Remembering Berlin

Philippine Daily Inquirer/Opinion/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo
I OWN A PIECE or pieces of the Berlin Wall. A friend who went to Berlin shortly after the fall of the wall in 1989 brought home a piece for me.

Two years later, in 1991, I and several journalists were in Germany for a two-week cross-country tour—courtesy of a German press association, Germany’s department of tourism and Lufthansa. This was my second time in Germany. Berlin was one of the places we visited. We were there for the first anniversary of the reunification of West and East Germany which happened on Oct. 3, 1990.

Of course, I got pieces of the wall, but that time they came as part of a brooch which young artists made and sold near the wall area. I bought a beautiful molded face of a woman with one cheek covered with tiny pieces of the wall. I still have it and wear it now and then.

I remember being in a square where the statues of communism’s godfathers Marx and Engels stood. On the base of the statues someone had sprayed graffiti which said “Wir sind unschuldig.” Unschuldig means un-guilty. On closer look, one could see that someone had sprayed black paint on the un, as if to make the pair own up while at the same time absolving them. Another thoughtful graffiti sprayer had put back the un. And so the two gentlemen were pleading un-guilty once again.

Tourists roaming about at the square took turns posing for photographs beside the statues. Some even clambered up to sit on the lap of Papa Marx. One tourist picked the statue’s nose while his wife snapped a picture. Of course, I posed too. Eighteen years later my photo still looks good. I also have photos of myself writing graffiti on the wall.

Un-guilty or innocent of what?

With the collapse of communist governments in Europe and the reunification of the two Germanys, I couldn’t help thinking then that Marx and Engels must have been turning in their graves and their fans feeling low.

Now, 20 years later, as the world celebrates the fall of the wall, here comes a statement from the god/father of communism in the Philippines, Jose Ma. Sison, who is living in self-exile in Europe (not in North Korea). In paragraph after paragraph he perorates… “Since the fall of the Berlin wall…,” laying all the blame on capitalism and arguing why socialism is necessary. He is lamenting the fall of the wall and enumerating the ills in the world that came after it, practically pining for the Iron Curtain days.

If the wall could talk back… Let me say that I have kept the book that I bought at the museum at Checkpoint Charlie. It shows, through photographs and accounts, the ways and means that people in the communist-ruled East used to escape to freedom to the West during the Cold War.

Back to my reminiscing… At Checkpoint Charlie people sold chips of the old Berlin Wall. Our guide quipped that if someday all the chips that people bought were pieced together, the result would be a structure longer than the Great Wall of China. Where did all the chips come from? Your guess is as good as mine.

Berlin in 1991 was a study in contrast. To celebrate or not to celebrate—that was the debate. That was the first year after the reunification brought about by the crumbling of the wall that divided a people for decades. Curiously, the national official celebration was held in Hamburg at that time.

But the celebration in Berlin which we attended was held at the Rathaus. Beer and wine flowed. But there were also counter-celebrations. In front of the imposing Berlin Cathedral (on the East’s side), some 5,000 Berliners rallied. Almost without exception, every man or woman said he/she was for reunification, but always quickly added that it had been difficult. Prices of goods had soared and the daily earnings of the easterners had not gone up. East and West had been together only for a year.

The high cost of reunification was indeed daunting. In the East, we visited a factory that made lorries and street sweeping machines. A third or some 800 workers had been laid off. A top official of the factory, whose job it was to break the news gently to the employees, admitted his job was indeed a difficult one. A company from the West had bought the factory, and employees had to shape up or else. First to go were the incompetents who had it so good under their communist bosses.

Officials of the Treuhand-Ansalti (something like our Asset Privatization Trust), the agency in charge of privatizing companies in the East, had their hands full trying to dispose of them. It was not an easy job finding buyers of former state-owned firms whose products could not compete with those made in the West.

Indeed, there was unease on the first anniversary of Germany’s reunification. But there was a positive side to it in that the people realized early the cost that had to be paid. I couldn’t help thinking then, that in the second year after our own 1986 People Power Revolt, we were still discoing on the streets. On the third and fourth we were still in the clouds. The Germans were back to earth early.

Nineteen years after reunification, 20 years after the fall of the wall, look at them now.

