St. John Bosco

Last Christmas I received a very small gift. It was not even wrapped in a Christmas wrapper;  just in a manila paper. I did not feel any excitement when I received it. I thought to myself: “Ay kini ra?  Ka gamay!” (this is it? So small!) I haven’t seen yet what’s inside, I was already complaining. I forgot the first rule in receiving gifts: one should not complain. After all, its free!

But the small gift in an ordinary wrapper proved to be the most meaningful and practical gift I received last Christmas. It was a small keychain-LED torchlight with a compass. Press the compass to put on the flashlight. And its solar powered! Its useful especially at night and during brown-outs. The symbols is clear: every person needs a flashlight and a compass in his or her journey of life.

Today we celebrate the feast of St. John Bosco. He was a flashlight and a compass to so many youth who met him in their life. Even today, for those who follow his teachings, he is still a reliable flashlight and compass because he is powered by Jesus and Mary.

I would like to share some of the things Don Bosco taught to his youngsters as means to lead a good life. Here are 3 Practical Means to be good Christians and upright citizens:

1.     Have a Strong Conviction that God loves the young exceedingly!

Tell yourself: God loves me! Exceedingly!

Don Bosco wrote: “what ought to excite us to love and serve God is the great love which He has for us… Since our Lord loves you so much, you should form the sincere resolution to correspond with His love by doing whatever pleases Him, and by avoiding whatever might offend Him!”

2.     The Salvation of your soul depends greatly upon the time of our youth!

That means: Now na! Karon na – dili ugma!

Don Bosco explains: “But some of you may argue: if we commence to serve God now, we shall become sad and depress! I answer, that this is not true. He who serves the devil is miserable, even if he pretends to be happy… Courage then my dear friends, employ your time virtuously and I assure you that your heart will always be happy and contented. You will experience as a consequence how sweet and pleasing it is to serve the Lord.”

3.     The first virtue of youth is Obedience.

The greatest virtue of Jesus is obedience: to God in heaven and to his parents on earth. Thus tell yourself: “I will learn to obey just like Jesus!”

Last January 16, a Japanese – Hiroo Onada – died in a Tokyo Hospital at 91 years old. This guy was a very obedient soldier. He fought in the Philippines during World War II he did not surrender in 1945. For 30 years, he spent his life as a guerilla fighter in a war that was long over due. He did not surrender because he was awaiting orders from a superior officer. The Japanese government had to locate his commanding officer to relieved him of his duty. He finally surrendered on March 1974 – giving up his sword, his rifle with 500 rounds of ammunition and some hand grenades. Indeed this is a lesson of obedience!

Don Bosco taught: “Allow yourselves to be guided by those who have charge of your education and the welfare of your soul..” Morever, the saint said: “It is God’s will for you to be a saint!”

Let us ask this saint who loves young people exceedingly the grace to live wisely in this world amidst a lot of falsehood and deception that brings unhappiness to us in this life.

Irony of Life

Here is something to reflect and learn from:  The iconic Marlboro Man died from smoking!

Associated Press Writer Daisy Nguyen contributed to this story (News from Yahoo Philippines)

LOS ANGELES (AP) — When it came to portraying the rugged western outdoorsman who helped transform a pack of filtered cigarettes into the world's most popular brand, Marlboro Man Eric Lawson was the real deal.

Ruggedly handsome, the actor could ride a horse through the wide-open spaces of the Southwest, from Texas to Colorado to Arizona or wherever else the Phillip Morris tobacco company sent him to light up while representing a true American icon, the cowboy. And he really did smoke Marlboro cigarettes, as many as three packs a day.

Lawson was still smoking in 2006 when he was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. He died of the disease at his home in San Luis Obispo on Jan. 10. He was 72.

For three years in the late 1970s and early '80s, Lawson portrayed one of the most iconic figures in both advertising and popular culture.

And for the past several years, Lawson had spoken out fiercely about the hazards of smoking, doing a public service announcement for the American Cancer Society in the 1990s, years before he was able to bring himself to quit.

"He tried to speak to the kids, telling them don't start smoking," his wife, Susan Lawson, told The Associated Press. "He already knew cigarettes had a hold on him."

