our yes is a yes - 10th week saturday

I have a dilemma and I do not know what to do.  There are windows right beside the door of my room.  The question is, are these the windows of my room or are they windows of the priest pasillo?  I said I do not know what to do because if they are windows of my room then I am responsible for their cleanliness but if they are windows of the priest pasillo then they are not my responsibility. Those windows, it would seem, are not in my room and neither are they out of my room.  And because it could not be decided as to where they stand, no one can be pointed as having responsibility for their cleanliness. 

You see windows are ambiguous.  Ambiguous means there is a lack of clearness, there is no definiteness – ano gid bala?  It is difficult to distinguish and it is hard to clarify.

We could not deny that seminarians can sometimes become like windows.  They are not yet in and yet they are no longer out.  They do not know where they stand – naga-agaw-agaw. 

They demand freedom and yet they forget freedom's twin which is responsibility.  They claim maturity and yet they cannot make priorities and sacrifices.  They assert adulthood and yet they won't let go of their baby bottles of dependency needing to be told and even threatened so that they will do what they ought to do and not do what they ought not to do. 

Windows are like that, they are ambiguous – they are neither in nor out.

Whether you like it or not I am your prefect and it is my task to welcome you home tonight.  Prefects are in-charge of imposing the rules.  In the seminary there are a lot of rules, in fact we have a long list of rules.  In my long years as prefect I have never really relied on rules.  Sometimes I impose them to the letter but many times I treat them as references and guideposts.  But this I always hold sacred – say yes when you mean yes, and no when you mean no.  There should be no ambiguity in our relationship – our yes is a yes and our no is a no.  Ours is a relationship of trust.  In the seminary you do not break rules but instead you break your word and in doing so you break the trust.

As prefect I take things personally for you are my family, you are my community, this is our home – our yes is a yes and our no is a no. We are not windows neither in nor out.  You are home, welcome home.