We need an Easter Sunday culture, not a Biyernes Santo!

MANILA Philippines - And he departed from our sight that we might return to our heart, and there find Him. For He departed, and behold, He is here.  — St. Augustine

Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime.  — Martin Luther

Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song.  — Pope John Paul II

My apologies to theologians for this attempt at pontificating, I’m just a simple and imperfect believer in Christianity who wants to express my opinion
— we should exemplify more the triumphant, positive attitude of Easter Sunday than the gory mournful Biyernes Santo or Good Friday psyche.

Make no mistake about it: I am for the commemoration of the passion and death of Jesus Christ. There should be remembrance, but I have this uncomfortable feeling that many people in Philippine society are more fixated on all the pain associated with Lent than the triumph of Christ at Easter.

On a personal level, Easter is my inspiration for optimism and positive thinking. I believe our society should embrace this attitude without being blind to the harsh realities. The Biyernes Santo psyche unnecessarily colors people’s general attitude, which tends to over-romanticize poverty as noble or acceptable. It even encourages people to meekly and fatalistically accept our brazenly corrupt politicos and generals, and their shenanigans and their man-made tragedies as normal. Reject corruption, violence, death, lies and moral compromises as abhorrent and abnormal.

My theory is that this Biyernes Santo psyche was reinforced and propagated by our Spanish colonizers as one effective way to psychologically and emotionally control people of different dialects scattered throughout the Philippine islands during their 333 years of colonial misrule.

What better way to divide and rule than to make the masses accept grief as their fate, that socio-economic or even political sufferings are reminiscent of Christ-like bloodletting and his crucifixion on Golgotha, therefore making suffering seem romantic, bearable, and acceptable for generations?

How then can we explain our society’s almost masochistic love of the underdog, whether in politics, in the controversial Flor Contemplacion case, or in our perennially formulaic tearjerker TV soap operas?

Why are so many of our national holidays commemorations of defeat, like the Fall of Bataan, the execution of national hero Dr. Jose Rizal, the August 21 assassination of Ninoy Aquino and others? In any case, I wish to forcefully register my objection to workaholic President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s bizarre habit of moving our holidays for the utilitarian purpose of extending non-working weekends at the expense of history.

Our most popular historic landmarks are the execution spot of Rizal, which is now the Rizal monument, and not far away is the Gomburza monument of three Filipino priests executed by the colonizers via garrote, among others.

How then can we explain the phenomenon of so many historical injustices having been inflicted upon our society for generations, yet there has been no people’s backlash, no retribution and no justice in such cases as the 1983 Ninoy Aquino assassination, the 2005 Hello Garci scandal, the 1897 Andres Bonifacio assassination, the 1899 Antonio Luna assassination, the political elites’ collaborations with American colonizers in the 1900s and later with Japanese military invaders in 1942 to 1945?

I believe the over-emphasis on Biyernes Santos instead of the redemptive power of Easter Sunday is a tragic distortion — whether it’s a diabolical intent by others in the past or a misguided innocent zeal — of the essence of our Christian faith. If there is a crime under our laws on economic sabotage or big-scale corruption as plunder, then this is cultural and moral sabotage of the highest order!

We in the Philippines are Asia’s biggest Christian-majority nation — the Catholic republic of East Timor makes us no longer the region’s only Christian nation — therefore I urge our society to uphold the transcendent and empowering culture of Easter Sunday, not be overly-fixated with Biyernes Santo.

Culture is the X factor that primarily determines socio-economic and even political fates of nations. Look at the ethnic Chinese anywhere, our forebears and even us born overseas and citizens of different countries, are traditionally overly-fixated with good fortune. Our cultural mindset is focused on blessings, success. Our favorite color is red for good fortune.

Almost all Chinese rituals and traditions from new year, tieng-hun or engagements to weddings are focused on “hoc” or “good fortune.” Lucio Tan named his flagship firm “Fortune Tobacco.” Even the officially “atheist” communist leaders in Beijing believe in feng shui for good luck and unveiled the Olympics on 8-8-08 at 8:08 p.m., because the Chinese word for “8” rhymes with “good fortune” in Mandarin and Cantonese.

The Jewish people, despite over 2,000 years of diaspora, a stateless persecuted ethnic people, and in spite of the horrific Holocaust, still hold on to their positive attitude by reciting every year at their Passover festival: “Next year in Jerusalem.” Their faith is indestructible.

We in the Philippines are majority Christians, whose faith is built on the bedrock of the inspiring Easter Sunday miracle — of Jesus Christ’s resurrection triumphing over death and excruciating suffering, of hope winning over despair.

We shouldn’t be defeatists. We shouldn’t be fatalists. We should bury the age-old bahala na attitude. God helps those who help themselves. We are not victims. We are the masters of our destiny, with nobody else to blame but ourselves. We can and we must change our future!

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