As I rummaged through my Berlin photos and thingamajigs today, I found five Lenin pins that were the leftovers of the dozen or so that I bought in East Berlin for my nostalgic G&D (grim and determined) friends back home. Any takers? Maybe it’s time to sell them on e-Bay.

I hope to visit Germany again one day. One of the places I would like to visit (which many of my schoolmates have visited) would be that old little “castle” near Lake Starnberg in Bavaria where the German nuns of my alma mater came from, they who brought us the sound of the three Bs—Bach, Brahms and Beethoven.

Reflections on kidnappings past and present

Philippine Daily Inquirer/Opinion/by Ma. Ceres P.Doyo
AS IRISH COLUMBAN missionary Fr. Michael Sinnott enters his 24th day of captivity, people from all walks of life continue to pray that his kidnappers would have compassion and free him soon. That is, without ransom being paid. His kidnappers have asked for a $2-million ransom.

Fr. Pat O’Donoghue, regional director of the Missionary Society of St. Columban, has insisted again and again that Sinnott would not want that money be the reason for his release. The no-ransom policy stands.

As O’Donoghue stressed, paying ransom would “just add to everyone else’s vulnerability.” They are missionaries, “not commodities,” he added. For more than two decades these bandits/terrorists have been treating the religious as commodities.

The first kidnapping of religious that I had to write about involved the Carmelite nuns of Marawi City in 1986. I had to do a cover story on the kidnapping of the 10 nuns for the Sunday Inquirer Magazine at that time (“They also serve those who only pray,” July 20, 1986). That was 23 years ago.

In the recent “Reflections” or prayerful bulletins of O’Donoghue on Sinnott’s case, he mentioned that he officiated at the silver jubilee celebration of a Carmelite nun, Sr. Judith Luceno, one of the kidnapped nuns in 1986. The nuns in Marawi have since moved away and joined other Carmelite convents. What a pity.

But I remember that that Carmelite community was not like any other. Their lifestyle spoke of kinship with people of all faiths. I had not been there but I could tell they were different, based on my interviews with Carmelites in Metro Manila.

Set on a hill, the Carmelite “convent” in Marawi overlooked the placid Lanao Lake. On silent nights, the view from there, it was said, reminded one of Bethlehem. It must have been easy for the kidnappers to barge into the convent, a Carmelite whom I had interviewed said. Marawi Carmel was not the typical gothic monastery set apart by ivy-covered walls and iron grills. It was a poor Carmel, mostly made of wood. It was decidedly meant to be so.

The Carmelites came to Marawi to be one with everyone. They came not to convert, but to be witnesses to Muslim-Christian brotherhood—or sisterhood, if you may. They got along well with the people there. They were loved. The Muslims would even bring them food, I was told. It was therefore a surprise that a mass abduction should happen.

Mother Mary Madeleine (Mary Ledesma), prioress of Marawi Carmel at that time, was the moving spirit behind the little community of cloistered nuns whose lives consisted mainly of prayer, adoration, fasting and sacrifices, an apostolate which earthly mortals may not easily understand. But even as they preserved the original spirit of Carmel as inspired by St. Teresa of Avila (the founder of the Reformed Discalced Carmelite nuns and monks), their lifestyle in Marawi Carmel was very indigenized and not a copy of Western-style monastic life. (I’ve seen this kind of lifestyle in Carmel in Infanta, Quezon.)

During adoration, the nuns wore malong cloaks, they sang local songs, they adapted to the spirit of the place. They would even fast during Ramadan, in addition to the Carmelite fasts they had to undertake during the year.

They were not the modern-day Agneses of God (of the movies) or the flying nun types who knew little of birds and bees, or the age-old conflict in Mindanao. But little did they know that while in the middle of a nine-day novena to Our Lady of Mount Carmel, they would suddenly be swept into the eye of the storm.

As reports had it, they were forcibly taken from their convent, which was about two miles from the city, by armed men believed to be members of a lost command of the Moro National Liberation Front. Shortly after the nuns were kidnapped, an American Protestant missionary, Brian Lawrence, was also taken from his quarters at the Mindanao State University. The kidnapping came not too long after the release of the French Catholic priest, Fr. Michel Girord.

They were not to be the last. In the next two decades, there would be more kidnappings of church people, both religious and lay. Some of them resulted in gory deaths that told of extreme cruelty.

