Rev. Fr. Lorenz J. Festin would always define Philosophy as the study of all things and their ultimate causes under the light of reason while Rev. Fr. Sid Puyat would define Philosophy as a continuous dialog between God, Man and the World.
When I was not yet a seminarian, I had a very strange insight about Philosophy because I believe that Philosophy is making simple things to its highest point of complexity. Etymologically speaking, I knew Philosophy as the love for wisdom.
But now, I had proved that Philosophy, like Logic and Science is very inevitable to man’s life. Without Philosophy, I think we can never grasp the very reason of our existence in this world and the reasons underlying it, so imagine life without Philosophy, disastrous and chaotic isn’t it
Many would say that Philosophy is not that important because Philosophy cannot feed them or make them rich, and such beliefs cannot be true nor even proven because Philosophy is being negated, that proving such principles will not be possible due of the absence of correct and valid reasoning.
On my own conviction, Philosophy is like a heart that continues to sustain all the vital organs and all units of life because if we try to look and study all the subjects that we have today in our contemporary times, everything undergoes through it, and it is proven to be correct.
Everyman is born to be genius, the only problem with man is that he is continuing to be lazy and mediocre that he, most of the time, forgets that he has the capability to think and reason, and thus he became contented in such situations.
For us to appreciate philosophy, we should continue seek and think deeper with regard to our relationship to God, to fellowmen and to the world because through these, we can see clearly the brighter side of Philosophy in our day-to-day activities.
As a generalization, Philosophy is the basic unit of our own personal knowledge, for it serves as the very foundation of our reasoning in every phenomenon that happens to our lives, thus one must ask to himself, “What is my Philosophy in life?”, for him to find the true essence of his existence.
Logic
Logic is defined etymologically as the science and art of correct reasoning. Honestly speaking, at first, I cannot really appreciate the importance and relevance of it because “I am blinded by my false beliefs.”
Actually, I had taken this subject when I was still studying Mass Communication outside the seminary, and some of the important facts about this subject matter were discussed and somehow helped to understand better in re-studying it in the seminary. I had to admit that I am quite cynical and skeptic with about studying it again because I believed that it is quite unfair for my part.
I always tell to myself that is not that important to study logic thoroughly because if ever I become a priest, I would definitely not use the complexities of this subject in preaching, and what I only need to have is “common sense.”
As days go by, and our lessons became deeper and deeper, I had found and realized the significance and the relevance of it to man and in his society gradually. Aristotle said: “Homo ensrationis”meaning that Man is a rational animal, hence, being a man, I have the faculty to think and reason out for the betterment of my own life.
As a Philosopher, I had fortunately understood the real essence of logic through my day-to-day activities, my relationships with others in the community, through my prayers and most especially through my discermenment
As I critically observed my life, my community in the seminary and the outside world, that more often, the reason, why many experience difficult problems that seems to have no solution at, all is because, most of the time this “simple logic’ is being neglected and not used.
We tend to rely on our own idiocracies that never really helped us in anyway, trying to believe that we are good and we can do such by our own not noticing the dangers that it can bring to our lives.
As a future priest, I, as a seminarian, must be a good logician because I am expected to explain the Good News of the Lord, answer basic and complex questions about the veracity of my faith, give advices to people that is really quite logical and truthful and as shepherd, Logic can help to make a difference to be an instrument of the Lord.
Logical Thinking
Nowadays, we have been experiencing a lot of difficulties in our nation, destabilization in the government, socio-political disputes and deterioration of morality, and most of these problems are considered to belong to the vicious cycle in our society, a cancer that continues to ruin and kill the dignity of all its members.
These problems have been occurring for centuries and up to the present moment. I am citing these occurrences in our society because the root of these problems, if taken seriously is the lack, and maybe the absence of Logical Thinking.
In my own understanding of logical thinking, it is a way of reasoning correctly, logically and soundly, and by this we can formulate new concepts, ideas, formulae and solutions to have an answer or remedy to numerous eminent problems that we have right now.
Etymologically speaking, we must inculcate to our minds that it must follow the rules in logic− reasoning, so to speak for us to be sure that is logically correct. Logical thinking can make our minds to function accordingly and effectively, by this we cannot become merely victims of deceptions and oppressions all around our environment because we are expected to think before we act.
The seminary is the best place for having this kind of thinking because we follow certain structures that are not based from mere opinions and hypotheses that have no firm no foundation.
My Bishop would always tell us seminarians to think first before we act, for every action that we do, there is a corresponding consequence to be faced.
Spider man once said, “The greater power you have, the greater responsibility you must have.” Logical thinking then, refers to a systematic and comprehensive reasoning not base on opinions and theories without firm foundation and proof.
I believe that logical thinking is very suitable not only in our country but for our own selves as well for we are the members of this society that were expected to reform and change whatever is not right, this belief can push us through making our land a better place to live in.
