I know I'm way too late to still be blogging about this but this Saturday may have been the worst experience to date for most of the people in Metro Manila. I'm just so grateful that me and my family was spared from what had happened. Though I've experienced it last year when we were in Iloilo. Having to see half of everything you own submerged in waist-high water -- and not just any water, chocolate-brown water. I've seen most of our people hanging on to trees just so they wouldn't be caught in the rushing current. I may not have been a flood victim of Ondoy, me and my family had been a victim of typhoon Frank. It's just creeping me out that after over a year that it happened to Iloilo, it then again happened to where I'm at -- Manila.
Every Sunday, without fail, I'd tell my daughter,
Janiz: You know what honey? In most parts of the world, Churches are empty.
Kiara: What do you mean "empty"?
Janiz: In most parts of the world, people just stop going to Churches.
Kiara: You mean, people in those places stopped believing and stopped praying?
Janiz: That, I'm not at all sure of. It's not quantifiable that when they stopped going to Church, that their faith and prayer also stopped. But now that you asked of it, it makes me wonder.
Kiara: Oh. So why did they stop going to Church?
Janiz: People just became too busy, some work on Sundays. Or others take their day off on Sundays so they'd rather spend it home resting. Whatever their reasons are, it doesn't mean that they stopped believing.
Kiara: So every Sunday they don't go to Church, they're adding up to their sins.
Janiz: *smile* The context of sins nowadays are changing.
Kiara: No it's not. A sin is still a sin. Black is still black mom, even if you color it with blue or green, it's still black.
Janiz:*smiling* You're right baby, it doesn't mean that when everyone is doing it, makes it right and acceptable.
I waved my white flag, how can you argue with someone uncorrupted when it comes to faith? The innocence of youth, it keeps me grounded.
By the end of the mass, my witty little daughter asked,
Kiara: So what would happen to the Churches when there's no people praying?
Janiz: In Europe, it becomes sort of like a museum. While in the US, a priest once said that maybe this year, they're closing down roughly a hundred Churches.
Kiara: That much? A hundred?
Janiz: Yes baby. But look at the Philippines, the Catholic Church alone, regardless of the other religions -- we have anticipated Saturday mass, and an estimate of six masses on Sundays. Yet, the Churches remain full.
Kiara: Yeah mom, I've noticed. I just thought it was like this in other places as well.
Case in point, we Filipinos are deeply rooted in our faith. But how can a country such as ours be so religious and yet have one of the most corrupt government at the same time? My greatest disbelief comes when I begin to put it in that light. It's like saying, evil could really over-power good.
But when disasters like these come our way, that's the time that people will actually start to care. That's the time when people in power start to go out of their way to lend a hand and do the extra mile. A time when they start to care to the people outside of their family and themselves.
All I want to say is this, it is by far one of the most withstanding reality, that these people have long needed any possible help. Way before they were flood victims, they were already a victim of poverty, a result of the endless corruption that the people in power, and supposedly in public service would have done, a long long time ago. It's just sad, that we needed mother nature or any force for that matter, destroy us, to become a whole. And for these people to wake up, and see where they have brought our nation so far.
With that said, I rest my lifelong disbelief for a nation so God-fearing in the first place but still remains in the third world. God is not failing us, it's the people we put in power.
