Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Jose Rizal S Religious Views and Practices
Jose Rizal S Religious Views and Practices
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The Religious Philosophy of Rizal
Jose Rizal was born and grew up in a very devout Catholic family. His
education, from elementary to college, was from the prestigious
Catholic schools of the period. It was expected therefore, that he
should have been also, a devout Catholic. Although he was for a while,
however, in later life he developed a religious philosophy not totally in
accord with the Catholic religion.
Why the transformation?
It all started when Rizal first went abroad in 1882. At the age of 21, he
enrolled at the Universidad Central de Madrid, working for degrees in
medicine, philosophy and literature. In Spain he found the boisterous
atmosphere of freedom: where conservatives and liberals, socialists and
anarchists, protestants and Catholics, atheists and agnostics, debated and
discussed at meetings, in cafes, on street corners, in the taverns and more
especially in the press, - without the fear of being apprehended.
In December 1896, after Rizal was sentenced to death by the Military Tribunal which
had tried
him for treason, he asked for some Jesuit priests to come and visit him. Father
Miguel Saderra
Mata, S.J., Rector of the Ateneo Municipal, together with Father Luis Viza, S.J.
went in haste to
Fort Santiago, to the cell in which Rizal was imprisoned. They were greeted warmly
by Rizal.
Rizal then asked them if the statue of the Sacred Heart, which he had carved as a
boy, was still
at the Ateneo. Father Viza, in reply, took the statuette out of the pocket of his
soutane. He had
guessed rightly. Rizal would remember it at the hour of his death. Rizal took it
from him, kissed
it in his hands, and placed it on the table where he would soon write the Ultimo
Adiós.
The statuette remained in the cell where Rizal prayed and confessed, attended Mass,
and
received Holy Communion.
The following day, 30 December, just before leaving his cell for Bagumbayan, Rizal
reverently
held the statuette to his lips for the last time. With his two hands holding this
close to his
heart, he moved slowly to give this back to the Jesuits, who were with him to his
last day.
San Pablo Ermitano | St. Paul
the Hermit
Materials: Terra Cotta
Plaster of Paris | Gives as a gift to Fr. Pablo
Pastells in Dapitan, 1893
Sculpted by Jose Rizal during his exile in
Dapitan, El Ermitaño is an 1893 terra cotta
figurine given as a gift to Fr. Pablo Pastells. It
shows Rizal’s own interpretation of St. Paul the
Hermit or Paul of Thebes, known in Catholic
history as the first Christian hermit.
El Ermitaño contains inscriptions in reference to
the long and controversial correspondence
between Rizal and his Jesuit mentor, Fr. Pastells.
The exchange of letters, which took place
between September 1892 and June 1893, reveals
the Jesuit priest’s attempt to win Rizal back to the
Catholic Church.
Christ
Crucified
Immaculate
Conception
Material: Crayon
Remarks: 1875
Material: Crayon
Remarks: Made in Manila, 1874
San Antonio de Padua
en barro obra del Dr.
Rizal
In this novel, Rizal has unmasked the hypocrisy, which under the cloak of religion.
Rizal
distinguished the true religion from the false, from the superstitious, from that
which traffics with
the Sacred Word to extract money.
The facts Rizal brought to his fellowmen's attention through Noli Me Tangere:
The corruption and brutality of Spanish priests and the injustices to the Indios.
The Friars have made the Catholic religion an instrument for enriching themselves
and perpetuating
themselves in power by seeking to coerce the ignorant Filipino in fanaticism and
superstitions instead of
teaching them true Catholicism.
The Noli Me Tangere is not merely an attack on the Spanish colonial regime. It is a
charter
nationalism. It calls on the Filipino to recover his self-confidence, to appreciate
his own worth, to
return to the heritage of his ancestors, to assert himself as the equal of the
Spaniard.
El
Filibusterism
o
Known
“To the memory of the priests, Don Mariano Gomez (85 years old), Don José Burgos
(30 years old),
and Don Jacinto Zamora (35 years old). Executed in Bagumbayan Field on the 28th of
February, 1872.