Fallacy
Fallacy is defined etymologically as an erroneous and false reasoning and argumentation, and if it not examined carefully, one can become a victim of this. For me living in the province is one of the best experiences a person can have because there one can enjoy the beauty of the sceneries, the peaceful ambiance, the friendly gestures of the people, and the freshness of the air that soothes and refreshes the body, but, in the province, as I have experienced, a lot of fallacies are around the place, one of these fallacies is the belief in superstitions.
Media has become a visible bridge of these strange beliefs, because they portray it in movies, talk shows, via internet, radio programs and so on, and the people, without critical thinking become lured by these fallacies.
As a seminarian, it is indeed a great challenge for me to correct these kinds of erroneous beliefs and convictions that people do believe. These fallacies make our rationality to decline and change its course from good to worse because we are easily deceived by this Filipino erroneous maxim; “Wala namang mawawalapagnaniwala.”, at first we can say that is all right, but we are not aware that we already been affected by these kinds of strange beliefs without even any solid proofs.
In our times of darkness and difficulties that our nation had been undergoing, I believe, as a seminarian that everyone must know how to reason out and examine what is a fallacy and what is not because through this we can become effective in fighting and correcting what is crooked
Many have been victimized and fallen by these fallacies, many have lost lives because of these, many minds have been affected by these erroneous reasoning, enough of this!
I believethat the progress of this nation depends upon its citizens, and we as members of this nation, must act reasonably and logically so that we can uplift our nation.
I believe that is not still e for us to make a difference, to change fallacies to correct reasoning, from falsity to truth because we are logicians by nature that has the ability to reason out, thus if we do so, these fallacies will be done gradually.
Life
Throughout the years, man has been always been optimistic in making his quality of life to be in the highest level by making solutions to the most frequent problems in life like medicines, mechanical technologies, researches, state of the art gadgets and so on.
Life, according to our professor in Zoology, Bro. Reynaldo Yago, OFM, Life per se, cannot be defined due of its mysteries and complexities. As I see it, many of us do not look at the importance of life by neglecting our duties and responsibilities to nurture life by extreme pollution, engaging to vices, abortion, and pre-marital sex and so on that make life to deteriorate.
Life of man and our world must be given a prior importance because these two have a mutual relationship, meaning they work together for their “dike.” The deterioration of our generation and the degradation of our environment are the causes of our irreverence to life. We are informed by means of televisions, radios and internets some debates or shows about the importance of life regarding its importance and the way we can improve the quality of it, but what is lacking is our means to make such revolution for the upliftment of it. The most visible examples of these are “abortion” and “suicide” for many years now, people all around the world continue to discuss whether to legalize or not the said matter, and sad to say, many who are in favored of the legalization of abortion stated that if the baby is unwanted, then it is right to abort it for the baby not to suffer, suicide is also like that, if you do not want to suffer then commit such!
Life for me is quite a big deal because it is the clearest visible sign of the loving presence of God that he even created us in His own likeness and image and with free will, thus by these reasons we should nurture our life to the fullest so that we can thank our God for creating us.
Life is given to us only once and thus we should live our life to the fullest by doing the will of the Lord for us, and by doing such, we can proudly say that are life is never a non-sense but a fruitful one because we know that we do our part, go on celebrate Life!
Seminary Formation
When I was still an applicant, aspiring to become a seminarian, I though being inside the seminary means only praying all the time and doing hard work and reading the sacred scriptures, and other words I though that these are the only things that we have to do in the seminary. Upon entering the seminary, I had so many realizations in my life and found out that what I had been anticipating were not true after all.
Seminary formation is indeed not that easy because it has a very structured form of organization and schedules that is being implemented to each and every seminarian inside the community that sometimes let me thought that the schedules and the things to do were not according to Human Rights and is totally unfair and unreasonable.
Aside from a very long seminary formation, it also trains seminarians to be good and holy priests because of the many aspects and effects of the rules and the activities that is implementing. I have to admit that really seminary formation has helped me a lot especially on how to deal with others that seems to be the most difficult, how to form study habits, how to confront and correct myself which is indeed very needed to do so. Seminary formation is indeed a key for a seminarian to know himself more effectively and truthfully because the seminary is not a school or rehabilitation center that help a young man to reform himself and live his life according to the dictates of his environment, but because it is the seminary of Jesus Christ, thus, because of His grace, mercy and justice, one can see rightly what kind of personality he has.
The seminary has been founded many centuries ago, it had had witnessed a lot of changes in the nation, but still it has never change its structure and main goal because it is not based on the opinions of people which are totally not grounded in truth and morality, which of course are the main basis of seminary formation. I have to admit that most of the time I become so hard headed, rebellious and most of the time illogical upon thinking that the formators are unfair in making decisions because I have a mind set that they are putting a seminarian inside the box and being judged unjustly, but at the end, I had realized that even though sometimes the formators has hurt me, there is still a ray of light that helped me understand them, and that is because that they formators loves us and do not want us to go astray, and for that, in want to thank you, dear formators for always guiding us even though we are most of the time hard headed.
