EDITORIAL - Discovering goodness in Tomas' pain

There is always truth in the fairness of life. And that truth could not have been made more apparent than when Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña announced that a tumor was discovered in his urinary bladder.

We do not refer to the truth that a lot of people whom the mayor rubbed the wrong way are now saying, at least to themselves, that the mayor has finally had his come-uppance. That kind of truth is of the baser kind. We do not want to be a part of it.

We refer instead to the more subliminal truth, the one that says people, all human beings, are inherently good because that is the way God made them. There is a goodness in people that cannot be denied, no matter how bad they have reacted to life's unrelenting trials.

This inherent goodness in people is what we have seen emerge from the news about the mayor's illness. This is the truth we mean about the fairness in life. This is what we mean when we say that no matter how we may dislike the mayor, hate him even, we still wish him well.

The inherent goodness in people, the inherent goodness in us all, have made all of us gather around the mayor in his moment of weakness (never mind if he does not admit it) to lend him support through prayers and well wishes.

It is this inherent goodness in people that gives these same people their own strength to continue hoping that humanity is not yet lost, is not yet beyond redemption, and that despite the madness and disease that afflicts us all, we still stand a fair chance in God's eyes.

What a joyful moment it is to discover that instead of vengeful rejoicing on learning that this arrogant man, this object of so much loathing, is after all just like the rest of us, we find ourselves feeling for him in a manner we never allowed ourselves to believe we could.

We ache his ache, for God's sake. We tremble at his mortal fears. Our leader is in distress and we have offered ourselves, almost automatically, as a crutch. This spontaneity, this lack of hesitation, shines forth in gleaming validation of the inherent goodness in people.