Life Update 03.11.2020

Gothic rib-vault ceiling. Photo by Tom Kamenjack.

It's been a while! So, I had no idea that this niche of mine still exists here online. I just spent the last couple of hours reading some of my old blog posts and playing around with a new theme. Maybe I'll revive this sleeping blog. Maybe not. I don't know. It's nostalgic and at the same time like a time capsule, from another me seven years ago.

It's 2020 and a lot has since changed since my last post. I'll go over and fill you in on some of the details in the last "twenteen" decade. Let's see...

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In 2014, I enrolled myself in a 25-week Living Waters program to deal with the struggles I had regarding behavioral addiction problems and false intimacies. The latter half of this year was spent recollecting my broken self. I finished my undergraduate thesis and while waiting for my graduation day, got myself a job in a small architectural firm. I was mostly on the production of contract documents used in construction, with a bit on the schematic and design development for new projects.

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In 2015, I finally graduated from college and got my Bachelor's Degree in Architecture. I left my first design firm and switched on a non-government organization, teaching out-of-school youths marketable and specialized construction skills, while managing projects in the field of heritage conservation --- mostly centuries-old churches built during the Spanish-Colonial period. I spent the next four years here falling further deeply in love with church history, liturgy, and research. I also had a health crisis that will be changing the course of how I view and live my life.

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In 2016, I fell ill around the later half of the year and decided while recovering to spend the rest of the remaining months studying for the upcoming Licensure Examinations. I enrolled myself for review classes, had a great time burying myself for hours and hours studying, made some awesome study buddies and grew my hair to about shoulder-length <laughs>.

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In 2017, I took the Licensure Examinations for Architects (LEA), passed and had myself registered as a full-pledged licensed Architect. It was one of the most surreal time of my life. For my old-time blog visitors, I started this niche to cope with the stress I had in the university as an architecture student. Looking back, I'm not even sure if I wanted to be an architect enough to merit where I am right now. I was truly just going with the flow, to be honest, but I somehow knew it was the right track for me to traverse at the time. Later, I would continue with my job on heritage conservation and would enroll myself for graduate studies to supplement and complement what I had been learning on-field all along. I had a lot of problems with politics in my working culture and environment, but I was getting by. I also started to lose my luscious locks and embraced balding. 

I think it was also around this time where I finally had this sense that I am being called to a life other than the married vocation and the priestly vocation. I was content being single and had regularly attended a weekly group with chastity as its primary goal. The catholic group truly is a gem that had nourished me spiritually and sacramentally through thick and thin. My love for the Mother Church and her heritage --- all her Truth, Goodness, and Beauty --- only grew, as well as my confidence to use my knowledge in architecture and history only for the service of the Church.

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In 2018, while actively working for the NGO and studying for graduate school, the toxic work environment had started to take its toll on me. I reacted by looking for a place elsewhere in the academe and was considered for a part-time position as a lecturer in my old university. As much as I wanted to teach history, I was only given Building Laws and Tropical Architecture, which to my surprise, I had a great time teaching. Tensions in the faculty did not spare me, and while I was doing well and had a sense of satisfaction, juggling three concerns in my head at all times really was too much.

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In 2019, I was at my wit's end. I quit my job in the latter half of the year and stopped going to classes in my graduate school, with no further intention of ever finishing. After a couple of years, chasing one goal after another, and trying to accomplish as much as I can with as little time (I hear people with a ticking time bomb, had this tendency), my passion had grown thin and weary. I figured it was a perfect time to slow down and just enjoy living. I took classes in graphic design and 2D animation while trying to figure things out.

I never stopped loving church history, and liturgy. I never stopped sketching, and making illustrations and reading the Lives of Saints because these creative activities and hobbies have given me life. I have a growing interest in iconography and hagiography (Click here for my DeviantArt Gallery!)

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Fast forward today in 2020, I just started a new job for a small design firm specializing in liturgical and ecclesiastical architecture. For anyone who has been with a start-up company, you know how it is with the birth struggles. Health-wise, I'm doing relatively good (amidst an impending public health crisis aka plague with the COVID-19 and the Novel Corona Virus). The world truly has changed a lot in the last couple of years.

