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Breaking the Dam

(The author, Dr. Ma. Dominga “Minguita” Padilla, is an ophthalmologist and president of Sinag, a people’s crusade for good governance. She is a signatory to the “Citizens impeachment complaint. )

“Where are all the good leaders?” “Who is the alternative to the present leadership?” “Yes we believe that the Gloria Arroyo cheated, lied and stole her way to the presidency, and we believe that the stealing goes on, but will fighting the present wrongs, resisting the present injustice, bring us anything better?” “All we see waiting in the wings are politicians who will simply give us more of the same, if not worse”. “Show us something, some light at the end of the tunnel, and then we might have the courage to act”.

United 93

I attended the preview of the movie “United 93” and one thing struck me: whatever our religion, whoever is the God we worship, in desperate times, our last recourse is prayer.

In the movie, United 93, reconstructing the drama inside the fourth hijacked plane on Sept. 11, 2001 there were many scenes showing both passengers and terrorists praying.

Their words were different but they were all directed to the Divine Being. The leader of the terrorist team was shown fervently praying before he moved to capture the cockpit. Surely, a positive answer to his prayer meant tragedy to the passengers. Many of the passengers, on the other hand, were praying to have the terrorist plan foiled.
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None of the 40 passengers and four terrorists survived. But unlike American Airline Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175, both from Boston bound for Los Angeles, which both crashed into the World Trade Center in New York and killed thousands, United Airline Flight 93 missed its target, the Capitol building in Washington D.C. (The third plane, American Airline Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon.)