Martial Yule
When martial law was declared in Maguindanao barely a week after the start of Advent, some people feared that it was the start of the government’s own sly version of the Twelve Days of Christmas: Maguindanao was just the first day’s “partridge in a pear tree” and that by the 12th day, the military’s “drummer’s drumming” would already be heard in Metro Manila. But amid all the howls of protest that they were only taking advantage of a truly heinous crime to further their agenda, the authorities apparently decided to go caroling another time and lifted its declaration after only eight days. (Tenk u, tenk u, ang babarat ninyo, tenk u!) Of course, all the theatrical debates about the President’s motives and the constitutionality of the act continue. After all, the show must go on. And it all got me thinking about someone who probably has all the right and justification to declare martial law — Jesus Christ.
After over 2,000 years of trying to teach us to stop killing and stealing from each other, can you blame God if He finally decided this Christmas to unleash His army of angels to bring about peace and order on this earth? Remember that although angels are gentle by nature, with God’s sanction, they can be the most powerful of warriors. There will be no more “Our Fathers” and “Hail Marys” as penance. Think instead of Sodom and Gomorrah. Heck, even Ampatuan’s entire private army and arsenal of weapons are no match to the firepower of a single angel swinging the jaw bone of an ass. Wouldn’t it then be easier for all of us to behave if we knew that one misstep could turn us into pillars of salt? Indeed, why stop there? Why not ask the Lord to take away our so-called intelligence and free will as well? Take them away because we always lose out to sin anyway. Wouldn’t salvation be easier and everyone be happier if we all just got transformed or reborn as dumb obedient carabaos that could be easily herded and brought in trailer trucks to heaven?
From my father’s grave, however, I hear him chuckle softly that he doesn’t think carabaos can actually be happy. (My father dedicated his entire adult life to helping the poor and is therefore somewhat of an authority on the question of salvation. And so, when he haunts, I listen.) You can never take away our ability to think and choose, he adds, because there is a part of God in us. It is also this part that got separated from God when man fell from Eden. True happiness can only be attained when we are reunited with Him. And the only way to do that, he whispers, is to choose God freely and not through some sort of Martial Yule.
Alas, the salvation business is not a simple and easy affair. One would think that after Christ was born and died for us, it would be all over but the hallelujah-ing. Well, apparently not. We still have to carry our own crosses. Curious to find out what ordinary farmers thought about this deep mystery of our faith, my father once asked a group if they thought that Christ’s work of redemption was already complete. One farmer stood up and answered that insofar as God was concerned, He has already completed the work. But insofar as man was concerned, the work was not yet finished. He said that man was not yet done because he still has to tame the rivers and make irrigation projects; he still has to fight injustice and oppression; he still has to fight hunger and disease; and so on. They concluded that was probably what Jesus meant when He said, “Take up your cross and follow Me.” That simple man taught my father that redemption does not mean that the fight is over for man, it only means that man can win. Perhaps before our redemption, we were too weak to overcome the power of darkness, but now that we have been saved and shown the way, we can win. But we have to fight. We have to fight because we are intelligent and free. And choosing God is the fight. Only then can we be happy as human beings and only then will our redemption be complete.
And so as we celebrate once more the birth of our Savior, let us all resolve to keep on fighting for Him. Whether it is in our families, our work, our communities, our nation, or our planet, let us not give up. We may often falter and fail, but with God’s grace, one day we shall overcome. One day we shall succeed in saving our own selves. May you all have a Blessed Christmas!
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