In education, he knew many in the field and the words he heard often: "students' marks are good but the capability is low". Besides grades other elements are needed.
Why is this the case? Justus von Liebig (German scientist who made a great contribution to agriculture with his 'law of the minimum'. (If one of the essential plant nutrients is missing, plant growth will be poor even when the other essential nutrients are in abundance).
This is the same when it comes to capability. An intelligent quotient may be high with many special qualities but if relations with others are poor capability will suffer. Here is a need to add the emotional and spiritual quotient to the intellectual.
Relation-Ship can be compared to traveling on a ship together. Sea-sickness comes from living together with others. Even the smallest storm that is experienced if not overcome, will not allow one to head out to sea. But with the power of the will, we can overcome the difficulty.
The Anglican priest John Donne wrote in the poem: For Whom Does the Bell toll, the line that No man is an island.
No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
.....
Any man's death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind.
.....
We are all part of the continent. The death of another has a connection with me. With the worldwide social media and internet, we can readily understand this new reality. We are all connected but we are not all communicating or relating, there is no contact.
In our world, information is not what is most important but our relationship with others— but before we think of the world-family let us go to our own families. When we come to the dinner table do we come with the hand phone? Even pope Francis has mentioned we should put our hand-phones away when we come down to the dinner table.
The essence of the Scripture is the love of God and neighbor. That is our mission to love God and neighbor. It is in this relationship with others that we find out who we are.
This is necessary for traveling on the ship of life. The compass will give us direction, for the Christian, the Scriptures.
We are made up of trillions of cells. The process of growing an egg and sperm from a single cell into an organism with such an organic and unified life is still an area that cannot be fully explained scientifically. Cells, which were initially identical, soon differentiate into different organ tissues. Cells with strong vitality before differentiation are called stem cells. Stem cells do their own thing while constantly interacting organically with neighboring cells and the surrounding environment without errors to form a unity.
Stem cells have the same 3 billion sequencing genomes but express only a small portion of the information to play a necessary role at the required site.
In addition, while making the necessary proteins, each cell is differentiated to live well so it can do its job. How wonderful this is! For example, if a stem cell is injected into a damaged heart, the stem cell becomes a heart cell. By injecting stem cells around brain cells with Parkinson's disease or dementia, they can grow into new cells. So stem cells give hope for the repair of organs of the body. It will soon revolutionize future medicine. Of course, obtaining stem cells from embryos poses ethical issues, but obtaining them from somatic cells avoids this problem.
Our students dream of college and a number of them are planning for masters and doctorate degrees, he wants all of them to be like stem cells and work to nourish their possibilities and potential in the years ahead. This is his prayer for all of them.
