Salutation #113

Those who live to nurture
the tree of the desolation of war
- shall certainly eat of its fruit -
and the fruits of war is plain
and bitter forever.

Therefore,
let us return now to the native peace of our nations -
that we may eat of the fruit that sustains our humanity;
that we may be a support to each other as citizens;
that we may be a blessing to each other as nations;
that we may reflect the glory of the God heaven on earth.



(The Tree of the Desolation of War)

THERE WAS ONCE
an orchard filled with trees
of many kinds.

All of the trees in the orchard
bore good fruit save for one.

There was a tree
at the center of the orchard
that bore no fruit at all.

It was the largest tree of all.

It was also the most ancient of all.

It's great and lofty branches
overshadowed a third of the orchard.

It blocked out much of the sky.

And it drew up nourishment
from the soil meant for other trees.

Now,
the number of trees in the orchard was fixed
by the owner from the beginning.

To each tree he assigned
from among all of his laborers in the field,
a custodian.

For the owner had much property to tend
and not enough workers.

To each custodian in the orchard, 

the owner assigned a specific yield. 

And for this yield he gave a specified time.

He then left to find more workers.

- selah -

The trees are our nations. 

The great tree at the center of the orchard 

is the desolation of war. 

The custodians are the angels of the nations 

who are the keepers of our sacred remembrances. 

The owner is the LORD, 

the one Sovereign of all nations. 

And we are the workers.

But the custodian of the desolation of war 

is the great serpent of faded Eden. 

And he bids us 

- constantly - 

not to tend to our trees. 

At the very door of our hearts, 

the enemy of all human nations 

calls us not to serve
and to commit adultery
against our own humanity.

Time came 

and a great darkness fell upon our nations: 

The great cycle of the one celestial season is turning: 

Winter now approaches our time on earth.

Let us then work 

to complete our own remembrances 

with autumn leaves shed 

not so much for winter's sake 

but for the spring.

Let us turn away from the darkness.

Let us tend to each our own trees. 

And bear the good fruit of repentance.

Let us fight for the Causes 

- that have forever established us -

a free and human nation: 

Sacred Life, Law, Justice, and Benignity.

Let us compete in virtue 

- as citizens to each other - 

and produce for God and for each other 

a yield of good works, ten-fold, 

a hundred-fold, even a thousand-fold!

Starve out the serpent, O my nation! 

And let our generations prosper far into their years...

Born to the Morning: 

This is our land and Now is our time.

Because now is the time for peace.

This is our time.

---<--@

It is human to fight for right causes. It is not human to fight against Justice.

It is human to know when to stop fighting. It is not human to forsake the cause of Peace.

It is human to hope for self and for others. It is not human to despair of either self or of others.

It is human to fight for love. It is not human to fight for hate.

For when we fight for love, we defend. When we fight for hate, we only fight.
---<--@


Lightning Preceding Thunder

20110604

Salutation #11

(On Honorable Religion, Religious Harmony and Pluralism)

Peace, I salute you.

Religious wars are a perplexing feature of the last great age of war

and one that we ought to guard against in this new age of peace.

Alone or with others,

our nations stand to gain much through honorable religion

but only if we succeed in exorcising the past

and healing the present from the contagion of War.

Alone or with others,

the fruit of all honorable religion is peace

not because they are the same but because they are different.

For despite the unrelenting tide of the darkness of exile time

and the half-forgotten specters that haunt our history,

honorable religion is ever the engine that inspire

the ennobling light of human civilization,

advancing the Causes that like sheltering wings defend

from the relentless gravity of War's final defeat

the heart of every nation of our one family of nations

gathering together the generations of the children of Mankind

ever toward greater peace, true belonging

and universal brotherhood.

As a shelter against War, therefore,

the peace of our Republic undertaking must prove proof

against the spirit of division.

As citizens to each other,

we can no longer dare to extend safe harbor,

in our hearts and in our times,

to the debilitating rot

of religious divisions, misconceptions, prejudices,

than accept the eternal loss of our peace.

If we love as we ought, then we will see -

that fear and ignorance breeds intolerance

and intolerance destroys human community.