Exactly how many rugged he-man types portrayed the Marlboro Man over the years isn't clear, although Lawson was one of dozens.

His wife said Monday he was friendly with some of the others, including Wayne McLaren, a former rodeo rider who died in 1992 of lung cancer that he blamed on his lifelong smoking habit.

Like Lawson, McLaren spent his final years advocating against smoking. So did David McLean, who died in 1995 of lung cancer that he also blamed on smoking. He was 73.

As the Marlboro Man, Lawson and the others helped turn a brand that had once been marketed as a mild women's cigarette into the ultimate symbol of American machismo.

Not every Marlboro Man was a cowboy — there were also pilots, hunters, weight lifters, miners and other macho characters. But cowboys were clearly the most popular and the most often used.

"The most powerful — and in some quarters, most hated — brand image of the century, the Marlboro Man stands worldwide as the ultimate American cowboy and masculine trademark, helping establish Marlboro as the best-selling cigarette in the world," the industry publication Advertising Age declared in 1999.

Part of the reason for the brand's success was that Phillip Morris' ad agency went to great pains to track down real cowboys, who not only looked rugged but could really do things like rope and ride.

"He had to go out and ride, he needed to prove himself as a cowboy," Lawson's wife recalled of her husband's audition to become a Marlboro Man.

By the time he got the job in 1978, cigarette advertising was no longer allowed on U.S. television, so Lawson appeared in print and billboard ads. His wife still has one from Time magazine.

The ads, often filmed in stunning, picturesque settings in the West always emphasized that it was a real man, not in any way a wimp, who smoked a Marlboro.

Lawson was perfect for the part. The veteran actor had appeared in such Western films and TV shows as "The Shooter," ''Walker, Texas Ranger," ''Tall Tale," ''Bonanza: Under Attack" and "The A Team."

Later, he also became a perfect role model who made a difference in the lives of the people he kept from smoking simply by pointing out what it did to him, said John Seffrin, chief executive officer of the American Cancer Society.

"That's important," Seffrin said, "because people stop and think if that happens to Eric Lawson it could happen to me."

The Schweitzer of Sudan

In January 2010, Fr John Lee Tae-seok, a Korean priest nicknamed “The Schweitzer of Sudan”, lay dying of cancer. His fellow Salesians surrounded him in his last agony and tried to accept the imminent death of the saintly priest who was only in his 40s. Fr John had worked tirelessly for nine years as part of the Salesian mission in war-ravaged southern Sudan. He had given the mission the full benefit of his talents: as a doctor devoted to the victims of leprosy, as a teacher and as a musician.

A few hours before his death, Fr John awoke and said: “Don’t worry. Everything is going to be all right.” He was referring to Sudan. Perhaps he sensed that the south was on the verge of a historic breakthrough. This January, almost exactly a year after Fr John’s death, the southern Sudanese voted for independence. The Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, the first sitting head of state ever to be indicted by the International Criminal Court, has accepted the referendum result. Some believe that Fr John may have had an intercessory role in this. At Fr John’s funeral, Fr Farrington Ryan, the Salesian delegate to Sudan, gave a speech asking Fr John to “implore the good Lord to give us peace in the Sudan”. 

John Lee Tae-seok was born in 1962, the ninth of 10 children. His parents, humble and committed Catholics, lived in the town of Busan in South Korea. Fr John lost his father at the age of nine and his mother supported the family by eking out a living as a seamstress in the market. John excelled at school. He had been very impressed by the biography of Albert Schweitzer and wondered about becoming a doctor. 

But as he watched his older brother become a Franciscan friar he felt the stirrings of a religious vocation. His mother, however, was keen that John study medicine first. Partly in obedience to her he became a doctor. He worked first as a surgeon in the Korean army. But, when in uniform, he again felt the calling to be a priest. Seeing that he still wanted to pursue a religious vocation his mother gave him her blessing. “If that is what you choose, go ahead” were her words. 

