Galileo Galilei (b. 1564) is my favorite scientist. A genius who worked hard all his life seeking truth. He is to scientists as Thomas More is to lawyers: the King’s good servant, but God’s first. Unfortunately his life was made supremely miserable by the most well-meaning persons including the Jesuit saint Robert Bellarmine.

Galileo was sent to a monastery for his early education. He was attracted to the monastic way of life and became a novice. His father wanted him to become a medical doctor however and pulled him out and enrolled him at the University of Pisa.

He never finished his medical studies because he spent most of his time studying mathematics. He taught mathematics for 21 years first in Pisa and then in Padua. His famous quote on mathematics appeared in one of his books: “Philosophy is written in this grand book, the universe, which stands continually open to our gaze. But the book cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and read the characters in which it is written. It is written in the language of mathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles, and other geometric figures without which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of it; without these one is wandering in a dark labyrinth.”

He remained devout and devoted to his work, his 2 daughters became nuns.

In 1609 he invented the telescope and within a two month period of observing the evening skies, he arguably made more scientific discoveries than anyone before or since. He firmly belonged to the Copernican camp but was purposely quiet on the matter not wanting to stir controversy.

In 1616 Cardinal Bellarmine was ordered to meet with the other cardinals of the Inquisition to decide upon Copernican theory. Theological experts were summoned and the theories of Copernicus were formally condemned. Bellarmine personally informed Galileo of this decision and was explicitly forbidden to support the studies of Copernicus. Galileo was largely unmoved because his friend and supporter Maffeo Barberini subsequently became Pope Urban VIII.

Partly to aid in the defense of a student Galileo published in 1632 the quaint and esoteric Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief Systems of the World - Ptolemaic and Copernican. Much like what was in vogue at that time, it reports upon the dialogue between Salviati, who argues for the Copernican system, and Simplicio who is an Aristotelian philosopher. Shortly after publication, the Inquisition banned its sale and ordered Galileo to be tried.
Because Copernican theory had been heretofore declared false, Galileo didn’t stand a chance and was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment.

Galileo died a heretic and even though he stated in his will that he wished to be buried at the family crypt inside a Basilica his relatives rightfully expected retribution from the Church and it would take close to a hundred years for this wish to be fulfilled, and even at that time, amidst great opposition.
In 1992, 350 years after Galileo's death, Pope John Paul II admitted that errors had been made by the theological advisors in the trial of Galileo. He brought closure on the case without admitting that the Church was wrong to convict Galileo at that time on a charge of heresy because of his belief that the Earth rotates round the sun.

My admiration for Galileo has only grown with my years of practice as a physician. I am confronted, daily with the problems of patients who seek my counsel because they are looking for other opinions. I have been guided, all these years by what Galileo had written long ago: “I do not think it is necessary to believe that the same God who has given us our reason and our intelligence wishes us to abandon the use of our reason or intelligence in living our lives”.

Twenty years ago, I found myself in a heated discussion with my seatmate aboard a USAir flight. He was an American veteran of World War II who had spent a year in the Philippines and we were talking about the Atlantic Monthly article of James Fallows that had appeared a few months earlier. The veteran began by professing his deep love for the Philippines and profound respect for the Filipino people but confided to me that he agreed with the conclusion of Fallows: our culture was damaged.

Remember that we had just overthrown Marcos at that time and we were all full of hope and nationalism was running high. Our time had arrived and we were going to prove to the world we could be as productive as the rest of our neighbors. I blamed everybody and ascribed our national failure to historical precedents and worldwide economic upheavals. Everything and everybody but our very own selves and our culture.

Twenty years later, I revisited the article and discovered an entirely different reading. Fallows had been divining from a crystal ball. Only his conclusion was off. Consider these paragraphs: “The countries that surround the Philippines have become the world's most famous showcases for the impact of culture on economic development. Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore--all are short on natural resources, but all (as their officials never stop telling you) have clawed their way up through hard study and hard work. Unfortunately for its people, the Philippines illustrates the contrary: that culture can make a naturally rich country poor.”

