Someone is Truly-in-Charge

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I received a flurry of e-mailed comments on my last blog article a week ago entitled “In Bad Faith and in BAD, BAD company!”

The comments and suggestions ranged from that of a layman apostle of Jesus Christ the Returning King, who prefers to leave the matter of our national travails to God’s Divine Providence who “at the appointed time… will tell us exactly what to do”, and another religious inclined young lady who said that “change may be improbable or impossible but with the Lord’s grace, it may take time but it will definitely happen.”

At the other end of the opinion spectrum was a 4-page account (apparently from the Romulo Neri which was obtained through his Black-and-White Movement convenor-friend) with its detailed rationalizations as to why and how useless or in vain Neri’s sacrifice as a whistle-blower/witness against PGMA, would merely become, despite full public disclosure by Neri of the incriminating Malacañang secrets behind the NBN-ZTE scandal.

After reading these and other comments, I was left with the same nagging yet ambivalent impression I have lately been absorbing by reading our newspapers or listening to the most recent Senate hearings on the botched NBN-ZTE contract and related developments.

My impression is that we are a people still sorely confused and deeply divided, but with quite a number of highly encouraging signs of hope for our national redemption. Yet it seems every new major scandal or controversy such as this latest one over the botched witness abduction masquerading as “witness protection” and subsequent “true confessions” of Rodolfo Noel “Jun” Lozada, further widens the confusion and deepens the level of dissension among mutually hostile sectors of our society, and sparks fresh animosities even among hitherto allied groups and institutions.

I have thought long and hard as to why our people seem to be speaking in a thousand different tongues unintelligible except to a few, thereby creating even more confusion and hostility among those who do not understand much less agree with one another’s disparate opinions.

To theorize and ascribe our national disunity to a particular Pinoy cultural flaw or to a prevailing absence of sound and consistent episcopal moral/ spiritual leadership, would merely contribute to more hostilities among ourselves perhaps even among hitherto natural and fraternal allies.

And so after several days of my not knowing what to entitle nor how to proceed with this piece after its opening paragraphs were composed, I am now led to rely on the truly consoling (ever since my jailbird years!) and surely solid theological notion vis-a-vis our on-going national moral purgation and looming catharsis. Thus this piece is addressed mainly to my fellow Christian believers who sincerely accept and regularly recite the most profound basic truths of our common Faith as expressed in that universal Christian prayer addressed to “Our Father.”

And so I now proceed on the premise and belief that God our Father, sovereign Lord of all of mankind’s history from the beginning of Time itself and even beyond, is still definitely yet lovingly in charge and in sovereign control of the Filipino nation, as with all other nations.

Whether we know it or not, or can explain it logically or not, as sovereign Lord and creator of the whole world and cosmos, “Our Father” is knowingly in charge and in control over the fate of each and everyone of us. And that includes particularly at this time, PGMA, FGMA, Ben Abalos, Romulo Neri, Jun Lozada, Joker Arroyo, Lito Atienza or anybody else including my own self of course, but without violating anyone’s Free Will! Otherwise, we would all be non-independent automatons shorn of any moral responsibilities, whether of guilt and much less of merit.

That being the case, I can NOT nor can anybody else, change nor improve by one whit, the absolute correctness of the timing, nor degree of punishment, or vindication, or fullness of justice or depth of mercy that Our Father will surely and eventually impose on me and/or on PGMA, FGMA, Ben Abalos, Romulo Neri, Jun Lozada and everybody else. And such Divine judgment will be in perfect accordance with God’s perfect justice and infinite mercy as applied to each and everyone of us at any given time.

Having said that, I also firmly believe that free-willed as we all are but endowed with a God-given conscience, and through prayers and good will, with unimpeded access to His superabundant supernatural Grace, we all therefore ought to know, AT LEAST the basics of what are obviously MORALLY right or wrong vis-à-vis lying, stealing and killing etc., especially if we claim to know and believe in God’s ten basic commandments. And more so if the early years of our education and conscience formation were spent in the most reputable Catholic schools.

Thus for example, common sense and a modicum of a clear conscience should lead most every reasonable Christian to arrive at a reasoned judgment that:

1. Joc-Joc Bolante and his associates and superiors in government who have been accused of facilitating the squandering of huge sums of our people’s money, and who have refused to face the bar of justice so as to explain or exonerate themselves, have done a serious injustice to our people. Thus our people’s protests against such continuing mockeries of our justice system should not be blithely dismissed as supposedly “mere political NOISE”.

2. Either Benjamin Abalos or if not, Romulo Neri is guilty of blatant perjury and other high crimes, considering that under oath Neri has publicly accused Abalos of masterminding a P200 Million bribe offer to facilitate the NBN-ZTE transaction, and Abalos on the other hand has denied it categorically thereby and thereafter accusing Neri of gross perjury. For our national leaders to dismiss such serious accusations and counter-accusations among top level government officials, as well as denigrating its continuing Senate investigation as mere “political grandstanding”, is certainly another mockery of their moral and legal accountability as public servants, to us the sovereign people of this nation.

3. The harassment of vital witnesses and dire threats to their very lives, thus preventing the full disclosure and investigation of alleged high crimes, and the summary dismissal of such allegations of high crimes on the part of top government officials, particularly in the case of the abduction of witness Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada, are obvious and gross violations of our laws, as well as God’s 5^th and 8^th commandments as well. That these gross violations have become so blatantly and brazenly done, and yet have been ignored or even justified by reasonable but supposedly apolitical Christian citizens many of whom are friends of ours, are clear contradictions of their own Christian vocation.

Therefore we who claim to be adult Christian citizens of this nation have the clear moral as well as civic duty to “observe, judge and act” according to good reason, upright conscience and established legal and religious norms, with respect to the MORALITY or IMMORALITY as the case may be of our public officials’ conduct as servants of the people subject to our laws and in the light of God’s Ten Commandments. This duty to observe, judge and act may not be evaded or postponed especially if the alleged violations of the law seriously affect the whole nation, regardless of whether or not the accusers or the accused are our friends, loved ones, or enemies – politically or otherwise!.

And as a Catholic Christian, I also believe that such a process of observing, judging and acting especially on serious moral issues and matters affecting our nation, will be much more effective with respect to the true and correct Common Good -- which is/Who is, Jesus Christ Himself, the Way, the Truth and Life itself, if done prayerfully, humbly and contritely, and while conscious of our own past and present shortcomings.

And lastly I also believe that habitual resort to personal private prayerfulness which we all owe to our Creator, does not however mean that we will have an exclusive, private and unerring instruction from God Himself as to what to do. Although such private revelations may in fact have been granted and will still be granted to a few privileged souls, most of the time however, God’s Will for us on what to do even vis-à-vis basic national moral issues, will be discovered mostly STILL through common sense, and the simple yet logical application of our fundamental laws and God’s Ten Commandments.

As to Romulo Neri’s rationalizations on the supposed impracticability and uselessness of a morally correct course of action just because of the anticipated morally evil counter-actions by the enemy, these are nothing but a confused soul’s last efforts to wiggle out of a morally correct but painful decision. Moreover, such temptations are as usual, at the instance of S.A.Tan, the Evil Father of all lies and false rationalizations.

The latest up-to-the-minute developments shown on TV, on the NBN-ZTE/Lozada/Neri imbroglio, whether at the La Salle campus or at the Senate and elsewhere, are proof enough to me that Divine Providence is still and truly in charge, despite all the intricate obfuscations high crimes and detestable lies of mice and men.

HALLELUJAH!