20101123

Pathology of a Tyranny

Today, the whole nation commemorates the Maguindanao Massacre.

Exactly one year ago, 58 of our fellow Filipino compatriots, including 32 journalists, were ruthlessly murdered in a great and astonishing crime that shocked the nation and sent ripples around the world.

What was shocking about these murders is the sheer audacity by which it was carried out. It was committed with an air of impunity and brutality that was so great as to be astonishing.

It stands out singularly and distinctively as an evil fruit of an evil tree.

No evil of this magnitude suddenly appears without first being allowed to maturate, my fellow Filipino compatriots, the Maguindanao Massacre was not an accident.

Tyranny takes many mature forms but are born of one beginning; the people has to allow it. For without our permission, in principle, no tyranny will ever reach its most absurd heights.

This was allowed to happen, the evil tree was allowed to bear evil fruit.

In times of peace, in a Republic such as ours, it would have been more difficult for a tyranny of any shape to evolve into a form that threatens the freedom and order of our civil society.

But these are defining times, my fellow Filipino compatriots - we are still in a twilight shadow for a decision looms over the threshold of our hearts - a choice for a meaningful, sustainable, durable peace toward a better, more vital Republic of the Philippines.

It is the common work of tyrants whether temporal or spiritual to deny us our ability to benefit from our human freedom.

Indeed, how can we consider ourselves free if there is an area of our life that is ruled by fear and ignorance? How much do we know of ourselves? How much do we know of our fellow Filipinos?

Differences and divisions are only fearsome if we allow ourselves to be ruled by it. Our Country is wracked by these divisions and nowhere are the wounds of our nation more evident than in our beloved Mindanao: As one of the three stars of our Old Defiant, she deserves to shine no less brightly than the first two.

Therefore, we should let our remembrances today stir our hearts and spur our minds onward, God-willing, toward a better understanding of ourselves as a people - that we are one people; a nation established by God; a nation distinct but not apart from the one family of the nations of Mankind.

We deserve better, my fellow Filipino compatriots, and because we do, the work is ours today to make it so - the work of Country: We are a Republic because peace is the will of the LORD for us, the peace that prospers.

No power on earth can ever bring back the victims of the Maguindanao Massacre. But we can dignify their passing by a celebration of their lives, their hopes, undimmed and unforgotten, now joined to the hopes of all our heroes and martyrs for a better, more vital Philippines for all Filipinos.

We shall grieve with the loneliness of those who have lost their loved ones but not with tears of bitterness shall we weep today, my fellow Filipino compatriots.

For we shall bear with each other the pain of their remembrance, O my nation, and make it our own and we shall see this season of sorrow pass away into new seasons of life together this time.

Truly, it flies in the face of the Republic, here in this day and age, to have such an evil hovering over the hopes of our compatriots -

It not only requires but demands justice:

Justice delayed is justice denied!

The later it takes to bring the cause of justice completely to bear upon this great an evil, the more potent its spirit shall in time become to haunt our generations over again.

Televise the trial for the benefit and the healing of the nation.

Indeed, let us also always remember not to punish the innocent with the guilty. In the pursuit of justice, we must never repay evil with more evil.

May our remembrance of that fateful day be both blessed and meaningful.

And let us all continue to pray for justice and for peace.

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Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.

Salutation #3

(Darkness)

TO THE NUMBERLESS LIGHTS
of our kindred belonging,
greetings of sincere hope
and good will -
my love and prayers:

There is evil in our days,
as it was in those days of old.

Evil where it is allowed to endure
into every present time
to stand against the line
established in the Now of the moment
is an enemy that is never meant
to defeat the will of the good.

For the arrangement of all past things
in every person's life
like a romance between human choice
and the serendipity of God's grace
is always intended in such a way
by the beneficence of Divine Providence
so as to culminate into every present time
which is always sufficient in its own Day
with regards to the particular evils
that each and every individual soul
must in each their own time and place
learn to recognize and vanquish
by and through the grace of our LORD
in and with the support of our human communities,
civic and religious, national and international,
that exist for our benefit

- in exile time -

to safeguard and foster our common good.

Should there be evil in our day,
even if the past had a large part to play
in its appearance in our present time,
indeed, it should not be here to give us reason
to conveniently dwell on the darkness of past things.

Where evil is allowed to endure
into the present reality
of souls and communities of souls,
it is so that we may learn in our own lives
how to effectively close the doors of past things.

Believe that evil endures
not to defeat the human being
but to allow him or her the opportunity
to recreate in every present moment
in God and with each other,
the beginnings of better, brighter and nobler things.

Peace.
---<--@

Darkness is but darkness that does not lead to the light.

---<--@

I hope that Tilapia roast they had over at Maguindanao makes it into the record books! Salaam: Peace be to all of you from all of us.

Eye of the Heart