Current Events

Media

Part of The Little Apostle of the Mountain Province

Title: Current Events
Language: English
Year: 1924
Rights
Fulltext: 120 r 9 •1 ~ 'wra ......... ~:.:.-llllll:~'!lllliiO:-t§O$J:!WIDl--.,j·~, I+ CURRENT EVENTS+ I ~~+,...._ll•i:l•Dl!IP~•Ql-:...:;--.?'-"3Wama.'+ •1• ,_.. -..cal Philippines With the Legislature. It is proposed by a bill to compose a national common language. Why not take as a common language the Tagalog dialect? Or why not use the three principal dialects of the Islands? Let them be taught in the schools. The bill proposing to give the women the right to vote was voted down. Hence individuals will be allowed to purchase 144 hectares of public land. Those who are qualified to apply for homestead shall be 16 years af age at least, pay an initialfeeof 2 P only. place under cultivation at least one third of the land within five vears and shall live in the province ~here the homestead is located. A proposition to suppress the cedula tax was rejected. The Sena.te plans to start agricultural colonies, administered by the Government and whose benefits would go to the nation. The sum of P500,0C-0 would be appropriated for that purpose. The Senate adopted the Fonacier bill making appoinments of superintendents of public schools suuject to confirmation of the Senate. The legislature would extend the right of voting at the coming elections to the inhabitants of the non-chrlstian provinces. A bill was signed by the Governor General making Pl,000,000 available as aid to provinces to build hospitals. The provinces who have alreadv hospitals under construction will be the first to receive assistance. Thanks to Senator Alegre the easy divorce bill was rejected. Senator Ale}andrino was reseated in the Senate with the right to vote but. deprived of his salary. Auditor Wright havingdeclared that certain members of the legislatrr~ abused their transportation privileges by charging the transportation expenses of their families to the funds of the legislature, the Senate wrote a protest against the Auditor accusing him of gross discourtesy for calling the above said expenses: "'legalized robbery." As a bill was proposed to introduce religious instruction into the public schools, so that anv student mav at the request of his p0arents receive. the religious instruction he wants, Senator Alegre attacked severelv the co-edueation system of the pubiic schools, as well as its irreligiousness. "There is rampant ignorance of God a.nd looi;:e morality in the schools", he said, "and the co-educational system hen· in ,-ogue is largely responsible for this deplorable situation." Are better days in view? The American Hood Rubber Comp11.ny sent a representative to study the possibilities of growing rubber in Mindanao. Mr. Deininger after a. six months' stay in Mindanao stated that in the "economic garden of Eden" (Mindanao) rubber, tea, colfee and quinine could be produced in greater quantities and at greater profit than in the Dutch possessions, but, he added, the development of plantations in Mindanao ought to be done by interests with large financial backing. Coir fiber of coconut husks is in great demand in Europe. Millions of these husk;; are wasted in the Philippinee. Since long, machines have been in use in the English Indies to extract the coir fiber. Why not introduce them into the Philippines? During the month of October prices of hemp reached a high figure, to fall down a little later. Last September Al bay again produced most hemp: 25,172 bales, with Leyte a close second, 2:l,261 bales. The total production in the P. I. was 125,375 bales. A great constructor from Hongkong declared lately that the best cement in the Far East was the Cebu cement. No wonder thus t.hat more and more Cebu cement is exported. Exportation of embroidery during the last five years (1919-1923) averaged a little less than PI0,500,000 of which 60?1> represents the wages of the workers engaged in the industry. During the month of September Cebu exported to foreign countries merchandise worth 1"3,574,258. Nevertheless more and more l:i.borers leave the Philippines for H awali, while the possibilities on the rich Filipino soil are unlimited. WHY ? What are the remedies? \Vifh busy readers. The Holy Father, Pope Pius XI.sent 1'15,000 to the typhoon sufferers of the diocese of Tuguegarao. ,,. Seventy-two, of whom 60 are women, passed their last examination for pharma.cists, although 24 of them, who passed only conditionally, wi.11 have to face another examination. 121 President Quezon and Senator Osmeila were given a hearty welcome on their return from the United States. Both are hopeful to see the next session of the United States' Congress pass legislation settling the Philippine question definitely by granting the Islands their long coveted independence. Both were feted at Tokio by the members of the J apaoese diet. According to President Quezon, Mr. Coolidge will be elected President of the United States. .;A Representative Recto, another member of the Filipino Independence Commission will arrive during this month. It is said that he will make sensational revelations about the independence situation in Washington. Of the 25,000 teachers in the public schools of the P. I., 10,363 are women. ,,. These last months the papers reported enormous numbers of Chinese immigrants. Questioned about this danger, Mr. Aldanese, insular collector of customs said that notall of the incoming Chinese intend to stay in the Philippines. 