Thou must ever so beware, O Man,

guard thee never to behold the LORD, thy God,

as an image of thyself - a limited, mutable, ephemeral, unfinished work.

For the LORD, our God, is not the invention of any human religion.

The LORD, our God, dearest Starshine, is an infinite Reality.

Compared to the LORD,

all of time and all of the timeless,

all of creation whether seen or unseen,

everything that was, is, and shall ever be,

are all but a particle - incomprehensibly tiny.

Remember thee always, Starshine,

only through God's wisdom,

only through His benevolence,

and through His generosity,

may thy little soul attain

to the incomprehensible vastness of Eternity.

Notwithstanding religious distinctions -

You will know the LORD, thy God,

only inasmuch as you allow thyself to love Him.

And even then, O Man,

you yourself know in your heart of hearts

that you can never love thy God

in the way that God ought to be loved.

Because you heart may never behold the infinite -

no creature may do so, my beloved, and hope to live.

The Divine Reality

when one may think it is understood

is understood only because the One and infinite God

is pleased to reveal Himself to thy understanding.

All creatures are limited

but the LORD is neither finite

nor lacking in anything.

We know Him only by the tiniest of degrees

and even then, always indirectly.

For no creature

may truly know God, dear Starshine,

and hope to survive.

What thou understand therefore

is never God Himself as Himself

but God as He is pleased

to become so intimately related to thy soul

through the freedom of thy faith.

God pours into thee like a tiny vessel

an essence thou can never hope to contain

without His Face beholding thee always

and so only with love, mercy and compassion,

from the LORD and His instruments -

the Angels and the Prophets,

the Incarnate Word of God - Christ the Lord,

Our Emmanuel through His Sacred Humanity,

may you attain to the object of thy faith -

The God Who is, the LORD.

Be this way unto all beings, therefore,

thou who have attained to God in truth and Spirit -

loving, merciful, and compassionate.

Worship none but the LORD - God and God alone!

Honor and respect all of God's instruments

all the Angels and the Prophets,

the Incarnate Word through His Sacred Humanity

Who is Christ the Lord and Savior of All

without any confusion or division of heart -

let there be no cause in thee for War in the heart

and say thee truthfully thy peace to All of creation.

Be thankful always and be glad, being humble in heart,

tremble and work out thy salvation in virtue and good works

for the Reality of the LORD has become a reality to thee!

So let thy faith bid thee

seek, serve and love God

and in thy heart, be at peace.

Our dearest Starshine,

what all creatures will to safely and meaningfully comprehend

whether great or small, seen or unseen,

from the noblest of Angels to the least responsible of Man,

are our distinctly individual relationships to the One.

The LORD's unchanging will for all of Sacred Life is Our business:

How this will of salvation is revealed to all creation

is the universal labor of all faiths.

Now, a faith that is universal is one that must also become particular.

For no one faith may truly hope to represent the totality of the LORD.

Religion is the structure that makes a particular faith present.

And the fruit of all honorable religion is peace.

- selah -

As a Roman Catholic Christian, most especially,

I do not consider myself at odds with any honorable religion

most especially with Judaism and Islam.

For I must practice my peace to keep it - not to lose it.

For I shall be held to account by my Lord Christ for this grace;

the grace of belonging to God and to my Country

and of prospering in the faith and obedience of my Holy Mother Church

helping to add to the life of my own nation,

and hoping to grow into a peace this world can neither provide

nor truly ever understand without God

and God in Christ Jesus the Lord -

the one Redeemer of All.

---<--@

On Religious Harmony

Religious toleration seems to me, an oxymoron - what is there to tolerate?

It implies a sort of truce. But what if there really was no conflict to begin with...

To build harmony among our religions, there must be interdependence - a common ground.

This common ground is the labor of peace-building - primarily, the work of its inspiration within as well as between our nations.

It is the work of fostering hope in the people and also of realizing these hopes for the benefit of the greater good, competing in good works.

This is religious harmony.

---<--@

Moving Forward...

Congratulations to our President Noy on the success of his recent trips to Brunei and Thailand.

