We had forgotten that Jimmy, the super technocrat . . . was human . . . and he needed our listening, our patience, our forgiveness, our nurturing, our friendship. And our love.

PRAYER OF A FRIEND OF JAIME ONGPIN


In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

O LOVING FATHER…

What is it in our work for the Philippines that destroys the very best in us? The latest one destroyed is . . . Jaime Ongpin.

All of us — we want so much to do our best, and to serve our country and our suffering people. BUT AT WHAT COST, O GOD, AT WHAT COST?

NOW our friend Jimmy Ongpin is gone.

We focus our attention and our energies so much on the IMPERSONAL, and the MACRO LEVEL, so that for us, reality shrinks and becomes limited only to the correct, the quantifiable, the successful, the popular. . . .

AND WE NO LONGER LISTEN TO THE HUMANNESS WITHIN US . . . to the loneliness, the imperfection, the ambivalence, the incompleteness, the thirst for Home, the need for affirmation, the CRAVING FOR A REAL FRIEND.

Yesterday we went to the Ateneo and we gazed upon the lifeless body of JAIME ONGPIN. A noble man. A brilliant man. A brave man. A good man. But we had all forgotten.

We had forgotten that Jimmy, the super technocrat . . . was human . . . and he needed our listening, our patience, our forgiveness, our nurturing, our friendship. And our love.

In the darkness, and in the raging, cruel waters of depression, Jimmy was drowning. And we were not there. Our friend Jimmy Ongpin was alone, and he needed us, and we were not there.

Maybe because the universe for us has indeed shrunk to the impersonal, the correct, the quantifiable, the successful, the popular.

Maybe because we can no longer HEAR the silent, painful scream of the HUMANNESS within our BROTHERS and within US.

Maybe because we no longer REVERENCE the HUMAN . . . the loneliness, the imperfection, the ambivalence, the need for affirmation, the ANGUISH, the PAIN, the CRAVING for a REAL FRIEND.

And that is why we cannot see, and we cannot hear, and we cannot treasure the most essential, the most priceless reality of all — THE HUMAN PERSON. . . .

AND SO THEN, MOST LOVING FATHER, today we humbly pray to you. . . . Please teach us to be sensitive and TO LISTEN. TO LISTEN TO THE HUMANNESS IN OTHERS. TO THE HUMANNESS IN OUR OWN SELVES.

Teach us to LAUGH . . . teach us to CRY. Teach us to REVERENCE: the SACRED, the WOUNDED, and the WEAK. Teach us to be GENTLE. Teach us to FORGIVE. And, please . . . teach us TO LOVE.

FOR WE ARE ALL HUMAN. LIKE JESUS CHRIST. OUR SAVIOR. OUR BROTHER. AND OUR FRIEND.

v v v

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.


~ acj ~