“The Church, by refusing to degrade you, has placed in doubt the crime that has
been imputed to you;
the Government, by surrounding your trials with mystery and shadows, causes the
belief that there
was some error, committed in fatal moments; and all the Philippines, by worshiping
your memory and
calling you martyrs, in no [vi] sense recognizes your culpability. In so far,
therefore, as your complicity
in the Cavite mutiny is not clearly proved, as you may or may not have been
patriots, and as you may
or may not have cherished sentiments for justice and for liberty, I have the right
to dedicate my work
to you as victims of the evil which I undertake to combat. And while we await
expectantly upon Spain
some day to restore your good name and cease to be answerable for your death, let
these pages
serve as a tardy wreath of dried leaves over your unknown tombs, and let it be
understood that every
one who without clear proofs attacks your memory stains his hands in your blood!
J. Rizal.”
To the Child
Jesus
Why have you come to earth,
Child-God, in a poor manger?
Does Fortune find you a
stranger
from the moment of your birth?
Alas, of heavenly stock
now turned an earthly resident!
Do you not wish to be
president
but the shepherd of your flock?
A
La Virgen Maria is a
sonnet written by the
Philippine national hero,
Jose Rizal. The story of this
sonnet is said to be about
the last member of a
prominent clan in the
Muslim Kingdom of
Granada around during the
15th century. It was
written during Rizal's
academic stay in Ateneo
Municipal de Manila on 3
December 1876.
From thy throne, from heaven high,
kindly hear my sorrowful cry!
And may thy shining veil protect
My voice that rises with rapid flight.
Thou art My Mother, Mary, pure;
Thou’ll be the fortess of my life;
Thou’ll be my guide on this angry sea.
If ferociously vice pursues me,
Help me, and my drive away my woes!
The Intimate Alliance Between Religion and Good
Education
He did not intend to destroy the Catholic Church but desired its practices
more consistent with the fundamental tenets of Christianity.
Other Religious Ideas of Rizal
In his essay “The Creator Gazes on the Philippines”, Rizal had the Lord Jesus
talking to Himself:
“When one dies for love or for the conviction that his death will do some good,
death is a pleasure. But
when, after death, after the sufferings, comes disillusion. . .Oh! Could I not
convert myself into
nothing, annihilate myself completely, destroy my conscience in order not to see
the disastrous effect
of my work . . . I have come to the earth as light and men have used me to envelope
it in darkness; I
have come to console the poor and my religion gives favors and pleasures to the
rich; I have come to
destroy superstition and in my name superstition flourishes and lords it over
perfectly; I have come to
redeem peoples and in my name have been subjugated provinces, kingdoms, continents,
entire races
having been reduced to slavery and disappeared entirely. I have come to preach love
and in my
name, for trivial distinctions, for the craftiness of the idle, men have hurled
themselves on one another
and have spread over the earth death and devastation, sanctifying crime with the
prestige of the
divine. Horrible absurdity, monstrous error, stupendous blasphemy!”
Other Religious Ideas of Rizal
Dr. Rizal wrote an essay in French entitled “Dimanche de Rameaux”, which talked of
the significance of
Palm Sunday, in this vein: “This entry [of Jesus into Jerusalem] decided the fate
of the jealous priests, the
Pharisees, of all those who believed themselves the only ones who had the right to
speak in the name of God,
of those who would not admit the truths said by others because they have not been
said by them. That
triumph, those hosannas, all those flowers, those olive branches, were not for
Jesus alone; they were the
songs of the victory of the new law, they were the canticles celebrating the
dignification of man, the liberty of
man, the first mortal blow directed against despotism and slavery ….”
In his diary written on the ship from Barcelona to Manila, 1896, after he was
ordered imprisoned for suspicion
of complicity in the revolution, Rizal wrote: “I believe that what is happening is
the best that can happen to
me. Always let God’s will be done! I feel more calm with regard to my future. This
afternoon I have meditated
because I had nothing else to do nor could I read. I feel that peace has descended
upon me, Thank God! Oh
God! Thou art my hope and my consolation! Let your Will be done; I am ready to obey
it. Either I will be
condemned or absolved. I’m happy and ready.” This faith in God’s will helps explain
why the Spanish medical
officer found his pulse to be normal right before he was shot by the firing squad
on December 30 of that year.
