beauty

Some people don’t get it. And yet the answer follows the same logic we use almost everyday. Some people may have asked you, why pay so much to have the images repainted? Why bring it to Pampanga when we could have them repainted here just as they did in the past (I have heard that these were repainted in the early 60’s by a group of people from the leprosarium.)? Well, as I have said, the same logic we use almost everyday applies. I can put make up on your face in no time. Anybody (and that includes your husband) can put an eyeliner, your lipstick, your eyebrows. Anybody can concoct a meal with the best ingredients you can possibly provide (I say concoct, I’m not saying edible!). But why go to a parlor and choose a reputable one at that? Why get a good cook? And why spend more money if there is a free alternative? It’s because you are looking for talent and are willing to pay for it. Yes I can dress you up if you are going to a Halloween party and cook you a meal if you want to continue to fast and be faithful to your diet, but I cannot make you more beautiful than you already are, nor could I provide you with a sumptuous, mouth-watering meal, nor could I make you a beautiful house unless you are a bird. I do not have that magic touch the way other people have with these things because I do not have that particular talent that make things in life beautiful, delicious and comfortably habitable. That is why I am willing to pay (if I have the resources, and beg if I don’t have) for people who can mix the right colors, combine the right ingredients and build for me a better house. Not all of us have these talents. Some people have more and some have less, and some do not have it at all. Let us face it, not all of us are created equal! The earlier we recognize this reality, the better for all of us.


This is the very principle that makes us a community.
Look, if only we could recognize this fact in our human life, imagine how peaceful our elections would be without these many a pretender, how calm and focused our meetings could become, how beautiful our surroundings can be made. This is the reason why in the clergy for example we have a personnel board who appraises our greatest good for the appropriate assignment. Just because one is ordained as priest does not qualify him to any position in the archdiocese – God forbid if the opposite is the case!
The problem is, there are just too many pretensions in this world, too may unfounded claims, too many imagined grandeur than real ones, too many people parading like emperors with new clothes. And to think that it takes only the naivety of a child (“But he is not wearing anything at all!”) to strip us of our arrogance.
And this is my second point – learning to appreciate.
I have been teaching philosophical aesthetics (humanities) for a number of years in the seminary not so much because I am qualified but because there was just nobody with the guts to teach it (when worse comes to worse guts can be a talent too!). The appreciation of the beautiful is part of our humanity. Imagine a life that considers only the practical! Imagine how drab life can be. It is a life without colors, taste, feel, smell and beautiful sounds. Precisely we use these in our worship because these very things are gifts from God to our humanity. In worship we call these the holy exchange, we give back to God the best of what is in our humanity as He gives to us the best of His divinity – His Son, so that in this holy exchange we can become like Him who has become like us in all things but sin.
But my point here is this: though talent may be unequal there are equal opportunities for appreciation. Like talent this capacity needs to be developed (that includes exposure) but unlike talent it is inborn to all, part of what makes us truly human. We may not have for example the capacity to heal the sick (I think I even have the capacity to make them worse which is the reason why I avoid conducting masses with healing), but we all possess that capacity by virtue of our humanity to care for the sick. So also when we speak of appreciation. But people do not appreciate others because they feel threatened and insecure when they feel others are better than they are – people who never outgrew their competitive slant. People do not appreciate because they feel everything that did not originate from them is in bad taste. But most of all people never learn to appreciate others because they have never really learned to appreciate themselves first. It is really very hard for people to appreciate something when in life they had nothing but criticisms. Too bad. Nature provides us with the best things in life (and the best things are not always “things” but our manner of seeing and accepting them, our way of appreciating, that is.) but nurture can spoil everything nature has provided and equipped us with.
Hopefully in the days ahead we can become more appreciative of each other’s presence in our parish community. To recognize each other’s good and make full use of that good in us is a very important milestone in community building.