Remembrances of Christmas just past

No doubt about it, the e-card and handy SMS have replaced the traditional Christmas card that is mailed in November to ensure its arrival at its destination during the Christmas holidays.

This year, I received a grand total of two cards mailed from wintry Ontario, Canada, by Rosemarie de los Reyes and from just-as-cold Chicago, Illinois, by Tessie Romero, all first cousins I grew up with before the Great Migration to North America of the Lolarga, Romero and Valdellon families, descendants of Enrique Acosta Lolarga and Telesfora Cariño. Our patriarch and matriarch were migrants, too, meeting as public school teachers detailed in Camiling, Tarlac, before settling in Sampaloc, Manila, and founding their own school, National Radio School and Institute of Technology (now closed down).

The cyber-highway has made possible clan reunions through e-mail and Facebook, making the website www.lolarga.com put up by my brother Junic and cousin Telly Valdellon almost passe as updates are more regular in our FB accounts.

So here's to the passing of traditional printed cards. Thanks to the Internet, I was able to "collect" a good number of cards celebrating Christ's birth, the endurance of family and all good things about Christmas.

Following is my "loot":

Junic and Amy Lolarga of Calgary, Alberta, with children Sara and Christian

Cousin Louie Lolarga and husband Mike Johnston in Joplin, Missouri, with their children and grandchildren, some of whom survived the killer tornado there and rebuilt their lives and homes

Little Lucie Server Mendoza, one of the many additions to the family on my mother's side this year and also a Canadian citizen/resident

Almost like family to me is writer Luisa Aguilar Igloria of Norfolk, Virginia, with her daughters Ina, Trixie and Gabriela. Not in photo is her eldest child Jenny Cariño, my hijada, who still lives and works in Baguio City.

Part of our First Draft sisterhood of writers is Melinda Quintos de Jesus (seated, third from left). She is shown here with her husband DJ and family on a rare reunion in Bohol.

Meran Daza Umali and I go back to St. Paul College Quezon City where she was a batch ahead of me, but that didn't keep us from becoming lifelong friends. She is shown with husband Cesar and their sons Likha (my godson), Likas and Lakan. Their only daughter Sinta (at right) is herself a mother of baby Monique.

Connie Estrada Calimon and I also go back to SPCQ when we used to be officers of the Student Catholic Action along with Meran. The SCA spirit stayed with her as she and husband Gil, a mountaineer like her, have been part of climbs for a cause (last year they brought school supplies to a far-flung school in the Cordilleras). Their eldest of two daughters, Rose, is now Sister Manaoag, while the youngest, Resa, is a freelance photographer-designer.

I made a new friend in Fralynn Manalo of the Metropolitan Museum of Manila. She never fails to email me invites to coming shows and reminders when an important show is about to end. Fralynn and her colleague Bill Ray are the people to look for on a visit to the Met because they'll answer all your queries, provide the wheelchair for the disabled and lead a guided tour.

Tireless human rights worker Tinay Palabay sent this.

From another First Draft colleague Rita Ledesma came this image of the giving tree (that's how I prefer to call it because gifts under this tree are given during the season). Rita's Internet-savvy grandchild Regina selected this for her to serve as her e-card.

And Melba Padilla Maggay of the Institute for Studies in Asian Church and Culture (ISACC) emailed this Advent message, a fitting end to this second day of 2012 reminiscence:

"Unlike other Christmas seasons, this one feels like the aftermath of fleeing from a house on fire, or being swallowed up and tossed to and fro by raging waters, and then getting swept and spewed ashore by the roaring tide.

"Great disasters, as well as the pressures that daily besiege us, have reduced many of us to numbness and shock. Something inside wears away, as massive poverty and the thinness of soul that accompanies adversity erodes our capacity to even pay attention to the meaning of Christmas – the great wonder that God has come to earth, These days, I confess, I feel a great need simply for the veil to lift and see through the hiddenness of the Christ that our faith tells us has come.

"Where is he, who has been born king of the Jews?"

"The unrest and crises all around us tell us that great upheavals are taking place. Long-term despots in the Arab world are falling one by one, and others more are fighting for their survival. Wall Street is under siege, and protesters all around the world are putting to question the viability of a system that honors greed and consigns to the shadows those who are failing in life. And as I write this, thousands of our hapless people in Mindanao are shivering from sickness, hunger and homelessness, their obscure lives and meager property swept away by floods, nature ruthlessly striking back at human vandalism and the despoliation of creation.

"The question of the Magi rings in my ears: “Where is he, who has been born king of the Jews?”

"The question, we are told, troubled Herod, and all Jerusalem with him. He hastily assembled the chief priests and scribes – guardians of the Temple and the Torah -- and ascertained from them where the Christ was to be born. The Jewish establishment was not without knowledge. They knew exactly where the prophesied Messiah was to be born. Yet apart from the fear of Herod, -- whose crown lay uneasy on his head because he was an Idumean,-- the news that an heir had been born to the decayed dynasty of King David did not stir them.
The Magi from the East, -- wise men who read the movements of the stars – knew that a great king had appeared, and they had trotted on their camels through the sharp winds of the desert to search for him and worship. They had sensed that this was no ordinary king, but someone who, though born of the Jews, was nevertheless king beyond the Jews, -- and worthy of the finest gifts that they can offer.

"It is worth noting that the first to recognize Jesus for what he was were Gentiles from afar and roughhewn shepherds -- those in the margins of the original chosen people, -- Israel. Undertandably, who would have thought that deliverance for the world would come through a child born in a stable? It had to be revealed – to the wise through their schooled sensing of planetary movements, and to the simple through a straightforward announcement by an angel. It takes either the wisest insight or the simplest of faith to bow the knee to the Christ-Child.

"When we experience devastating hardship, it is a struggle just to pause and remind ourselves that at the center of our existence is a good God who has sent his Son to meet us in our need. His footprint may be hidden from us, but we can be sure that Jesus walks with us, just as he did in the dusty streets of Palestine 2,000 years ago.

"In the same way that his birth was shadowed by the savage slaughter of children his age, his continuing presence among us is obscured by the dark deeds of those who, like Herod, are threatened by his coming. The coming of the true King and of his kingdom is always an imminent threat to those who, by means fair or foul, bulldoze and usurp their way into power.

"But like the Christ-Child, we are not unaided. In the same way that the Magi were warned and Jesus’ parents were directed to flee to Egypt, we are kept safe through the help of the unseen host that surrounds us. Like the Christ-Child, beset and hunted by the fierce ragings of evil, helpless and vulnerable before the powerful, -- we shall be kept hidden, safe in the hand of God, till the murderous shadow of the Herods of this world had passed.

"A blessed Christmas season to all of you who love his appearing, and are looking forward to his coming again."