Freemasonry
Jerusalem
The purpose of forming the Knights Templar in Jerusalem in 1118 A.D. was to
France, England and Germany and then visited lodges in New York.
Jose Rizal as a Mason
(Berlin)
Who influenced Rizal to join Masonry?
His brother Paciano was a student of Padre Burgos, whose brother-in-law, Dr.
Mariano Marti, 33rd Mason, most likely became one of Paciano's influences.
Teodora Alonzo's brother, Jose Alonzo, was also a Mason and it was in his house
in Binan where young Jose stayed when he was a student. In his first voyage,
when they docked temporarily in Naples, he wrote his family, how impressed he
was with the posters of Masons announcing the death of Garibaldi, their former
Grand Master.
Who influenced Rizal to join Masonry?
When he got to the Universidad de Madrid, his history professor was Miguel
Morayta, whose being a Mason figured prominently both in Spanish and Filipino
Masonic history. All these plus the fact that the powerful people in the Spanish
government (among them, Becerra, Sagaste, Pi y Margall) mostly belonged to the
Fraternity, its indelible impact on the young student in all likelihood made him
join
Acasia Lodge No. 9 -- under Grand Oriente de Espanol, whose Grand Master then
was Becerra.
Jose Rizal as a Mason
In 1884, Rizal began to write Noli MeTangere to expose the political and
religious corruption of Philippine society. Later that year, he delivered a speech
at a
banquet organized in honor of Juan Luna and Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo, who had
both won gold and silver medals at the Exposición Nacional de Bellas Artes. In the
speech, Rizal expressed his deep regard for Spain, but condemned the friars in the
Philippines. When copies of the speech reached Manila, he earned the anger and
enmity of the authorities who called him a filibustero or a subversive.
Jose Rizal as a Mason
In Hongkong, he got to know his brother Jose Ma. Basa. In New York he secretly
wrote in his
diary the street adjacent to the street of NY's Grand Lodge. In London, he hooked
up with his
brothers Reinhold Rost and Antonio Regidor. His Sucesos was smuggled in Hongkong by
Basa and
another brother Rodriguez, in Manila. Despite his hectic itinerary, he became
affiliated with the
Propagandists in Spain, most of whom were Masons like del Pilar, Lopez Jaena, Luna,
Ponce,
Panganiban, etc. - even with his old professor Morayta. He became an officer in
their lodge
Solidaridad No. 53 in 1890. They decided to spread Masonry in their miserable
country because
they strongly felt it was needed there.
Jose Rizal as a Mason
However, a controversy remains on whether or not Rizal recanted Masonry before he
died.
There were allegedly three eye-witnesses to his retraction: Fathers Balaguer and
Viza of the Society
of Jesus and Captain Rafael Dominguez, who claim that Rizal had signed a document
of retraction
and conversion before he was executed. Captain Rafael Dominguez, who was with Rizal
during
Rizal’s last hours, mentioned it in his notes, which were an hour by hour record of
Rizal’s last
moments (Zafra, 1951). On the other hand, others believe that the documents
produced by the
Jesuits were fake and altered and the testimonies given were coached. They assert
that the
Catholic Church only started to claim Rizal as their own once they realized that
the people had
learned to love and admire Rizal (Fajardo, 1996).
Jose Rizal as a Mason
In 1912, the Jesuits approached the Rizal family for the rights to bury their
famous pupil, but
they gave their consent instead to his fraternity brothers, who, led by Dr Isidro
de Santos and
Timoteo Paez, asked for the same petition. So then on December 27, 1912, Rizal's
fraternity
brothers, dressed in full Masonic regalia had a long procession to the Masonic
Temple in Tondo
solemnly carrying their slain brother's body, or rather, what was left of it. On
December 28, they
had their funeral rites, and on the 29th they were with the Rizal family in the
Luneta. They saw
both their famous blood brother and fraternity brother be given the honorable
burial he deserves.
