O faithful Republic of my people -
Some are all about height and distance,
but thou - let thou be all about width and nearness.
Nearness to the people is what governs;
thy popular mandate to reign is derived from it.
Width is all about completeness;
it is the fullness of thy will to embrace the Nation
in faithful service of thy most sacred trust.
From nearness to the people is derived
the authority to govern thy peers
and from completeness of will,
the ensuing exercise of Power
is consequently recognized
as legitimate.
Some are all about height and distance,
but thou - let thou be all about width and nearness.
Nearness to the people is what governs;
thy popular mandate to reign is derived from it.
Width is all about completeness;
it is the fullness of thy will to embrace the Nation
in faithful service of thy most sacred trust.
From nearness to the people is derived
the authority to govern thy peers
and from completeness of will,
the ensuing exercise of Power
is consequently recognized
as legitimate.
Our Barangays
are the living sails of our Cities.
If the life of our Cities
are the wellspring of our Sovereignty;
the vitality of this life is singularly an attribute
of the general state of health of each our Barangays.
Our leadership in the Barangay are essential to the Nation
and so we must be free to seek them and they, to seek us -
through the electoral processes that is appointed for this task.
Indeed,
the toughest battles, invisible to the rest of the Nation,
to build up from the Unknown Earth, our Republic Vision -
are fought and won upon the ground of our Barangays.
It is here within our Barangays where - at every age -
the Divine Commandment to prosper and to make good
the sacred trust of our Nation - across our generations -
is everyday from the Providence of the LORD received -
and the labor of the Republic with each morning begun.
It is here where each our citizenship is everywhere exercised
and the blessings of our togetherness with each night kept -
the greater will of our Peace, each and every day won.
They are the oldest
and most venerable part of our Republic.
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The Diwata ng Lahi, a replica of the ancient Balangay boat, went out for a test sail in Manila Bay on July 11 2009. The word "barangay" is derived from an ancient Malayo-Polynesian boat called a balangay. It is commonly believed that in pre-colonial Philippines, each original coastal “barangay” formed as a result of settlers arriving by boat from other places in Southeast Asia.