The exodus to the countryside has begun, and anyone left in metropolitan areas is distracted and not focused on anything to do with current events. To be sure, there’s some news but who are we kidding? The week before, the week of, and the week after, Holy Week, very little, if at all, gets done. Carl Rove rapping is about as serious as I’m willing to get. I’d rather be examining Venn Diagrams.
So no politics for this week and in fact, this blog’s going on vacation. Over in the Inquirer Current blog, my entry is on the great debates that have surrounded the choice for the date of Easter.
Congratulations are in order for the winners of the Philippine Blog Awards (an event, according to FriskoDude, on par with Guns n’Roses’ surprise concert in Bangkok!), which I had the honor of judging for, though I was unable to attend the awards ceremony. On a related note (to Easter and the religious festival it’s part of) the event was apparently not without incident, as Atheista complained about the content of the invocation (not having an invocation per se) that began the program (in Bayanihan Blogs Network, though, the invocation was described as witty). Personally, I have no problems with invocations, provided they are preceded, and not followed by, the national anthem.
Anyway, the vacation, whether one goes out of town or not, is usually spent catching up on reading, viewing, and listening (and eating). So here are some lighter things you might want to look at.
Vanity Fair has a cover story on the The Sopranos, the landmark angst-ridden mobster series, which bows out this year. Here are some amusing things to view: caffeine sparks points to movie dialogue, courtesy of Mark Lapid: and how others have copied it. Through the blogger behind The Mad Tea Party, I learned of what is probably the wierdest vintage Filipino film to get a second life: watch a 1970s Filipino dwarf James Bond. They say the makers of Casino Royale were sent the clip and loved it.
When it comes to food, I love to eat, but can’t cook, so sometimes I comfort myself by enjoying food vicariously: Slice, for pizza fanatics, brings you to a recent pizza festival, for example; A Hamburger Today discusses perhaps the most insane (and sinful) hamburger ever, the Luther burger, which uses a Krispy Kreme donut as a bun (for a really focused look at McDonalds, on the other hand, there’s McChronicles, though another Hamburger Today entry is disturbing: McDonald’s burger surviving unrefrigerated for 18 years! ).
Wierd Meat focuses on the disturbing: deep fried sand worms, for example. Speaking of fried: kottke.org points to goldfish in Japan that live in a functioning, deep fat fryer!
Lovingly and I must say comfortingly, delicious, is kitchen cow, to which I’ve linked before, but really, it’s the prettiest food blog ever.
For music, check out Last.fm – The Social Music Revolution, while very kind of cultural podcast is covered by a great blog, Open Culture, which can consume hours of bandwidth (read: downloading) time. Downloading Is a Packrat’s Dream is how you’ll end up if you’re not careful, though.
Happy vacation to all! See you on Monday.
I think this photo says it all. For a few days, at least, let’s hope everyone’s minds will be on lighter things.
(Image from The Straightlaced Bohemian.)
Just to clarify, I did not complain because there was an invocation.It was the content of the invocation that made me see it as something very inappropriate.
This prayer?
Why was it inappropriate for the occassion?
It wasn’t a christian event and not all bloggers blog to remind to be steadfast in their Christian commitment that visitors may find in our blogs a source of encouragement and inspiration.
Not all bloggers blog to lead us closer to You.
Ninety percent of the prayer was funny and witty. The remainder reeked of insensitivity and bad taste.
benj, fixed the entry.
Thanks man. 🙂
My opinion, if it matters.
1. benj is right, it is not a Christian event.
2. Fr. Cuyos, however can not be faulted for delivering such kind of invocation because he is a Catholic priest.
3. I am a Catholic but I respect other people’s belief.
4. In a place where, there is a diversity of religion, even the greeting of Merry Christmas is substituted with politically correct holiday greetings so the word Christian should have been omitted because we may never know if among the audience/bloggers, there are Muslims, Jews and members of other religion.
5. Except for this observation, I concur with others that the prayer was witty.
benj commented in other site that the Speech (invocation) was 90 % witty and delivered with ramrkable candor, but the rest was reek with bad taste and political correctness.
and I added:
And that 10% is enough to defeat the whole 100% of the speech. I neither find it funny asking the Almighty to forgive us for the things that we should not do in the first place, if you are that religious. Or even you are an atheist but a law abiding citizen..
sorry typo errot should be “political incorrectness” sorry to benj and the rest.