Today, many groups and individuals all over the world continue to pray for the safe return of Sinnott. There was a sense of relief when Sinnott’s kidnappers released a video showing him holding an Oct. 22 issue of the Inquirer. “There was a sense of relief to see him at all,” O’Donoghue said. “But I also experienced a tremendous sadness at seeing him in this horrendous situation. I would believe that all of us would know that he did not write the statement of his own volition. Words like ‘indignity of it all’, ‘humiliation’ and ‘exploitation’ sprang in my mind. But I also realized that he has not lost his gentleness which radiated through it all. God’s love is still flowing through him. I am aware that I could be accused of being melodramatic but the image stuck—ecce homo (behold the man). God is in this powerfully.”

O’Donoghue continued: “If the kidnappers were to look at the man they are holding and see him for who he is and not as a means for making money, and in compassion release him immediately, then we would remember them as men of compassion and not as kidnappers. One of the agencies in Rome asked me if I really thought these men were capable of compassion. It was an honest question that deserved an honest answer. I replied that if I were to answer simply from a human point of view, I would have to say, ‘Probably not.’ But I prefer to continue to see this from the horizon of faith. And from that perspective of what is impossible for us is possible for God. God can change hearts, despite our firm resistance.”

Juan Tama, virgin voter

That’s Tama (right/correct) indeed, we didn’t miss out on the letter d. But before that d disappeared, there is Juan Tamad of Philippine fable, the stereotypical lazy, lethargic Filipino who just waits for the proverbial guava to fall from the tree and into his mouth.

Once again, Juan Tamad takes center stage on a circa 2010 life, but this time he metamorphoses into Juan Tama. And indeed, it takes a village, so to speak, to transform him from obduracy into advocacy.

“Si Juan Tamad, ang Diyablo at ang Limang Milyong Boto” (directed by Phil M. Noble), the latest offering of the Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA), is the thing to watch especially by first-time voters, or virgin voters, as PETA calls them.

Set in the imaginary island of Isla Filiminimon, the musical revolves around Juan Tamad (nicknamed JT), the son of two overseas Filipino workers toiling in Isla Agimat. Juan’s parents open the story and introduce their son who grew up with his grandmother but who turns out to be a lazy, apathetic 21-year-old. (Juan is played by Marvin Wilbur T. Ong and Victor B. Robinson III.)

Here’s Juan Tamad’s opening song. Bakit ka ba magbabanat ng buto/Para ba sa kapiranggot na sahod mo?/Gigising araw-araw na may baong pag-asa/Sa pag-uwi alikabok lang ang ipon mo./Bakit ka pa mangangahas mangarap/Gayong hindi naman matutupad/Bakit mo pa sinusubukang umunlad/Mas pulubi pa sa iyo ang Bayan mong sawim-palad…

Juan’s only desire is to join his parents in Isla Agimat but they are against the unending cycle of migrating Filiminis. Juan is upset but being tamad, he easily accepts his fate.

With the presidential elections so close, Lola Anitan pushes her apo to register and vote for a new Pinunong Bayan. Though hesitant, Juan registers. Suddenly a whole new world is flung open before him. False promises, manipulative moves by candidates are among the negatives that Juan encounters. Still Juan holds on to his hope that with a victorious ideal candidate, things could change. He is in for disappointment.

Weaving in and out of the scenes is Diyablo/Storyteller (Vincent de Jesus who wrote the play including the music and lyrics) plus a caboodle of colorful characters that pull JT in all directions. The Diyablo/Storyteller double character is, to me, the one that holds the entire thing together. I thought De Jesus was just so flawless and fantastic, brimming with energy in his acting and singing. Wow talaga. (Veteran stage actor Robert Seña also plays Diyablo/Storyteller for the second cast.)

Diyablo sings: Ay eto na! At sa ngalan ng demokrasya/Tatlong buwan buong bayan maging perya!/Kanya-kanyang arangkada at diskarte/Upang makuha ang tiwala ng botante/Ligawan ang mga tao na parang syota/Yakapin mo at kindatan nang maniwala.

Despite JT’s disappointment (his candidate loses), his grandma urges him to continue to be vigilant so that the winning candidate would do his job well.

JT becomes involved in community projects and does his part in effecting change, starting with himself. He realizes that good governance is not dependent on one leader but on the vigilant efforts of every Filimini who must make sure that the elected officials’ promises are fulfilled and that they are accountable to their constituents.

