Did Rizal Retract?

Did Jose Rizal retract?

                Was there any retraction? A question still unanswered from 1896 to the present day. Professor Padilla of the University of the Philippines states the position of many and perhaps most educated Filipinos in this way.
                “Briefly then the picture presented before us is that of Dr. Jose Rizal, the man, the scientist, and rationalist who wrote vigorously against the Catholic Church, and who ridiculed the idea of hell. A few hours before his execution, when threatened with eternal damnation, he became suddenly ‘distributed’ and like a child, ‘ No, no, I would not be condemned’. Answered by Father Balaguer that he would certainly go to hell if he did not retract and return to the Catholic Church, the fear became greater, his reason capitulated to faith, and he exclaimed: ‘Well father, I promise that the remainder of my lifetime I will employ asking God for the grace of faith’. Where  upon he signed a retraction in which he disowned all that he ever said and wrote against the church and abominate Masonry. This supposed facts brought out in the way of evidence, when pieced together, do not seem to fit psychologically into the picture.
                The ones who believed that Rizal retracted are mostly basing their arguments to the statement of Father Balaguer who have given the story of how the Jesuits managed to convince Rizal to go back to church and make a retraction. The retraction paper and the book ( Act s of Faith, Hope, and Charity) was their most important evidence.
                These evidences instead of proving that Rizal retracted caused more doubts. Rizal’s relatives were promised that the retraction would be read to them in Paco Church, but the never heared it. That caused doubt. The newspapers published different versions. That caused doubt.
                Then came the report that it had been lost. Absurd! After four years of effort in Dapitan to convert Rizal succeeded, after the orders had all prayed with penances, the retraction, the most precious document the church possessed in the Philippines, had be been lost?
                Father Balaguer swears under oath (1917) that he took it to Ateneo before Rizal was brought out to be shot, and that Father Pio Pi carried it to the Palace of Archbishop Nozaleda, entrusting it to Gonzales Feijoo, who deposited it in the chest for reserved papers. Then all trace of it was lost. Father Pio said they looked for it but could not find it. That caused doubt.
                For thirty-nine years, million of Filipinos, whether Catholic or not, denied that such paper existed. Then the retraction was found by Father Manuel Garcia on May 18, 1935 in the very files where it had been formerly sought in vain. That facts caused doubt. Why had it been missing for thirty-nine years?
                The archbishop permitted Ricardo Pascual, Ph. D. to examine the retraction, and gave him a good photostat of it. On Pascual’s book called “Rizal Beyond Grave” in which he seems to show the minute measurements that the retraction diverges from the style of Rizal’s other writings of that period, and he concludes that the paper was forgery. Pascual points out that both the signatures of the “witnesses” were signed by the same man, and they do indeed look alike.
                There were more issues which produced doubts. Rizal was not buried where persons in good ecclesiastical standing are buried in  Paco Cemetery, but in “unconcentrated ground” between the outer and inner wall where Father Burgos had been buried after his execution. This raises doubt, if he really did go back to the church why was he not buried in a coffin or a boy of any kind. This raises doubt.
                As to the burial of Rizal, if you will receive the burial record of Rizal in the Paco Register it is not on the page 147 where the persons who died in December, 1896 were recorded, but on page 204, where person buried ten months later, in September, 1897 were recorded. His name was written on the burial record 10 months after he was buried. Pascual’s theory ist hat they buried Rizal as an unrepentant criminal, and the had to frame a case later to fit the retraction story which was in question.
                Doubt has also been raised by the fact that neither the archbishop nor the Jesuits asked for pardon or mitigation of Rizal’s sentence. If he really retracted and went back to the Catholic Church, he must have been protected by the Jesuits but only his family begged for mercy.
                The strongest argument was the character of Rizal. Few months before his sentence he had rejected Father Sanchez’ offer offer of a professorship, a hundred thousand pesos and an estate if he would retract; and he had declared that the could not be bought for half the Philippines.
                That is Rizal and not the one who cried infront of Father Balaguer. He was not only incorruptible, but very angry at the least suggestion that he might be buried. The character speaks so loud against the retraction that all of Rizal’s old friends believe he could not have written it. They look at the writing and say “ Yes, that is his handwriting, but then, Maraino Ponce and Antonio Lopez and many others could write exactly like Rizal.
                The question,”Did Rizal retract?”depends upon the the genuineness or otherwise, of the supposed retraction. The archbishop should settle this suggestion, or at least attempt to settle it, by permitting the document to be submitted to the greatest hand writing experts in the world, preferably to several of them working independently. He should permit the paper and the ink to be subjected to the best tests of modern science.
                The analysis which has thus far been made is that of Pascual, and he pronounces the document to be a forgery. Under these circumstances, the church must shoulder the burden of proof that it is not. As of now, after thorough research on this topic, if you are to ask the researcher of his answer on the question, “Did Rizal Retract?” He would answer NO.