Peace be to Brunei Darussalam and to the Kingdom of Thailand - It is always a very good thing indeed to foster relations with our friends in ASEAN.

What is good for one in ASEAN is good for all in ASEAN.

---<--@

Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.

God Encompassing God

O LORD,

God encompassing God,

God encompassing All in Thyself!

O LORD,

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit -

Blessed Unity,

Holy Trinity,

Perfect Company!

O LORD,

there is none but Thee,

there is none like Thee!

O LORD,

Thou art from everlasting to everlasting -

in Thee All draw their being,

in Thee All draw their living life,

in Thee there is no shadow of turning,

in Thee there is neither darkness nor Night,

in Thee there is joy, abundance and peace,

in Thee there is only love and the Light!

O LORD,

Thou desire salvation for all beings

to Whom shall all needful souls turn to,

my God, but to Thee?

O LORD,

Thou art the one Sovereign of all nations

unto Whom shall Thy exile peoples return to,

my God, but unto Thee?

Abide in us, O LORD, be with us!

Be the God of our lives, our families,

and our national communities!

O Goal of all my goals,

I love, I trust, and I adore Thee!

---<--@

Our God, O my beloved of my heart, is a God of relationships - One, Triune Perfection!

20110201

I am just going to speak to you freely about some things here...

Some of the things I am feeling I find difficult expressing in words. Because if I do, they will become distorted. Usually, these things just need a little more time. But sometimes, they do not need any form of expression at all. Regardless of which it is, what I put down I must put down or else not at all.

But let me tell you of what I am feeling instead of what it is all about. You know that line between patience and impatience; where anxiety meets daring right at the confluence of faith and hope. I am there. Because, my fellow Filipino compatriots, the world is speeding up again.

You know that holiday lull, that sense of a calm in the storm? It's over now and the calm that we felt we now realize was the calm right at the beginning of it.

Moreover, we can no longer afford to be insular in our thinking as a nation. I know this thinking because I used to have it. Before I left for overseas, I thought Filipinos were all there is to our world.

But our world is a community of peoples - a family of nations.

And it is getting smaller in a sense that we must be able to take it all into our mind and hearts to understand how we fit in and how to go forward from where we are.

What's happening in Egypt seems far but it is no longer so. We must remember we are now presently living at a transition into a different age; a twilight if you will, and that in this twilight, it is so easy to be lulled into a deadly complacency.

What we have discovered so far about ourselves as a nation seems easy to dismiss. For they are mostly immaterial in nature. But the work of the heart always precedes the work of the earth. Indeed the calamities we must now face on a planetary scale have all precipitated from a neglect of these same things.

I know that there will be those who will find their security in complacency; that there are those who will deny themselves the effort and the concentration to even attempt to understand the work that is being proposed to us. Indeed I am fully aware that there will be those whose hearts God will harden. It is written.

But it is not for the unwilling that I am writing, it is for you - my fellow Filipino compatriots - for us and for all those other free and willing citizens of our kindred nations in general - all the people of the peace - so that what belongs to you might always be yours in peace and good will. And that we all (including myself) might become better for it - as a nation, indeed as one family of nations.

For in my heart, O my nation, as I know you do, the colors I have chosen to wear is that of our Old Defiant. So I will have nothing to do anymore whatsoever with that Old Compliant: I reject the lie of war (and its train of social and personal sins along with it). Therefore, I must tolerate no division in my heart and strive to constantly uphold the honor of the LORD in my soul. For the LORD is God and He alone is God, one, peerless and eternal: My one, triune Perfection.

So what is happening in Egypt affects us indeed. Therefore, may peace reign in Egypt. May the people over there including our fellow citizens find safety. Above all, may peace reign in the Middle East and in our native Philippines. Let us not forget to put these in our prayers to God today.

We do not have to exceed our promise nor must we hold back on it: We are one whole sky after all, my honorable compatriots.

Today is the first day of World Interfaith Harmony Week: Try to learn something about those who are different from you and use this learning to enrich your sense of our nation today and all this week.