And so it was that until his death and beyond, his ties with the Fraternity was
still with him.
Other Masons:
Juan Prim - led the revolution that set up
Rizal was not only his country’s first nationalist but also its first
Protestant.” “That is to say, he rejected not only the
subordination of his people’s welfare to that of strangers,
but also the submission of any man’s reason to the
authority of another who claimed to be the unique
interpreter of God’s will.” But he was not an atheist, a
materialist or agnostic; He believed in God though he might
have his doubts about the divine inspiration of the
Scriptures, he believed in the supremacy of private/individual
judgment.
Bernard Shaw pointed out that one can be an anti-clerical and a good Catholic too.
Rizal exposed the foibles (weakness of wicked priests; his witty gibes (utter
tauntingly) at
spinsters greedy of indulgences and rich usurers (referring to friars) trying to
widen the
gates of heaven or to sneak into Paradise in tattered habit (clothes) bought and
sold with
emeralds for a painted image, may even be defended as the righteous whipping of
hypocrites and merchants ( referring to friars) from the Temple (church)
Rizal did not believe in the uses of scapulars girdles, votive candles and holy
water.
Theologians have professed to find attacks against the Catholic Religion in 36%
(120 of
332 pages) of the Noli and 27% of Fili.
One religion is as good as another in the sense that one conscience was as good as
another; all roads did not lead to Rome but they all lead to heaven; and few lead
to Hell
because he could not reconcile the absolute and perfect goodness of God with the
condemnation of one of his creatures to eternal damnation.
Fray Bernardino, a Dominican, who had been rector of San Juan de Letran chose the
Jesuits to “save” Rizal, re-convert him and to re-enlist him to Ramon Catholic
Church.
Father Miguel Saderra Mata, Rector of Ateneo & Father Luis Viza were received by
Rizal
on December 29,1898 with great courtesy and true joy and after greeting them asked
a
copy of Thomas Kempis’ The Imitation of Christ and the Gospels and expressed desire
to
go to confession. Fr. Viza gave Rizal the Sacred Heart that he carved as a student
in
Ateneo saying,
“Here you have it; the Sacred Heart comes to seek you out.” Rizal took the image
and kissed
it.
Though Rizal wanted to save himself, “nevertheless irreligion had become rooted in
that
unfortunate man’s heart in so cold, calculated and skeptical a fashion that he
resisted God’s
grace with tenacity xxx” Saderra left early followed by Visa then Father Rosell
“badly
impressed from the little he had heard from Rizal, that the latter was a
Protestant.”
It appeared to the Jesuits that “Rizal did not admit to the authority of the Roman
Church or Pontiff,
and had for his rule of Faith the Scriptures INTERPRETED BY HIS OWN JUDGMENT.” That
Rizal
was guided only by his own reason and that he could not admit any other standard
that that of his
own mind which God has given him and that he would not
change, for if he will admit another criterion, God would reprove (censure)
him for having abandoned the judgement of that pure reason which He
Himself had given him – RIZAL A RESOLUTE FREE-THINKER
The Correspondence
Fr. Obach handed Rizal, in exile, a gift from Fr. Pastells, the apologetics of
Sarda with the message: “Tell him (Rizal) to stop being silly, wanting to look
of his affairs with the prism of his own judgement and self love; nemo judex in
cause propria” (no one can sit as judge on his own cause)
“If we were to look with the prism of others, it would be impractical since
there would be as many prisms as there are individuals, and also we
would not know which one to choose among so many, and in choosing we
have to use our own judgment unless we were to make an infinite series
of choices, which would have the result that we would all be running each
other’s houses, others ruling our actions and we ruling theirs and all would
be in confusion UNLESS some of us would disown our judgment and self
love, something which in my humble opinion would be to offend God by
spurning His most precious gifts.”
Rizal “imagined that God, in giving each one the judgment that he has, did what was
most convenient and does not want the man with lesser judgment to think like the
man
with greater and the other way around.”