-Ronnie Barrientos
-for classroom purposes only-

Analysis: Does Homosexuality Pose a Threat to Children?

"I have known few homosexuals who did not practice their tendencies. Such people are sinning against God and will lead to the ultimate destruction of the family and our nation. I am unalterably opposed to such things, and will do everything I can to restrict the freedom of these people to spread their contagious infection to the youth of our nation." - Pat Robertson, May 24, 1994 letter.

This argument is based on several misunderstandings: that homosexuals are more prone to molest children and that it is possible to recruit children into homosexuality and that homosexuals carry out such acts of recruitment.

On the issue of molestation, this is what Dr. Gregory M. Herek at the Psychology Department of the University of California at Davis has to say: "The empirical research on adult sexual orientation and molestation of children does not show that gay men are any more likely than heterosexual men to molest children. This is not to suggest that molestations of children by adult homosexual men never occur. They do. But molesting children has nothing to do with whether a man is heterosexual or homosexual."

On the issue of recruitment, this idea imposes two theories: that homosexuality can be induced by conscious acts and that homosexuals wish to and do recruit.

The first theory is obviously based on assumptions. First, almost all the research in psychology and biology indicate that homosexuality is a part of a person's inner personality, just seeing gays or gay couple or living with gays can’t turn a person into a homosexual, “homosexuality is caused by genes and not by the environment (Search for the Gay Gene: Dean Hammer and David Copeland), thus proves that homosexuality can’t be induced. As for the second theory, that homosexuals wish to and do recruit, this is without any basis. For a person to recruit, first he should have the ability to induce homosexuality to someone, it’s already proven by science that homosexuality can’t be taught or be imposed so no recruitment can occur.

It is often said that homosexuals wish to portray homosexuality in an attractive manner in the media and in the schools in order to attract young, impressionable children. This accusation is incorrect, for it’s possible to influence the sexual orientation of a youngster by means of movies, articles, or factual classroom information. Even if that were the case, the heterosexual lifestyle is clearly so predominant in society (which heterosexuals most often do not even reflect upon), that the impressions taken by youngster must be much stronger from that side than from the side of homosexuality. Weinberg, President of The American Psychiatric Association stated in 1977: "A parent's fear that their child will be recruited at school or elsewhere is without scientific foundation".

The information about homosexuality in media and schools is desired by gays and lesbians solely to help kids who feel attracted to kids of their own sex to accept those unchangeable feelings. The sole purpose is to make these kids feel better about who they are, because most of us who grew up with homosexual feelings felt quite lonely and scared of society's reaction. Good information can help these kids to grow up healthy and self-confident. Gay and lesbian teens are two to three times more likely to attempt suicide than their heterosexual peers and account for up to 30% of all completed suicides among teens - in 1989, suicide was the leading cause of death among gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered youth (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1989). Therefore, honest information, positive role models, support from well informed teachers, counselors and friends could be of a great help to a teenager who is struggling with his or her sexual orientation.

To conclude, then, the claim that homosexuals pose a threat to children is defaming and without basis. Homosexuals, just like heterosexuals, generally love and care for children and wish them only to lead good, rewarding, and honest lives.

LGBT

LGBT collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. The term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community", which many within the community in question felt did not accurately represent all those to whom it referred.

The term LGBT is intended to emphasize a diversity of "sexuality and gender identity-based cultures" and is sometimes used to refer to anyone who is non-heterosexual instead of exclusively to people who are homosexual, bisexual, or transgender.

The initialism has become mainstream as a self-designation and has been adopted by the majority "sexuality and gender identity-based" community centers and media in the United States and some other English-speaking countries. Even in the Philippines, the term LGBT is also used by journalist and writers when they refer to the gay community.

P-FLAG

Most of the gays and lesbians who decide to come out experience discrimination, rejection and bullying. Friends turn their back to you and parents maltrating you when all you wanted is just to stop pretending to be a person you’re not and start being your own self.

