THE WONKER

Consequently, Merry Christmas!

The debate rages on to this day, more than 100 years after his martyrdom on 30 December 1896, as to whether Jose Rizal, national hero of the Philippines, did in fact renounce his Roman Catholicism and become a Protestant in effect, without being baptized? That’s a big question; this time, I just want to talk about Rizal’s Christmas in relation to Rizal’s Christ, when Rizal was merely drifting from Catholicism to Protestantism.

In his time, did Jose Rizal, emerging non-Catholic, celebrate Christmas? I thought he didn’t, until I checked the correspondence. I found two references to Christmas Day, and the two reveal much of Rizal’s idea of Christmas and of Christ. Apt image from CodenameShaider who captions it ‘Colors Of Christmas’ (flickr.com/). Rizal’s Christmas is as colorful as his life, except that his Christmas does not revolve around Christ as God. That takes color off my Christmas.

This is part of his letter of 24 December 1886 from Berlin to his friend Ferdinand Blumentritt in Leitmeritz:

A friend of mine from the Philippines (Dr Maximo Viola) arrived from Barcelona where he studied. He is studying German and wishes to stay nine or ten months in Berlin. We talk a great deal about you and your work and he wishes to meet you. I will spend Christmas with him and young Moret, who is sending you his Christmas greetings. Many thanks for your kind invitation. I should like to see a Christmas celebration with a Christmas tree, but the families who know me have invited me only for the New Year, either because they have no children or their children are already grown-ups. At home the whole family partake of a good soup at midnight; and the children decorate a Belen (Nativity scene) with the image of the Child Jesus, the animals etc. This season is the most beautiful and pleasant we have in the Philippines. (Translation by Encarnacion Alzona, whose ‘big’ I changed to ‘grown-ups.’ I don’t know about ‘a good soup’ at midnight – I would think ‘a good snack’ is better, but I don’t have the original Spanish in front of me to make my own translation.)

Rizal has been invited by Blumentritt to visit him and, therefore, Austria. Eventually, soon after the Noli Me Tangere comes off the press in March 1887 (as he writes his friend, he in fact is now writing the manuscript of that book), in May 1887 Rizal and Viola will go visit Blumentritt. But this Christmas time before that, Rizal writes that he is longing to be with a family around a Christmas tree, and no family has invited him to celebrate Christmas as part of the family. Actually, he is longing to be with a family, period. Any family. The Rizals are as close a family as you can get, and he misses the fuss and attention. In any case, he is the darling of the Rizals. He is their genius of a man.

He does not mention a Christmas tree in Calamba; he does mention a Belén, which is the Spanish word for the Nativity scene, which every Roman Catholic in the Philippines knows means Christmas in all its senses. He speaks of that with love: ‘This season is the most beautiful and pleasant we have in the Philippines.’ If you are not a Filipino, I tell you it is as Rizal describes it. I’m talking of the countryside. Christmas in the City is too commercial now, even in the Philippines. That’s the Protestant Ethic.

On another Christmas Eve, in 1888, he again writes his friend, this time from London:

Only last night at eight o’clock, I returned here from a trip to Spain for a period of twelve days. I left so suddenly that I had no time to write you. Last night I received many letters, but I will answer yours first.

That shows they are more than friends in fact – They are soul brothers. It’s almost Christmas Day, and his first thoughts are that of his friend, and then his family. He writes a little of his story and history:

Today is Christmas Eve. This is the feast that I like to celebrate best. It reminds me of the many happy days not only of my childhood but also of history.

Is this the Roman Catholic Jose Rizal as his teachers and friends at the Ateneo and of Calamba, Laguna, as his mother Teodora knew him? Not anymore. He is intellectualizing. If you really believe, you don’t intellectualize; if you intellectualize, you don’t really believe:

Whether Christ was born or not exactly on this day, I don’t know; but chronological accuracy has nothing to do with tonight’s event. A grand genius had been born who preached truth and love; who suffered because of his mission, but on account of his sufferings, the world has become better, if not saved. Only it gives me nausea to see how some persons abuse his name to commit numerous crimes. If he is in heaven, he will certainly protest! Consequently, Merry Christmas! Let us celebrate the anniversary of the birth of a Divine Man!

‘… if not saved.’ ‘If he is in heaven …’ Two big ifs. Rizal is not willing to say that by the teachings of Christ the world has been saved. Not necessarily Savior, Christ is a genius of a man, a divine man, but a man nonetheless. As in man in the New Age.

‘… who suffered because of his mission, but on account of his sufferings, the world has become better, if not saved.’ Rizal must be thinking of his own mission – which is ‘to make men worthy,’ as he tells Fr Sanchez (letter of 2 February 1890 to Blumentritt) – and he may as well be predicting his own suffering.

‘Only it gives me nausea to see how some persons abuse his name to commit numerous crimes.’ Remember Rizal, now a non-Catholic, is writing to his friend, a Catholic. He is accusing the friars of abusing their authority, the whole Church for making money out of believers. ‘If he is in heaven, he will certainly protest!’ I’m not protesting. I’m only saying Rizal is thereby equating Roman Catholicism with the abuses of Roman Catholics, priests especially. That is like equating the apostleship of Jesus Christ with that of his worst apostle, Judas, who betrayed his master or, with that of his ‘best’ apostle, Peter, who denied him 3 times, on the night he was betrayed, remember?

Whether the baby Jesus who became Christ was born exactly on the 25^th of December some 2000 years ago is beside the point, yes. He preached truth and love, yes. That is the point: truth and love, truth with love. Truth alone is not enough. Science claims the truth – that is not enough. Without love, truth is nothing. Even if science claims love, what is the basis of that love? Man’s reason. It cannot be higher than that of mere animals (who, Science says, is one of them), of mere man, mortal man. If your basis of love is God, then I love you! Three things remain, these three: faith, hope and love. And the greatest of this is love.

The thinking, rationalizing Rizal is not saying Christ is God; he is not saying Christ is God-Man; he is only willing to say ‘a grand genius’ and ‘Divine Man’ – not Christ as a member of the Holy Trinity, 3 persons in 1 God or Godhead. It is clear to me that he is putting his Reason above his Faith.

I believe that like oil and water, Reason and Faith don’t mix. Reason, otherwise called Science, otherwise called Logic, otherwise called Philosophy, which is belief in Man, cannot co-exist with Faith, otherwise called Religion, which is belief in God, who is greater than all men and all geniuses and all logicians and all philosophers combined, to say the least. Science calls itself the only mirror of Truth; it denies that Faith is another way of looking at, mirroring Truth. What is the basis for that denial? Science itself; Science is its own witness that Science is right! The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars but in our logic. Who created the stars? Not God but the Big Bang. Who is the Big Bang? Something or other.

Let Augustus be my Christmas gift to you. Christ was born in his time and under his empire.

Rizal is gifting his friend with a book or a painting or piece of sculpture called Augustus. Augustus was probably a book, but remember, Rizal can paint and sculpt. At least, Rizal is saying there that Christ was born, which means he as man is not denying the birth of Christ, but which he denies is God. Nowhere do I read that Blumentritt the ever-loyal Catholic ever complains that Rizal protests too much against the Catholic Church – a true friend.

Me? I cannot celebrate Christmas fully if I don’t believe that Jesus Christ is God, fully, mysteriously. Consequently, Merry Christmas! Instead of cerebrating, celebrate life!