Judgment is like a lantern which a father gives to each one of his sons before they
set
out on rough & winding paths. To the one who must cross ravines and precipices he
will
not give an oil lamp, for the oil might spill; to that one who must face gale, he
will give a
lantern of heavy glasses, xxx. Woe to him who midway on a whim or in sheer madness,
changes his lamp for another! Let each one keep and improve his own; Not envy or
despise anybody else, while at the same time profiting by the reflections of their
lights
and by the signs and warnings left by those who have ahead.
SELF LOVE is the greatest good that God has given man for his perfection and
integrity saving him from many base and unworthy actions when the precepts that
he has been told and in which he has been trained are forgotten.
Self love is worthy when it is not become a passion, is like a sap that drives the
tree upward in search of the sun, steam that pushes the ship on its course
restrained by judgment. Man is the masterpiece of creation, perfect within his
limitations who cannot be deprived of any of his component parts, moral as well as
physical, without becoming disfigured and unhappy.
PASTELL in his reply blamed Noli on the Protestant and the Fili on the Freemasons,
matched prism with prism and lantern for lamp.
“You should not be guided in your affairs by the prism of your own judgment and
self-love
because these are obstructed and falsified by erroneous principles and disorderly
affection.”
It is this GREAT TRUTH (Infallible truth) that the great FATHER (God) of all
families
has given to each of his sons for his journey through this life his own LANTERN OR
JUDGEMENT, but this lantern die to poor oil provided for us by our disinherited
first
parents (the reference is to original
sin), gives little light, and because of our indolence (laziness) the lampglass
glows grimy, or the wick grows damp, or the oil gets spilled, and
then we follow fitful and phosphorescent lights (light without sensible
heat) that suddenly dazzle us and then leave us in the middle of the road
in a terrible and heartsick darkness.
RIZAL “If you only knew (referring to Fr. Pastells) what I have lost by not
declaring my
conformity with Protestant ideas, you will not say such a thing.” I had always held
the
concept of religion in respect. If I had taken religion as a convinience or as the
art of
having a good time in this life, I would now be, instead of a poor exile, rich,
free, and full of
honors.”
Our (Rizal & Protestant pastor) ideas are poles apart religious no matter what they
were,
should not make men enemies of one another, but good friend.
Modernist
answer to the argument from authority who had authority, who was authority
& by what authority did it assume authority? Rizal admitted that TRUTH had been
POLARIZED
in passing through his mind. Rizal being a man is fallible. We confuse the truth
with our
CONVENIENCE. He insisted that only human reason can correct itself, but admitted
that human reason was much inferior to supernatural (divine) light. Who, with just
reason call himself, the REFLECTOR OF THAT LIGHT? ALL RELIGIONS claim to
possess the truth. Even the most ignorant, most bewildered, claims to be right.
Men in search of truth are like a students in a drawing class sketching a statute
around which they sit, some nearer than others, others farther off, these from
certain
height, those others from its very foot, all seeing it in a different way, so that
the more
they try to picture it faithfully, all the more their sketches are different from
one
another. Those who sketch
directly from the statutes are thinkers who differ from one another because they
start
from different principles; they are the FOUNDERS OF SCHOOLS AND DOCTRINES.
A great number, however, because they are too far away, or can not see well, or are
less skillful or are lazy or those who copied nearest to them or from those they
think
seems to be the best. These COPYIST are the partisans, the active secretaries of an
idea.
Still others, LAZIER, or those who buy a ready made copy, a photograph or a
lithograph
and go off happy and satisfied. These are the passive secretaries, who believe
everything to save themselves the trouble of thinking.
Who would now judge the sketches made by the others by comparing them with his own?
He would have to place himself where those others were, and judge from their own
points of
view.
“And do not tell me Your Reverence, that truth seen from all angles, must always
appear
the same; that would be true only for HIM WHO IS PRESENT EVERYWHERE.