“It seems to me that the prospects for the Philippines are about as dismal as those for, say, South Korea are bright. In each case the basic explanation seems to be culture: in the one case a culture that brings out the productive best in the Koreans (or the Japanese, or now even the Thais), and in the other a culture that pulls many Filipinos toward their most self-destructive, self-defeating worst.”

The article even quoted Benigno Aquino Jr as he began his political career to illustrate the intractability of the problems: "Here is a land in which a few are spectacularly rich while the masses remain abjectly poor. . . . Here is a land consecrated to democracy but run by an entrenched plutocracy. Here, too, are a people whose ambitions run high, but whose fulfillment is low and mainly restricted to the self-perpetuating elite.”

I was faintly aware of the demoralizing effect this article had on many Filipinos because during this entire period I lived and worked in the US. I was busy testing my own mettle and determining whether I could compete in a country that attracted the most competitive people. Returning to the Philippines made me painfully aware of Fallows’ prescience. He was mostly right and we continued to be left behind even by countries that had seemed so unlikely to progress 20 years ago.

What made the article devastating then was the utter gloom in his concluding paragraph: “It may be too pessimistic to think of culture as a kind of large-scale genetics, channeling whole societies toward progress or stagnation. A hundred years ago not even the crusading Emperor Meiji would have dreamed that "Japanese culture' would come to mean "efficiency.' America is full of people who have changed their "culture' by moving away from the old country or the home town or the farm. But a culture-breaking change of scene is not an answer for the people still in the Philippines--there are 55 million of them, where would they go?--and it's hard to know what else, within our lifetimes, the answer might be.”

James Fallows could not fathom at that time that it was indeed possible to move 10 million Filipinos to other countries where they would be left on their own and be forced to confront the stark reality of becoming productive or else fail and flounder. The answer was there all along, a mass re-education for 10 million Filipinos that would definitively prove that we had it within ourselves to change our destiny.

Now I just smile whenever pundits analyze the origins of our national illness. How our postwar leaders should not have allowed parity with other powerful economies; how a federal system will eliminate the inequality in wealth distribution; how “genuine” land reform will eradicate homelessness; how pervasive corruption sucks up funds meant for health and education and infrastructure and discourages foreign investments; how sending convicted ex Presidents to prison will instill justice.

Not in our stars, in ourselves. The answers are literally out there, everywhere, in almost every nation on earth where fellow Filipinos strive daily to reclaim what we rightfully deserve: security, health, education, a way of life that does not debase but rather upholds our humanity.

Here in the Philippines, we don’t think twice greeting people “Merry Christmas”. None of this nonsense about “Happy Holidays” or “Season's Greetings”. December 25 is all about the birth of Jesus Christ. Have a problem with this celebration? Suck it up.

Merry Christmas to all.

1. 'Yes!'

2. 'Not yet.'

3. 'I have something better in mind.'

There was a transport strike and school was out. The natives said it couldn’t be done, they said we were not in America. But we were determined to drive to Mactan, though mapless a mere 90 miles away as the crow flies. So we set out at the break of dawn for San Carlos City where there was a ferry that would convey our car across the Tanon Strait. There is a previous entry describing this scenic route that cuts through Mount Mandalagan.

While waiting for the ship, a relative in Cebu tried to dissuade us from making the trip citing the difficulties in finding directions. His advice was ignored. We drove the car inside the cargo hold of the 35 year old Japanese freighter and went up to the steerage section. We weren’t about to trade feeling the sea wind for a silly movie in a dark, air-conditioned enclosure in the “Business Class” section.

Just watching our 4 year old shriek with excitement as the engines of the ship bellowed into life and listening to the younger kids shouting at the top of their lungs, copying the foghorn blasts made the trip worthwhile. In 90 minutes we reached Toledo, in Cebu island. The roads were excellent and with the assistance of those indispensable Coca Cola and Jollibee signs we reached Shangri-la in fine shape.

I wouldn’t have felt like Conway if I had taken another way.

There were many high points in this unplanned getaway but one of them was surely when I skyped Dr. Paul and Dr. Todd and I panned the webcam across the pools and the bars and the beaches while it was snowing in 25’ Guymon.

Now the strike is over and the kids are back in school.