JT is no longer Juan Tamad. He is transformed into Juan Tama. He shows that dramatic change can come about in one’s character. And anybody can experience the same given the right stimuli and inspiration.

I thought the acting was superb and the energy electric. The musical could sound quite pedantic in some parts but the music, choreography, costumes, stage design, lighting and all more than make you forget the preachiness. The lyrics are very now. Bukod sa fiesta at undas, Mahal na Araw at Pasko/Ngayon ang araw na kailangang magsilabas lahat tayo/Halina at magtungo sa ating presinto/Ihayag ang saloobin tayo’t bumoto.

PETA president CB Garrucho says: “There are 5 million first-time youth voters that must be convinced first to register, and then to actively participate in governance. These 5 million combined with the 9 million already registered youth voters could definitely create the swing vote in choosing decent leaders for our country.”

PETA, Garrucho adds, has a voter’s education campaign dubbed “Casting Call: The Virgin Voter’s Campaign ‘I Want My Vote to Count.’” This goes with Bagong Bilang, a workshop by PETA’s youth arm for schools that would engage students in discussing citizens’ participation in elections.

The hilarious musical play “Juan Tamad” is at the heart of the whole campaign.

Playwright and lyricist De Jesus (Diyablo/Storyteller) himself confesses: “I am 41 years old and I am still a virgin. A virgin voter, that is. I grew up during martial law where no election happened from 1972 to 1981. When I turned 18 I wasn’t able to vote because my name was mysteriously struck out from the voter’s list. After People Power, I worked abroad for seven years and when I came back home I’ve completely lost the appetite to vote .…The massive cheating, having the same old trapo candidates … I found the whole process pointless .… But when this Voter’s Education production was assigned to me, I had a change of heart.”

“Juan Tamad” is available for touring from now till January. It will run again at the PETA Center in Quezon City from February till March. Interested schools, institutions and communities—and sponsors most especially—may contact Julie Anne Bautista at 0916-5805153 or 4100822.

There is hope for Isla Filiminimon and for Inang Pilipinas. As the song at the end of the musical goes: Ganyan ang batas ng kalikasan/Matutumbasan ang bawat kabutihan/Hanggang isa ay maging dalawa/Ang dalawa’y dadami pa/Hanggang maging daan at libu-libong munting alon.

Dam lessons from Yu Xiaogang

Philippine Daily Inquirer/Opinion/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo
Three weeks after Chinese expert dam watcher, activist and 2009 Ramon Magsaysay awardee Yu Xiaogang left the Philippines, the dam broke, so to speak.

I wish I had asked Yu all the dam questions that are plaguing us now. I wish he were here for the Senate hearings and the forum debates to witness the dam-damning, blame-throwing, finger-pointing and breast-beating.

He could listen to the torrent of words from government officials, soothsayers, feel-gooders (they announce on TV how very good they feel after doing acts of charity even while the flood victims continue to feel bad) and what-have-you that all but drowned us again after the two great catastrophes of the past weeks that killed almost 700 (by drowning, landslides, leptospirosis, etc.) and destroyed lives and livelihoods.

There is a lot we could learn from Yu and I wish we could call him back now. Yu has not only kept an eye on China’s 85,000 dams, he has done much to prevent wanton construction that could lead to destruction. There is also a lot that he could learn from the recent tragedy that visited us.

Macli-ing Dulag, slain tribal chief and Cordillera icon who fought mightily against the proposed Chico River Dam almost 30 years ago that could have destroyed large portions of Kalinga ancestral lands, would have loved to meet Yu but the Kalinga brave and martyr was born too early and shed his blood too soon. (Macli-ing was killed in 1981.)

The Philippines does not even have 100 dams and suddenly we are deathly afraid of them. But we have reason to be. I shudder when I think of the deadly few that we have.

The RM Award Foundation honored Yu, 58, last August “for fusing the knowledge and tools of social science with a deep sense of social justice, in assisting dam-affected communities in China to shape the development projects that impact their natural environment and their lives.”

I interviewed Yu and wrote a front page story (“RM Award for China’s water guardians,” Aug. 30). The other water guardian was Ma Jun, 41, a Chinese journalist who used the power of information in addressing China’s water crisis.