How can you blame Fr. Cuyos, a Catholic priest, for expressing his Christian belief thru the invocation? “Non-believers” should also respect the belief of others, right. And to blame the organizers does not sound fit as well since the PBA’07 opened its doors to all bloggers who would care to volunteer – believers and non beleivers alike.
To Benj and others who got offended, I’m sure the organizers as well as Fr. Cuyos did not intend this to happen. Next year’s event will be bigger and better!! Things like this can be prevented the second time around. Cheers! 🙂
Only the banana has a heart…
naah, a nonbeliever has a heart too…i.e., the sensitive kind. he chose to differ among the rest but is offended when he is left out. yes, fr. stephen didn’t mean to hurt him and leaving out the others (of different faiths and non-faiths) possibly is an unintentional sin of omission.
i’m sure the organizers are now wiser. an invocation of silence is the best invocation of all…men with faith silently praying and men without faith keeping silent…even long after the event…
Marcvill, given this scenario, mutual respect has to be observed. The only way to do that is to keep the prayer devoid of potentially polarizing elements like generalizations and presumptuous claims regarding the purpose of the attendees blogs.
I do hope that changes are put into place next year. 🙂
It’s nice that you’re standing up to make sure that the religious bullies are recognized and counted. Good for you.
Benj: It wasn’t a christian event…
But was it a private event? And were the organizers Christian? If Im throwing a private event and Im a Christian, I have a right to invite to speak whomever I please, do I not?
…and not all bloggers blog to remind to be steadfast in their Christian commitment that visitors may find in our blogs a source of encouragement and inspiration. Not all bloggers blog to lead us closer to You.
Therefore that invocation was only addressed to those bloggers who have a Christian commitment to blah-blah, etc, etc. If you werent one of those bloggers, then the invocation wasnt about you and you can ignore it. I still dont see that as inappropriate.
Unless you were somehow offended. Again I see no reason why you would be. Youre an atheist, therefore the invocation means nothing to you. The priest might have been reciting Humpty Dumpty for all you care. If youre offended, then youre offended about nothing.
But I see where youre coming from, benj. Youre claiming some sort of ‘victimhood.’ This isnt the way to deal. I mean, if I were in an Islamic community, and one of the events I attended (for example, the Saudi Arabian Blog Awards) included an invocation to Allah in the name of the Prophet Mohammed, I wouldnt complain about it. I see no reason to.
Our constitution, which protects the rights of atheists, isnt itself atheist. But under the constitution, you and I have equal rights even though Im a theist and youre not. The way to deal then is by claiming equal rights and not by claiming victimhood and persecution. The state gestapo arent hauling atheists into death camps, but once they do, Im sure theists in this country will stand up and defend you.
But your pronouncements that an invocation is somehow insensitive and in bad taste worries theists. If for example one day the atheists come into power, they worry that you would take away their right to freely practice their religion. They cant pray in private gatherings like blog awards for example.
Stop claiming victimhood. Stop being overly sensitive over a little invocation that means nothing to you. Be an equal. If you want to advance the cause of atheism for example, issue a call to your fellow atheists and put up a charitable institution to help the less fortunate. The theists have Mother Teresa, Gawad Kalinga, and the Salvation Army. The atheists have…? This is your chance. The atheists could make a difference in our country by doing the same thing. Put up a Rational Army, or something like that. Join civil society instead of campaigning for political correctness. Political correctness is for wimps.
That’s my Holy Week message to atheists, my fellow Filipinos. 😉
Ninety percent of the prayer was funny and witty.
Frankly I found it banal, but it’s the thought that counts.
Yeah Benj, just grin and bear it.
Back in College, i assigned one of my groupmates to lead the opening prayer during an organization event. Only much later did i discover that she was an atheist. Now, that was insensitive.
So has anyone heard of an invocation that pledges allegiance to the Republic of the Philippines?
Or is this so un-religious a pledge as to be unreligious?
maybe even blasphemy?
Come to think of it… can anyone recount the instances as what the Filipino priest said when this Filipino priest pledge allegiance to the bangsa ng mga Pilipino ?
