The Miracle of Conversion from Vice to Virtue

Samuel B. Batara (2002)

University of Asia and the Pacific

Consistently showing interest in the welfare of the problematic person can

do a lot of wonders. Many people don’t seem to realize their self-worth until
somebody else goes out of himself to make them aware of how valuable
each person is. To some, just listening to their concerns may do the job. To
others, making them feel somebody cares may take cake of the trick. To still
others, giving the attention they cannot get from traditional sources may be
the answer to their seemingly endless worries. In a few cases, someone else
may need to show them alternative steps and the possible consequences of
each step they take and enable them to decide. Some may need to be
confronted and led through a painful analysis of their irresponsibility or
inability to grow out of their immaturity. Very rare cases may need the help
of experts and specialists to start and effect the healing process of broken
relationships and marred self-image.

In the last 26 years where I have directly been involved in the ministry of
healing, as a parish church pastor, a hospital and prison chaplain, a youth
development worker, a college chaplain, and a guidance counselor in two
high schools, I have encountered much of human ills that ultimately needed
healing of relationships – i. e. bringing a person into fuller relations with
one’s self, with others, and with his God. As a matter of fact, there was a
stage in my ministry when I was so touched by the wonder of conversion –
the sudden about face, or turning around, which happened in so many of
those I have helped. It inspired and moved me to write a short story, which
got to the top 100 out of 4000 entries in one Asiaweek literary competition.

Just last year, there was the case where a handful of students in my school
were almost taken away and sold into prostitution, if not because of my
concern and interest in following up the events.

It came to my notice when homeroom advisers reported to the Guidance

Office that some students had accumulated an alarming amount of absences.
I asked their teachers to bring these students to me when given the chance
that they were in campus, so that I could find out what exactly was holding
them from attending.
That opportunity came when, presto, all the girls in question were gathered
in front of my desk. With no sweat, the teachers were able to gather them all,
not one less. It gave me the impression that the girls were into some peer
grouping of sort, that when one attends, everybody does. Something else
struck me. They were all wearing the school uniform and they seemed like
sextuplets bearing identical similarities. They all wore make-ups in the hue
of greenish. After some observant felicitations, I also noticed a mark
tattooed at the same place on their hands, an image of a crawling scorpion
between the thumb and the pointer finger.

The initial meeting got nowhere. They made up their own stories of how
they stayed home sick of whatever. They were warned that their chances
were slim if they kept on skipping classes. I gave them the usual lecture of
what they were in school for, why their parents do work their guts out just to
support them through school, on the picture of the leverage the fully
educated have over the ill educated, and the kind of life opportunities they
must bear if they did not at least finish high school. They were made to write
senseless promissory notes that they must not absent themselves or suffer
the consequences of getting dropped from the school rolls.

They promptly came to school for a while. Then reports came anew that they
were missing classes as usual. This clear breach of the written pledges their
kids earlier signed was inevitably brought to the attention of the parents.
Radio broadcasts were arranged for the parents of so and so to come to
school for some important matters concerning their children.

A series of meetings was held with the parents together with the girls, as
well as with the parents by themselves. As expected, the parents were all in
praises of their teens, until it was spilled by them that there had been
frequent occasions where the girls had asked permission to be in school at
night for some school programs and these or those activities. To the
contrary, no night programs or activities actually happened in the school in
those nights cited. The parents still expressed trust in their kids that they
were into something productive. They were however lectured too on how
parents should cooperate with teachers in looking after their own children,
particularly outside school hours, and in ensuring that these students
continue and finish their studies.

Attention was focused to the case study done on these students. I almost
became their guardian angel who would be preoccupied with knowing where
they were when they were not in the classroom. I would bring them into the
campus, into their classrooms from whenever I found them, from leisurely
making the day pass by in and around the chain of stores and other hangouts
surrounding the school campus. Teachers continued to report the noticeable
attitudes and bearings of the students who were under closer analytical
observation. They bypassed school rules by not wearing IDs and uniforms,
and how they could sneak into the campus through the gate guards in their
high heels, mini-skirts, bell-bottoms and so on. They still wore the identical
hues of makeup each day, while they became listless in, if they were not
cutting, their classes.

Parents were again called in for a series of consultation, with and then
without the students. We zeroed in on the nights these kids escaped from
home. A lot of stories made-up by the students to their parents were aired.
They were into so and so’s birthday party, in a review session at one or the
next girl’s house, etc. Conflicts of testimonies, however, became discernible
when parents of the supposedly host girls denied that their students were in
their houses at the mentioned times.

I made my own surveillance of the group. I asked other students of what

they knew about the activities of these girls. No one seemed to know about
anything. Until one deep night I got a call from the police regarding some
students wearing theirr school uniform roaming around the city plaza. A tip
was given that these kids might be into some drug hunt, pimp deal, hustler
pick-up or something else. I had to physically get out of bed in the unholy
hours of the night and round the plaza girls home to their indifferent,
scarcely shocked parents.

Another face to face cathartic session between parents and the teens was set.
I was determined to dig out what really these girls were into. An
excruciating process of questioning revealed that they spent most of the
nights they were out in a beach house situated some three towns away
belonging to a certain figure in this city. They danced, they drank, and they
slept, were all they said they did. The ambivalent parents did not yet seem to
be bothered by the revelations.

I continued to pursue my investigation of the case and found out that these
girls have been recruited into a fraternity, imposing strict rules of
recruitment, initiation and secrecy, which explained the strange things
happening with their schooling and their being tight-lipped about their
activities. I had occasions to reveal my findings to the parents, and some
even contested the facts by insisting that their kids could not possibly do
such accusations.

I organized a network of responsible people in the immediate community,

including student leaders and village officials, to spy on the whereabouts and
activities of these young things. Until one night at around 9:00 o’clock,
someone telephoned me about something fishy. A Mitsubishi L300 van was
about to leave for Manila. It contained female students of our school. I
immediately contacted not the parents but the police and asked them to
intercept the said vehicle, and that I would be with them soon to identify the
students whom I theorized as about to be transported to a den in a far place
away from this city.

Only when the police have taken the group into their custody did I contact
and ask the parents to come and collect their kids and their belongings. They
were becoming more aware that they themselves almost sold their children
to slavery by not paying them attention they needed. It was a good while for
these parents to realize how far they condoned the leanings of their girls that
almost brought them to hell, and for these students to understand that they
needed to listen to warnings of life, or life can be terrible. How thankful they
were!

They have changed. No more classes and projects missed. One or two of
them may even graduate with honors at the end of this year. They all now
want to go to college.