While he was here, Yu was invited to speak in several gatherings and to share his knowledge and experience of dams. Well, three weeks after he left, the dam “broke,” na nga. For besides the unprecedented amount of rain that fell on our lives (so we blame climate change which is also our doing), there were the dams that released and sent oceans of water hurtling into villages, towns and cities.

Dams, the threat they pose and the havoc they have caused are the primary concerns of Yu, founder and director of Green Watershed. Begun in 2002, this non-profit NGO developed an integrated watershed management program in the Lashi Lake area in Yunnan. Dam projects, supposedly the harbingers of progress, could destroy lives, livelihood, the living habitat of human communities and wildlife and, just as important, heritage sites.

And once in operation, dams could be destructive too, as what happened in the Philippines’ case when typhoons “Ondoy” and “Pepeng” struck. We’re still reeling from too much water and now typhoon “Ramil” is roaring towards us. Now all eyes and ears are on the dams.

Yu grew up in Yunnan and he remembers the mystifying beauty of the place. Yunnan Province is home to three of the world’s largest rivers: the Nu, Yangtze and Mekong. China’s misty lakes and rivers that one beholds in paintings are now dimmed when one thinks of the staggering number of dams in China—85,000 at last count—or 46 percent of what the entire world has.

Yu said that 30 years ago dams were built for agriculture. Then they were built for electricity, that is, for profit. There are now so many dams in China, Yu said, and for some, the market has not even been identified. Dams for dams’ sake or for some imagined future needs are not the way to go especially if their environmental impact has not been assessed, Yu stressed. That’s something we should bear in mind.

It was while doing post-graduate research on the impact of Manwan hydroelectric project that Yu discovered and documented its adverse impact on the area’s inhabitants. Yu had stirred a hornet’s nest, causing the government to investigate and do something about the dam’s destructive effects.

In the Lashi Lake area in Yunnan, a dam project diverted 40 percent of the lake’s water, flooded farmlands and destroyed the people’s livelihood. Green Watershed organized the Watershed Management Committee and mobilized the people to engage in irrigation, fishery, microcredit and training in watershed and protection and biodiversity conservation.

The efforts bore fruit and the Lashi project became a model for participatory management. It even received a citation from the government. Encouraged, Yu embarked to do more in other dam sites. Green Watershed conducted research and forums and engaged mass media to help.

Green Watershed conducted public debates when the government announced the building of 13 dams on the Nu River. The dam would have displaced 50,000 people and affected a Unesco World Heritage nature site. China’s Premier We Jaibao put the plans on hold.

This year, China’s Three Gorges Dam, touted to be the mightiest in the world, is going to open. Where there used to be mightily raging or smoothly flowing rivers, there are now the monstrous structures that lord it over the waters. Hydroelectric power, a key to China’s mammoth energy needs, is what dams are primarily for.

To dam or not to dam? Does China, or any country for that matter, really need so many dams? What Yu insists on is that communities and ecosystems need not be sacrificed in the so-called altar of development.

‘Pakikipagkapwa-damdamin’

Philippine Daily Inquirer/Opinion/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo
(This piece is the continuation of last week’s column, “Deep calls to deep.”)

IN 2005, after killer landslides and flash floods brought the provinces of Quezon and Aurora to their knees, I wrote about the groundbreaking book, “Pakikipagkapwa Damdamin: Accompanying Survivors of Disasters,” (Bookmark) by psychologist Dr. Lourdes A. Carandang. The book was the result of her and her Ateneo de Manila University team’s efforts (funded by Unicef) to give psychological aid to survivors of the 1990 earthquake, the 1991 Mount Pinatubo and 1993 Mayon Volcano eruptions.

Carandang and her team’s “helping manual” could very well have been written for the 2005 Southern Luzon tragedy. It also found context in the catastrophic 2005 tsunami tragedy that killed more than 200,000 in Asia and Africa. And in the past two weeks’ deluge and landslides that paralyzed Metro Manila, Rizal Province and Northern and Central Luzon.

I am sharing again some of the insights from the book that might be useful for those who are helping individuals and groups, children in particular, deal with their recent traumatic experiences with the disaster caused by Typhoons “Ondoy” and “Pepeng” and by human beings as well.

