Spirituality of Babad (Immersion)

The last public lecture/webinar for 2021 was held last December 4, 2021 on “Spirituality of Babad (Immersion)” with Fr. Dave Capucao, Ph.D., S.Th.D., author/writer of “Exploring the Spirituality of Babad: Engaging the Poor and Inter-religious Dialogue Today” (Peeters, 2021), as resource speaker.

Fr. Capucao started his talk by sharing the story of the Salt Doll. He defined the Filipino word Babad as to immerse, to soak, to plunge, to dip (active mode) and to be absorbed, to be involved deeply (passive mode). Then he also gave the definition of Immersion as the act of immersing, or the state of being immersed; a sinking within a fluid; a dipping and it also means submersion in water for the purpose of Christian Baptism, the state of being overwhelmed or deeply absorbed and deeply engaged.

He also shared his own Babad/immersion experience from different immersion areas. He said that Spirituality of babad requires us to listen to the prompting of the human spirit. He uses Bp. Labayen’s three (3) characteristics of human spirit: 1) search for meaning, 2) capacity for self-gift, and 3) capacity for self-transcendence (to dream dreams). Then he uses three symbols to help us understand the hermeneutics of immersion: the pebble, flower, and encounter.

He also shared the five (5) concepts of poverty in the Christian Tradition: 1) Material poverty – socio-economic poverty; imposed poverty, 2) Spiritual poverty – attitude of dependence on God; need for God; humility; Pope Francis’ expression: crying, begging, dreaming, 3) voluntary poverty – agapeic poverty, 4) solidarity with the poor – struggle with the poor, 5) poor as shapers of own history – poor as evangelizers. Then he ended his presentation by sharing a quote from a Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu: “Go to the people, live with them, learn from them, and love them. Start with what they know, and build with what they have.”

There were 68 participants who attended the webinar, with some attending in groups.