In a world where most of the people’s eyes are closed for acceptance and ears shut for understanding.  Here arouses a group of people who open their hearts for love and respect; here comes a socio-political group of family members and friends of  lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people, walking on the streets, organizing pride parades and gives counselling in support of the LGBT.

With more than  500 affiliates throughout the United States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and 11 other countries, this fast growing group aims to celebrate diversity and envisions a society that embraces everyone, including those of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities. Thanks to P-FLAG or Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, there is now hope that someday, like these people, the world will accept homosexuals.

Gaydar: Definition

During the 80’s and 90’s, it’s easy to identify that a person is admitted to himself that he is gay; just by the way he dress, the way he walks or the way he talks you will already be able to know if he’s “confirmed” or not.

Today, most of the gaymen choose to be more straight-looking, some enroll in modelling classes to learn the proper way of walking and some we’re just very straight even in the way they talk, sit or react on things. Making the famous slogan by women before that says, “kapag naghanap ka ng lalaki, siguruhin mong gwapo” into “kapag naghanap ka ng gwapo, siguruhin mong lalaki”.

Nowadays, differentiating gays from straight men just by looking at them is very difficult, but not everyone is decieved, some people have this somekind of ability called “gaydar” that helps them identify who’s gay and who’s not.

Gaydar is a combination of two words, gay and radar and refers to the intuitive ability of a person to assess others' sexual orientations as homosexual, bisexual, or heterosexual. Gaydar relies almost exclusively on non-verbal clues and LGBT stereotypes. These include the sensitivity to social behaviors and mannerisms; for instance, acknowledging flamboyant body language, overtly rejecting traditional gender roles, a person's occupation and grooming habits.

The detection of sexual orientation by outward appearance or behavior is frequently challenged by situations with gay men who do not act in a stereotypically "gay" fashion, or with metro-sexual men who exhibit a lifestyle, spending habits, and concern for personal appearance stereotypical of fashionable urban gays. For those who are said to have stronger gaydars, they no longer have difficulty in knowing who’s gay even if he looks so straight.

A number of scientific studies have been conducted to test whether gaydar is real or just a popular myth. Perhaps the earliest study asked people to judge sexual orientation from video clips and concluded that it was not. A later and more rigorous study published in a prestigious psychology journal showed that people could accurately judge sexual orientation. This study asked people to indicate their sexual orientation using the Kinsey scale and then had others view very brief silent clips of the people talking using thin-slicing. The viewers rated their sexual orientations on the same scale and the researchers found a significant correlation between where the people said they were on the scale and where they were perceived to be on the scale. Sexual orientation was therefore perceived accurately just from nonverbal behaviors. Later studies have repeated this finding and have even shown that home videos of kids can be used to accurately judge their sexual orientation later in life.

Later studies found that gaydar was also accurate for judgments just from the face. The race, ethnicity, and nationality of neither the person making the judgment nor the person they are judging seems to make a difference when making judgments from faces. Even individual facial features such as the eyes  give enough information to tell whether a man or woman is gay, straight, or lesbian. One study showed that judgments of men’s and women’s faces for about 1/25th of a second was enough time to tell whether they were gay, straight, or lesbian. People’s judgments were not any more accurate when they had more time to make their judgments. Follow-up work to this suggested that gaydar happens automatically when someone sees another person and that seeing someone’s face automatically activates stereotypes about gays and straights. People seem not to know that they have gaydar, though. Not surprisingly, gay men have better gaydar than straight men and women have better gaydar when they are ovulating. One study hypothesized that this might be because gay men are more attentive to details than straight men.

-Ronnie John Barrientos

Source: Biology of Behavior by David Copeland
           Gaydar by Donald F. Reuter

Rejection of Parents to Gay Teens Affect Teen’s Health

In the Philippine setting, a country known to be the center of Roman Catholicism in Asia, most of the populace believe that being gay is a sin, unacceptable and immoral. In a country this conservative, coming out is very difficult, rejection, prejudice and condemnation is rampant and discrimination is inevitable.

Filipino gays had been survivors of this very narrow-minded land, gays learned how to treat these unjust acts as a part of their daily gay life, but like ordinary people, gays can also be hurt, like normal people, gays can also feel insults and like everyone, when we we’re still small children, when we are bullied, discriminated and rejected, we run crying to our protectors, our parents, but what if the very  persons you believe to comfort you also rejects, hates and don’t accept you, what will you do?

