There was a boy
named Tommy who had a particularly hard time in school. He continually asked
questions, and he never could quite keep up. It seemed that he failed every
time he tried something. His teacher finally gave up on him and told his mother
that he could not learn and would never amount to much. But Tommy’s mother was
a nurturer. She believed in him. She taught him at home, and each time he
failed, she gave him hope and encouraged him to keep trying.
Whatever
happened to Tommy? He became an inventor, eventually holding more than one
thousand patents, including those of the phonograph and the first commercially
practical incandescent electric lightbulb. His name was Thomas Edison. He
epitomized the idea that when people have hope, there is no telling how far
they can go. 1/ Yes, this is the same Edison who wrote: “I have not
failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” 2/
How did he get
to have this positive perspective in face of successive ‘failures’? No thanks
to his teacher, who labored under the constrictions of her limited preconceived
notions of what a promising young person should be. And yes, thanks to his
mother who believed in him and who gave him the unlimited idea that, in and
with hope, there are no limits to what one can achieve.
I respectfully
submit, there are no limits to what the Filipino people as a nation, can
achieve.
As Ninoy Aquino said:
“I have carefully weighed the virtues
and the faults of the Filipino and I have come to the conclusion that he is
worth dying for because he is the nation’s greatest untapped resource.”3/
Greatest untapped resource for what?
I submit: for the realization of the democratic ideal, expressed by US
President Abraham Lincoln as a “government of the people, by the people and for
the people” 4/ and enshrined as one of our constitutional principles,
viz: "The Philippines is a democratic and republican state. Sovereignty resides in the people and all government authority emanates from them." 5/
With all our government authority emanating from us, the citizens, we
hope to “build a just and humane society, and establish a Government that shall
embody our ideals and aspirations, promote the common good, conserve and
develop our patrimony, and secure to ourselves and our posterity, the blessings
of independence and democracy under the rule of law and a regime of truth,
justice, freedom, love, equality, and peace”. 6/
The idea that governance emanates from us, the sovereign, is the basis for
President Manuel L. Quezon’s bold declaration: “I would rather have a country run like hell by Filipinos
than a country run like heaven by the Americans, because however bad a Filipino
government might be, we can always change it.” 7/
And, having the sovereign capability to choose change for the better
and to pursue it persistently, we can change our government by fully exercising
our rights and duties as the citizens of our Republic.
Modern citizenship has often been looked at as two
competing underlying ideas. The first is the liberal-individualist or sometimes liberal conception
of citizenship, which focuses on man’s economic nature, and suggests that
citizens should have entitlements necessary for human dignity.
It assumes that people act for the purpose of enlightened self-interest. According to
this viewpoint, citizens are sovereign, morally autonomous beings with duties
to pay taxes, obey the law, engage in business transactions, and defend the
nation if it comes under attack, but are essentially passive politically, and
their primary focus is on economic betterment. This formulation posits that the
state exists for the benefit of citizens and has an obligation to respect and
protect the rights of citizens, including civil rights and political rights. It
was only later that so-called social rights became part of the obligation for
the state. The second idea is the civic-republican
or sometimes classical or civic humanist conception of
citizenship, which emphasizes man's political nature, and sees citizenship as
an active process, not a passive state or legal marker. It is relatively more
concerned that government will interfere with popular places to practice
citizenship in the public sphere. Citizenship means being active
in government affairs. An ideal citizen is one who exhibits "good civic
behavior". Free citizens and a republic government are "mutually
interrelated." Citizenship suggested a commitment to "duty and civic
virtue". 8/ According
to one view, most people today live as citizens consistent with the
liberal-individualist conception but wished they lived more in line with the
civic-republican ideal. 9/
From the perspective of the 1987 Philippine Constitution, with its
provisions among others on being both a democratic and republican state,
national economy and patriotism, as well as social justice and human rights, it
seems that we want to straddle both concepts and shift from one emphasis to the
other as the national needs may warrant.
We can say that our polity has both economic and political emphases,
with highlights on equitable financial opportunities/income distribution even
as we enlarge our economic pie, and on optimal political participation for
selecting leaders who are statesmen (preferably also philosophers) while
ensuring governance with integrity/transparency and the full development of our
national capabilities so that the blessings of “independence and democracy”
shall indeed be secured for ourselves and our posterity.
We can start with reclaiming belief in and respect for ourselves and
our fellow Filipino citizens.
Perhaps, we can follow the principle of finding what you look for. As in general, we find what we seek: the
vulture finds the carrion it hunts for; the hummingbird finds the nectary
flower it zeroes in. Similarly, let us overlook incidents that give us reasons
to disparagingly say “Pilipino kasi, eh!”
For by it we perpetuate, without realizing so, the colonial belittling strategy
to make the Indio believe he was inferior and unequal to the colonizer. Rather,
let us find every cause and reason to say with honor and just pride “Pilipino yata ‘yan!” For with it we
reclaim our self-respect as well as respect for and pride in our fellow Filipinos
that we are at the least equal to other peoples and have the capacity to work
together as a team.
