Selections from my Franciscan essays (hover cursor over link for source or click for full article)
‘The Stonecasters. ‘We Are Our Own Best Enemy’ – Tony Meer, Filipino’

February 25 – 22 years after People Power 1 drove out of this country benevolent dictator President Ferdinand E Marcos, 7 years after benevolent clown President Joseph Estrada was deposed by People Power 2, many jokers and jesters are still trying to stage People Power 3 against President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. They are the stonecasters at the adulterous woman of biblical times. They hate the sinner, not the sin; if they hated the sin, they would have to hate themselves.

You can hate at your convenience.

***

I recognize GMA’s Metro Manila Dilemma yesterday, today and tomorrow – damned if you do, damned if you don’t – because of all the clamor for good governance by those who don’t recognize it when they see it. They are the blind followers of the stonecasters.

***

Who are those who persecute, vilify, revile the woman? They are the many churched and unchurched, private and public, literate and illiterate, rich and poor, civilized and barbarians – they masquerade as saints. They can hide their faces, but they cannot hide the facts. They too are sinners. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of good.

***

I ain’t a saint myself. But as a writer I must proclaim my faith in the status quo, the establishment, even as lawyer Tony Meer must state his case of his state, the Philippines. The writer must profess even as the lawyer must confess love of country especially when everybody else seems to un-love her. Patriotism is the first refuge of soldiers, the last refuge of scoundrels.

***

No matter what the stonecasters say, it is not Adios, patria adorada! I believe it is not Adios, beloved country. I also believe that good men should do something, should dirty their hands. I believe with Abraham Lincoln that ‘He has a right to criticize who has a heart to help.’ So I want to enter politics without running for office. Politics is the first refuge of scholars, the last refuge of scoundrels.

***

Entering politics has now been embraced even by the Roman Catholic Church, with Fr Eddie Panlilio winning as Governor of Pampanga, the home province of GMA, and whom he has condemned as sinner in multimedia: TV, print, audio, video, Internet. Modern media have their uses.

***

In contrast to the big mouths in the Big City of Metro Manila, the small people in the rest of the Philippines celebrate life such as by growing the biggest squash in town, the biggest eggplant, banana, guava. ‘This is the kind of People Power that we want,’ says La Union Governor Manuel Ortega, ‘People Power that will bring our nation forward and not People Power that will drag down our country from development’ (Jun Elias, Feb 26, abs-cbnnews.com). The people have spoken. Amen!

***

The pie of politics is there for all to snatch slices from, or contemplate the recipe. Today, I prefer to contemplate the recipe in relation to a bigger pie: society. Her critics focus their contemplation, nay condemnation, on GMA; but she is not big enough, she is not society. GMA’s condemners do not condemn themselves as they should; they are men (embracing women) wearing masks, not unlike the Makapilis of Tony Meer’s time. If this society is being misled by Makapilis, we’re back to World War 2.

***

To put an out-of-the-box perspective to all the extravagant displays of statesmanship in Metro Manila, let me make a paradigm shift and refer to Nicanor ‘Nicky’ Perlas, my favorite student, who wrote an astounding book in 2000 titled Shaping Globalization: Civil Society, Cultural Power And Threefolding (274 pages, published in Pasig City, Philippines by CADI & GlobeNet3).

Nicky’s proposal he calls Threefolding, that is, the application of cultural power on the social forces for the good of society itself. ‘All activities in societies emanate from three separate but interacting realms,’ Nicky says. ‘These realms of society are its culture, its polity, and its economy’ (page xxi). The three forces are Civil Society, the State, and Business (180). He is like saying, if the State is in control, it’s a dictatorship; if Business is in control, it’s profiteering; if Civil Society is in control, it’s heaven. That’s the theory.

***

Today, February 24, I find that I must add after the Third Force not a Fourth Force but a force that gives meaning to the Three Forces – and this is the Moral Force. This is not the Truth Force, and it is not meant to set anyone free – no one can ever be free in a society. Moral yes, that is, edifying, virtuous, reputable, ethical, principled, honest, decent, proper, honorable, just, right, good.

***

Now, whether silent or noisy, do the Roman Catholic or Protestant clergy constitute the Moral Force? I a layman say, clergy or not clergy, you do not constitute the Moral Force if you do not preach and practice the two greatest commandments of God.

I will grant you the first commandment – you love God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. Now, do you love your neighbor as yourself? If you condemn him (embracing her), the sinner, you are the opposite of the Christian, no matter what church or denomination or group you belong to.