This had been the very first reason why most of Filipino gays don’t come out, the reason why they do not enjoy their life, especially  their childhood. We see gays becoming the source of fun in group discussions or in different events but the real scenario when they return home is like a play where you pretend to be someone you’re not, a very unfunny thing.

In some worse cases, parents even hurt their gay child physically, their had been so many reports about abuse on gays,some put their gay sons in drums full of water, some tie them inside a sack and hang them and beat them and some fathers even hit their sons until they bleed; these physical abuses by their parents on gays is so prevalent in the Philippines and so is psychological abuse which most of the psychologists believe to be more harmful.

According to new research, parents who reject their gay or lesbian teen are setting the teen up for an increased risk of poorer health in their early adulthood.

Specifically, gay young adults who reported higher levels of family rejection during adolescence were more than 8 times more likely to report having attempted suicide, nearly 6 times more likely to report high levels of depression, and 3.4 times more likely to use illegal drugs or having engaged in unprotected sexual intercourse, compared with peers from families that reported no or low levels of family rejection.

The study, led by Caitlin Ryan, PhD, Director of the Family Acceptance Project and her team at the César E. Chávez Institute at San Francisco State University, shows that negative parental behaviors toward lesbian, gay or bisexual (LGB) children dramatically compromises their health.

“For the first time, research has established a predictive link between specific, negative family reactions to their child’s sexual orientation and serious health problems for these adolescents in young adulthood such as depression, illegal drug use, risk for HIV infection, and suicide attempts,” said Ryan.

Finding out that your son or daughter is gay, lesbian or bisexual can come as a shock, but it is important that you can learn to understand and accept your child for who they are. This is very important because it can knock your child's confidence if you don't support their views.

I hope, as a gay, that the day will come when gays would no longer need to wait for their fathers and mothers to die before they come out.

-Ronnie John Barrientos

MSU-GSC Failure of election (SSC) and the image of the COMELEC

Last March 1, 2012, Mindanao State University General Santos City had a university-wide election for new sets of officers for the Supreme Student Council (SSC), SY 2012-2013. The election started smoothly but on the last ours of the sad day, it was discovered that some of the ballot boxes was touched by unauthorized personnels and some ballots we’re tampered, that started the chaos, with so many revelations so was the rise of worse and more unimaginable issues; some witnesses went out and testified that a running officer is giving Certificate of Registration (COR) (a requirement for a student to vote) to those who want to vote but forget or lost their CORs, CORs can’t be given by just students, these documents must come from the Registrar’s Office, so many issues went out that day that you can’t even identify what is true or what is just a mere hearsay. With such issues, the COMELEC declared a “failure of election”.

The COMELEC (Commission on Election) as the one assigned to facilitate the election is being blamed by so many for the declaration of the failure of election. It’s the first time in the history of MSU-GSC SSC elections that the COMELEC declared such decision, the event had been a very big issue in the entire university and the feedback of most of the students is, “what a shame to the COMELEC”.

I am not a member of the COMELEC nor a relative or a bestfriend of one of the COMELEC officers; I am just a concerned 2nd Year AB Political Science Student of MSU and wants to voice out my better opinion (I believe) than most of the studentry. I wrote this article to show my understanding of the situation, that it’s “an applause to the COMELEC” and not “a shame on them”. You know, these COMELEC officers we’re volunteers and didn’t even have any just compensation for their efforts, before we give our reactions let as first try to investigate and understand what the situation really is.

For most of the students in the university, upon hearing the issue of the failure of election, the first reaction is “WHAT!” then puts all the blame to the COMELEC officers. I can’t blame these students of having such reactions; it’s true that the term failure of election is so negative, but let us think scholarly, we’re students of a state university and we must use first our brains before our mouth.

The COMELEC is the body that we put our trust into during elections, "public service is a public trust." As protector of the people's right of suffrage, the COMELEC pledges to faithfully and evenly discharge its solemn constitutional responsibility of ensuring the sanctity of elections. With the failure of election, I believe the COMELEC still has done its function, “ensuring the sanctity of election”; think of this, which is better, declaring  a failure of election or letting those who did dirty politics take the positions and win. I believe that with such scenario happening that day, the best decision is to declare a failure of election, would we think first of the image and let those who do not deserve take the positions than do the right actions? The issues of “dagdag-bawas” can’t be blamed to the COMELEC, they are human beings and have limitations, it was the ones who planned to sabotage the election results that must be blamed, if there’s a will there always is a way, as I’ve seen, the COMELEC did all their best even with scarce funding but what can they do if some would really persist to impose their will.

