An excellent Filipino

The Ateneo memo that formally announced his passing last week said it all: “We take solace in the knowledge that his was an earthly life filled with meaning and purpose (and)… dedicated to service, to standards of excellence, in the greater glory of God. Indeed, a man, an excellent man, for others.”

The memo, posted on social media, paid tribute to Fr. Joaquin Bernas, SJ, 88, a Jesuit

lawyer and one of the framers of the 1987 Constitution, who passed away early Saturday morning. Bernas served twice as dean of the Ateneo Law School (1972 to 1976 and 2000 to 2004), was president of the Ateneo de Manila University from 1984 to 1993, and was also a much-esteemed columnist in this paper for nearly a decade, from 2005 to 2014.

Those who had the privilege of knowing him hailed Bernas for raising a new generation of lawyers with a strong sense of social justice, and for helping a country just coming out of 14 years of authoritarian rule to again find its bearings as a democracy. He “may be best remembered as one of the brilliant minds that crafted our present Constitution, but he did more than just help a fledgling democracy stand on strong legal foundations,” said Sen. Joel Villanueva.

Serving as a friend of the court (amicus curiae) or as resource person in media, Bernas frequently weighed in on discussions on Charter change and other contentious issues of the day, simplifying opaque legalese into everyday language. “His prose was clear, crisp and accessible,” said author and former Ateneo professor Danton Remoto. He was also known for his short homilies and his grounded approach to the law, framing issues within secular experiences that many would find surprising in a man of the cloth.

During the heated debates around the divisive Reproductive Health Law, Bernas stated a legal position that contradicted that of the Catholic Church to which he belonged: The government, he said in a TV interview, “is a secular government. It is for all, not just for Catholics.” He went further and skewered the Ayala Alabang ordinance requiring people to secure prescriptions before being allowed to buy condoms and other contraceptives in the village. “This is something which gives the Catholic religion a bad name. It is reminiscent of the Inquisition.” He also twitted the authors of the ordinance for possibly bringing in the police “to search the sacred precincts of marital bedrooms for telltale signs of the use of contraceptives,” saying that “the very idea is repulsive to the notions of privacy surrounding the marriage relationship.” As for the ordinance’s criminal sanctions, the legal luminary had only harsh words: “Only a real court and not a village kangaroo court or vigilante may impose criminal penalty, and only after trial.”

Bernas’ particular legacy is in “ensuring protection of the rights of individual citizens,” said former Supreme Court spokesperson Theodore Te. This was apparent in the bar topnotcher’s (ninth in the 1962 bar exams) legal advice to Ladlad, the organization founded by Remoto and the first LGBT party list to run for office in 2009, to appeal to the Supreme Court the Commission on Elections’ rebuff of its accreditation on grounds of “immorality.” The party won its case.

Bernas’ erudition made ample room for wit and levity. Former associate justice Mariano del Castillo recalled how, when students were running out of their classrooms because of a strong earthquake, Bernas came out of his office asking, “Who wants to confess? Who wants to confess?”

His inaugural address in 1984, in the midst of burgeoning unrest against the Marcos dictatorship following the Aquino assassination the previous year, showed how seriously Bernas regarded his role as the then newly installed Ateneo president. The university, he said, “is not an island. It must not be… (It is) the transmission of what is best and must be preserved. (It is) an instrument for the growth and the transformation of a society in a world that is rapidly in process.”

Faced with “justice brutalized beyond recognition,” the university is challenged to make a contribution, he maintained. It can offer “a vision which shapes the spirit and the method of our approach to the educational enterprise.”

Bernas cited “freedom growing in the crucible of trial” as among the many components of that vision: “Freedom is not a hothouse product. The history of nations and peoples is a constant struggle between light and darkness, between virtue and malevolence. We see a university as bridge between students and the battlefronts where choices are made and lessons learned, and character shaped and freedom tested.”

In ending his address, Bernas challenged the university and its faculty and students “to experiment with courage, to reflect without regret, to learn with a nation in transition and, in the process, nurture the growth of freedom.”

That challenge, those words, might well define the life of this “man for others.”