For The Love Of Money

"But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive..." (2 Timothy 3: 1-5)

As the ninth child in a brood of ten, being raised in an over- populated home has never been easy. First things first - food. Though it was not much of a dire issue, it never came by easily. Both my parents had to toil beyond their means so that each one gets to have a proper meal. Sending us to school and  finish our elementary is already a bounty, to say the least.

At school, I envy my seatmate named Garry for his daily "baon" of Ovaltine powder neatly wrapped in green cellophane. I thought that really tastes good as it smells good. He would sniff at it and teasingly parade on our faces as he stuffs his mouth. I would look at my classmates' glossy notebooks with 'That's Entertainment' stars for their cover while mine a hand-made by my mother salvaged from some unused pages from  previous year. Ah, those were fine memories that bring  smiles to me nonetheless.

A lot of people have gone through so much in their lives. Poverty, poor health, oppression, getting marginalized and the list goes on. I have seen on TV people who have won lotteries and became instant millionaires. They tell their stories of wastefulness as soon as they get rich, how they satisfied themselves with all the things they lacked and even going the extremes till they see themselves going down the drain with no hope.

There was also this one episode sometime ago in a GMA public affairs program, an old woman in Leyte in her early seventies who was left to care for her three grandchildren whose mother ventured to work in Manila and not to be heard again after a few years. Their decrepit house had no lights save for the generous night sky that lights up when it's full moon. Needless to say, it's good when it's not raining. The old woman gathers firewood and sells them in exchange for a meal - if it is fittingly so. Understandably, she would forgo her share for her grandchildren's sake. I can feel every tear she shed, the calluses in her bare feet stalked by the camera adds up to the agony of every viewer for her frail and bone-encased body. How much more  pain she should endure daily?

Sometimes when we're not confronted with this kind of reality, we seem to have lost touch with what is happening around us especially when we are literally swimming in the comforts of our achievements. Then very basic questions in life come to mind. With so much poverty around us, still a lot of rich people have that insatiable cravings for more riches even to the point of robbing others, even a whole nation. Look at some politicians in the Philippines and you will see greed personified. And it doesn't stop there. Truth is, these things don't bother us a bit as long as we too are unhindered in our own quest to store up more wealth for ourselves.

The internet and social media in particular has been abuzz recently with the corruption issue involving the Napoles family who allegedly channeled billions of pesos into their own pockets in connivance with some supposedly respectable Philippine politicians. And we are talking here of billions stolen from the Filipino people by these privileged few. It's not for me to talk about details but the flaunting of wealth by the daughter of the Napoles matriarch is vomit-inducing you wouldn't believe all the while there already existed an heir to the so-called the greediest woman in history. And your guess is as good as mine.

Though mostly got the shock of their lives for such a brazen display of extravagance at the expense of  people's money, I'm not a bit surprised. I'm not talking in a perspective of a citizen who helps keep the local economy afloat but as a mortal being who believes everything in this world has an end. Even the world's richest men know that at some point they will let go of their riches upon death. However, it is only the belief that they can pay their way to heaven that keeps them greedy even more. It has been foretold in the Bible (2 Timothy 3) that in the last days people will be  lovers of themselves and lovers of money - such is a terrible time that we are witnessing right now. And this is where it gets even more scary.

Justice Is On The Way

The Bible says in Mark 8:36, "For what profit is it for a man if he gains the whole world but loses his own soul?" In this world where everyone is busy storing up riches for himself even at the expense of another human being, kindness and generosity toward those in need sometimes get obsoleted when the love of oneself supersedes anything that is called humanity. I am a firm believer though that God is coming swiftly with His justice and righteousness for the nations. Not that we should gloat on a bunch of robbers and bandits for their imminent destiny but that there is still hope for them if they change their ways no matter how sinful they think they have been.

The Good News

God loves His creations. He loves us, yes, even though it's too good to be true that a righteous and just God can forgive even the worst sinners among us. Jesus laid His life for all of us sinners: robbers, murderers, idolaters, liars, homosexuals, adulterers, fornicators, everyone of us, even those plunderers. If we  repent of our sins and sincerely sorry for all the sins that we have done, then Jesus will forgive us of our sins and remember them no more. And He will most importantly give us eternal life. But who can escape God's wrath if we reject such a great salvation?