'lhe largest number of Chinese arrived in 1923. -14,676 were admitted, but that year too 12,020 Chinese left for China. .;A The dirigible ZR-3 made the voyage from Friedrichshafen (Germany) to the United States a distance of 5,066 miles, in 81 hours and 17 minutes. ,,. Tokio registered 4,096 earthquakes since the last terrible earthquake of Sept. 1, 1923. Lately it was discovered that the deepest place in the Ocean (32,636 feet), is at 145 wiles southeast of Tokio. ,,. Four Filipino girls, who arrived penniless in Seattle with the hope of finding a job, covering their expenses while studying at a college, had to be 122 placed under the care of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd : they did not find a jOb and so have many Filipino students been disappointed, when they landed in the United Stll.tes without the means of support. foreign China. About the :fifteenth of October the civil war between Kiangsu and Chekiang came to rather what the Chinese call the end. The Chekiang forces surrendered and an armistice was declared. Some of the Chekiang higher officers fled to Japan. Were they bribed to give up their arms? China is the classical land of bribery. When soldiers are sent to fight the bandits, they try to bribe them, rather than to fight them. In the meantime the bandits try to bribe the soldiers, to get weapons and ammunition. If both come to a clash, much shouting accompanies the shooting .... in the air mostly. Even in this civil war between Che.kiang and Kiangsu the casualties existed mostly in the papers and not on the battlefield. Most of the bullets were sent in a vertical and not in a horizont;il line. Why should the Chinese kill each other? Let the officers come to an understanding. This does not mean that the civil war has come to a happy end. In China there are three great men who for years try to become the leading force in the country: Sun Yat Sen at Canton, Wu Pei Fu at Peking and Chang Tso Lin in Manchuria. Sun these last days has seen his own sun eclipsed. So the real fight now is between Wu and Chang. Who will win? Let us look behind the curtains. Nearly all foreign powers favor Chang. He is not antiforeign. Wu is favored by the U. S. He hates the Europeans. In view of the harmony between foreign powers to support Chang, it is more than probable that the U. S. will let Wu play his own game. Both need foreign help : th~ one who gets most of it, will surely be the luckier at the end. And then, will China be free of civil war? The country is too big and th~ spirit of . di vision between the south and north, as between the different provinces, is too deep, to unite the Chinese efficaciously under one man. England. Premier McDonald has resigned. New elections will take place. In fact McDonald should have resigned long ago, or rather he should never have accepted the premiership. His labor party was weaker than the parties of the conservatives and the liberals. But these last two who have been alternatively in power for a long time, were unwilling to help each othe:r against the labor party. Rather than help each other to govern, they gave the premiership to McDonald, the leader of the labor party. In this they had a second reason, Both parties bad long been in struggle with France, about peace made and to be remade with Germany. But England could not overcome the stern opposition of France and of most of thA Allies. Rather than to give up their demands and to humiliate themselves, both parties gave the labor party a chance to smooth up the situation between England and the Allies. Lately the conference of London pacified more or less all contendants, so McDonald was of Iio further use and Liberals and Conservatives gave him his vacation. The new elections will decide what party shall dominate in England. The 6erman loan, prescribed by the London conference and to be subscribed by different countries of Europe and the United StateS, has been a complete success. In all the countries which had to 123 contribute towards the $300,000,000 loan to Germany, their part was greatly oversub..oeribed. This is a good sign for coming peace. With money in Germany, the other countries will seek to keep Germany in peace. War would mean the loss of that money. it Mission Week. These last ten ~·eal"i! the Mission Week, celebrate'd in all towr1s ac:d villages of Belgium and Holland, has been a source of immense revenues for the foreign missions. What is a Mission Week? Father N . . . • from T .... wants a Mission Week. He announces it to the people of his parish a few "·eeks in advance. In the mean time he writes to the different Missionary OrderS of his country. At the date fixed, the various Missionary Orders send one or mo·re of their Missionaries to the parish of Father N .... On the eve of the Mission Week, they open in one of the biggest halls of the parish a small Exhibition of objects and curios, that came from their missions. During the mission week any one is allowed to visit the