20110923

Towards the morn, O ye nations,
towards that awakening dawn!

Towards the peace, O ye peoples,
towards the twilight of the new!

Towards the LORD, O ye numberless stars,
towards that promise made of old!

Towards the Light, all ye living lights
away from the darkness,
where all our roads,
lead back to you, Jerusalem.

The September 23 Palestinian Initiative

Today is September 23. I am well aware of the prominence of this date in the context of the Middle East Peace process of which I am an ardent advocate.

Today, I am anxious. I am not anxious in a sense that I am afraid. I am anxious in the sense that I am expectant. I feel I can not be anything else. I am praying for a break in the doldrums. I am expecting for the slightest bit of forward movement.

I am hoping for even a few people to chose peace in the Middle East.

I am praying for Abu Mazen and for Benjamin Netenyahu. I am praying for President Obama. I am praying for President Sarkozy whose solution to the deadlock I feel closely matches what I have in mind.

I am praying for the representation of my own Republic in the United Nations and for all notable nations who are represented there not to be confused by this seemingly intractable divide.

For the heavens above us have no division save for the divisions in the mind of Man. This is also true of the Middle East Peace.

The confrontation that is to happen today in the United Nations between the two sides is going to be very difficult.

It shall be fraught with deep and profound emotions supported by histories going back centuries. And these histories shall often be expressed in a form that appear outwardly prejudicial for they shall never be perceived by any nation in and of itself to run parallel to the unified experience of the United Nations.

Indeed, it is for this reason that the spirit of the Council stands; to reconcile human history to itself so that War shall be forever denied a place on our earth.

Nothing of good and lasting worth for any Country can ever be said to have been cheaply won. Everything we hold dear to our sacred remembrances as individual nations upon this world of earth and fire can not be said to have been so easily obtained by our generations.

So it goes as well for the hope we all must invest in the peace between Israel and Palestine and maybe even more because of the sheer difficulty of it all. Indeed, this dream of peace must be a wonder worth seeing unto its very fulfillment. It must be something worth standing for.

Having said all this and having considered the bravery inherent in this undertaking of peace as a whole as well as the virtues God has so generously invested and showered on all sides of our one human family, I shall now personally conclude that at the end of this day, September 23, 2011, if even a few people gets absolutely convinced of the need for Peace over War in our world especially between Israel and Palestine, then I feel that all this expectation is worth it.

Because it is for the individual to heal the wounds of the nations and the nations for the healing of the wounds of our failing world.

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Epilogue: Georgia vs. Troy Davis

Despite protests, the State of Georgia carried out the execution of Troy Davis. The US Supreme Court decided not to intervene.

The story can not end here though. Because even now, the doubt still lingers and the hope still stands.

Because if it were that an innocent man was sent to his death by the justice of the state to atone for the death of another innocent man, then the death penalty ceases to become an instrument of justice and becomes an instrument of injustice.

It is easily taken for granted that innocence is like a feather and guilt is like a brick and that such is the easy appearance of things always disinclined against the person of the accused.

Yet in a criminal case, when life is pitted against life, the person of the accused and the person of the victim when measured, each against the other, on the scales of justice measure equally.

For in our justice system, the feather and the brick must suppose no weight in and of themselves at the beginning of every criminal trial.

The prosecution must prove weight. The defense must seek to dismiss it. And the bench always bear in mind and heart in the singular interest of justice that these appearances matter.

In the case of Troy Davis, conscience is compelled by the peculiarities of his appeal to re-examine the case from the beginning of the trial where innocence is presumed until guilt is proven beyond reasonable doubt.

It may lead many to a re-examination of capital punishment in the United States.

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Peace is not an end to our battles but the beginning of our winning them.

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Mabuhay po tayong lahat! God bless all His nations of the one family of the nations of the children of Mankind.

Breaking the Siege

Healing Work

20110921

On Capital Punishment and the Case of Troy Davis

This article on Yahoo News caught my eye -

Troy Davis is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection in the State of Georgia on Wednesday 7pm US Eastern Time.

