Giving back

As this is published today (Tuesday), may I share to our dear readers the message that I prepared for Monday evening on the occasion of the awarding ceremony for Catmon’s new professionals. I had the honor to be invited as guest of honor and speaker of this annual event organized by the St. William Cooperative School and Catmon Community Multi-Purpose Cooperative.

The awarding is one of the activities scheduled leading to my hometown’s annual fiesta on February 10.

The awardees and their families are witnesses to the challenges the awardees went through in order to achieve their goals. So an awarding ceremony is an occasion to acknowledge their hard work and steadfastness.

But an awarding ceremony is not just an occasion to celebrate the achievements of our community’s sons and daughters. It is, more than anything else, an affirmation of our community’s values which the awardees have exemplified.

In the case of newly-minted professionals, these values include discipline, determination, passion for learning, and most important of all, humility, and faith in God.

Awards inspire others to embrace these values. But they also serve as a challenge to those who are given the award to respond to the greater call for service. While the awardees are now well-placed to use their knowledge and skills to support themselves and their family, they are also now in a position to give back to their community.

In 2007, I had the privilege to write a volume about the history of Catmon as part of the Cebu Provincial Government History Writing Project. It was at that time when I came across the lyrics of the Catmon March, part of which goes: “Lungsod kini ang saad ko; Bisan asa man ako, Mopauli gayud kanimo… Oh Catmon mahal kong lungsod, Unsay mahimo ko; Oh Catmon mahal kong lungsod, Ako maghalad kanimo.”

This clarion call for offering oneself also presents opportunities to achieve a better future for our community. After all, an essential part of our survival and our success was having the support of the community when we were guided by its moral compass and traditions. Our community gave us a sense of who we are and what we can achieve as a group. Whatever we do, we must try to unite it with something bigger than ourselves.

Another message that I’d like to impart to the awardees is actually addressed to those who have yet to achieve their goals in life. There is a time for everything, and for sure as long as they continue to embrace the values of discipline, determination, passion for learning, humility, and faith in God, opportunities will come and things will work out for them in the most meaningful ways.

If I may inspire them with my own experience. To those who earned their academic degree and professional license within the time that they planned it, I say congratulations to them. But to those who are still struggling, hindered by some unfortunate incident or difficult circumstances in life, I must say to them, I was once in their shoes. I too had faced difficult situations but thanks to the community that embraced me I always tried to hold close to its time-honored values and it paid off.

Before I end this, I would like to thank St. William Cooperative School and Catmon Community Multi-Purpose Cooperative, in coordination with the Municipal Government of Catmon, for organizing the annual awarding ceremony last night.

And finally, let me greet happy fiesta to my hometown, Catmon, in honor of our patron saint San Guillermo de Acquitania!