2010: Change of Presidents: A- must read article

I know... right? It's been a long time and I miss you all! In my oh-so-super-busy schedule where I can no longer open my YM and other networking-stress relief tools, I found 1 email that really made me stop for a while to read and digest words of wisdom. Honestly, I was moved. I don't know. I have never voted all my legal-aged life. Swear! I never intend to. I'm so busy working but this made me realize one thing: "What if there are 100,000 Filipinos who think like I did? What if this 100,000 Filipinos can make a change? Is this article (below) true enough? We would never know. But one thing that I'm sure of: If we align our intentions to good will, success and integrity, Filipinos can make a change. Feel free to read the article. I highlighted some statements that really struck me. This might move you big time, too. Miss you all! 

2010: CHANGE OF PRESIDENTS

OR CHANGE OF HEARTS?

By Detch Nonan-Mercado

The funny thing is, some Filipinos are able to believe that changing presidents is all we need to be given a shot at a better life but truth be told, change in leadership does not guarantee change in the calamitous situation of our nation. A new president does not necessarily equal new national breakthroughs. What guarantees change is change of hearts.

As a nation that has long since wallowed in almost hopeless poverty and seemingly endless misery due to wanton corruption in high and low places, what we need is an overhaul and drastic reengineering of our national values, a change of our collective heart that can only be initiated by a leader whose own values are shaped by a relationship with the Manufacturer of Hearts Himself. Otherwise, we must not expect emancipation from this wretchedness.

No matter how many new presidents we elect into office, change will not come unless one with a renewed heart occupies Malacanang and lead the way towards national transformation. In fact, we don’t need a new president. We need a new heart. But we can only, as a people, begin to entertain thoughts of change, if, as, and when our leaders, especially the one serving as president, blaze the trail. The people will only follow the leaders, as usual.  

The long and short of it is – we need a president that has a big heart more than he has a good head. There is no sense having a president that is able to eat economic theories for breakfast but is unable to feel for constituents that daily live the reality of the last four letters of the word “breakfast”.

Unless the heart-motives of a leader are pure, he will have no genuine concern for our people’s deplorable plight. At night before he sleeps, he will not be counting sheep but counting his gains, calculating the time left in his power ride.

Talk about inclinations of the heart. Recently, Senator Manuel Villar took to the floor to denounce allegations his huge real estate business enjoyed some cash injections from the 2008 budget for the C5 road extension project, after Senator Panfilo Lacson reportedly insisted that Villar answer an ethics complaint over the corruption allegations. Both of them held their respective grounds, two senators trying to wisecrack about each other in the hope of elevating their worth in the public’s estimation.

Looking at their verbal duel, a subliminal message is put across: Senator Lacson is merely protective of taxpayers’ money. He just wants to investigate if there is any truth in the alleged “double funding” in the budget for the C5 project because he cares for the interests of the common Filipino. But does he, really? Or does he just want to score on his PR because he himself has to make sure that anti-Lacson issues (remember Bubby Dacer?) will not come back to haunt him and hurt his 2010 aspirations.   

Is Senator Lacson truthfully just after securing back the money allegedly lost in corruption in the C5 project for the sake of the Filipino people, or is he just out to discredit Senator Villar, one of the stronger presidentiables in the 2010 elections? 

Meanwhile, one real-time frame away, still in Manila: Despite a constitutional ban against re-election for the country’s highest public official, deposed president Joseph Estrada is reportedly planning to run for president again should opposition candidates fail to unite and come up with their 2010 standard-bearer by November. 

Looking at his pronouncements, a subliminal message is put across: deposed president Estrada is vigilant about sustaining the opposition, the watchdog that works to keep the administration from committing abuses. Is this Estrada’s true-to-life intention here?

Is deposed president Estrada sincerely keen on keeping the opposition alive so that the administration may think twice before committing an abuse? Or is he just looking for a way in, and later find a way to somehow fix the constitutional ban? 

These three politicians, a deposed president and two wannabe-presidents, have separate agenda, but they all want to convey one and the same message: they are supposedly serious in serving the country and they care for the people’s interests. But has anyone asked about the validity or sincerity of their intentions? What about their real motives? What about the status of their hearts? 

Motives are but reflections of the condition of the heart, actions the extension of it. If the heart is not right, the motives will not be right, and the actions, too.

As a nation, we don’t need a new president as much as we need a president with a renewed heart trained in righteousness because righteousness lifts up a nation. We need a leader whose heart is a student taking lessons in compassion and justice at the University of Divine Wisdom, with the Holy Spirit as the Teacher, and the Holy Bible as the ultimate textbook.

Some would say this is simplistic, a simpleton’s theory. But is it not that we go back to the manufacturer when our gadgets are broken? In the same way we send back our faulty laptops to their makers for repair, we go back to God for our rehabilitation. The only way to fix a heart defect is to go back to the heart Creator, God.

Now, if our leader is humble enough to realize his nothingness apart from God and he decides to go through this “schooling”, change will start. As his inner man is being reengineered at the University of Divine Wisdom, his heart will become more like Christ’s, and his words and actions will soon reflect his renewed heart. Righteousness will be a common thread in all his dealings.

Consequentially, we, the Filipino people, will notice the difference and enjoy the fruit of our ruler’s righteous governance. Then eventually we will act, talk and be like our leader.

Read: Even lofty officials of the land must humble themselves before God, acknowledge their smallness in the sight of the Awesome Maker of Heavens, Earth and Man, and admit that their hearts need some finishing touches from Him so that they are able to plan with wisdom and implement with love, with both actions remaining in the auspices of righteousness which is the very element that ensures fairness and justice for all constituents. 

For this country to rise from tragedy, we don’t need to install a great new president. We have to install a new president with a great heart that has been changed or is willing to be changed by a power higher than him, a president whose heart is incorruptible, compassionate, and desirous to see the good in men, and to do good to men.

We have had different types of presidents in the past; some honorable, some forgettable, but all their good qualifications, if any, and better intentions, did not seem to work. Juan de la Cruz still cannot land and job. His wife still has to go to Singapore or Hong Kong to work as domestic helper. We are still in the same rut we found ourselves in a long time ago.

In other words, in this hour of desperation, we don’t need a new president that has superior skills in law, economics and military strategy but has no skills in showing compassion towards his fellow Filipino. We don’t need a new president that has a bloated resume and a head full of significant leadership know-how, but has an empty heart. We need a new president with a renewed heart ruled by God.

We have tried almost everybody and everything, but we still lost a lot in the process. Foreigners look at us and they shake their heads in disbelief as they ask, “Where did you go wrong, Filipino?”  

Obviously, we went wrong in our choices of leaders. Perhaps in 2010 we should try choosing a president whose heart has ALREADY been changed and is ACTIVELY ruled by the Author of Powers and Authorities, God Almighty, so that we can rest assured righteousness, the kind that brings in hope and prosperity, will finally reign supreme in the land!

“Righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.” Proverbs 14:34