The problem is there is an overwhelming upsurge of public sentiment to - at the very least - postpone capital punishment in the light of new developments in support of his case for the defense.

The prosecution is adamant. The defense is making last minute appeals. The public is becoming more and more anxiously divided on the issue.

But both the prosecution and the defense are integral elements of a justice system that must subscribe to unifying principles that safeguard a court's ability to preserve the peace of the state.

One of these principles are - the innocent must never be punished with the guilty.

My instant reaction is to agree with a suspension of the sentence. It is also the natural reaction of many other notable people including my Holy Father Benedict XVI.

I am a Roman Catholic Christian in private as well as in public. My faith has a lot to do with every aspect of my little life, its true - because if I had remained in my sin, if I had no Savior, I would not be speaking sense to you today.

It would be a grave miscarriage of justice if the court gives in to anger or the spirit of revenge or allow itself to become drawn into any political divisions that, having no place whatsoever in the consideration of these things, further deny the State and the community of the people their natural recourse to the remedy of law.

No one would deny justice to the victims and their families. Let there be no doubt that the causes of both Justice and Law serves their grievances first and foremost.

But to prevent the community from reaping further grief from what seems to be a reasonable doubt looming against the cause of justice, one must prove right to make this appeal to the government of Georgia to intervene and not make this doubt a permanent motion that would, in the interests of narrow-minded expediency, remove the peace of that State of the Union further away from the public trust.

And so I too find myself making this same appeal for the authorities in Georgia to intervene to suspend the execution of Troy Davis.

If the person is innocent and he is delivered to God guilty, the burden no longer lies with the innocent but with the community who condemn themselves with their blood.

This shall not go without repercussions.

Indeed, all human care and all legal means must be exhausted beyond reasonable doubt to make sure that the innocent is never punished with the guilty.

That the guilty should be punished without delay is a corollary of this first principle.

This is why capital punishment is never a remedy for failing to address the failures in the justice system of any nation - most of all, here in my native Philippines.

God bless the State of Georgia, God bless America and may the LORD prosper thy Republic that justice prevail for all thy peoples unto the last of their generations.

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Some more considerations on the Middle East Peace -

I reaffirm this once again. We must fully support President Obama's initiative to bring back on track the Middle East peace process. The political peace (distinct from the national peace) has the best chance of achieving itself under his watch.

It should be recognized that the protection of the Jewish-Majority nature of the undertaking of Country known as modern Israel is essential to preserve that Country's ability to decisively preempt another Holocaust and to defend the rights of the whole nation of Israel at home or abroad.

I say Jewish-Majority here because of the fact that in any undertaking of Country, there shall always be a minority and for this reason, the majority can not rule without justice and this justice is impossible if the minority of any undertaking of Country is not given full recognition as well as equal protection before the law. This must also be recognized.

Furthermore, the same exact thing must be expected of the nascent Palestinian undertaking of Country.

As a matter of fact, the 4th Cause applies to every undertaking of Country that draws its breath from the spirit of its own nation.

In this sense, Israel and Palestine shall be reciprocating unto each other greater and greater examples founded on good will instead of those descending cycles of ill will that have plagued and confused their peoples for a generation.

It must be conceded by both the State of modern Israel and the Palestinian Authority that the deadlock in the Middle East (along with whatever reasons, covert or overt, that have given this conflict the appearance of justice) can no longer be sustained in this new age.

Both nations must cross the Minimum of the Times - stop looking backward - and complete their remembrances under this present season of heaven.

There can be no other choice that will secure the long-term national success for both the nations of Israel and of Palestine than to make the choice for peace today while it is still today.

For peace is the craft of nations.

Both sides must be given an honorable exit strategy and an honest and dependable way of return for their common peoples out of this untenable state of division and away into unity and the promise of the new age...

that Peace may proceed from Jerusalem and good will spring up from the heart of our Asia to bring down from God in heaven the blessings of this new age for all our nations dreaming together of a better world for our common humanity, alelluia.

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Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.

Blindness