Never mind the
momentum of history where we still see many among us displaying the habits of
colonials and the conquered. For it has been said: “Treat a man as he appears
to be and you make him worse. But treat a man as if he already were what he
potentially could be, and you make him what he should be”. 10/ Besides as the late father of our current
President wrote: "I believe that the Filipino will respond to the call to
greatness not by coercion but by persuasion, not by intimidation but through
the ways of freedom." 11/
It is submitted that our reciprocal respect and respect for us and our
nation by others, form the quintessence of Dr. Jose Rizal’s dreams as expressed
in the ‘Last Farewell’. Let us then each assume responsibility for the ideas
and the thought-emotion clusters we broadcast about our people and our country,
that we may do some constructive part in helping to realize Dr. Rizal’s “Dream
of my life, my ardent, living, passion and rallying cry” “Ensueño de mi
vida, mi ardiente vivo anhelo”, which was to see his “jewel of the sea of
the orient, the dark eyes dry, the smooth forehead held high: without frown,
without wrinkles, without stains of high color” “joya del mar de oriente,
secos los negros ojos, alta la tersa frente, sin ceño, sin arrugas, sin manchas
de rubor”. For we would, in effect, help build Filipino self-respect,
Filipino mutual respect, and respect by others. 12/
And let us do these with courage,
the care of a good parent of a family, dignity, fearlessness, being
knowledgeable, and the ability to think for ourselves. For these are some of
the attitudes and mindsets that Dr. Rizal encouraged the maidens of Malolos to
have and to wield. Among others, he wrote: “First, the tyranny of some is
possible only through cowardice and negligence on the part of others. Second, what makes one contemptible is lack
of dignity and abject fear of him who holds one in contempt. Third, ignorance is servitude, because as a
man thinks, so is he; a man who does not think for himself and allows himself
to be guided by the thought of another is like the beast led by a halter.” 13/
Indeed, we are
told: "Nurture your mind with great thoughts; to believe in the heroic
makes heroes." 14/ To believe in our own and in our peoples’
capacities to be heroic will save us from the seemingly endless lamentation, as
Dr. Rizal put it: “Where are the youth who will consecrate their budding
years, their idealism and enthusiasm to the welfare of their country? Where are
the youth who will generously pour out their blood to wash away so much shame,
so much crime, so much abomination? Pure and spotless must the victim be, that
the sacrifice may be acceptable! Where are you, youth, who will embody in
yourselves the vigor of life that has left our veins, the purity of ideas that
has been contaminated in our hearts? We await you, O youth! Come, for we await
you!” 15/
And this belief in the innate heroic capacities of our people and our
youth can be realized when we pursue it along the lines of St. Paul’s plea for oneness
and respect founded on humility: "If there is any encouragement in Christ, any solace in love, any participation in the Spirit, any compassion and mercy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, with the same
love, united in heart, thinking one thing. Do nothing out of selfishness or out of vainglory; rather, humbly regard (esteem) others as more important than yourselves, each looking out not [only] for his own interests, but [also] everyone for those of others." 16/
Filipinos! Philippines! a self-respecting nation-state standing with dignity and honor as a valued member of the global community! Because we have hope, self-esteem, solidarity and mutual respect among us; we hold the good and welfare of our country as our motive; and we prove to the whole world that when a Filipino wills something he can always do it. 17/
Filipinos! Philippines! a self-respecting nation-state standing with dignity and honor as a valued member of the global community! Because we have hope, self-esteem, solidarity and mutual respect among us; we hold the good and welfare of our country as our motive; and we prove to the whole world that when a Filipino wills something he can always do it. 17/
“May the God of hope fill (us) with all joy and peace in
believing, so that (we) may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” 18/
________
Notes:
1/Dennis Rainey and Barbara Rainey, Building Your Mate’s Self-Esteem,
Nashville, Thomas Nelson, 1993 cited in John C. Maxwell and Jim Dornan, Becoming a Person of Influence,
Nashville, Thomas Nelson, 1997, p. 54.
2/ http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/t/thomas_a_edison.html
3/ Speech delivered by Senator Benigno S.
Aquino, Jr. before the Asia Society in New York, August 4, 1980.
4/ The Gettysburg Address, November 19,
1863.
5/ Section 1,
Article II, 1987 Philippine Constitution
6/ Preamble, 1987 Constitution
7/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manuel_L._Quezon
8/ Beiner (editor), Ronald (1995). Theorizing
Citizenship. J. G. A. Pocock, Michael Ignatieff. USA: State University
of New York, Albany. pp. 29, 54. ISBN 0-7914-2335-2, cited in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizenship#cite_note-tws2Y18-27
9/ Ibid.
10/Quote from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
11/ Quote from Benigno S. Aquino, Jr.
12/ cf “Of Fellow Filipinos” in http://rizalsignificance.blogspot.com/search?updated-min=2012-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&updated-max=2012-12-30T01:12:00-08:00&max-results=10&start=1&by-date=false
13/ First 3 of the 7 points Dr. Rizal made
to the Maidens of Malolos, in his Tagalog letter “Sa Mga Kadalagahan sa
Malolos, Bulakan”, from London, Feb. 1889
14/ Quote from Disraeli
15/ Padre Florentino’s soliloquy in the “El
Filibusterismo”
16/ cf Philippians 2:1-4, NABRE
17/ cf Rizal's Speech Delivered at Café
Habanero, 31 December 1891; http://www.rizalinfo.net/
MemPolDetails.asp?TableIndex=17
17/ cf Romans 15:13, NABRE
