading it, I had a deja vu. Not only that I thought it was queer coincidence but a few moments right before the deja vu happened, I thought I predicted that I would be having the deja vu. Afterwards, I kept on thinking how was that even possible? In the end, I thought when I first got hold of the book, I must have casually opened it in that exact page and read a paragraph or two, but which I already put deep in my subconscious for forgetting. Then since I take the elevator quite often, the memories of both events were combined to make the collage that is the deja vu. Plausible? Hhhmmm....

Holy Week in Paete, Laguna

If you have visited the Philippine Atheists web recently, I posted two pictures of the traditional afternoon procession of the dead Christ in Paete, Laguna. This procession is called locally as Dapit. In my whole life, I have been only a spectator of the Friday events, except one time when my college friends came over for a visit. But I used to participate in the Wednesday events way back before then. Dapit starts at around 2 or 3 o'clock in the afternoon so the sun is still blazing and hot. The poon is brought to the Catholic church for the mass later in the evening followed by the evening procession. Here are more pictures that came with those I posted in the website.

In the first set of pictures, the figure is taken from the Catholic church and brought to the house of the family who owns it. Then on Friday afternoon, it's taken out for Dapit (the pictures I took) going back to the church for mass. The Friday evening procession is the "main event" of the Holy Week celebration in this town of about 23,000 people. I hope others will post more pictures later. It's only today I learned that there are more ceremonies/rituals with the same poon.

These Holy Week events have become a popular tourist attraction for some time now. It's also the time where townfolks who have settled elsewhere come back and visit their remaining relatives which is one good reason to go home on these days as the town comes alive with plenty of out-of-towners. It's also the perfect opportunity to catch up with old friends who take their vacation during this time of year to come home.

On Good Friday, no marching bands will accompany the processions, neither will the bells be knelt. Instead, pieces of metals attached to small planks of wood will be used like clappers (forgot what its called) together with split bamboos are used throughout the procession for sound effects. The bells will not be knelt until early morning of Easter, when another procession traces its way across town with the poon Risen Christ.