Fr. Pastells dismissed the parish priest of the Rhine with a gesture: the man was
“some
ignorant nincompoop who lost his Catholic common sense, who is a Protestant as the
servant of the God of the Catholics. Such a thing could be said only by someone who
like
you (Rizal) believes that the difference between Catholics and Protestants are only
matters of
opinion and not of faith. Where would all this lead
to? Moderate Protestants believed that man could be saved within any of their
sects; liberal
and progressive – within any religion; Free-thinkers-do his duty and attain
happiness without
any religion at all! If this is admitted, then away with science and philosophy,
most
contradictory principles, and illogical and monstrous conclusions should all be
respected as anxious of truth
Enthronement of human reason, Pastells argued would thus lead to its destruction
and
universal skepticism. HUMAN REASON WOULD BE THE REASON OF UNREASON.
True Religion must consider the false as enemies; “Who is not with me is against
me.”
The Savior had brought “not peace but sword.” “I am the light of the world”, “I am
the
truth”. “Do you admit the divinity of Jesus Christ and the divine
institution of his Church?” Rizal had asked “who can call himself the reflector of
such
Light?” Pastells asked in turn “And does my dear friend, the divine mission of
Jesus Christ,
His divinity itself, count for nothing, weight nothing in the intellectual
balance….?”
Unfortunately we do not have Rizal’s reply in its entirety we only have fragment
which
seems to avoid the challenge.
“I
firmly believe, by reason and by necessity more than out of faith, in the existence
of a
Creative Being. Who is He? What human sounds, what syllables in what language, can
capture the name of this Being whose works overwhelm the imagination of anyone who
thinks of them? Who can give
Him a suitable name when some miserable creature down here with
transient power, has two or three names, three or four surnames, and many
titles and dignities?
We call him Dios, but this at most only reminds us of the Latin deus, or
the Greek Zeus. What is He like? I would attribute to Him in an infinite
degree all the beautiful and holy qualities that my mind can conceive, if I were
not restrained by the fear of my own ignorance. Someone has said that each
one makes his God in his own image and likeness, and, if I remember rightly,
Anacreon said that if the bull could conceive of a god, it would fancy that god
horned and with mighty bellow.
“For all that, I dare believe Him infinitely wise, powerful and good; my idea of
the infinite is
imperfect and confused, seeing the marvels of His works, the order that reigns
among them
their magnificence and overwhelming vastness, and, goodness that shine in all.”
From Pastells text it is plain, Rizal had not surrendered. Rizal believed in God.
“Not all is
lost; your soul still carries hope which will carry you to salvation. You have
sucked the pure
doctrine of religion from your mother and family and in Ateneo – sooner or later
you will
return to the Catholic Church. Patells discussed in his letter to Rizal, the Nature
of the
Causeless Being, the divinity of Jesus Christ as proved by His Resurrection from
the dead,
divine institution of the Church of Rome, relationship between faith and reason,
divine
inspiration.
of the Scriptures, nature of miracles, Salvation outside the Church, etc.
PASTELLS – (after explaining that he was writing by analogy) God need not eyes to
see or
ears to hear…. God possesses what are called positive perfections in an infinite
and absolute
degree. (His) creatures participate in the perfections of God in a finite degree
and by analogy.
RIZAL – I believe in Revelation but not in the revelation or revelations which each
religion or
all religions claim to possess. Upon examining them, one cannot but recognize in
all of them
the human thumb print and the mark of time in which they were written.
PATELLS – What thumb print and what mark? “Catholics mean that sacred books were
written with Divine inspiration. Shall we deny that God was the author of the
inspiration.
As long as the Catholic Churches recognized the Divine finger of inspiration behind
the
human thumbprint, it is enough to assure that the book of the Old and the New
Testament, recognized as such by the Catholic Church, must be received by the
faithful
sacred.
RIZAL
RIZAL
– there are necessary and useful precepts, but God placed this in the conscience of
man, His best temple, that is
why I would rather adore God who has endowed us with salvation, who keeps open His
book of
revelation through the voice of our conscience.
PASTELLS
– That voice is not incessant because, heard only from our conscience, how many
times are its cries muffled by the callouses formed in it by a bad life? – all
kinds of errors have
been multiplied in all pages of history of people except in Christendom.
RIZAL
– I cannot believe that before the coming of Jesus Christ al peoples were buried in
the
profound chasm that you speak. Nor can I believe that after Christ all was light,
peace and good
fortune, that the majority of men turned just. No. I would be belied by the
battlefields, faggots,
prisons, acts of
violence, tortures of the inquisition, the hatred that Christian nations profess
towards one
another over petty differences, slavery and for 18 centuries, prostitution.