fair, provided he leaves a certain ·a.mount of money, of course for the sup· port of the missions. On Sunday the Missionaries deliver a sermon at all the nf asses about their respeeti ve missions. A collection is taken up and nobody present would refuse bis generous alms for the missions. In the evening one or more of the Missionaries give a lecture in the hall of the Extlibition, again a.bout the missions. Useless to say that a new collection at the end of the lecture swells the already gathered funds. During the week various committees visit the houses of the cat.holic families of the ,·illage or town. The work is made known in the sermons and lectures: the Catholic people, interested in the apostolic work of the Missionaries and anxious tohelptbeircountrymen as well as the poor heathens of other countries, answer generously the calls of the members of said committees. And the result ? Here follows one of the last Mission Weeks at Brussels, Belgium. "The collectio11s in the Churches, parish and conventual, of Brussels, five parishes of Laeken, St. Gilles, the Sacred Heart, the Churches of the Carmelite Fathers, the Dominicans, the Fathers of the Blessed Sacrament, the Gesu, were 67,483 franks or 117, 496,03. The Exhibition : 39,340 franks or $7 ,868; the conferences : 7 ,060 franks or $1,412; the film: 10,739 franks or *2,H7,04; the schools that were invited to the exhibition and film o:lfered 15,000 franks or $3,000; the total, together with the funds co11ected by the Committees, amounted to 200,000 /ranks or M0,000 or PB0,000." 124 fortiter et Suaviter Education should becarried on with firumess a.nd gentleness. Unless it be a meaningless word "parental authority" is obliged at times to have recourse to admonitions, reprimands and even chastisements. Nevertheless, to facilitate the efforts on the part of the child, compelled to study much, and thus renounce attractive pleasure, parents and teachers must be gentle a.nd give their orders persuasively, trying to convince the children of the good and necessity of the order given. It is thus one obtains submission and better results from children. "If you know how to show maternal affection and good humor, if you have more frequent opportunities for rejoicing with your pupils, rather than for scolding and punishing them, everything will be easier for you" (Alfred Terrieres, Doctor in Sociology). The pa.rents' good humor (what is said about parents must be applied to teachers) is communicative. The children seeing them working joyfully and merrily, without murmuring against daily hardships and contrarieties, will naturally imitate them and be more self-possessed and more virile in character. They will more easily overcome little annoyances, which make others complain loudly. It is thus t.Patstrong characters are formed. The part of a mother in the education of her children is force tempered by constant devotedness to du t·y. Sweetness and gentleness on all oc.casions have charms for the little ones entrusted to her care. Wtiakness which tolerates faults in children and satisfies their every whim, discloses a lack of intelligence and true love. Such a weak mother does not see how these uncorrected faults increase in the child dispositions to commit them a.gain and again, and how they _form real habits: she spoils the child; no, she does not love her child truly. The little delinquent must be sometimes chasti.\ed, but without anger, and who corrects must gently persuade at the same time. Certain mothers by their gentle manners and occasional reprimands at "opportune moments" obtain obedience, relative peace and mutual endur~nce. Screaming, making noise, insulting, multiplying the following cautious words: "be quiet! ... Lea,·e me alone" are good for nothing, they may inspire fear, but they decrease respect and affec~ion. Instead of trying to make the child keep still, which is impossible many a time, why not turn to account its youthful and spontaneous outbursts and activity? Mother has to see to the babies: a constant exercise for her patience and gentleness. With sufficient will power on the part of their mother, the band of little ones will well understand that mother, though kindness itself, is als:> their "mistress." Parents ought to act firmly and gently, especially at the age when physical as well as moral personality is being developed and asserting itself. Too much indulgence does harm; on the other hand harshness fetters confidence, which ls so necessary for the young. Those in authority oup:ht tG be amiable by their condescendence to just desires, aspirations and efforts of the young: this way they win thP affection of the children and when one possesses the heart of a child, he controls also the will. One can thus with more success give a reprimand when it is necessary. But nevertheless one must never tfO beyond bounds: once the heart is shut,· educational influence is doomed to failure. Christian parents be~ God's help in a work on whic.h depends the happiness of their children. The wisest of parents will seek these. indispensable gifts of fortitude and meekness at their right source: frequent Communion, which will enable them to accomplish their task "fortiter et suaviter" (firmly and gently). ·