All Saints’ and All Souls’ Day

Today is one of Catholicism’s most important holidays called All Saints’ (and tomorrow All Souls’) Day or as we learned in Spanish, “Todos los Santos” and in Cebuano “Kalag-Kalag” or “Undas” in Tagalog. It is our equivalent to the United States’ Memorial Day Weekend, the weekend that registers the highest road accidents annually as people often go home to visit their relatives and friends who have passed on to life eternal.

Of course, it must be said that a great majority of our people from all walks of life, regardless of their religious affiliation, troop to their respective cemeteries to remember those loved ones who once walked with them on this earth. It is always good never to forget those who had fallen asleep because in our Christian teaching, we shall hopefully meet these people once again when we too would give up the ghost.

I say hopefully because we can only hope that we’d all end up in heaven with God and, God forbid, we won’t be sent to a fiery life in hell. After all, as many people say, we are mere pilgrims passing by on this earth and if you’re an armchair historian… this is an indisputable truth. But more often than not, the truth is being mangled today, thanks to those who have taken a stand against God. Yes, atheism is on the rise selling all sorts of falsehood, which is opposed to the truth that our Lord Jesus Christ taught us.

Even in Christendom itself…there are those who insist that we should not pray to those who have passed away because they are all saved by our Lord Jesus Christ and are now in heaven. If this is so, why would our Lord Jesus Christ tell St. Peter in Matt. 16:19-28, “You are Peter and upon this rock I shall build my church and the sins that you forgive shall be forgiven in heaven and the sins that you retain shall be retained.” When we truly accept that as humans we are never free from the bondage of sin, then God gave us a way out…to ask the Saints to pray and intercede for us. This is why when we pray to the Blessed Virgin Mary we ask her to “Pray for us.”

As for you folks reading this in the cemetery, I can understand that today many families use All Saints’ Day as some sort of family reunion. In my book family reunions are part of Filipino culture. However I exhort our friends to use this day to pray together as a family. After all, Arch. Fulton Sheen gave the world this famous quote, “The family that prays together, stays together.” The key to a united family is the act of forgiving one another.

While our Lord Jesus Christ taught us to love one another… he also said that if you love only your family and friends, even pagans do this. Then he tells us to love our enemies. This is the hardest teaching in Christianity. But then who ever said that Christianity was an easy religion? So pray for an uneventful All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day weekend and stay safe.

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After more than a month of telling the Filipino people that President Benigno “P-Noy” Aquino III had finally changed his mind as to amending the 1987 Constitution so he could seek an extension of his term of office and also to clip the powers of the Constitution, last Wednesday, Oct. 29 the headline news in the Philippine STAR blared, “Noy: 2nd term not the right solution.” This was followed last Thursday with another Star headline, which blared, ‘No flip-flopping on Noy 2’ and a caption on the left said, “Palace: Noy truthful on 2nd term.”

What does this two-headline news tell us? That Pres. Benigno “PNoy” Aquino, III has all but lost his credibility. The Wednesday headline was to announce that he changed his mind, and then last Thursday’s headline was to tell the Filipino people that he was telling the truth! I reckon Pres. PNoy is akin to the boy who cried “Wolf!” too many times, people no longer believe him anymore. This is due to their massive use of yellow propaganda!

Apparently Pres. PNoy made a speech at the Semiconductor and Electronics Industries in the Philippines (SEIPI) during its 13^th CEO Forum and 118^th General Membership meeting in Makati where Pres. Aquino said, “At the end of the day, again I have to reemphasize, this is really a collective effort. Even if there are some quarters saying I should try and go for a second term. I don’t think that’s a right solution. We all have a time card in this world and we have to prepare for the eventuality of being called to meet our maker. So there has to be that continuation of people of like mind who will deliver on the promises that are real and not just self-serving or nice, pleasant to hear.

After that speech, Malacañang Palace spokesmen, Sec. Sonny Coloma and Edwin Lacierda rushed to issue a statement that Pres. PNoy was telling the truth in that speech. They literally brushed aside speculation that Pres. PNoy would suddenly change his mind and once more seek another term. Come now, aren’t these two jokers the very same people who tried to justify that plan by Pres. PNoy to seek another term by changing the constitution? So how can we know that this time around they are telling the truth?

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