REACTIONS ON THE ARTICLE
Written by Barbie Velarde and her group
The goodness and evilness of something seem to be
confusing at some point. Distinguishing right from wrong oftentimes becomes a
challenging task to every individual. However, choosing to embrace the good
rather than favoring the bad makes a person free because they are not
controlled by violence and manipulated by the actions of others. These is one
point stated in the article which I strongly agree with. Every individual has
the free will to choose which path to take. But, it’s quite difficult to
maintain the goodness of life since, there are a lot of circumstances or
factors which influences our decisions and desire to take on what is right. As
an individual and a student at this age, I can readily relate to what the
article is trying to pertain, that good people are free people. In my life, as
my nature of being human, I may not be a perfect person, however, at some point,
I can say that I was able to make / choose on right and even tough decisions
which gave me a heart free from worries and doubts and most of all, a clear
conscience. For instance specifically, when friends invite me to go and do
cutting classes just to go window shopping or wandering around town, or in
other cases, going overnight to a classmate’s house just to enjoy friends
company and using school works or other school related activities as the reason
to parents. These is very rampant during my high school years. But, instead of
doing so, I choose not to, since it is the right thing to do even if I know
that I was not able to enjoy and experience the fun. As they say, “you missed
half of your high school life”. But for me, it doesn’t mean that if almost
everybody is doing so, it’s the right thing to do and that, its not always that
you should go with the trend of today’s world/generation. We just have to keep
our track and know our responsibilities. One thing I just wanted to add on in
knowing what is good and not is that maturity is one major factor which helps
us decide on the way. Hence, knowing what is good or not paved way for us to
become a responsible person and a mature one leading us to the road to freedom.
Despite the reality that
man is aware of the goodness and evilness of something , yet, we fail to
respond to being consistently achieving to do good. We tend to prefer our
selfish and egocentric self in which we get what we want, where we feel
satisfied and obtain happiness. Thus, doing what is right is a lifelong
responsibility to take and a continuing struggle for one.
The article which talks about
right or wrong inculcated much insights on our part not only because of its
interesting concept but also because being a student and as adolescents, we can
readily relate to it. One important concept in which the article emphasized was
on achieving freedom in doing what is good. it cited specific justification and
even historical/biblical personalities to show that indeed good people are free
people. As youth of today’s generation, what we see that is manifested by the
majority becomes the basis of what is good to do. Indeed, it is then our
responsibility to weigh it out and decide which we will follow. For instance as
what one of the members pointed out that, refusing to go with friend and
classmates doing cutting classes or
lying to parents for the sake of having fun with peers might be a challenging decision
since it does require us to turn the other cheek. Refusal to the many peer
pressures and influences as an adolescent who usually cope and find
belongingness to friends really is a big challenge for many teenagers now a
days.
One common notion that we
had which the article also talks about is choosing good against evil
even if it demands us to “turn the other cheek”. These exemplifies doing good
even others does not.one pointed what the bible have said that “throw bread
instead of evil” emphasizing that choosing what is right isn’t easy. Yet it
makes our conscience clear. The choices is all in our hands , either go and
walk with righteousness or be a follower of goodness. Then the question we are
all eager to answer is “How do I know if I am doing the right thing?”. Simple,
by just seeing and evaluating the fruit of our chosen actions and decisions.
For us, we all know the fruit of wrong is evil and the fruit of righteousness
will bear goodness. As Galatians 6:9 emphasizes “What man soweth, that man
shall reap”.
The article also talks
about forming our conscience wherein one common realization of the group is
that anyone who has the choice to decide for the good needs to become concern
not only for oneself but also for the welfare of others. Hence, we all do agree
with that doing what is good is totally accepting the presence of God and his
teaching and living life not just for oneself but totally submitting our life
to God’s will.
Living life in goodness is
a continuing struggle Thus, we might be given the choice to decide for
ourselves. But we are guided by the wisdom given by God and that it is our
responsibility to form our conscience in the true light of God’s words.
No comments:
Post a Comment