Del Rosario, Angel Paul B. September 18,2011

Eng1 – B-2R Reaction Paper

Impenetrable Shield of Faith

I. Introduction

Since the day we existed in this world, there’s a lot of temptations. A fight between good and bad. A story about a man who protected his faith through series of temptations. A story entitled Junto Al Pasig which means “Along the Pasig River” written by Dr. Jose P. Rizal. The story revolves in the coming of the feast of the Virgin Mary. The havoc of Satan to the world of humans to tempt them to change and worship him. This is also the time where the pilipinos are under the colonialism of the Spanish. A story written to show the love for the country and all of its sufferings under its conquerors specially the Spaniards.

II. Body

The coming of the Virgin is one of the most awaited moment for Christians because it’s the mother of their savior. In religion classes it is taught that the Virgin Mary serves as the bridge for our prayers and for us to be able to reach her son Jesus. We offer different things in her feast. All of us gets excited in that day. Like the characters in the story they’ve offer flowers, birds of different colors, firecrackers, and a flute to be played. Offering different things in order to give thanks for everything she has done to us. It’s a good thing because without her, Jesus won’t be in this world and she’s a good example for all of us to practice being good people, to be able not to commit a lot of sins in our lives. Her purity is really amazing.

Satan, the counterpart of God, is also part of the belief of Christians. It is the cause of temptations and every sin that a man could do. Without Satan there’s no balance in these world. God wants to have balance by having good and evil in this world. Making things difficult will help us learn and become stronger day by day. Satan is also referred as the Spanish in the story. Satan wants to take revenge to God by tempting people to

commit sin and worship him. Satan is thrown into hell, a place that is full of suffering, hatred, sadness, and death. In the story she/he goes back to tempt Leonido to turn to the dark side. Man in nature is selfish therefore we tend to commit sins. We always want to gain the things that we want. For others, they’ll do whatever it takes in order for them to have it. We want to claim something we don’t even own just like Satan, claiming this world like he/she is the creator of it.

In the play there is a part where the actress playing Satan changes role into a fairy, tricking Leonido to change, that she’ll give everything in return of obeying her. Leonido was able to resist the temptation making the fairy mad. The fairy gets mad saying that she’ll destroy everything in this world, calamities will happen. Leonido told that his faith won’t change and to tell him who really is she. The fairy reveals herself as Satan. She began calling her minions to wreath havoc to the world starting by killing Leonido. I really admire the courage of Leonido in resisting the temptation of gaining the power to have what he wants. He also tells that if Satan really is the to worship, then why did she let the Spaniards liberate the Philippines. She even aided them. Spaniards can be classified as Satan because they taught us of their beliefs and culture. It feels like they force us to obey and worship them by using force so that they would strike fear in our hearts. But there are Pilipinos willing to die for the sake of the country just like Leonido fighthing for his faith.

The angel came fighting Satan, turning all the devils. He save Leonido who’s about to be turned into a devil worshipper. Those who are faithful will be save. He told him that he’s been freed from the clutches of Satan and he shall welcome the Virgin in the river of Pasig. He should reunite with his friends and gave their prayers, praises and gifts. All of the people we’re praising and singing for the Virgin Mary, all of them rejoice together. It’s really a great scene seeing people very excited for the Lord or even the other things connected to it. It shows the unity within people. Just like how the Pilipinos defended our nation. We were able to win through unity.

III. Conclusion