Getting back to the real Business After Business

It is Easter Thursday! And hopefully we all have been able to recover from the long weekend that we had as we once again face a new set of holidays! I love holidays and I guess most of us do. Except perhaps those in business who have orders to meet and work to compensate. Holidays mean added expense.

Last Holy weekend, my family and I went to the northern part of Luzon. It was supposedly refreshing to go on a short break except we had to contend with the traffic brought about by numerous processions of churches in close proximity held.

It was nice to watch tradition with all the artistry and its color except that I did not understand the need for glum faces and bloodshed as people literally walked along the streets whipping themselves with what looked like bamboo tiles tied together at the end of a rope. I was told that they inflicted these on their bodies as an act of penance.

As blood marked their bodies, some sprinkling among those who were close. I could not help but cringe at this act of violence against self.  Christ died for our sins. And HE ransomed us all. There is no need for us to share in his passion in this way. For the act of passion is indeed a great act of love for mankind that Jesus had to endure for us. And no amount of physical pain during the Holy Week can pay or even allow us to share in His pain. It in fact to a degree is insulting His sacrifice especially when I learned that in some areas, for a sum of P50,000, a person will allow himself to be nailed. Another will take on the role of the one who whips and crucifies the character player of Jesus. This is no way to repay our Lord! And in fact is more reminiscent of Judas!

But there is one way we can share in His passion, and that is to live our lives the way He would have wanted us to do. To sacrifice pride and replace it with humility. To release hatred through forgiveness. To be kind in words and be gentle in spirit. To be more patient and truthful and self-controlled in the midst of all the immediate demands of technology. To be discerning in our choices over the material displays in social media. To opt for presence rather than focus on the phones that take away attention from what is tangible, and real.

We have learned how then pursuit of ambition and affluence have somehow affected the choice to form families. How being self-centered and lack of concern for others has left people eventually lonely. And even how tolerance has allowed us to be apathetic to correction that has reared in a multiplication of wrongs because we have never really cared to nip a problem in the bud.

Perhaps we have to revisit how we help in molding our children. How is their character displayed? Do we find God in their actuations? Do they in fact know God? Do we know God intimately? Perhaps its time to look into this Business After Business.