Heaven seems to do its part, always, “at least in these parts, when the calendar for the departed souls come. It may be in flourish, sometimes in fleeting kindness, at times too much for the living souls. Poorer or richer doesn’t matter. It always reminds the Christians or the religious that there is more than meets the eyes or doesn’t.
One thing is true, or accepted willingly or willy nilly. ” Dust thou art, to dust thou returnest, was not spoken of the soul ”, the poet Longfellow wrote. So the calendar is divided into two events: All Saints’ Day to the faithful, All Soul’s Day to the religious. A third one has been embraced in fashion: Halloween.
Alas, the poor South Koreans didn’t know what hit them when tragedy smashed more than their ego in a fatal crowd surge. South Korea, it is flaunted about, has overtaken the Philippines as the next best place for Christianity. So the Koreans, on the word of their president, have observed a national day of mourning. For the Philippines? Grin and bear it, may GOD have mercy on your soul and go replace those felled trees.
Actually, BBM was more realistic than religious. He knows, as Longfellow did, life is real and serious.It’s not in the stars that we suffer, Cassius of Rome said, but we have found the enemies and he is us, Pogo said in another time . Do we have an environment secretary who will not fall for the whines and wiles of the miners or the bribe and bullying of the quarriers? Will she not suffer meltdown under a leader with a strong admiration for Machiavelli? Gina Lopez did and brought her heartaches and dreams to the grave. . The next big rain or strong typhoon should tell us this time around.
The most recent is the last devastating typhoon that wrought havoc in 16 of the country’s 18 regions or so, the heaviness of the wrath prompted a collective call for a declaration of state of calamity for the whole nation. The cool cat in Malacanang can’t be stampeded into obliging to the chorus for government’s ultimate succor.
There must have been an official consensus a priori: state of calamity directives are a panacea and usually line up the pockets of those have an easier access to the cookie jar and leaves the victims holding an empty bag or clutching an empty stomach. PBBM knew what mattered most: goodwill and goodies, with an obvious hand from his social welfare cum p.r. alter ego. Like or not, it achieves its purpose: political, social and probably spiritual, too.
In this hopeful land torn between the faults and typhoons on the Pacific Rim,the show must go on, even as the living remember their dead.
A better way was misdirection or re-direction. Why not plant a tree to make for the lost ones on denuded hills and mountains that were helpless to hold inundations from the fast- changing climat? , President Marcos Jr, suggested instead. He momentarily forgot that when a tree falls in the forest here, as a result of government neglect or with its consent, it’s too soon to think about rampaging floods, obliterated homes and buried bodies. The government needs all the revenues or taxes it can get to keep the country above waters with debts hanging like millstones around her neck.
After the storm, people brought their flowers and candles to the rain-soaked , or flooded, graves of their loved ones . Many posted their visitation photos and fondest hopes on FB. On or before, there were death anniversaries remembered with such unmoved convictions and contradictions. “ Happy 10th anniversary in heaven,” one of many similar posts greeted on FB. “ O death, where is thy sting?”, Paul asked. Sisters Mary and Martha felt the pain but were assured of Lazarus’ glory in the afterlife.
Somehow, Karl Marx had an idea but with a different take. “Religion is the opium of the masses,” he said in laying down the ideology of communist as antithesis to organized religion. So religion doesn’t thrive in communist states like China, which gave its more powerful leader in history, Xi Ping, his unprecedented third term. Even Mao never had such a day! Did his disciple Duterte, who had bowed before his might as against our right in the West Philippine Sea, knew it was coming? Will BBM?
In his time, Duterte waged war against another opium that has allegedly taken the lives of between 6,000 to 30,000 souls for whom their loved ones can only have two wishes: 1) that their death anniversaries will be as happy as can be in heaven and 2) justice will be finally served. Cross your fingers: BBM has doubted the natural death of a middleman in a journalist’s murder. A forensic EXPERT has confirmed his worst fear. The PNP and BUCOR are at loggerheads. Misdirections are sprouting from the religious to the irreligious. Cul de sac?
“ To the well-organized mind, “ J.K. Rowling, “ death is the next great adventure.” That is the heart-felt wish of those who braved rain, flood and the tail wind of a strong storm to remember their loved ones who have gone ahead. To the living, planting a tree may be your next best step. Pay your taxes and hope that BBM will also settle his family’s long overdue estate tax amounting to P203 billion.
In another place, the living saints paraded their dead saints in the streets through the rain , in a fashion not entirely inconsistent with Rowling’s notion of a great adventure in the next life. It’s fun, at the least.`