It's funny when I think of myself as a grown man when all I could do right now is crawl back here where it all began. I stopped journaling a few years ago shortly after I stopped blogging. I missed writing and putting my thoughts out here for anyone who cares to dedicate a couple minutes to stop by and read. 

It may look like that I'm holding up pretty good for an average millennial, but with our age marked by uncertainty, all I could really do is to try to live one day at a time, write a piece in the stillness and quiet of my room, and narrate this story to myself. Just to make sense out of my restlessness, even for just a bit.

Shutterbug Wannabe #021: Conventus

Still life and everyday household photography at the convent of the Missionaries of the Beatitudes.

Luis Ak-ak's wood carving of St. Ezekiel Moreno

I had the best time with my almost 4-month stay at the convent of the Missionaries of the Beatitudes this summer - truly a momentous event in my life. The many quiet and sunlit afternoons in my final week of stay woke up my lost love for still life photography - a truly absorbing art requiring just the right lighting and composition. Check out more pictures here.

Update 06.07.12 - Retablo

What's keeping me busy all summer.

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Yesterday, the Lord broke my heart. 

Today, I'm starting to see how He piece them back again.

Funny how I have waited for a year only to be greeted by another two years of waiting.
It is not a race against time. The will of the Lord prevails. *sighs*

A Monastic Movie: Into Great Silence

Stumbled upon this trailer while scouring for a monastic vocation promotions video at Youtube. It's a movie/documentary about the life of Carthusian monks in their ascetic monastery in the French Alps. I'll update this post and make a review after I've seen it. I can't wait! For now, check out their official review and trailer:

Nestled deep in the postcard-perfect French Alps, the Grande Chartreuse is considered one of the world's most ascetic monasteries. In 1984, German filmmaker Philip Gröning wrote to the Carthusian order for permission to make a documentary about them. They said they would get back to him. Sixteen years later, they were ready. Gröning, sans crew or artificial lighting, lived in the monks' quarters for six months—filming their daily prayers, tasks, rituals and rare outdoor excursions. This transcendent, closely observed film seeks to embody a monastery, rather than simply depict one—it has no score, no voiceover and no archival footage. What remains is stunningly elemental: time, space and light. One of the most mesmerizing and poetic chronicles of spirituality ever created, INTO GREAT SILENCE dissolves the border between screen and audience with a total immersion into the hush of monastic life. More meditation than documentary, it's a rare, transformative theatrical experience for all.

Check out more from MongrelMedia. You can download there a pdf file of an interview with Philip Gröning and cool high resolution poster and images :)

A Catholic Convert

"My family was supportive, but my friends were not in the least bit. Most of them doubted that I could ever change or stick with it. They were just waiting for me to fall again. In a way, that doubt from other people pushes you harder. I looked at their doubt in me as an extra source of motivation."

Those words from a Catholic convert in an interview at LifeTeen.com definitely struck a familiar chord. It reminded me of the time when I broke down after hearing discouraging words from someone I considered a friend. Katie Lewis there was right to turn other people's doubt as an extra source of motivation to push yourself even further and go the extra mile in your love for the Lord. As for my  vocation, I am slowly settling down at the thought that obviously not everyone is called to a life of contemplation. There is no doubt in that. But definitely you cannot blame monks and cloistered nuns for giving up their entire lives to pray and be close to God. That is the true meaning of sacrifice.

A Portrait

Posing before Luis Ak-ak's wooden carving of St. Ezekiel Moreno
@ the convent of the Missionaries of the Beatitudes :)

Just got back from my indefinite and unofficial hiatus from blogging :) Been spending most of my time for the past weeks inside the simple and humble convent of the Missionaries of the Beatitudes. I think I just found my second home inside this concrete jungle of the metro. I am so looking forward to a journey of perpetual contemplation :) A Happy Easter to all! 

Our God is not dead! He's alive! He's alive!

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I wish to die to all other loves, and to live only for your love.

