Independence Day 2014

"I would rather have a country run like hell by Filipinos than a country run like heaven by the Americans", the second President of our Republic is famously quoted.

Indeed, these present days, further up (or down) the lineage of that prestigious and noble Office, some might convincingly argue this country indeed is being run like hell by us Filipinos.

Was President Quezon being cynical about the budding Republic with which he so diligently served our struggling and anxious nation as our first head of State? Was our second President, after Aguinaldo, being bitter about our chances at actual Independence?

Should we be careful what we wish for? Should we dare not believe again in our hopes of Country?

My brothers and sisters of the Promise, Manuel L. Quezon is one of this Republic's guiding lights. His star is one that shines bright, but only when we care to look at ourselves in the right light.

To do the memory of the man Justice, allow me to finish his quote, "...because however bad a Filipino government might be, we can always change it."

He knew the learning curve would be steep. He knew the world during his time was consumed by war and our nation was in the thick of it. He knew the way toward maturity for our young lion of a Country was one fraught with much danger and pitfalls, internal as well as external.

But he also knew, Independence was a risk we should always be willing to take.

We are always better served by bravery rather than timidity when it concerns Liberty and Country.

Because however badly we may be going at any time, were we single-hearted enough as he was to dare to believe we can as a free and sovereign people change things around for the better, we can.

We have a lot of heroes, if only we should want to seek them.

There is an entire constellation of them up in the skies above this nation's soul - if only we care to find it. And at nights, if you must know, when our Republic is at rest - it is the forbearant, quicksilver light of their living memory that watches over our way towards every golden sunrise.

Personally, I admire President Quezon for the compassion he showed to the suffering humanity of the elder sons and daughters of Israel, our brother and sister Jews, who during WWII, at one of the darkest times of their nation's life, this President gave free sanctuary among us in our lands.

I would, if I had the clout, likewise provide free sanctuary to the suffering humanity of the people of Syria not because of anything else but because they are suffering and they are human not unlike you or I - just like our second President.

Let me remind us that War is a slavery, and is a master we ought not serve.

We shall never achieve the fullness of the promise our actual Independence is meant to bring for this nation with a spirit divided, dark and confused. Let us carry on with the peace process - unto completion.

May we be blessed with a meaningful Independence Day.

Happy birthday to our citizenship, my fellow Filipinos, mabuhay!
---<--@

President Quezon 
lost his battle against tuberculosis 
away from our home away from Home
but what he never lost was - who he was - 
and in my remembrance - still is -

a leader to his people,

and a friend to his friends.

Vessel of the Generations

A NATION 
who lays asleep in the darkness,
fearing nothing - and - knowing nothing
is like a ship that knows only the safely of a harbor,
a vessel unaccustomed to voyage.



But that's not what nations are for,
dearest starshine.

:::Think and Unlock:::

Salutation #173

Wings that work
are wings that lift - aloft -
they fly not merely
because they can, or they must;
they fly because
they carry something that belong
to the skies!



(Burden of Justice)

A nation's burden of justice - is -
all its unaccounted for losses
   (these losses being all that was given us
   that was taken by force from among our midst)
measured in terms of individual human life
each in their own distinct and unrepeatable persons,
each with their own particular names known to the LORD,
the God Who commanded all nations to keep them all,
ever in their entirety, each in spirit preserved
in the sacred remembrance of every nation of the children of Mankind
as a debt of remembrance owed to the God of all life - and -
as a work of peace to be kept - in common trust -
on behalf of all the life of living creation itself.

To each nation God has provided a right of ascent,
a way through which a nation may attain to a knowledge of itself
   (being a way of our returning from the exile darkness -
   in spirit - through - the easternmost gate of faded Eden)
and to every nation there is only one right of ascent.

It is therefore crucial
especially in these present times
that every nation know - as well as -
understand the (1) truth that abides within itself;
   (in general, that every nation is distinct yet the same;
   that every nation though it may long for many things long for only one thing;
   that though the spirit of war marches to threaten,
      in every time, place, and in every age, the peace of all nations,
      that every nation exists for the good and only for the good;
   that every nation exists for the other and that, in the economy of grace,
      there is no other but the self alone;)
and (2) that the power of this ascent is directly affected
in proportion to every nation's burden of justice
and that the weight of this necessary burden
is carried by all of our citizens,
   (each of us according to the measure
   by which we receive them from the Providence of God)
to be shared - as a common labor of peace - across all our generations,
according to our national debt of remembrance -
   (so that it may be heavy - the people choose to forget their hope -
   or it may be light - the people choose to take responsibility for their hope.)

Failure to responsibly carry
this burden of justice - in a nation -
is failure itself.

For a nation overtook by the darkness
is no longer itself.

And every spirit of Country
that has become utterly corrupted
by the adversarial nature
of the enemy of all nations
shall perish forever
from the earth!
---<--@