Flame Pillar of Rizal

The Religious Boy Rizal

The early education of the boy Rizal was at the feet of his loving mother, Teodora Alonso, who was a graduate of Santa Rosa College, and had, among other gifts, a literary talent so that it was no wonder that she had encouraged Rizal to write poetry. She must have transmitted to her son the rudiments of the Christian doctrine, a requisite in Catholic schools.

As Rizal would recall from his childhood memory, his mother gathered all her children to pray the Angelus in the house as customary to lowland Filipino Christian families in the days of yore. Further, he fondly remembered that the Angelus was followed by the nightly praying of the holy rosary.

In his book, "José Rizal, Life, Works, and Writings," the late Dr. Gregorio F. Zaide, recounted that "Young Rizal was a religious boy. A scion of Catholic clan, born and bred in a wholesome atmosphere of Catholicism, and possessed of an inborn pious spirit, he grew up as a good Catholic."

Under the personal tutelage of his mother, who was a devout Catholic, the boy Rizal learned the common Catholic prayers at an early age. At five years old, he was able to read, although haltingly, the Spanish family Bible which, perhaps, was illustrated in black and white and commonly called then Historia Sagrada.

As a young boy, Rizal loved to pray in church, taking part in novenas and joining religious processions. He appeared to be so devout that jokingly, he was called Manong Jose by members of the Orden Tercera (Third Order), an association of lay people affiliated with a religious order.

For a formal schooling, Rizal was sent by his parents to Biñan which, like his hometown, Calamba, is in Laguna, to attend a private school where he studied from 1870 to 1871. While studying in Biñan, he often heard the early morning Mass as recorded in his memoirs thus: "I heard te four o' clock Mass (in the morning), if there was one, or I studied my lessons at the same hour and heard Mass afterward."

On account of his academic excellence, Rizal sent to the Ateneo Municipal in Manila. As an Atenean student, Rizal started the day with a prayer, continued it with daily prayers and ended the day with a prayer. In Ateneo then, students heard Mass in the morning before the start of the classes. As customary in Catholic schools, class in every subject opened and closed with prayer.

On graduation day, March 23, 1877, Rizal had some fear as to what the realities of life had in store for him. Thus, in the morning of that very day, he prayed fervently at the college chapel, commending his life "to the Virgin so that she might protect me when I set foot in that world which inspired me with such dread."

Rizal's devotion to the Virgin was secondary to his devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus under the Apostleship of Prayer in which, as earlier pointed out, he was a promoter. His devotions to Jesus and Mary were expressed in his carvings of the images of the Sacred Heart and the Blessed Mother sculpted on batikulung (Philippine hardwood) with the use of his pocket-knife.

His devotions to the Mother and Son were further manifested when he wrote during his Ateneo days two separate religious poems dedicated to the two. One was titled, "Al Niño Jesus" (To the Child Jesus), and the other was named, "A La Virgen Maria" (To the Virgin Mary).

The other religious poem addressed to the Virgin Mary appeared to be a sonnet which, while undated, was considered to have followed the ode to the Child Jesus. Its last three lines remind one of the hymn, "Moher of Christ" in the Baclaran church novena and their English version of translated by Frank C. Laubach, American writer and biographer of Rizal, are the following:

"If deprivation comes to buffet me,
And if grim death in agony draws near,
O, succor me, from anguish set me free."

It will be noted, therefore, that from his early childhood in Calamba to his Atenean student days, Rizal showed his religiosity which may be attributed to his environment. In fact, he composed a poem entitled, "Alianza Intima Entre La Religion Y La Educacion" (An Intimate Alliance Between Religion and Education) in which Rizal expressed the importance of religion in education and to him, education without God is not true education.