UPn Student, wouldn’t that be the Philippine National Anthem?
He’s an atheist. Even a moment of silence will offend him because that will still be praying.
UPn, if by invocation we mean calling for the aid of a deity, then I suppose the Constitution would qualify.
He’s an atheist. Even a moment of silence will offend him because that will still be praying.
To be fair to atheists, not all of them are offended when people pray. Ive encountered a few in real life and on the internet and benj is the first one Ive encountered who felt offended by people praying. I suspect he’s a new convert to atheism so the zeal is still there. (Please correct me if Im wrong, benj.)
Men without faith are atheists? But being an atheist requires faith and convictions in ones beliefs. Faith in nothingness is a belief system. If there is faith in nothing then there is no belief system and hence it approaches nihilism.
The Christian principles and ideals are faith, justice and peace. A faith based belief system in a Deity.
Atheists also have faith in nothing. A dogma in nothing is necessary for one to be considered an atheist. Pure rationalism where nothing is assumed. The dogma of life without assumptions. A fundamentalist rationale.
However Christians instead call it the continuing rationale of the mystery of the faith. Dogma in believing that even the physical scientific universe is too vast, unending and seemingly eternal to comprehend what more the spiritual side of existence.
In essence the Christian faith is about discovery about all humanity and that includes atheists so where is the contradiction?
benj’s taking offense is misplaced. His ridicule of the invocation’s content is out of line. An invocation is a religious act. So, what did he expect Fr. Cuyos to say? Read the instruction manual on how to operate a PC?
It just so happened that the event’s organizers were, I suppose, mostly believers so they found it appropriate to include an invocation. I’m sure benj knew beforehand that there would be an invocation, so he could have stepped out of the room while it was being made to spare his sensibilities.
If I found myself, a believer, in an event organized by atheists, the absence of an invocation would not offend me because to force atheists to make an invocation would be oppression. To prevent believers from making an invocation would be oppression, too.
hvrds,
When will you put up your blog????
When people are able to travel and go out of their cocoon, they will find out that religious beliefs are not only limited to Christianity and Islam.
Even the Catholic faith is divided into Orthodox and the Roman.
Invocations can be made by just using the “Generic” name of the Almighty. But as I have said, Fr. Cuying cannot be faulted because he is a Catholic priest.
The observance of moment of silence does not necessarily mean uttering prayers. It is a call to remember events, people or do some reflections.
Again, I reiterate, it is not a Christian event, since, it is not about spiritual retreat, neither it is a church congregation or a Christian celebration.
It is a congregation of bloggers which at this year may be composed of one hundred per cent Christians. As the Philippine blogosphere expands, there will be more joining who may be coming from different faiths, beliefs and religious orientations. Are we going to exclude them?
The word Christian by Fr. Cuying is a start to include non-Catholics. Why is a non-exclusion of non-Christians an issue?
Reading benj, I understand that he is not against the invocation per se.
This is not an issue between atheism and Christianity. This is more of acknowledging diversity of FAITH among men and respect.
It is not only between Christians and Moslems. But it is also about people who are practising Buddhism, Hinduism.
Yoga is actually a meditation of Buddhists but it was introduced as non-religious cleansing exercise because the religious incantations are made generic.
If Benj, the atheist is going to desecrate a symbol of my faith like what one blogger did, I will not hesitate to speak my mind.
I dont get it, C at. Who was being excluded? Father Cuying was praying for Christian bloggers. He wasnt excluding non-Christian bloggers from the blogging community. How can he? His prayer won’t prevent Benj and other atheists (and Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, pagans) from continuing to blog, nor should it. And including atheists in the invocation will not make atheists feel better. Im sure they would much rather be left out of the invocation. This, the priest did. That’s why Benj’s taking offense at the contents of the invocation was a bit baffling to me since it wasnt about him. It looked like a claim to victimhood or at least a claim for political correctness which, come to think of it, might be the same thing. We’re all different but we’re one in that we belong to a community. E pluribis unum.
some people here have chosen to make comments without reading more than one sentence. : |
I have always been clear in saying that I am not against prayers per se. I really hate it when I’m being misrepresented – wittingly or unwittingly.