Pakikipagkapwa-damdamin could mean empathy, and more. This Filipino word or phrase is not just a noun, it has been coined from both verb and noun. While the word empathy is rich and deep in meaning, its Filipino equivalent is so much more suggestive and active. Although it is a tongue-twister, I can easily visualize it. I can visualize persons reaching out and I hear the song “People who need people.”

Written in a narrative and personal tone, “Pakikipagkapwa-Damdamin” is different from other books on psychosocial rehabilitation in that it mainly uses the psychological, not the symptom-oriented, approach in examining the inner world of survivors by “letting them speak for themselves.” The phenomenology of the “carer” is also laid bare. How do they see themselves, sustain their level of energy?

The therapists discovered that the children were the barometers of the psychological and emotional climate of the community. No matter how the adults tried to conceal their feelings, the children always provided an accurate gauge of where the community was at.

And so the children were the perfect entry points for gaining rapport especially through games.

“Mirroring” entailed making the children feel that the therapist was one with them, like imitating the child’s posture or facial expression. The therapist entered the child’s world and made the child feel at ease and accepted.

The therapists came in with soft voices. They were friendly but not overeager, waiting for the children’s responses instead of demanding them.

The children set the pace for the interaction. The team’s enthusiasm must not overwhelm. Interaction was kept open so that the children could respond, feel safe, be in control and empowered.

Introductions, using names, sitting close and touching, making the children feel safe, listening and showing interest in their answers—these were some of the techniques to gaining entry to the children’s world.

Therapists also relied on non-verbal ways a child communicated. A child’s drawing could speak a thousand words. It is also a tool for drawing out more stories.

Writing, Carandang recalled, was an effective tool for rapport and self-expression among older children and adults. It even proved “infectious” and touched off a “writing wave” among evacuees.

“Working with adults who were in various emotional states was an essential part of the holistic multilevel process,” Carandang said. “We found out that they needed help to move on with their grieving process. Many needed help to get unstuck from their immobilized states that ranged from bitterness, pain and depression to suicidal thoughts.”

Blaming, quarreling, fits of anxiety, mental anguish, helplessness, hopelessness, loss of appetite, physical weakness—these were some of the symptoms the survivors experienced. For some, intrusive thoughts that would not go away could be a problem.

Talking about it helps, said a survivor. “We swap stories. I talk a lot about my own experience. I talk about what I think to my neighbors, the better to distract myself from my worries.”

Using story metaphors, play therapy, looking at things in a new light, talking about lessons learned, making use of their senses and their connectedness to nature—these helped children make sense of their experiences.

Carandang recognized the adults’ emotional bond with nature. Familiar nature scenes were used as metaphors to help them look beyond their present situation.

One therapist used the two mountains that marked the boundaries of the relief center—one barren, the other lush—to re-frame the outlook of an adult stuck in his feeling of loss.

Prayers, hypnosis and massage helped those suffering from psychosomatic reactions. Rituals and prayers done together could be a means to hasten community healing.

“Perhaps the most tender and touching part of the prayer service that our team experienced was the Offertory,” recalled Carandang. “The people offered themselves quietly to the Lord, calling Him ‘Amang mapagmahal’ (loving Father).”

The community offered a big rock to symbolize the strength of their faith. More compelling than the shared outpouring of grief was their will to live lives of enduring trust, faith and hope.

What about those who have been vicariously traumatized by the images? Carandang’s advice: “Take a break, connect with others and build communities of care. Trauma renders people powerless. Sharing stories help to heal the trauma and empower people.”

Father Mick: A fighter for victims of injustice

Philippine Daily Inquirer/Feature

TWO MONTHS SHY of 80, Irish priest Fr. Michael Sinnott has worked as a missionary in the Philippines for more than four decades, devoting the last few years helping disabled children, whether Christian or Muslim.

His abduction by armed men on Sunday night has shocked not only his fellow priests belonging to the Missionary Society of St. Columban but the leaders of the Philippine Roman Catholic Church.

Fondly called Father Mick by friends, Sinnott is the latest in a lengthening list of foreign and Filipino missionaries kidnapped by lawless elements in the volatile Mindanao region.

An aunt of his, Sr. Theophane Fortune, a Columban missionary sister, also served in Mindanao years ago.

In recent years, Sinnott had been in ill health.

Fr. Pat O’Donoghue, regional director of the Missionary Society of St. Columban, said Sinnott suffered a heart attack in 2005 and underwent a quadruple bypass surgery in Cebu City.