PASTELLS
– It was Jesus Christ who brought the world that true peace which made men
who received it adopted sons of God and heirs of heaven. For this we are obliged to
adore
God … who opened for us the book of natural law and that of supernatural law
depositing
both in the infallible custody of the teaching of the Catholic Church…
RIZAL – Your brilliant arguments cannot convince me that the Catholic Church is
endowed
with infallibility. It is an institution more perfect than the others, but human
after all, with all
the defects, errors and vicissitudes proper to the work of men.
PASTELLS
– Christian religion has its branches in the hearts of the people, but it roots and
foundation in the Christ from with it sprung. It is based on the will of God and
the efficacy
of supernatural grace by virtue of the merits of Christ.
RIZAL
– Who died on the Cross? Was it God or man? If it was God, I cannot understand
how a God, conscious of His mission, could die, or how a God could exclaim in the
garden:
“Father, if Thou wilt, remove this chalice from me,” or how He could again exclaim
from the
Cross: “My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” This cry is absolutely human,
it is
the cry of a man who had faith in justice and the goodness of his cause; except for
the
“Tomorrow thou shalt be with me,” the works of Christ on Calvary all suggest a man
in
torment
and in agony, but what a man! For me, Christ – man is greater than the Christ –
God.
PASTELLS – Christ as man died on the Cross, that is to say, when Jesus Christ
died, his
soul left his body, and the person of Christ remained united in the soul and in the
body…
RIZAL
– God cannot have created me for my harm; for what harm have I done Him
before being created that He should will my damnation? Nor can He have created me
for
nothing, or in indifference. He must have created me for a good purpose, and for
that
end, I have nothing to guide me better than my conscience, and only conscience
alone
which judges and qualifies my acts.
PASTELLS
– God must have created man for some good purpose attainable after this
life, for, if God is just, where would He reward him who dies unjustly. To defend
his justice?
Where would He punish the sinner. God made me to love Him and serve Him in this
life
and to enjoy Him forever in the next. To attain this end the grace of God, the
merits of
Jesus Christ, and our own good works, are needed.
RIZAL
– ended his last letter to the Jesuit with a characteristic gesture “who is more
foolishly
proud: he who is content to follow his own judgment, or he who proposes to impose
on others
not even what his own reason declares but only what seems to him to be the truth?
The
reasonable has never seemed foolish to me, and pride has always shown itself in the
idea of
imposition.”
Retraction
Onza, Jhouana
Retraction
means that
he is taking
back what he
said against
the Catholic
Church in the
Philippines
and the friars.
Rizal’s Charateristic
Balaguer
Rizal
Balaguer
Rizal
They
Balaguer
Rizal
Balaguer
Rizal
Balaguer replied “ Offer up to God, the sacrifice of your selflovem and even
against the voice of your reason, ask God for
the grace if faith....the only thing required is that you should not
reject it”
Rizal
Source: http://www.slideshare.net/imPrincessSarah/jp-rizal-letters-in-hong-kong
Retraction Controversy
Personalities who says that the retraction letter is fruad
Trining
- Show the document to us
Ricardo Pascual
- He said that the document found in 1935 is not Rizal’s
handwritten
If the text and signiture were authentic, “ the document would prove
Rizal’s abjuration of Masonry but not his conversion
to
Catholisim.” One acts, he states, “ is independent of the other”. He
added “ it would prove also that, if Rizal had recanted his religious
ideasm he had not done the same with his political ones. In any case, a
document obtained by means of moral violence and spiritual threats has
very little worth in history.”
Retraction Controvesy
Why rizal fail to tell his fond and pious monther that he had
returned to her faith?
Why was his body not handed over to his family, and instead
buried secretly?
Why were there no requiem masses said for the repose of his soul?
Why the retraction not furnished fis family despite their request?
Josephine Bracken
- She married Rizal but marriage contract had never been shown
Villanueva, Marifel
Heresy
Belief