John joined the Salesians. He was asked many times why he did not become a Capuchin like his brother, but he felt that their way of life was, for him, too “restricted”. What attracted him to the Salesians? He said he was “fascinated by their music and sport as well as their loving, spontaneous, free and family style of relating”. 

As a deacon, John visited the Salesian mission in southern Sudan. At first sight he found the leper colony a shock. He had been accustomed to practising medicine in the spotless conditions of Korean army wards. 

The normally upbeat doctor was so overcome upon seeing the Hansen’s disease patients with their rotting limbs that he fled from their sight and ran into the bush. Once he had recovered he promised his fellow Salesians that he would “get used to it”, but they did not expect him to come back.

To their surprise Fr John wrote to them after his ordination in June 2001 to say that he would be coming soon. He explained that working among the lepers would be “the best way to be a doctor, priest and Salesian”. 

Before starting work Fr John went to a hospital in Kenya to revise his medical knowledge about tropical diseases and to do some specialised study of malaria cases. The spirited young priest was certain he would “be a better missionary among the lepers than anywhere else”. 

In Tonj he built a medical clinic with his own hands. He treated some 300 patients a day there. He had a Jeep so that he could make personal visits to patients who could never travel to him. In particular, he sought out Hansen’s disease victims.

Fr John had grown up in grinding poverty and never kept himself aloof from the poor of Tonj. He could have lived the affluent life of a highly qualified doctor. But instead, day after day, he was both nurse and doctor to some of the world’s poorest people. No longer daunted by the sight of the lepers, Fr John spent long hours cleaning and bandaging their wounds. He recorded his experience of helping them in two books:  “The Rays of the Sun in Africa are Still Sad” and “Will You Be My Friend?”

Fr John was known to have a special way with the young people of Tonj. They were drawn to his winning personality and radiant smile. The locals knew the gentle confessor as “Fr Jolly” – a name that stuck. He built the local school with the help of students and taught maths and music. Fr John also started the Don Bosco Brass Band and found that music lifted up the youth, who were in dire circumstances. 

But one day Fr John took a rare holiday to Seoul. He had a routine check-up and was diagnosed with cancer of the colon and liver. At first he responded well to chemotherapy, but in the last months of his life his condition rapidly worsened and he died on January 14 2010, aged 47.

Fr John was extremely bright and had a joyful temperament. His all too brief life shows the great feats just one missionary can accomplish. As a result of his work there is now an infinitely higher standard of care for the victims of Hansen’s disease in southern Sudan. Fr John also passed on his love of music to the youngsters he taught and the Don Bosco Brass Band is now the most famous music group in southern Sudan. 

A Korean television documentary about Fr John’s life in Tonj has been adapted into a powerful film, “Don’t Cry For Me Sudan.” 10 minutes of watching the film most people are reduced to tears. Some 120,000 people have watched the film in Seoul alone. Members of the Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism, the largest Buddhist denomination in South Korea, were greatly moved by the scenes depicting Fr John tending the lepers. Venerable Jaseung, the head of the order, admitted that he was unsure whether to show it to Buddhist monks and lay workers for fear they would convert to Catholicism after seeing it. 

“It depicts the good life of a Catholic missioner and I was worried some of us would convert to Catholicism after being moved by the film,” he said. 

But he went ahead because he believed that Fr John was a good role model for Buddhists. “If we could have one Buddhist cleric like him, the better it would be for Buddhism,” he said.

Meanwhile, Catholics who are devoted to Fr John are becoming increasingly dissatisfied with his nickname, “the Schweitzer of Sudan”. For in some respects Fr John was an even better missionary than the Franco-German doctor and theologian. Schweitzer was a great man, but is often charged with having held a snooty, superior attitude towards Africans. This could never be said of Fr John, who is regarded by the southern Sudanese as a healer, friend and now an intercessor in heaven.

(Source: CatholicHerald.co.uk)

Following Jesus Through St. John Bosco

They say love is blind but marriage is the eye-opener!

When we speak of marriage, we speak of a choice. In marriage, the couple have chosen each other for life. The greatest reason is love.

The Gospel (Mt 4:12-23) relates that Jesus chose his disciples. What were the qualities of his choice? He chose fishermen; unschooled individuals; from the lower echelon of society. We can also say, even God’s love is blind!