Reasoning
For the past two semesters of studying logic, Reasoning is one of the many keywords I cannot forget because Fr. Sid would keep on reminding and reminding this very word upon his teaching in Logic. Upon reflecting, I had realized that reasoning can make a boat to run in its course, and thus it can make or break the boat depending upon the steersman, that’s why, we must use every knowledge that we have in order for us to develop a good sense of reasoning.
Reasoning is a very great help for each and every individual, by this, it can make us understand the problems that we encounter in our daily lives, for example, in our subjects in school, especially mathematics and other subjects that requires analysis, we can be assured that we can solve them easily if and only if we do the right procedures.
Most of the time, we Filipinos tend to become unreasonable whenever we are doings actions, implementing the rules and regulations, judging between good and right and so on, thus we encounter a lot of backfires in our own selves, but the sad thing is that we no longer recognize our own faults, and the sadder part is that we keep on blaming others, that were actually innocent of such things.
Like what I have wrote on my previous reflection papers, and some of personal credos, it is indeed true that in order for us to progress and gain what we have been longing for, the only thing we should do is to reason out with the use of our head, because it will be the source of everything and anything that we can have in order for us to renew and reform the things that we had before that were not effective and truthful.
Many politicians have already promised that if they win, then they will change the way of living of the people, that even their families and friends were not exempted from the laws of the land, that they will let go their businesses and self interest for them to serve the nation, but as voters, we did not use our reasoning that we are easily deceived by these people and the of course, the out come is not that pleasant.
If we only use our “human reasoning”, I think the Philippines will be ranked among the top countries of the world, zero rate in corruption and so on. We can still make it happen. Let us work together and extract the creative reasons that we have.
Clarity of Language
I would like to define language base on the lectures that our professor had thought us, as the verbal expression of an idea. Honestly speaking, I never really thought that language is a part of studying language; it has been late for me to realize that it has a certain importance not only in logic per se, but to my very self as well.
For me, language subjects are the most difficult subject to study with because unlike any other subjects, languages have rules to follow and principles to be considered before you verbalize and write it. Actually, even in Filipino, our national language, it always took a hard time to comprehend such.
Language is very important to humanity because without I think we never really understood each other and thus it will become very chaotic among us for we cannot mean what we are trying to express, but unfortunately, we cannot see clearly the importance of it.
I believe that the Clarity of language is first and foremost the important factor upon studying a language because there are words that spell the same, there are words that even though not spelled the same has a the same meaning and so on. I think that if we do not have the clarity of language we never really understood what we are trying to say, as a future priest, it is indeed true that we are considered as the communicator of the Good News of the Lord and thus we should know how to become effective preachers by the help of the said matter.
All languages are words, but not all words are language, and this is true because there are words that do not express an idea after all. Many times, we experience a lot of problems in communicating, for example, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has been a constant victim of misinformation, and because of this the clarity of language has been corrupted.
Therefore, I believe that Language must be taken seriously because if the language is not clear, aside from not communicating effectively, we can distort the culture, tradition and customs that a certain place has, thus like logic, science and Philosophy, we must treat Language as one of the important factors in our ministry.
Insight
Insight is defined in the dictionary as a perception or inner nature of a thing; an intellectual discernment, a quick perception of truth or knowledge without conscious attention or reasoning; that which is perceived or known intuitively.
Nowadays, where chaos, problems, socio-economic and political corruption are very rampant in our world, I think and I believe that insight is very important for a person to have. I remember Rev. Fr. Lorenz Festin would always say on his lecture in Intro to Philo that man, (specially the Filipinos) tendsto become shallow and trivial because of the information or the kind of thinking that he has. I think this is quite true because I have experienced it myself.
Insight is also very much alike with that of vision because they both have the perception and expectation. His Eminence Gaudencio Cardinal B. Rosales said that a person without vision commits treason, and I believe that it very true because as I have I experienced, I always commit a lot of mistakes, illogical actions and reasonings, fallacies and inability to make effective decisions concerning my vocation.
I had realized that insight is very important for a future priest like me because I have to be careful in acting respective principles, judging between right and wrong, dealing with morality and immorality and so on.
The reflection papers that we have in Logic is very helpful for me, and for the whole class as I may say because it has trained us to have a view, inculcate to our minds new lessons, ask questions very related to our experiences and the discussed topics and of course, bringing on to life as a form of realization upon acquiring knowledge and virtue.
I believe that insight can make a difference even on its own little ways because big things come from small things, and thus, things can be done gradually to be efficient and precise. Like an architect, who is very capable of planning before executing what he had planned, we can too as seminarians or priests can do so because we have planned ahead of time before acting such programs or agendas. To have an insight in life is being logical, effective, precise and critical kind of person.
By: Romeo Q. Locson Jr. | Barangay Secretary to the Sangguniang Brgy. of Camachile
