Part II of One Country: Faith in our People

AS EARLY AS THE 9TH CENTURY, Chinese traders came to the Philippines. Their junks docked on the shores of the islands, bringing porcelain, silk, beads and lead sinkers for which Filipinos traded cotton, yellow wax, pearls, betel nuts, tortoise shells, coconuts, sweet potatoes, obacc cloth and coconut leaf mats. Chau Ju Kuo, a Chinese merchant, paid tribute to Filipino honesty. In an account written in 1225, the merchant stated that Filipinos would carry off Chinese goods to be sold inland and they would always return to bring back whatever payment was agreed upon.
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MY HONORABLE COMPATRIOTS - beloved, one and all - being a Filipino is not about how we look or how others look in relation to us.

From the time of our ancient fathers, external appearances was never contained within our founding natures. We are a deeply profound people and no temporal superficiality or earthly vanity ever led us astray from our silent quest for the truth. In those times, virtue was more important to us than material riches.

This was true and is still true. We just have to respond to the resonance within our hearts that beckon to us that we may remember who we truly are as a nation.

I shall refrain to delve into our martyred colonial past, suffice to say that from what we now know about hope, that the past is never lost to us only if we consistently honor the remembrances of our kindred generations by constantly living out their hopes for us within our present reality and from present unto every present unto God.

We should not blame the Spaniards, nor the Americans, nor the Japanese, but continue in our sacred trust one with another in God, holding on to the truth, releasing hate, and understand with what understanding we have been given to completely liberate from the past our soul as a nation.

One could only hope to do all that he or she could do with the utmost love and in good faith, leave all the rest unto God. Likewise, one could only hope to be all he or she can be with utmost love and in good faith, leave all the rest to God. For whoever is ashamed of his or her own sufficiency is at peace with nothing.

Being Filipino is all about our soul, it is all about the Filipino heart and mind in motion. It was never a question of what color, how tall, how pretty or how much as the Filipino soul is not at all quantifiable. For our ancient fathers, it was always a question of quality that made us into who we are then and who we are now as one Filipino people.

---<--@ for Ninoy, with thanks.

Prosper the Peace. Prosper the People.

Sancta Sanctis!

Glory to God in the highest
Adoration to Jesus Christ
Peace to men of good will.

"Faith in God and faith in our people."

- Senator Benigno Aquino, Jr.
(November 27, 1932 - August 21, 1983)
---<--@ Via Con Dios