For me particularly, I think the Muslim hijab (head dress) is a beautiful thing. As a Roman Catholic Christian, I see it as a true symbol of a woman's right to choose; it is a practice that encapsulates a freedom that is not license; a responsible freedom; a freedom that leads to good things; a freedom that is pleasing to God Who Himself is free.

---<--@

Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.

Forward Thinking

20110119

World Interfaith Harmony Week

On October 20, 2010, the United Nations passed a unanimous resolution to establish a World Interfaith Harmony Week on the first week of every February.

This initiative is being spearheaded by H. M. King Abdullah of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan to whom we should give proper regard for this very praiseworthy undertaking. Therefore, may God bless him and his family for opening for us and for all nations this vital opportunity and may peace be unto the people of Jordan.

This initiative, my fellow Filipino compatriots, if we so choose to willingly undertake and adopt as an official part of our national commemorations shall benefit us greatly.

Because peace is our common salutation: All Christians, Jews and Muslims universally bless each other with it.

Why then is the world so resistant to this truth?

To even begin to comprehend the richness of the spiritual heritage of our three, great Abrahamic faiths of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, we must first work to overcome the inertia of the last 2000 years.

We must begin to break down the barriers of ignorance and misconceptions that have for so long fed into those vicious cycles of violence that have set us apart and have denied for our world the promise that the LORD, our God, has intended through our Father Abraham - that we shall in His own time be as the numerous stars, a blessing to all the communities of Mankind.

Indeed, if we are to begin to comprehend the beauty of this promise of old and to finally come to an understanding of the true extent by which God in His graces have established - for our own good sake's - from the beginning of time, for all our nations, a singular path of brotherhood, we must first learn to take into ourselves the spirit of the new age.

And we must do this with much prayer and effort - together this time.

The paradigm of the last age was one of war. Understanding this paradigm of war is important for us, my fellow Filipino compatriots, because it allows us to begin to penetrate the darkness of war and perceive the unseen presence of the beast (spirit) of war.

First of all, it is vital we understand we are entering into an age of thought.

Now, the substance of thought is spirit. This spirit is the force of all truth and this force of truth gives form to all visible things and is comprehended by the soul of Man in terms of meaning not of words. It seeks to fulfill all things in the truth of God Who is Himself Spirit.

The beast of war is the opposite of this. It is a spirit that denies the power of truth. It seeks to corrupt the soul of Man and destroy the meaningfulness of all created things. It seeks to undo the purpose and the order of God in all creation.

This beast of war is ancient. It was cast out of heaven by the holy angels of God by the power of God. It first entered upon the earth at the time Cain killed his brother Abel, when man was first killed by the hand of another man.

Since days of old, this beast of war has fed upon the sufferings of countless innocents. The soil of our earth is soaked in their blood.

But the hope of the innocents cry out to God against war, "this beast is not sustained by virtue of our lives for we are those who lived for peace."

To all the nations of Mankind, they testify, "our blood is shed not to propagate this suffering but as a witness against the deception of war. For war is sustained by its own injustices."

"It has spread to sow the seeds of division upon the ends of the earth. It has shattered the reign of many of the lineages of the kings and rulers of old. It has brought forth the ruin of many nations."

"Upon its deadly wake, Man labor only in bitterness and despair."

Indeed, the last 2000 years have seen the beast of war inflict abomination after abomination upon all the peoples of the world. The last century is a century of genocide.

Now this beast threatens the very purpose and order of the nations of Mankind. For the nations of Man contend against war. But Man was never meant by God to contend against this beast.

Therefore, we must learn to understand the ways of peace and peace as a paradigm.

To do this, we must learn how to think as a nation. This is very important for us to understand, O my nation, because it will provide us with the strength and the solidity necessary to overcome the enormous momentum of the last great age of war.

There is a purpose and an order to our labors upon the earth: (1) The building up of the (unknown) earth (into the inhabited earth) and (2) the preservation of the dignity and promise of the children of Man.

The building up of the (inhabited) earth is a labor commanded by God of all the generations of the children of Man. This building is the purpose of the nations of Mankind. Because the (inhabited) earth may only be built by the labor of Nations. No man lives or dies for self alone.

