The message of Holy Week, Fr. Fidel Fabile – our parish priest in Moonwalk in Las Piñas, said is hope.
After Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem marked yesterday with our waving of the palms, suffering and grief followed culminating in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Then comes the Resurrection which is celebrated on Easter Sunday.
Fr. Fidel said Holy Week re-assures us that amidst all suffering in life, something beautiful awaits us. That there is something to hope for.
Fr. Fidel’s sermon reminded me of the self-confessed member of the Davao Death Squad Edgar Matobato and the incident with a firefly.
This story was related by a priest who gave sanctuary to Matobato after he left the Witness Protection Program when Rodrigo Duterte won the presidency in May 2016.
The priest said this was before Matobato met with Sen. Leila de Lima in a mass about two years ago. De Lima, then the head of the Senate Committee on Human Rights was leading the investigation of the rising number of extra-judicial killings as Duterte was revving up his anti-drug campaign.
The priest said,with Matobato under their protection they were all the time conscious, even paranoid, about the security risks they were facing.
One late night when all the lights were off and the convent was quiet, he got a call from Matobato who was concerned because of a tiny light penetrating into the room which he shared with his wife.
The priest said he had to go to Matobato’s room and investigate. They traced the source of the light and it was a firefly.
The priest cites the Alitaptap incident to underscore how God works in mysterious and heart-warming ways. That even in a pitch-black room,light will find its way in.
This is a nice reflection this Holy Week.The light from that firefly boosted their faith and generated more light to sustain Matobato who courageously repeated his testimony in the Senate about Duterte’s Davao Death Squad despite harassment from the senators.
Matobato’s testimony led retired policeman Arturo Lascañas to see the light.
Lascañas reversed his first testimony denying Matobato’s story about the DDS. In a one-day hearing held by the Senate Committee on Public Order headed by Sen. Panfilo Lacson, Lascañas not only confirmed what Matobato narrated but added more information about his role in the Davao Death Squad.
But not surprisingly, the senators preferred to remain in the dark, giving more weight to Sen. Manny Pacquaio’s flawed arguments than Lascañas’ testimony.
That’s what Holy Week is all about- we have to go through darkness before we can see the light.
Dear Ellen.
Please allow me to just call you Ellen, your beautiful nickname. I’m 80 and love to assert my age though sometimes it’s not proper. Presently I’m in the U.S. and people here (except some Filipinos) call their elders or much older people by their first name regardless of status in life.
Regarding the dark and light in the life of Motabato, Lascanias and the priest, the light should be permanent. That is, it’s source is the sun and the more permanent and powerful one is the light coming from God. The darkness is temporary and is caused by the revolving earth which surface when in the dark is not directly facing the sun but occasionally through the reflection from the moon a cool light shines on us. But that darkness is temporary as we experience it every few hours everyday.
Truth is light and if we are true to our faith we should acknowledge that only God knows whether or not we are causing darkness in our lives by telling lies. In the case of Motabato and Lascanias they might be telling lies because they were proven liars during the Senate Hearings. The small light of the firefly is very insignificant. How could that freithen a brave and a killer Motabato? How could the priest use the infinitely inisgnifant firefly light to justify Motabato lies for hope against a more noble duty of Rodrigo, the President, to save the Filipinos from becoming Zombies due to illegal drugs?
I believe in the mission of President Duterte to minimize, if not to totally eliminate, the illegal drug trade and other crimes in the Philippines including corruption. It would be impossible to accomplish his mission without collateral or even murders among drug traders themselves attributed to extrajudicial killings.
One human being killed in any mission is one life too much. However, if all the natural disasters that kill by the thousand people regardless they are good or bad is allowed by God, then so be it. If we are Christians, Jewish or Muslims we can read in our Holy Bibles and Koran that God allowed so many killings in history favoring higher missions for mankind.
Thank you and may God always bless you and family.
Leonardo L. Gutierrez, P.E.E.
wolf in sheep’s clothing at lenten season: duterte urging people to renew their faith in god – duterter’s god? the one who cannot sign a bank waiver is urging people, the one protective of his tagong yaman is urging the people? he whose son imported 6.4 tons of the illegal drug shabu, aba, the firely is more blameless.
light and darkness are both permanent fixtures, one cannot be without the other, complementary sila, two sides of a coin. we maybe daytime creatures, but there are also nighttime creatures, nocturnal creatures like glow worms and fireflies, there’s beauty in darkness.
equal billing yang light and dark, day and night, both made up the 24hrs a day. where there is light, there is darkness.
duterte’s drug war is fake and intended only for elimination of poor people as collateral. the rich like his son, polong duterte, and duterte’s compare, some chinese drug lords, are untouched and free to make and traffic more drugs.
god works in mysterious ways and if god uses the firely to brighten matobato’s night, good on god!
be careful of collaterals po, they’ve got families, relatives and friends who’ll cry to god for heavenly justice. and then take up a fight, they can also kick up a stink until earthly justice is done. they can heckle their way through day in and day out, night and day, does not matter. and if god listens to them . . . all duterte can do is withdraw from ICC.
be careful of collaterals, they may not be humans to duterte and thought them deserving of his ire, but they’re humans to their families, friends and relatives, much loved and sadly missed, their passing mourned at pinagluksahan pa. collaterals may have voted for duterte too, made him president, and now they’re dead. thanks but no thanks.