This brings me back to my own calling. I am now 16 years as a priest and counting! God did not really call me personally; as in appearing to me in person like the disciples. But he called me through a Salesian, Fr. Pat Buzon (now a bishop of the Diocese of Kabangkalan, Negro Occidental).

I was then in Grade 6 at the University of San Carlos when he invited me to enter the minor seminary in Don Bosco - Lawaan. I was not really paying attention to his vocation orientation; I was then busy talking with my friends. But what caught my attention – when he showed pictures of the aspirants all in smiles. At the background was a beautiful waterfalls! I thought – Wow! Kanindot sa Don Bosco may waterfalls didto.. that was how I ended up in Don Bosco! There never was a waterfalls because that picture was actually taken during their outing in Kawasan Falls, Badian, Cebu. But that encounter changed my life. I am now who I am because of that fundamental encounter.

Among other things, I learned 3 things in staying with DB; in being with DB:

1.   I acquired a Big-Picture Thinking

I learned to see the Grand Design of God in my life. I acquired the ability to Look Beyond! Don Bosco can teach us to find our place in the big picture.

Once I attended a seminar. It was tiresome and very scholastic. But during the breaks, the secretariat placed puzzles outside the hall for our recreation. One had 1,000 pieces. Little by little the puzzle’s panorama was coming. Finally it was completed except for one missing piece. We looked for it. But we did not succeed. Next day, one participant declared he had the last missing piece. “Iyang diskarte” – to have the honor of completing the whole picture! I realize: in our life, God is that missing piece! We can never be complete without Him.

There is this movie: “Don’t Cry for Me Sudan.” Its about the life of a Salesian Korean missionary, John Lee who worked as a priest, doctor, teacher, conductor, and architect in the small Sudan village of Tonj. Father John Lee died of colon cancer in 2010. A funeral was held for him by the local dinka tribe in Tonj, with many of the tribal warriors in tears.

After High School, he wanted to be a priest but his mother did not allow him because his elder brother already joined the Franciscans. So he thought he could also serve as a lay person. He became a medical doctor, a surgeon. Still later as a military doctor, the call persisted. He remained restless. “I had to go after Jesus to find peace and fulfillment.” He ended up becoming a salesian priest and missionary in Sudan. He found his place in the great scheme of things.

2.   Little Things Count

Mama Margaret taught little John Bosco to see God not only in Church but also in nature (beauty of the heavens); in people (God’s generosity through them); in the events of life (abundance of harvest). Mama Margaret stressed that God was actively present in the world and in our life. Thus, we should do everything for Him! For God’s glory! Moreover, God sees the little things that you do. They count; they are the ingredients of eternity. God appreciates the small things that you do especially done out of love.

Don Bosco became a maker of saints among his boys: Dominic Savio, Michael Magone, Zeferino Namuncura, Roderick Flores. His secret: Do your ordinary duty with great love for God! It’s a very simple spirituality of Being there. Being responsible. Not running away from the tasks we are bound to fulfill. Having the courage to show up even in doing the most distasteful and oppressive duties of ordinary life.

3.   Never Give Up: on myself, on people, in the world.

One amazing story I read is about a 21-year old Bosconian from Cordoba, Spain: Bartolome Blanco. He was martyred in 1936 together with other Salesians. Shot in firing squad. It was a time of christian persecution by the order of the Communist government. Till the end of his life he was forgiving his tormentors. He wrote his family: “I ask you to avenge me with the vengeance of a Christian: returning much good to those that have tried to do me evil.”

He wrote a letter to his girl friend at the eve of his death. These are the two highlights in his letter:

He expresses his great love for her and says goodbye. He encourages her: from now on, your primary objective should be the salvation of your soul. In that way, we will be re-united in heaven for all eternity, where nothing will separate us.

Towards the end of the letter, he reminds her: there is a better life, and attaining it should constitute our highest aspiration.

Today, Jesus continues to call us and invites us to follow Him. He uses people or the events of our life. I am just glad the channel he used in calling me was through the Salesians of St. John Bosco!