Food for thought for the Holy Week

The message of this Holy Week acquires a deeper significance in the light of the Supreme Court’s decision declaring the Reproductive Health (RH) Law constitutional except for eight provisions related to penalizing parties who do not comply for reason of religious beliefs. The reproductive health bill was persistently opposed by the Catholic Church hierarchy, which mobilized constituents over an extended period (15 years by one count). Some actually believe that the RH issue was used as an effective “bribe”: the witting or unwitting support of the Church hierarchy for an administration marked by patent corruption, even illegitimacy by virtue of electoral fraud, in exchange for the freeze of the RH bill.

“My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my followers would have fought that I might not be delivered to the Jews. But, as it is, my kingdom is not from here” (John 18:36). If there is the threat of crucifixion of the unborn in the RH Law, the Church hierarchy would seem to have fought a fight according to the kingdom of the world. Archbishop Socrates Villegas is quoted as having said that “the Church mission will continue … despite this unjust law.” Perhaps, in humility, it may be more productive to admit that as long as the Church is unable to push its mission effectively and have her message internalized by the people, there will be unjust laws. Justice is the consequence of a pure and humble heart.

The Holy Week message is Life above and beyond this life. And there is the cross to go through and not bypass to be able to live the Life. This message gets lost among the people when some members of the Church hierarchy seem to go around the cross, when what they demonstrate is a show of force and power. In the process, they are unable to express: “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” The Holy Week message is Love, and it gets lost when the response is enmity and adversity.

Pope Francis is a timely and refreshing symbol of Church leadership; the virtues of humility and love seem instinctive in him. It is not the power of his seat from which he proceeds; it is the power of his love. His response to the challenges to the Church emanates from his love for his people. Like the One he represents, he is not judgmental. He is alter-Christus, ipse-Christus.

The debate on the RH Law will be a continuing process, with discussions acquiring substance as actual experiences occur in the law’s implementation. The fears of the anti-RH camp will be either validated or dispelled. The pro-RH camp will get to know exactly what it has advocated. There really are no winners or losers. There will be either experiences for life or against life. It is not even “prolife” or “prochoice.”

That there is an RH Law is no justification for condemnation by the Church of this system created by man in this country. In the Garden of Eden, there was the “Tree of Knowledge” from where the fruit was picked and a bite changed the course of human history—a choice away from the Creator in favor of man’s selfish pursuits. But God’s people, like Adam and Eve, can still choose not to follow the bidding of the law without violating the law. Of course, like Adam and Eve, the likelihood is for the people to choose wrongly. But it remains a choice, like the fruit in Paradise. Yet instead of condemnation, God took this as an opportunity to show His unconditional Love for all in no uncertain terms. This is what the Holy Week reminds us.

If the Church serves her people’s needs, she must have faith that no bite of the forbidden fruit will be made. Does the Church show God’s unconditional Love for His people? The Church needs self-introspection. The bishops must show humility, as Pope Francis does. Like children, the faithful will know and feel whether the priests and bishops at the pulpits delivering their homilies this Holy Week are speaking from their hearts or from their egos. They can be the Good Shepherd, or the blind man leading the blind.

Beyond the death on the cross, an ignominious way to die, the Holy Week offers the way to True Life. The believer at his deathbed will live, or if he lives and believes, he will not die. The Man on the Cross conquered death completely. And He did because He is One with the Father and the Holy Spirit and never at any moment was separated from Them.  His Body must have experienced death as we know it, but that same Body transcended death because His Spirit never experienced death. Nothing is impossible with God, and that is our faith as we commemorate Jesus’ Death and Resurrection.

Jesus’ message is that we, too, are one with the Father and the Holy Spirit. He has shown that like His Spirit, our spirit need not experience death if only we believe. This is a universal reality of creation. The unborn receives this gift like everyone else blessed to be born under whatever circumstance. The born and the unborn—i.e., the created—have been gifted with the spirit, in the image and likeness of the Creator. This is what Love is all about. It is not the finite reality that we have, it is God’s Infinite Reality with all its Glory that He shares with everyone, not by accident, but by His Choice.

The Holy Week is a time to pause. Feel the breeze, smell the flowers, and know that these are for everyone forever, even for the unborn.

Danilo S. Venida ([email protected]) holds undergraduate and postgraduate degrees from the University of the Philippines and the Center for Research and Communication/University of Asia and the Pacific. He is a former president of the Philippine Daily Inquirer and is now a business consultant.