Things that we need to tell JM Natividad

1. Why are you not here?

2. Why are we here?
3. Who are we…. Really?

 Responsibility, guilt, relationships worth fighting for  justice

o Guilt and responsibility are contingent to the sense of justice
 NOTE: not action
o Our guilt is what prompts us to commit to our duty
 Justice is what makes us feel guilty
 The ideal of justice, and the reality of our condition, and the awareness
of the reality of our condition – prompts us to start
 Meaningful relationships are what keeps us committed to our duty
o It is possible to form/deepen these relationships through continuous commitment
 Even if there was none in the beginning, where duty was pursued for duty’s sake
 Duty for duty’s sake is not enough to sustain this commitment because
it alienates the agent from his human nature (kyle the commie)
o What makes duty particularly hard for man to commit to is the
seeming impossibility of its total fulfillment
 A systemic order cannot be resolved within a lifetime.
Therefore, the agent cannot see the fulfillment of his
acts. He asks, “May saysay pa ba itong ginagawa ko, hindi
naman ako sigurado kung may naitutulong ako, kung may
nasasaktan ba ako, kung makikita ko ‘man ang resulta nito”
 It’s dependent on our capacity to see how well we could
fulfill that duty. That’s why we keep asking kung may
magagawa pa tayo, kaunti lang naman yung
maitutulong natin. Bata lang naman tayo, hanggang
upper-middle class lang naman kaya ko
 This humility also prompts us to work with
others so that we may enact more and better
change
o It is impossible
 Knowing the awful reality we are in, it still shouldn’t
paralyze us but rather inspire us
 Because:
o There are others that fight with us and
for us
o There are those people that we wish to
protect
 o There are those we are grateful for
o There are those we still wish to make
amends with – take responsibility for
o Man is inescapably social, he cannot find existential fulfillment
from the pursuit of abstract values
 Man should tie it to the people and his relationship/s
with them
 Calasanz: parang, your acts can’t be there to comfort
you when you are sad. It is the people around you that
catches your tears

 These relationships, specifically, were developed through our continuous

engagement with the people that are affected and fighting for the same cause
 We see from where we stand:
o “If you do not see your liberation to be tied to ours, then it
would be better if you leave. But if you do, then let us help each
other.”  clarify with text