And The Bad News

It's just the opposite of the Good News. If we don't repent of our sins the wrath of God will follow us and He will come swiftly with His judgment that not even our gold and silver will be able to hide us and save us from His justice. That is the saddest news when people do not repent from their sins and refuse to acknowledge Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Jesus is the only way, the truth and the life and no one comes to the Father except through Him (John 14:6) We might be struggling to find another way or some other ways imaginable, like donating to our church or giving alms to the poor or doing some good works just like what Oprah insists on her show because obviously she cannot accept that there is only One way. It's up to us people. We have been warned and lovingly told of the Gospel at some point in our lives. It is for us whether we accept or reject such a great gift of salvation. Sadly, many of us choose the path that we take. I hope it's not too late. We are happy to be alive today, but what about tomorrow? Do we know what tomorrow will bring forth?

Imelda, Gadhafi And Ahmadinejad Are Relatives?

"Ambitious or greedy rulers are tyrants. Instead of using authority to benefit their citizens, they covet more power and wealth, which leads to oppressive legislation and policies." - Proverbs 28:16

No, it's not a headline in one of the prestigious broadsheets nor a pop-up in your Yahoo homepage. Guess again.  Seems like a preposterous joke only jerks are able to weave out of disgust. Well, let's understand and put it in perspective how this supposed theory could generate facts that could establish a new gene pool of astronomical liars. Understandably, they have very similar reputation as big time liars. Ahmadinejad out of hatred for the Jews declared that Holocaust did not happen at all and it was an invention by the West. And the notoriety of this bearded sinister-looking man to change history had won him over the admiration of Imelda Marcos. She on the other hand, is of no lesser icon for her notoriety to twist and twirl the history. This twentieth century-reincarnation of Marie Antoinette whose extravagance would shame the latter's exploits have another to look up to as her model in Evita Peron. But history would prove that our diva from Leyte outsmarted and outshone them both in the 'greedy' category. She "loves all things of beauty" - of grandiose beauty cohesive with ostentatious display of excesses. That's her unchanging mantra only identifiable to her and her epitaph when the gods call it a day.

The vintage Imelda recently stole the limelight one more time with her unequivocal guiltless declaration that human rights abuses did not happen during the twenty-year rule of her husband. That having said a vintage liar only she personifies. Also recently, her son, senator Bongbong Marcos beamed to the world his take on EDSA that had it not happened the Philippines could have been another Singapore. What a shameless sarcastic affront to human intelligence only this magnificent tandem of liars can pull off! While the advent of social media has played a role in repressive regimes downfall one after another, one wonders why no one would ever dare to bust up the lies of this history-twisting family of plunderers. Why is it so? Because they are as equally as powerful as they were before. Their clout did not seem to erode. The  son elected to the senate overwhelmingly. The 'personification' of all greed elected to Congress unopposed in her district. The elder daughter as governor. That is despite a court's conviction of plunder, a world recognition as one of the greediest families ever in human history, of being champions of human rights abuses, among other titles and accolades appended to their resume.

Certainly it is noble to forgive much more to forget. But if you look too closely, nothing has been manifested that is worthy of forgiveness. The Filipinos have easily forgiven. In fact, they all suddenly fell into a deep amnesia. While it is hardly a bad thing, the pulse of a forgetful common man (read as stupid) has led to the revival of arrogance in the Marcoses. Instead of  faking out (at least) a show of remorse, they have been bluntly giving out a message of self-vindication and feeling sorry for the Filipino nation that the EDSA 1 episode had figured in history that according to them, it effectively  brought  the end the nation's opportunity to become the next Singapore. If some of the equally-twisted minds are happy to take that, then good for them. Their idols, instead of languishing in jail for their crimes against an entire nation, they are being glamorized and revered by a disgusting army of fanatics who are too delusional and blinded to be awakened from their idolatry. On the contrary, I do believe that we could have been another Singapore had this family of plunderers not invented corruption that became the norm in the government since their enthronement.