***

They are the stonecasters, the ones who dare proclaim by their acts that they are without sin. Many a columnist and journalist of a Metro Manila newspaper, many a TV broadcaster and host, many a Senator, many a blogger, many a priest, many a preacher, many a prominent citizen, even many a college student – each one of them, male or female, has been brazen enough to come out in public and throw not just one but many stones at the woman they have accused of being a big sinner. They want her to suffer the punishment for the sins of the nation. They want her as sacrifice.

***

I desire mercy, not sacrifice. I did not come to call the righteous but sinners (Matthew 9: 13, NAB).

But nobody is listening, Lord. Everyone is speaking all at the same time, and everybody is saying the same thing: ‘I accuse!’ They will say that to anyone, to a tape recorder, especially in front of a TV camera. But they cannot say for themselves, ‘Not guilty.’

***

I asked our common friend, another Tony (Oposa), a noted surgeon, to arrange for a dinner meeting for us so I could congratulate Tony Meer heartily and interview him. Why him specially? Because, as it happens, I know he loves his country, my country, the Philippines. Through Tony O, I had met him and I had read his book and had been sufficiently awed (see my ‘Remembrance, Remonstrance,’ frankahilario.wordpress.com).

FAH: When Christ associated with sinners, he did not condemn them, he did not vilify them, he did not persecute them. Someone I know is very negative about GMA. Half in jest, I emailed him that I wanted to strangulate the Filipinos who were very negative about their own country. I thought he would never talk to me again.

TM: We are our own best enemy.

FAH: Best, not worst. I like that! It’s so negative and yet it’s so positive.

***

Worst, we go down the dustbin of history. Best, we go the way of the Promised Land. A promise is a promise – we have to make it a self-fulfilling prophecy.

***

Can we depend on the raucous mass media and the boisterous politicians to lead us to the Promised Land? Not if they continue to portray the Rebel as Hero and the Government as Villain. (Read Tony Meer’s indictment of the mass media for their glorification of the Oakwood Mutineers, when TV, radio and the press reversed the roles – August 13, 2003, a full-page ad in the Philippine Star; reprinted in full on pages 474-479 in A Lawyer’s Fate & Faith.)

***

 ‘Power to the people!’ should not be ‘anarchy to the people!’ or ‘power to the media!’ Shame on you mass preachers, and shame on you mass media! You judge, you condemn, you do not pardon. You practice the exact opposite of Luke 6: 37. You do not lift up – instead, you pour into our lap a good measure, you press down, you shake all together so that everything runs all over us.

***

FAH: Do you know a Mariano Angeles, a UP Vanguard? You’re not a Vanguard, are you?

TM: My brother was a Vanguard, not me.

FAH: In effect, the ROTC is dead, right? I read Angeles in the Internet (‘On A Citizen Armed Forces,’ geocities.com/artesguerra). In my time, I was against the idea of being forced to take up the ROTC. After reading Angeles, now I like the idea of a citizen army, reviving the ROTC.

TM: A citizen army makes sense.

***

Angeles’ Vanguard’s Faith is that the ROTC is a force against elitism in the military. Not apart from that, what is My Writer’s Faith?

Oinam Anand says, ‘The chief mission of the writer is to struggle for peace and upliftment of society in which he lives. This role is determined not only by his place in literature but also by the degree of his involvement in the society’s public life’ (e-pao.net). For me, a writer’s role is a citizen’s role, but more because of his power over words, which is power to reach out with ideas. And what is the role of a citizen in a society? To love and let love. To be moral, not amoral. Morality is above all, even above the moralists.

***

My Writer’s Faith is to keep faith with the vision of my people, not with those pollsters, not with those politicians, not with those pundits of virtue, not with those prophets of doom.

***

Meanwhile, the media are playing their roles with gusto, even with guts and gory: opinion polls, news & columns in newspapers & magazines, as on radio & TV & in websites, including Senate inquiries ‘in aid of legislation.’ They already have their reward. 10,000 protesters (possibly including Communists and certainly including Catholics) gathered in Makati City February 15 to demand the resignation of GMA, the media reported (manilastandardtoday.com).

***

Now, what about the rest of us, what about the best of us – what about the intellectuals?

***

Preachers and preached, priests and priested, rebels and rebelled, media and mediated: So far we have 10,000 stonecasters, the ones who have thrown stones at the woman brought out by the mob in public; we have 89 million Filipinos and not one Christian. Where are the Christians when you need them most!?