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The Eternal
Rhythm of Life in Alimodian
By Angioline Loredo
For any Alimodiananon who has been away for an extended period of time, some
changes in town can be quite startling. Take the architectural landscape,
for instance.
There are huge concrete houses that draw your attention because they seem
to have been built with maximum security in mind -- as in tall concrete
fences that block any view of the houses and front gates that are locked at
all times. I guess it reflects the culture of the times – the unease about
peace and order situation. Or maybe it speaks to a newfound value of
privacy among Alimodiananons. One remembers with much fondness those
long-ago years when, passing by other people’s houses at night, one
literally peered into their domestic lives, down to what they were eating
for dinner at the time. Gone are the days when old folks sat by the windows
and called out “Diin ka maadto?” to the people passing by.
One
knew almost everyone in town. There were no strangers to get suspicious of.
That sense of complacency is a thing of the past. What hasn’t changed is the
rhythm of life. The nights are long, the days even longer. At night the
streets are pitched dark (thanks to official neglect), and one’s sleep is
unnerved by the intermittent howling of the dogs in the neighborhood and
crackling sounds coming from passing motorbikes. The mornings could not come
early enough. At four o’clock, the neighborhood stirs awake, and the daily
routine of life starts anew. Religious folks go to church, working people to
offices, farms, and businesses, children to school, and everyone else does
the same things they had done the day before.

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Christmas –
and Standing on One’s Head
Horacio dela Costa, S.J.
(The late Fr.
Horacio de la Costa, S.J., delivered this five-minute
homily at midnight Mass at the Ateneo Law School. Over
the years, it has become a "Christmas perennial,"
reprinted and re-read by many.)
CHRISTMAS is when we celebrate the unexpected; it is the
festival of surprise.
This is the night when shepherds wake to the song of
angels; when the earth has a star for a satellite; when
wise men go on a fool's errand, bringing gifts to a
Prince they have not seen, in a country they do not
know.
This is the night when one small donkey, bears on its
back, the weight of the world's desire, and an ox plays
host to the Lord of heaven. This is the night when we
are told to seek our king, not in a palace, but in a
stable.

Although we have stood here, year after year, as our
fathers before us, the wonder has not faded; nor will it
ever fade; the wonder of that moment when we push open
that little door, and enter, and entering find, a mother
who is virgin, and a baby who is God.
Chesterton has said it for us all: the only way to view
Christmas properly is to stand on one's head. Was there
ever a home more topsy-turvy than Christmas, the cave
where Christ was born? For here, suddenly, in the very
heart of earth, is heaven; down is up, and up is down;
the angels look down on the God who made them, and God
looks up to the things he made.
There is no room in an Inn for Him who made room and to
spare, for the Milky Way, and where God is homeless, all
men are at home.
We were promised a savior, but we never dreamed God
Himself would come and save us. We know that He loved
us, but we never dared to think that he loved us so much
as to become one of us.

But that is the way God gives. His gifts are never quite
what we expect, but always something better than we
hoped for. We can only dream of things too good to be
true; God has a habit of giving things too true to be
false. That is why our faith is a faith of the
unexpected, a religion of surprise.
Now, more than ever, living in times so troubled, facing
a future so uncertain, we need such faith. We need it
for ourselves, and we need to give it to others.
We must remind the world that if Christmas comes in the
depths of winter, it is that there may be an Easter in
the spring.
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