I wish that the people who will read this article will be more sensitive on giving comments about the said election, I’ve seen some officers being hurt because of negative feedbacks to them but what they did was just perform their duties. Even with our simple jokes, let us be more sensitive, this is not a funny issue for the COMELEC officials. Before you talk, try to first put your feet on their shoes. The persons that must be blamed here are the ones who did all the “hokus-pokus” instead of wasting our time in blaming the COMELEC why don’t we help them investigate who really we’re the very persons who must be held accountable for what happened. Go to the COMELEC and help, it’s not the time of blaming the wrong persons it’s the time of identifying who really are responsible and who should be punished.

-Ronnie Barrientos

Sex Education in the Philippines

The planned inclusion of sex education in both primary and secondary schools has started  a great deal of  debates in the Philippines. Since the proposed incorporation of sex education in elementary and high school curriculum pushed by Education Secretary Mona Valisno, various groups have started to voice out their opinion either agreeing or disagreeing with the said notion.

Many of the inhabitants of the Philippines, a country known to be the center of Catholicism in Asia and a very conservative country sees this proposal as an aggressive act that will result to catastrophic damages. Moreover, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), a governing body of the Roman Catholic  Church in the Philippines believe that such act will promote pre-marital sex and propagate immoral ideas and virtues.

The author of this article greatly appreciates and respects the views of the conservatives but let us not close all of the doors for the said proposal, though in the first look, the proposal is so negative but thinking twice and listening first to the views of the opposite side before deciding to be against or pro is a better way of coming up with the best decisions.

First, is there really a problem and will the inclusion of sex education to education curriculum solve such problem? As the data provided by the Forum for Family Planning and Development Inc. show, there are two million teenage Filipina girls who are pregnant at this moment while more than four million Filipinos aged 15-19 have already had sexual intercourse (most don't even know safes sex). Thus, such figures will show you the possibility of future increase in abortion and over-population because of unwanted pregnancy, not only that, there will be more drop-outs (mostly in women) among high school students which will also increase the number of the out of school youth and will inevitably cause a big problem in the Philippine economy, a state classified as a third world country. Moreover, not knowing proper and safe sex will also increase the number of AIDS victims and many other sex-related sickness , it’s a fact that most male teenagers involve themselves into unsafe sex such as going to bars and sleeping with women they don’t even know without using any protection. See, even just having lack of knowledge about sex can lead into a very disturbing domino effect.

Sex education will teach teenage Filipinos safe sex and is a very effective tool in fighting the very prevalent problems stated above. Sex education promotes ideas such as the right time to marry, the burdens of being a single/teenage mother and the fine line that separates love and lust.

On the other hand, most of the conservatives look at the proposal with closed eyes and ears, just hearing the topic “sex-education” already is for most of them immoral without even listening or trying to analyze why some people agree to it.

Their very main argument is that sex education will promote premarital sex to teenagers and will lessen the degree of morality among Filipino teenagers.

As to the promotion of premarital sex, sex education is not the promoter but is the solution for it. Teenagers and children even before reaching 10 years of age already have an idea on how to do sex even without sex education so this problem must not be blamed on the proposal, such acts are learned mostly in watching TVs, internet pornography which is very rampant and even sharing of experiences peers. Let’s be realistic, no matter how we say that we are in a conservative country, it’s a fact that children even in young age already know how to use their organs. Accepting that there is a problem is the first step in solving it, sex-education will open teenagers minds on the effects of engaging in pre-marital sex and unsafe sex and will be a daily reminder that there is proper time and way to do things.

Also, the church argues with the reasoning of morality but morality is not the issue here, it’s the health and the future of the young Filipinos, the state must approve and impose acts and rules just by looking if it’s for the welfare of the people and not if it’s moral or immoral according to the church; it’s clearly stated in Article 2 Section 6 of the Philippine Constitution (1987) that “the separation of church and state shall be inviolable”.

Sex education is not about having sex, it's about understanding how can premature sexual intercourse affect our lives. It's more like a tried and tested revivalist's technique; "first take the sinners on a tour of hell, after which heaven would appear more inviting."