Guns, goons, gold, cheating

Batas Mauricio

SEN. Grace Poe, Sen. Bongbong Marcos, and Catholic Bishops Dinualdo Gutierrez, Ruperto Santos, and Ramon Arguelles, concededly have the welfare of the country and our people in their hearts when they called for a righteous campaign and righteous candidates to be elected in the 2016 presidential elections.

But their call may not mean anything at all at this point. The fact is that, many Filipino voters are still totally uneducated on who to vote for in each and every election, and are still totally incapable of voting according to the standards set by the Bible in choosing leaders and officials that would govern the nation.

Elections in the Philippines are still decided by gold, goons, guns, and massive cheating, and the 2016 elections will not be an exception. Perhaps, Poe, Marcos, Gutierrez, Santos, and Arguelles can launch a movement to teach Filipino electorate how to choose and fight for leaders pursuant to biblical guidelines given by God, if they really want good, honest, and righteous Filipinos to be elected in 2022.

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I would have wanted to congratulate Sen. Poe for winning two temporary restraining orders from the Supreme Court, thereby enabling her to stop two orders from the Commission on Elections that disqualified her from the 2016 presidential elections, but it is still a long way to go for her.

I’d rather pray for her at this point, to ask God’s directions for her. The fact is that the Supreme Court as a whole will still have to decide whether to continue the temporary restraining orders which its Chief Justice, Maria Lourdes Sereno, issued late last month. The temporary orders could become permanent, or they may be set aside altogether.

In the meantime, Poe cannot fault her supporters and her financial backers if they start entertaining the idea that there is now a big and heavy baggage in her campaign and candidacy, considering the uncertainty generated by the disqualification orders against her. Well, as the Bible, in its Ecclesiastes 3:1 is saying, there is a time for everything, and it would do Poe well for Poe to consider the possibility that 2016 is not her time.

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We just had the 119th death anniversary of Dr. Jose P. Rizal, the national hero who was famous for his statement that the Filipino youth is the hope of the nation, and I couldn’t help but think how he would react to the law authored by former Sen. Francis Pangilinan which has single-handedly turned the Filipino youth into incorrigible criminals.

I guess Rizal would be crying in pain because Filipino kids are no longer the hope, as he hoped and envisioned them to be, but the curse, of our country. With Pangilinan’s law, Filipino children have become emboldened in committing crimes, because they could no longer be arrested by the authorities.

Just go around. Nobody will ever be able to deny that simple and heinous crimes are now the daily fare of many children, young enough to be still suckling at their mothers’ breasts. The tragedy is that no one, including Pangilinan, can stop them from their criminal ways now, because to even touch them would already amount to a crime.

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In spirit of welcoming 2016, I would like to share additional inspiring messages which could form the backbone of how we think, speak, act, and look in the next 365 days. First, we should, if ever, spend less time on worrying about our food, drinks, clothes, or about what will happen in the days to come.

The question has been asked: is there anyone in this world who, by worrying, added even a single hour to his life, or solved his problem to the satisfaction of everyone? There was none. The simple truth is that even if we worry, nothing good will come out of it, it will only complicate our health because worrying can compel our blood pressures to rise, and cause hypertension in our bodies.

Rather, we should endeavor to achieve everything we ever needed–money, food, and a good life–via the simple rule: seek first the kingdom of God and living according to His righteousness. This we can do by reading the Bible everyday, studying the commands therein day and night, and carefully obeying everything that is written in it.

E-mail: batasmauricio@yahoo.com