“Christmas is not loud. It is careful. It is grateful for survival, for dry ground, for one more chance to begin again”
I’VE come to think that Christmas doesn’t ask us to get everything right.
This year, that gratitude comes with weight.
Too many Filipino families welcomed Christmas after storms and earthquakes had already passed through their lives—homes destroyed and flooded, livelihoods washed away, memories soaked in rubbles, mud and loss.
Some are rebuilding quietly.
Others are still waiting. And there is an unspoken frustration that lingers, knowing that some of the damage might have been lessened had promised flood-control projects actually existed beyond paper and press releases.
For them, Christmas is not loud. It is careful. It is grateful for survival, for dry ground, for one more chance to begin again.
And yet, gratitude still finds its way in.
Not for what was perfect, but for what endured. For meals shared even if the table is smaller. For families that stayed intact even when houses did not.
For the simple grace of being together after a year that tested patience, faith, and trust.
Gratitude, this Christmas, is quieter—but deeper.
Resilience, especially for Filipino families, has never needed an announcement.
It lives in the way people rebuild before questions are answered, clean up before help arrives, and celebrate even when recovery is incomplete.
We decorate anyway. We cook anyway. We gather anyway—not because the year was kind, but because hope remains our most stubborn tradition.
In the Philippines, Christmas does not arrive on Dec. 25. It arrives quietly in September with the Christmas carol of Jose Mari Chan.
Christmas has a way of finding us—even when we’re not quite ready for it.
Filipino families know this moment by heart.
Over time, our Christmas table has learned to adjust. Our four children grew up with the eldest three.
Angel, Andrew and Magi now have their respective families except for Me-Anne. We now have seven grandchildren with the recent arrival of Bryana on Dec. 16, Magi’s fourth child.
Like many Filipino families, we’ve learned that Christmas is not always complete—but it is always full.
We miss Andrew, April and cute Addison who are unable to come home from Orange, California.
Last Christmas was one of our happiest as we were all complete capped by a family trip to Japan in January to celebrate a milestone 60th birthday of Tess.
Christmas has a way of teaching gratitude in its simplest form.
It reminds us to be thankful not for what arrived perfectly, but for what arrived at all.
Gratitude lives in the quiet realization that the year, for all its weight, has carried us safely to this moment, gathered around what remains, thankful for what endures.
Christmas lingers in the hum of familiar voices, in the comfort of knowing that for this season, everyone is safe, healthy and sound.
As we celebrate the birth of our savior Jesus Christ, let’s all pray —not for more gifts or blessings —but simply for gratitude.
For indeed, we all have many reasons to be grateful for. Merry Christmas and God bless the Philippines!
(The writer, president/chief executive officer of Media Touchstone Ventures, Inc. and president/executive director of the Million Trees Foundation Inc., a non-government outfit advocating tree-planting and environmental protection, is the official biographer of President Fidel V. Ramos.)