Saint Ezekiel Moreno

A Prayer

Prayer of Saint Ezekiel Moreno

My Lord Jesus, I am resolved to follow You wherever You wish to go. O my Jesus, I am waiting for You, confident that You shall take care of me, that You shall attend to me with care, that You shall fill me with Your divine love which is all I desire. 

I want to start a holy life, O Jesus, for the sacrifice that You ask me of now. I cast doubts away. I am willing to do everything. Accept, my Jesus, my resolve and bless it. Ah, my Jesus! You have come to awaken me from my lukewarmness… I thank You, my Jesus. Accept me for I hear Your call. My soul searches for You and chooses  You alone. Let us go, my Jesus, I want to be alone in Your company. I wish to die to all other loves, to live only for your love. O my Jesus! You alone suffice me! Blessed are You for You seek me in so many ways! Long live Jesus whom I love! I want to live for You alone, my Jesus, and for You alone I want to die! Amen.

(Cartas II, 147-149; Carta 942, Obras completes III, 223)

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I recently purchased a booklet on the life and spirituality of St. Ezekiel Moreno at the parish office of San Sebastian in Manila.  I was hyped and lost no second in buying the thin booklet for only P75. The parish was the last stop of a mini-photowalk we had on the last Saturday of February, organized by Sir Axl and was joined by Bro. Theofratus and Sir Joey Velunta. (More of that story on a later post). The above lines were one of those beautiful prayers he himself composed which became my instant favorite - a beautiful prayer of vocation and surrender :)

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Intense. These words made me cry.

"..., God often leads souls to himself along unusual paths: a lack, a loss, or a wound - if accepted and affirmed - can become a springboard for throwing oneself into the arms of God; the God who brings good out of everything and whose greatness can be discovered in redemption even more than in creation."

+ YOUCAT, par. 65, part I: What We Believe; p. 48

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For without you what am I to myself except 

a guide to my own downfall?

+ Confessions of St. Augustine; Bk. IV, Ch. I

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Life is too short to defy God's will.

Away from you, O Lord, to whom then shall we ever go?

Classroom Scenario: My Culture

"Culture comes from the Latin term cultura that has its origin from colere. It generally refers to patterns of human activities and the symbolic structures that give such activities significance and importance."

That was what Dean Inocencio, our professor in Theory of Architecture 3, said as he make his introduction to our topic about culture as an essential factor in architectural design. He was in his casual calm tone when he called a student out of the blue, asking how much that student knew about himself as a social component of a bigger society, and more importantly as a human. The student was dumbstrucked at the sudden question. And so was I, trying my best to hide from the back of my seatmate who was thinking also of what to answer.

"In understanding your culture, you have to understand yourself," 

he went as I mused on how much I really knew of myself and on how much I knew of my culture. He asked us to make a short anecdote of our culture in the hometown or place where we grew up and how it affects us as a human, which can later be a source of idea in our design philosophy and belief about the logical behaviour of life, people, and the environment. Below was my anecdote submitted at the end of our class:

"Growing up in the urban setting and lifestyle of Quezon City, I find myself literally confused about my identity as a person with all the diverse showcase and influences from different pop culture movements and modern philosophies abundantly viewed among the youth. But despite the seemingly selfish perception of what most consider as today's "me-generation", evidently seen on the growing number of teen reality TV shows, young consumers, vanity publishers (read: young bloggers obsessed about documenting their adolescent years), and techno-geeks, I found my identity and purpose in the "green" culture of nature-lovers and climate-activists who are investing their time and money to raise the awareness of the public regarding the current state of the environment because of global warming.

The Philippines, according to studies, being a climate "hot spot" is enough to give me a jerk to contribute something on the green movement to counter the effects of climate-crisis, and eventually to dream or aspire to be a "green architect" that focuses primarily on using sustainable building materials and as well as on making efficient designs that actually cultivates natural resources.

And as with the widespread sight of poverty among the slum and depressed areas of the metro, evident on the lack of decent living spaces and homeless families residing in streets, I also found my purpose in the culture of volunteerism - that is, a great desire on involving myself in organizations such as Habitat for Humanity or Gawad Kalinga to build houses and communities for the poor."