In all her glamour and splendor, Imelda simply has no tendency to cave at a psychological warfare vis-a-vis historical facts, much less retreat to her turf a wounded beast. Not even a scar from a plunder conviction could deter her from shouting to the world that the Marcoses are innocent. Her world is full of ironies that she made herself believe that they are being oppressed and disrespected by the EDSA architects, namely the millions of Filipinos from all walks of life, who felt the need to drive an evil regime out of the country that has produced countless of heroes for the sake of its people yet reigned over by perverts. The Filipinos were wrong she would assert, that they had driven out a great leader for twenty years in Marcos. Wrong because there were still rooms for billions of dollars worth of gold bullions in Swiss banks reserved for the Marcoses on top of the billions of dollars of cash already stolen from the typical hand-to-mouth Filipino family. That is where Imelda sees beauty that she's preaching to spread. There is beauty in plundering the whole nation that resulted to the advent of communist insurgency.  And there is beauty in possessing thousands of pairs of expensive, some diamond-encrusted shoes, and jaw-dropping hundreds of millions of dollars worth of jewelry that even Queen Elizabeth II would salivate in envy. And these discoveries were made a world spectacle attributed to  Imelda era that helped made the Philippines a famous country on the planet, apart from its reputation of being a Spanish colony for over 300 years. Such fame was undeniable that gave claimants of original English language a jolt and warns that one's lexical knowledge would be incomplete without adopting the word Imeldific to its fold. Well, pretty much the coined word says everything about Imelda.

This brutal battle of what and who decides who is right and who is wrong surely will not end, even history refuses to decide. Those human rights victims by the Marcos regime who have recently been awarded compensation  believe that it is a classic affirmation of good triumphing over evil; that the courts of law have proven that the evil regime had done terrible acts to its people and therefore it must own up to its abuses. While the world applauds this supposed victory, Imelda on the contrary is buzzing with her rhetorics screaming on top of her lungs that there was never a so-called human rights abuses during their reign and that the succeeding regime of democracy icon Cory Aquino had committed more human rights violations. And that is what we aptly call a brand of Imelda Logic. Good news though, she's not expected to be alone in her stratospheric schizophrenia. She has recently invited Gadhafi of Libya to join her into her world of fantasy where they can be each other's shoulder to cry on when the rest of the world does not believe in what they are fighting for. And together they join hands in fending off the infidels in their ululation of victory with the tune of "You And Me Against The World". They very much agree on a certain degree because unconsciously they agree on the saying "misery loves company". Of course, Mr Gadhafi is a multi-billionaire virtually 'owning' a country that sits on one of the world's largest oil reserves. And he claims all Libyans love him, the people of which a third of them subsist on a two-dollar a day, and the very same people that he swears to annihilate till there remains a soul that opposes him. After more than forty years in power and his  subjects wallowing in poverty in a supposed rich country, the Libyan citizens Gadhafi claims love him. There is no violence happening in his country despite the thousands dead bombed and fired at by his troops -  he still claims -  the troublemakers are those clueless foreign elements.

Let's not forget that our Lady Protagonist had once bonded with Gadhafi, and now that he is in trouble, being a friend to him she did not come short  of showing her support and sympathy for him when the US decided to freeze his assets, obviously for a familiar reason she finds affinity with. Yes, for her it still hurts that some of her assets, ill-gotten at that, were returned to the Philippine government because all of those 'rightfully' belong to Imelda. The paradox here surfaces of the peculiar similarity of mindset and behavior of the greedy. And a school of thought may emerge inevitably in the future that Gadhafi and Imelda might be of compatible genes that would put  Ahmadinejad whose denial of Holocaust dwarfs any single biggest insult in the history of mankind -  a first class liar but of inferior genes by virtue of his lesser appetite for  wealth and extravagance entrenched in the Imelda-Gadhafi personas. Just a thought - greed is the only other thing that does not change apart from the word change itself -  at least for this dispensation. It's scary to think that the world is full of greedy people as observed by Bernard Madoff in his defiance to world's condemnation of him  asserting that he is only one of the many. Another barbers' tale validated in a world of coincidences that "birds of the same feathers are indeed the same birds". :-)