A Coke and a blog post

[starshadow_rivaulx]

Grrr...a glitch in a page loading erased the nice start to my blog post! Though basically all I wanted to say is that I'm going to try blogging in shorter bursts, since a review of my microblogs turned up some topics worth expanding.

One of them was the the sale of Xavier House, which is where Fr. James Reuter, SJ, has lived for most of his life. Fr. Reuter is a priest of venerable age and reputation, a good priest of the kind they don't seem to make any more. Generations of children from the Assumption and the Ateneo were taught by him, or attended retreats under his guidance. He survived World War II. He directed Radyo Bandido, the voice of the first EDSA Revolution. He is a communicator in almost the same way as Fr. Patrick Peyton was a communicator - and between them, those two priests did more to shape my spiritual life than nearly anyone before or since, saving my own mother.

So it was very sad to receive a link (via my high school mailing list) to an online petition beseeching the powers that be to (a) not be in such a hurry to sell Xavier House and (b) to let Fr. Reuter remain resident in the building till he is called home to God. According to the petitioners, the very idea of Fr. Reuter having to pack up and transfer into a new place would have the most adverse effects on his health and peace of mind.

This link has more information about the alleged sale, the parties involved, and the possible fate of Xavier House.

Now I will admit that when I read about the (alleged) sale of Xavier House, equal parts of sadness and indignation rose in my soul. Sadness that yet another piece of Ateneo history would be given up - the Ateneo had to sell its old Manila campus (neighbor to the Assumption's Manila aka Herran campus) decades ago to a mall corporation, and the day the chapel was torn down, there were deep sighs and much regret (even from the students of the so-called "godless institution" known as the University of the Philippines) for the loss. Sadness for Fr. Reuter, who is in his 80s and surely deserves as much care and rest as any senior citizen, except that for him to sit still would ensure his swift demise, the way he goes on.

The indignation arose at the seeming high-handedness of it all, as if Fr. Reuter was being given an ultimatum and tossed willy-nilly out of the Jesuit ancestral home, so to speak. Now that I've read these two articles, my level of indignation has gone down, but I still don't like the idea of Fr. Reuter moving. There's something not quite right about it, don't ask me to explain why, because I couldn't give a logical answer in a thousand years.

The financial crisis has really come around to bite people and entities, hasn't it? It's a good thing that more details about the situation have come to light, though - if one were to base one's reactions solely on the online petition I was directed to sign, it's certain there would be more ill-will than there already is...as it goes, Fr. Reuter is apparently dismayed at the way things were presented in the newspaper article that started the whole petition movement.

As someone who loves a good old building, though, it would be a wonderful thing if Xavier House could be preserved as a historical structure. It's been around since the Jesuits arrived in the country; is itself a survivor of WWII which left Manila bombed to smithereens; and if those walls could talk! Guess I'll just have to cross my fingers and ask St. Ignatius if anything can't be done about that.

So here ends what I *thought* would be a short post. Yeah, right. *grin* Catch you when I catch you!
:)

Comments

[xandri.livejournal.com]

*hugs* Everything works out in some way.

I just hope it's beneficial to both parties.

[cindyg.livejournal.com]

So do I. The main concern of most people is for Fr. Reuter's health. The man is NINETY-FOUR, OMGWTFBBQ. Still in possession of all his faculties, but yo, 94...and he loves this country as much as any native-born Pinoy.

The secondary concern is for all the staff of the office Fr. Reuter runs from out of that building, who will be thrown out of jobs, which would be a major bummer in this day and age.

My own concern is: given that Fr. Reuter says the article which got everyone up in arms appears to have misrepresented the situation, the people up in arms will deal with the situation logically and with cool heads instead of getting all hysterical and historical about it.