Jeg, I was never aligned with any religion, nor did I have an overwhelming belief in the existence of a god. Kindly keep your assumptions to yourself especially if they have something to do with me. I mean that in the most respectful way.
AGAIN, THE ACT OF PRAYING DID NOT OFFEND ME. Manolo has already made the necessary corrections regarding that. It’s the act of presumptuously assuming that everyone’s blog was supposed to used for the forwarding of the interests of Christianity that set me off.
READ PEOPLE!!! READ!!!!! I NEVER SAID THAT PEOPLE SHOULDN’T PRAY. I didnt even raise the entire idea of the moment of silence – the christians on my blog were the ones who advocated that.
I think it’s ok to give thanks for the event, attendance, venue, etc. I think that’s still within the boundaries of common decency. Assuming that everyone inside the venue was christian and was blogging for the “greater glory of their religion/god” was very presumptuous and downright discriminatory.
“He’s an atheist. Even a moment of silence will offend him because that will still be praying”.
Observance of moment of Silence is not a prayer all the time. We do observe a few moments of silence every year, most notable the llth hour of the llth day of the llth month to Remember and To Honour those who gave the ultimate sacrifice in the plains and ridges of Europe so we can have our Freedom of Religions and that includes everyone of all Faiths, including non-believers. And after the moment of silence, everyone are free to say their prayers and everyone are free to listen or not.
But to deliver an invocation in a gathering that is not for religious purposes, where attendee may come from different faiths and no prior warning to those who may get offended is not only a breach of common sense, but imposing your own on others and it may not be illegal or unconstitutional, but just poor judgement….
Jeg, I was never aligned with any religion, nor did I have an overwhelming belief in the existence of a god.
Got it, benj. Like you said it was an assumption. I accept the rebuke.
yay! no harm no foul jeg. 🙂
if the intent was just to point out what was wrong with the proceeding, there should not have been a problem.
a moment of silence is normally preceeded by a prayer, the only thing there is it is done in silence.
Anyway, why aren’t we talking about Mark Lapid? that clip is sensational as well. hahahaha.
bote: a moment of silence is done in place of a prayer. The University of the Philippines often does this. In times that they choose to forego this, they usually have a choir singing hymns. 🙂
despite the obvious non-equivalence in paradigms (of atheists and theists), there are still more things that fall within the common ground*.
…mark lapid’s saging lang ang may puso is one of the common grounds. truly sensational…just read the viewers’ comments at youtube…
—–
*from benj’s website
Peace everyone. I am the author of the prayer. If you want to know about my take on the lively discussions here, please go to: http://www.stephencuyos.com/?p=282
wtf is joakim noah talking about?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58JsDoQDzTA
ex bush aide matthew dowd says he lost faith in Dubya.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/washington/01adviser.html?em&ex=1175659200&en=fdd5063f3666423f&ei=5087
With these statements of yours, I give you F in Logic.
And who sez, his prayer is stopping non-Christians not to continue their blogs.
Kapareho mo rin yong nagcomment doon sa blog ni Father CUyos na narrow minded ang mga nag-object sa parte ng dasal kung saan Christian ang ADJECTIVE na ginamit para sa mga bloggers.
Ang narrow-minded ay ang iniisip ay ang dasal ay para sa Kristiyano lang.
When I was lecturing in Indonesia, the attendees were mostly Moslems. But that lecture did not make it a Muslim event. We observed moment of silence before the start of every session. At 12:00, they were excused to say their prayers.
When my Jewish father-in-law died, there was a memorial. It was for the Jewish community, therefore prayers were in Jewish.It was a Jewish event.
But because he was a Head of Pathology Department of a hospital, a separate memorial was done by the employees and friends. Invocation did not mention anything about specific religion.
There is such a thing as INTERFAITH PLURALISM, people of little BrainFaith
benj, if you’re not against the act of praying, why do you want to dictate on what other people want to pray for? Why begrudge Christians if they want to advance Christianity through blogging? You have as much right to advance atheism through blogging, and I won’t begrudge you for it.
My Jesuit mentors have taught me to humanize Christian endeavors and Christianize human endeavors (like blogging. If you cannot acept that, have you heard of the word “tolerance”?
Hell C at. Your post on April 3rd, 2007 at 6:13 pm was about exclusion.
