MEDIUM RARE

As Fr. Jerry Orbos used to say, three rings are the hallmark of married life. Engagement ring, wedding ring, suffering.
As all other priests will tell you, suffering underlies the human condition. It’s like saying you cannot escape suffering if you’re human. Catholics are reminded to make sacrifices – suffer just a bit more – during the season of Lent. Nor are they the only ones. Another major religion prescribes the same 40 days, though at another time of the year, for believers to offer sacrifices.
Christian and otherwise, with or without the call for sacrifice, the season of suffering is upon us. Fires every day, including some tragically deadly ones, during the Fire Prevention Month. An ugly oil spill traveling 300 km from Oriental Mindoro to Palawan, leaving in its black oily wake an environmental disaster that affects livelihoods and the health of residents, not to mention the pristine beauty of our white-sand beaches. (This is going to take a lot more work, and time, than the massive cleanup of Boracay undertaken by the Duterte DENR. This tragedy is not to be blamed on climate change but a massive human, corporate error.)
As Davao de Oro picks up the pieces after an earthquake, elsewhere volcanic eruptions and daily reminders of a possible (or probable) earthquake hitting the National Capital Region are enough to fray one’s nerves. Then there’s the “peace and order situation” requiring the presence of six battalions of military peacekeepers in Negros Oriental after a high-profile political assassination.

Nor are guns the only weapons to be feared. In a series of horrific incidents during International Women’s Month, children were stabbed and killed or abused by a parent or relative, mothers murdered by a partner, young girls left to die after being raped.
As if such violent crimes were not enough, 4.8 percent of the population suffer from unemployment and underemployment, which means too many are hungry, maybe angry, certainly more unhappy than happy. They’re the victims of a lack of jobs, simply put, though it is wise to point out, it’s also a lack of employables with the required skills and talent. Every day the classified ads loudly, vigorously proclaim jobs hungry for applicants, but there’s a missing piece to the puzzle: the right fit.