Now, humanity is created by God to prosper the life of all visible creation. To the keeping of Mankind is entrusted the stewardship of the Sacred Life of all the visible universe entire. (Indeed, the void of the universe have become hostile to all of life itself only because of the shattering brought upon by the outset of war and exile time.)

Sacred Life being all plant and animal life, above all human life, each human being is particularly entrusted to the keeping of every other human being.

Each of us is singular, each of us is near infinite potential and all of us are arrayed from least to greatest according to the freedom of our gifts.

Our nations are so structured and established so as to maintain this design and in so doing to preserve the life of our common humanity and safeguard the order of our generations arrayed according to each their own times and seasons.

For the preservation of the dignity and promise of the children of Man as a reflection of the image and likeness of God in every individual human being is a labor that is likewise commanded by God of all the nations of Mankind.

Towards this purpose and order is established and ordained the brotherhood of the nations of Mankind so that by whatever name every present generation receives the unmistakable call of their original nationhood, this purpose and this order makes it forever meaningful and binding to the souls of all its citizens. For every nationhood is a work (of the heart). It is where it works. It is where it unfolds in time.

All true nationhood is a gift; an unmistakable sign of a divine endowment.

Therefore, true nationhood is not a thing that can be crafted by human hands. It is a reality that may only be granted by God alone. True nationhood is something that the children of Man seeks to obtain from the LORD not because Man is Man but because the LORD is God and He alone is God.

It is spirit and therefore, must always be sought from deep within the individual human heart.

It is timeless and therefore, encompasses all the generations of our people to the very last of our generations.

It is a promise won for Man by the immovable justice of God; a reflection of His great mercy to the children of Man, now fallen into exile.

It is a destiny perfected in the likeness of His love; a revelation of the fullness of His compassion to all creatures, great and small.

These are first principles of nationhood: It is spirit. It is timeless. It is endowed by God with both a purpose and an order. It is both a promise and a destiny.

The nation is the foundation of all human civilization. To begin to understand it as we ought, we must first come to accept it as it is - a particular living creation with us.

The nation is the people. To be more precise, a nation is a people under God; a community bound together in freedom by a spirit entrusted to a particular people of God.

This spirit is a particular angel of the LORD; a guardian of the people.

Therefore, when taken as a whole, the nation in each our minds and our hearts must always be more than what the present reveals.

It is what establishes us forever in the peace of our belongings to each other. It is light to drive away the darkness of an unknown earth; a sword to stay the beast (spirit) of war and a shield to preserve the Sacred Life of the people.

It is a keeper of our past, a guardian of our present, and a steward of our future. It is what keeps us faithful to to the original truth of our founding and the singular source of our common identity as Filipinos.

It is the invincible guardian of all our sacred remembrances, embracing all our generations into one lineage of hope.

It is an unseen reality that surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds all our hearts together into one particular love - the love of Country - the love of each other in God.

When we seek the truth of our belongings to each other, we are likewise sought by the nation in and around ourselves. When we begin to awaken to the reality of our being Filipino, we awaken to the truth of ourselves as ourselves as we begin to encounter the reality of our nationhood.

We know we are Filipino because our nation knows us - equally, individually, each by our own true names written in heaven. When we affirm it in ourselves that we are Filipino, our nation knows that we have come to finally awaken to a knowledge of our citizenship and that we have come to ally ourselves to the love that is the timeless keeper of the common patrimony of our people.

It is what binds all our lives and our fortunes together as one people, one work, one destiny.

For who is a Filipino but this love in the heart?

To seek the peace is to seek the truth of this love. And to understand that this love is not (and never was) beholden to division.

For this love is indeed present in the races but cannot be confined to a mere color of skin, sound of name, or slant of tongue.

It is a love that is, above all, allied to All that is bound by the freedom of the sons and daughters of the LORD, our God; the light in all His living lights.

We can never take this for granted.

This peace must be something that is constantly sought. For this peace is not the way of this world. Left to itself, our world as we know it will eventually spiral down the gravity of the void. Everything in this world, whether upon the earth or in the heavens above the earth, is destined for destruction.