Perhaps it was your writing that I found incomprehensible. To wit: You assumed that the attendees were 100% Christian despite the fact at least one atheist was there. You mentioned as the community expands there will be more joining from different faiths and rhetorically ask, “Are we going to exclude them?” implying that there is exclusion. [Which led me to ask, Who was being excluded?]
My point was that the prayer, a Christian prayer, ‘excluded’ no one from the blog awards ceremony, if youll recall.
You equivocate the Blog Awards with the Blogosphere, hence my confusion. And yet later on you write, ‘Why is non-exclusion of non-Christians an issue?’ which misses the whole point entirely. The ‘issue’, if there ever was one–and I submit the issue is a non-issue–is the exclusion of atheists in the prayer. I said, if youll recall, that the atheists prefer that they not be included in the prayer. They are deliberately excluded in the prayer which, I suspect, what they want. An atheist would not want any part of that prayer. So the issue of exclusion is really an non-issue. Such is the gist of my message to benj.
Do I get an A now?
Ooops. I meant Hello, C at. Not Hell C at. Sorry.
I wrote:
It is a congregation of bloggers which at this year
composed of one hundred per cent Christians.
Take note of the word
I wrote:
As the Philippine blogosphere expands…
I am not referring to PBA. I am really referring to blogosphere particularly the bloggers. Bloggers in the Philippine blogosphere do not only include Christian Pinoy bloggers. There are many who have already adopted other religious beliefs.
Again, I will tell you, the word Christian excludes other faiths or non-faith.
It is also like saying Filipino foods. The word Filipino excludes other foods.
When I was having a conference with some foreigners in a tall building some years ago, the earthquake struck.
All of us prayed for safety uttering the two words MY GOD SAVE US…the Muslims could have invoked their Allah and the Jews their Yahweh and the Buddhists, their Buddha.
After the earthquake, we managed to
everyone about saying
— that is owning GOD for our salvation.
Religion … Fr. Cuycos can comment again…. but is it not religion’s purpose to divide… and that those who “have the gift” also have the understanding that they may be asked to separate brother from brother, or children from parents, when necessary?
Fr. Stephen Cuycops… And is it true, or is it not true, that all members of the Philippine Catholic priesthood have the duty to spread the faith…. and to separate wheat from chaff? [ The females have dispensation to be good citizens only — taking care of orphans and sick — without need to ‘divide’. ]
But of course… all in jest.
yes, these days of political correctness, it’s secular in nature. But, let’s not kid ourselves. moment of silence was derived from prayers, it is prayer in disguise. true atheist are supposed to be against this practise.
rp excluded, i’ve never been to a meeting, seminars or a conferences that starts, or ends, the proceeding with a “moment of silence”. then again, i have never been out of ASIA. pardon my ignorance.
Since when did “true atheism” equate to being against everything that has something to do with religion? I think you’re confusing fundamentalism (in the atheist sense) vs political correctness. I don’t think atheism necessarily translates to being an anti-establishment mentality towards all religions. Limiting the definition of atheism to a religion-hating individual is totally false matter. I have no idea where you’re drawing your “tenets” of real atheism. Atheism is denying the existence of god. that’s it. anything else that the person does doesn’t make him a real, ‘unreal’ or ‘virtual’ atheist. I’m atheist – not a member of Al Qaeda.
bote, go to UP. Twenty pesos says it’s in Asia.
Shaman of Malilipot: Again, the speaker made an effort to include everyone in attendance and assumed that everyone was christian.
Jeg: I am not aware of what other atheists want, so I’m sticking to what’s logically sensible to me. Having myself (and my blog) lumped into a pile of “vessels that would lead closer to the christian god” is a bit too presumptuous.
Shaman of Malilipot : I have nothing against christians who advance their religions via blogging. Once they take advantage of a secular event and hijack it as if it were a christian extravaganza, I think it’s no longer proper.
SC Justice Sandoval-Gutierrez told law grads from Bulacan State University to be “prayerful,†is that problematic too?
What about when Ate Glue once said that an ideology for national unity could be based on “Christian Democracy,†was that poor taste too? hmmm.
of course it is. LAKAS used to be NUCD only – the NUMD just followed later. I don’t think there needs to be a debate on whether or not the church has a strong influence in politics and society.