Changing the Filipino’s heart

In the midst of the current political crisis there are calls for the Filipino’s change of heart. One change articulated repeatedly in the streets is towards social awareness and active involvement in communal actions, as one “activist” bishop terms it. The implication of course is that the people should go out and join the mass actions demanding for President Arroyo’s resignation.

But the general mass know better. They know that the very people creating this political disturbance are nothing but a disgruntled klatch of ambitions also-run politicians who are itching for positions of authority so that they and their ilks will get their turn to mulct this God-forsaken country again.

Look at their faces. One used to be a police officer whose very name evokes fear in many because of the violent incidents associated with him. Another is a former president who loves to be dressed in all-yellow get-up, as if to inspire once more an upheaval like that of Edsa 1, innocently believing perhaps that Edsas are a cure-all to our social problems, unaware, perhaps innocently also, of the untold damage such actions would create on our system of democratic governance.

Still another has the face of corruption itself. Convicted of plunder, he still has the nerve to show his face publicly, lisping as always his bogus stanch of pro-poor sentiments.

Of the NBN scam and others, the people are well posted, without doubt. Without doubt accusing fingers directed at the First Couple are justifiable fingers. But was there ever an immaculate settler in that Pasig Office? Even that innocent-faced housewife cannot claim a monopoly to clean governance. She too, like the rest of them, was guilty of bureaucratic lapses either by herself or by those close to her.

In the neck of the Arroyo administration, a number of unanswered questions hang like a dead albatross. Yet compared to her predecessor her kind of corruption is more tolerable because as a person she has not been associated with moral indiscretion. This, plus her able handling of the country’s economy, is her saving grace. (Despite high oil prices, the peso remains strong against other currencies, and inflation is manageable. Unemployment has been reduced to less than eight percent and the number of families with survival basket has risen).

Yet at an appropriate time that albatross should be dropped right into the sala of the First Couple. We have manacled once the country’s highest official, and we can do it again – using our democratic processes.

Such is the other side in the current calls for a change of heart. People power seems a romantic adventure into recklessness. It looks appealing. (Have you not heard of people boasting they were at Edsa 1 or 2?). But it is a counter-productive way of changing a regime. Being unconstitutional, it makes for a weak social structure because it thumbs down on the laws of the land. Unless we want to become a banana republic, we should not ape what the militant groups love to do to destroy the establishment.

Besides, two Edsas have taught us that unless the military sides with the demonstrators, nothing happens. A social disturbance such as what the anti-Arroyo groups are fomenting is therefore an invitation for the military to flex its muscle – for or against the incumbent leadership. Whatever the military option, the doctrine of the supremacy of civilian authority over the military is compromised.

There is another change of heart needed by all of us in these trying times. It is the change from too much concern of the self and too little regard for other people’s good. It is the fetish towards the we (kami) as against they (sila) that keeps us off the track of what is good in public service or in private affairs. As long as all is well with the family or kamag-anak, bahala na sila. What a lamentable tendency!

The big question, however, in trying to change our hearts is, how shall this be done? It’s one thing to articulate the desire to change, it’s another to inculcate it. If to do were as easy as to know, what were goods to do? says a poet. Our Christian upbringing teaches us what is right and what is wrong. But, alas, Christianity has not touched our hearts. Skin-deep, it has little influence on our thoughts and actions. Given a choice between worldliness and spirituality, what else would it be but that which gratifies the senses?

That’s why the Church is right in calling for prayers instead of mass actions. When things look bleak and hopeless, prayer is the answer. Changing the Filipino’s heart seems impossible. There’s canker in that heart. The leaders have it, the average Pinoy too. But prayer makes the impossible possible. If you have faith even as small as a mustard seed, says Jesus, you can command the mountain to transfer to the sea.

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