“Father Sinnott has recovered, but he has to be on medication every day. He has no medicine with him right now and that is a big concern for us,” O’Donoghue said.

‘Kind to victims of injustice’

O’Donoghue described Sinnott as “a very dedicated and humble man.”

“He is exceedingly kind and generous to the poor and the suffering and those who are victims of injustice. He has spent 55 years of his life for them,” O’Donoghue said.

In 1995, Sinnott and several others filed a complaint in court related to what they deemed was a miscarriage of justice in the murder of a church lay worker.

Most of Sinnott’s life has been spent in parish work in Zamboanga del Sur province.

Love for children

Eleven years ago, he set up Hangop Kabataan Foundation and a small school that attends to special children, including the blind, deaf and mute, colleagues said.

The school is about half a kilometer from the Columban house in Pagadian City, where Sinnott was seized.

After his heart surgery and needing to reduce his workload, Sinnott devoted his time to his charitable project.

“He considers the life of the children as more valuable than his own,” said fellow Columban missionary Fr. Sean Martin.

“Father Sinnott is very well-loved here,” Pagadian Mayor Samuel Co said. “He takes care of children, whether Christians or Muslims, especially those who are in need of attention due to physical disabilities.”

No stranger to violence

Typically Irish, Sinnott, who speaks Cebuano, has a very good sense of humor, O’Donoghue said.

“But he can be quiet and a little reserved. He is very incisive in analyzing things. This I must say, he is a very respected and a much loved priest in the diocese of Pagadian because of his gift of himself,” he added.

The Irish Columban missionaries are not strangers to danger and violence.

In 1997, Msgr. Desmond Hartford was kidnapped in Marawi City and held for nine days.

A fellow missionary said Hartford was “betrayed” by some people he had helped and that his experience caused his health condition to worsen, eventually leading to his death.

In 2001, Fr. Rufus Halley was on his motorbike when armed men tried to abduct him in Balabagan, Lanao del Sur. He tried to resist and the gunmen shot him dead.

During the martial law years, two Columbans, Fathers Brian Gore and Niall O’Brien, were thrown into prison, along with several church workers.

Malate martyrs

During World War II, four Columbans were killed by the Japanese. They are now known as the Malate martyrs, for whom a commemorative statue has been erected. A book was written about their martyrdom.

Sinnott hails from Ireland. He was ordained in 1954. After studies in Rome in 1957, Sinnott came to the Philippines. In 1966, he was recalled to Ireland to serve as rector of the Columban seminary.

He returned to the Philippines in 1976 and has stayed since.

According to Columban Fr. Kevin McHugh of the Malate Church, most of Sinnott’s missionary life in the Philippines has been spent in Mindanao. He had worked in Iligan City and also in Kapatagan town in Lanao del Norte. "The last 11 years were devoted to the disabled," McHugh said. 

"The last 11 years were devoted to the disabled,” McHugh said.

Fr. Sean Coyle, a Columban based in Bacolod City, responded to a blogger’s criticism that the Irish priests were putting themselves in danger.

The blogger had written: “Having a higher calling doesn’t mean you have to dive into a situation with reckless disregard. I recommend not raising a finger to free him. He made his bed, so let him sleep in it.”

Coyle retorted: “The Columbans have been working in Pagadian for more than 60 years. We are not a foolhardy group of people putting our own lives or those of others in danger. The population of the area covered by the Catholic Diocese of Pagadian is 80 percent Catholic.”

80th year

The missionary group Sinnott belongs to was founded in 1918 and named after the Irish saint, Columban (b. 543).

The Columban missionaries came to the Philippines in 1929. At one time, the Columbans in the Philippines numbered more than 200. Now they are about 40—Irish and Filipinos.

They run parishes and schools all over the country and work with grass-roots Christian communities. In May this year, the Columbans celebrated 80 years of missionary work in the Philippines. With reports from Julie S. Alipala, Ryan D. Rosauro, Ed General, Richel, V. Umel and Jeoffrey Maitem, Inquirer Mindanao

‘Deep calls to deep’

Philippine Daily Inquirer/Opinion/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo
“Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me.” (Psalm 42:7)

These words were roaring in my head all throughout last week, rising and crashing like a thundering symphony. Like a movie sound track gone awry. Brutal, majestic, exploding like Mozart’s “Rex tremendae.”