Indeed, it is an imperfect peace. But it is the perfect acceptance of this imperfect peace that allow our nations to walk in constant humility before the LORD, our God, Who alone brings victory to our peace. Our common sufficiency as nations - indeed, as one family of nations - rely on our free and willing submission to this truth.

Indeed, these days, peace, like love, is oftentimes a word that is emptied out of its meaning. A lot of people know how to say it. But not a lot of people know what it really means.

Some people think peace is the cessation of conflict. But that is not so. For the peace we speak of here is a commitment to the truth in the presence of conflict.

Some people think peace is the side that sits opposite of war. But that is not so. For the peace we speak of here is the overcoming of this very mindset of division.

It is something that must be obtained from God.

It is a free and willing choice made by the individual.

It is an absolute and irrevocable commitment to eternity, virtue, humanity and universality.

Now, the first of these World Interfaith Harmony Weeks is set to begin on the first week of February of this year, my fellow Filipino compatriots.

It is my hope that we may begin to receive this initiative with much enthusiasm and faith this year that we may begin that month with the most advantageous attitude of heart.

Because February of this year is going to be a busy month indeed.

We are, as a Republic undertaking of Country, going to become decidedly, fully engaged in the restructuring of our national psyche - towards the peace, and the peace that prospers.

No man is an island,

no man lives for self alone -

we live for but a moment,

we labor for just a day -

we are here only for a time

then everything passes us away.

---<--@

Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.

The Three Elements of Country

Service, Synergy and Sovereignty

The Tree of the Desolation of War

Those who live to nurture
the tree of the desolation of war
shall certainly eat of its fruit
and the fruits of war is plain
and bitter forever.

Therefore,
let us return now to the native peace of our nations -
that we may eat of the fruit that sustains our humanity,
that we may be a support to each other as citizens,
that we may be a blessing to each other as nations,
that we may reflect the glory of the God heaven on earth.

THERE WAS ONCE
an orchard filled with trees
of many kinds.

All of the trees in the orchard
bore good fruit save for one.

There was a tree
at the center of the orchard
that bore no fruit at all.

It was the largest tree of all.
It was also the most ancient of all.

It's great and lofty branches
overshadowed a third of the orchard.
It blocked out much of the sky.

And it drew up nourishment
from the soil meant for other trees.

Now,
the number of trees in the orchard was fixed
by the owner from the beginning.

To each tree he assigned
from among all of his laborers in the field,
a custodian.

For the owner had much property to tend
and not enough workers.

To each custodian in the orchard, 

the owner assigned a specific yield. 

And for this yield he gave a specified time.

He then left to find more workers.

- selah -

The trees are our nations. 

The great tree at the center of the orchard 

is the desolation of war. 

The custodians are the angels of the nations 

who are the keepers of our sacred remembrances. 

The owner is the LORD, 

the one Sovereign of all nations. 

And we are the workers.

But the custodian of the desolation of war 

is the great serpent of faded Eden. 

And he bids us 

- constantly - 

not to tend to our trees. 

At the very door of our hearts, 

the enemy of all human nations 

calls us not to serve
and to commit adultery
against our own humanity.

Time came 

and a great darkness fell upon our nations: 

The great cycle of the one celestial season is turning: 

Winter now approaches our time on earth.

Let us then work 

to complete our own remembrances 

with autumn leaves shed 

not so much for winter's sake 

but for the spring.

Let us turn away from the darkness.

Let us tend to each our own trees. 

And bear the good fruit of repentance.

Let us fight for the Causes 

that have established us 

a free and human nation: 

Sacred Life, Law, Justice, and Benignity.

Let us compete in virtue 

- as citizens to each other - 

and produce for God and for each other 

a yield of good works, ten-fold, 

a hundred-fold, even a thousand-fold!

Starve out the serpent, O my nation! 

And let our generations prosper far into their years...

Born to the Morning: 

This is our land and Now is our time.

Because now is the time for peace.

This is our time.

---<--@

Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.

Have thou now forgotten
that promise long ago?
Return now to the wonder
and never let go.