Like the psalmist and Job, thousands of Filipinos were left helpless in the face of the unprecedented rage of nature that swept Metro Manila and Rizal Province to the edge. There were those who described the tragedy as “biblical” in proportion, except that there was no Noah’s ark in sight.

Like many lucky ones, I was high and dry in my Quezon City home during those terrifying moments. But with all forms of media churning out endless images and news accounts of the disaster, those who were out of harm’s way but wanted to be connected through various modes of media communication experienced what is called vicarious traumatization.

I went to Marikina last Sunday to experience for myself the aftermath of the great deluge and the destruction that Storm “Ondoy” wrought. I was with some Benedictine Sisters who visited poor residents who were slowly rebuilding and emerging from the wreckage of their homes. The nuns have a big relief effort going on at their social action center in St. Scholastica’s in Marikina, but they felt that something more could be done besides handing out relief goods. And this was to visit quietly, almost unobtrusively, the scenes of destruction. And to listen.

And so we made our way through alleys, walked past mountains of mudded personal belongings on sidewalks and entered some wrecked houses. The residents were busy cleaning up, spading out the mud, hammering away, sorting out things, throwing out personal belongings that were beyond repair.

Busy as they were, they were eager to talk to strangers.

“Come inside my ravaged home,” a woman in an alley invited me. “Stay a while, and we will tell you our story,” she eagerly said, not sounding a bit defeated. And so I listened without pen or paper or recorder.

Other women emerged from their doors and extended the same invitation, trying to outdo one another in narrating what they went through in Tanong, Marikina, on Sept. 26.

Arm in arm, they said, they braved the neck-deep flood waters, children in tow, until they reached higher structures to perch on. Their remaining lifelines to survival—their cell phones—were of no use.

Many such stories continue to be told thousands of times but each story, each telling, is a survivor’s own. The day Ondoy let loose torrential waters equivalent to a month’s rain will forever be etched in every individual survivor’s memory and in collective memory.

But long after the waters have subsided, how do the survivors expunge the terror from their memories? How do the bereaved move on alone after the loss of loved ones? Will the sound of raging waters haunt them for the rest of their lives?

After coming from Marikina, I called my friend, Dr. Lourdes A. Carandang, a noted clinical psychologist and specialist in post-disaster therapy. “Deep listening empowers,” she told me. Having someone to listen empowers survivors of traumatic events. Just as empowering is the telling of the story itself.

Story sharing and deep listening are empowering especially for survivors of traumatic experiences.

One should not be surprised to find survivors eager to talk to strangers about something so terrifying and devastating, Carandang added. And it is good that way, she affirmed. Would that there were as many listeners as there were stories to be listened to.

Post-disaster relief and rehabilitation should go beyond the material and economic. The survivors need healing not just of their physical wounds but of their spirit as well. Adults, and children most especially, are vulnerable to the long-term psychological effects of their horrible experiences if no one helps them ease their trauma.

Carandang has been involved in addressing the post-traumatic stress of survivors of major disasters and helping them come to terms with their pain and loss. She and her team of psychologists’ field experiences could provide insights in handling cases.

In 2005, after killer landslides and flash floods brought the provinces of Quezon and Aurora to their knees, I sought out Carandang who shared her ground-breaking book “Pakikipagkapwa Damdamin: Accompanying Survivors of Disasters” (Bookmark). The book was the result of her and her Ateneo University team’s efforts (funded by Unicef) to give psychological aid to survivors of the 1990 earthquake, the 1991 Mount Pinatubo and 1993 Mayon Volcano eruptions.

Carandang and her team’s “helping manual” could very well have been written for the 2005 Southern Luzon tragedy. It also found context in the catastrophic 2005 tsunami tragedy that killed more than 200,000 in Asia and Africa. And in last week’s deluge that paralyzed Metro Manila and Rizal province.

“All persons have inner resources that can be resurfaced, affirmed and reactivated in times of crises,” Carandang stressed, “and this can be done through a helping process that respects their dignity even in the worst of circumstances. This is the essence of accompanying the survivors—by being with them, listening deeply and sincerely to their stories, and knowing and affirming that they have these inner resources.”

More on pakikipagkapwa-damdamin next week.