The year 2010 is fraught with foreboding presence of either God or the devil in the election. Our destiny hangs in the balance, and it hangs on the captain we will choose to steer the Philippine leadership to either greater bondage or the freedom from it. This ship, which I have discussed in my books “Freedom from religious bondage” (Bringing down friarism), and also in “Restorers of the breach” (Contending for the dream) symbolizes the present leadership and

every leader who have steered the country from the time it left port leaving its colonial masters. We were slaves of Spain having been conquered by the conquistador Miguel Lopez de Legazpi in 1565. The very word conquistador means conqueror, and we have been the slaves of Spain for more than 300 years. It was not until the time of the glimmer of 19^th century that Filipinos were allowed to travel outside the country. This was the time of the rise of the landed elite, the rich middle class such as Jose Rizal, Marcelo H. Del Pilar, Juan and Antonio Luna, Felix Resurrecion-Hidalgo and Graciano Lopez-Jaena, were enabled by their rich parents, their vast land ownership and their free adventurous spirit to seek knowledge and gain wisdom from the masters found in Spain and in Europe.

Up until that time, Spain was still an influential world power but England reigns supreme over the seas and her colonies have far outstrip that of Spain so that no longer the title as mistress of the seas holds true to her as much as to England. Nevertheless, the current turmoil and the longing for reforms within Spain itself were running feverpitch high, tumultuous and fraught with so many pitfalls because of the inability of their leaders to give even a few benefits to the colonies. By this time around most of the Spanish colonies in Latin America have been freed by Simon Bolivar and Jose de San Martin as well as his compatriots who were tired and weary of the Spanish yoke in their very own lands. Argentina got her independence in 1816, Chile in 1818, Colombia, Panama, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Peru all proclaimed independence in 1821 while Bolivia in 1825, and Cuba in 1868. Though Cuba did not really have her full independence until the American intervention and truly had it only in 1902, it is one of the few remaining possessions of Spain with the Philippines, Puerto Rico and Guam which were all ceded to the United States for a sum of 20 million US dollars in the Treaty of Paris in 1898. Not to be left-out with the wind of Independence blowing all over the globe, our young men caught the vision and the fire of resentment against its colonial master.

The young reformers

With the Filipino leaders remaining abreast of the developments in the other parts of Spanish Empire they too were soon influenced by this freedom movement that they wanted to throw away the yoke of Spain. At first, they sought the peaceful means and called for government reforms through their papers and tracts. Most of them abhorred the abuse and totalitarian power of the friars in the island, from rape, ignorance to hypocrisy and corruption; no one can deny that the friars held the neck of the Governor-general. Second, instead of asking for independence, they simply wanted representation in the Spanish Cortes, turning the Philippines as a legitimate province of Spain. But because all their efforts and lobbying never worked or was completely ignored, the reformers changed tactics.

“The oppressor does not give freedom to the slaves, it must be demanded, and if not given voluntarily, then it must be taken by force,” concluded Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. about the nature of oppressors and this was also the assessment of the Propagandists about their situation. “We have to do something else, otherwise, our dream to see our country free from Spain will never be realized,” said they in haste and they went back home. Just after their studies in Europe, they went back and rose to arms. Meanwhile, even if these elite were doing the same efforts, God has also not lost a single voice among the poor, He incited Bonifacio to arise and prepare the Filipinos.

This man, though simple living and a pauper by comparison to Rizal and the other propagandists, he learned letters by teaching himself reading and had been so impacted by the deeds and writings of Rizal as well as by Victor Hugo that it never deemed on him at first to lead the revolution. This was the second phase of the Philippine reforms, and it could have never gotten off the ground without this man giving himself willingly for the vision that is already upon the

country—Freedom! Freedom from the oppression of the friars and the corrupt governance which the Spanish crown was not willing to give to the country no matter what diplomatic means it could be.

When he realized this, he secretly begun gathering people who have the same mindset as his, and he in fact even joined Rizal’s La Liga Filipina, an organization that could have promoted the welfares of Filipinos but it truly never took off from the ground because Rizal was quickly rounded up and exiled to Dapitan. Nevertheless, this inspired Bonifacio to do likewise and the Katipunan was born.

Our nation, our call

This is the root of the Philippines, we are a nation who will fight for freedom to stay free and manage our own affairs. We have been called to fight also for the freedom of others even in Asia and beyond. Just as the reformation of the Philippines had begun with diplomatic calls until the revolution was inevitable, and the death of one man must satisfy the “sins” of the people, we need to do the same today. There is a great disparity between those who want to answer the call and those who raised their arms to this call, some have not truly understood it. The call to freedom is the call to victory from every form of oppression that seeks to bring us into bondage. The Lord speaking from the Scriptures says, “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom!” It is this freedom train that we seek to get aboard, to proclaim freedom to every captive, to heal those who are sick, to open the eyes of the blind, to mend the broken hearted and to proclaim deliverance by proclaiming the Kingdom of God to every person. This is the call of the Davidic generation being raised up today.

The young revolutionaries

If we could count the number of heroes in proportion to the population during their times, we would be surprised to find that most luminaries arose during the times of conflict and struggles. Most of these stars of the revolution and reformation were all very young and passionate fighters of freedom for the sake of the country. At first, there were just a handful of them, then they went on to gather and recruit more fellows until their numbers swelled paving the way for Bonifacio and his men to proclaim freedom, most known as the Cry of Balintawak. This same proportion of a heroic people who are ready to die for their country also appeared when World War II suddenly broke up without any warnings. There, in many provinces and in different islands were corpses of the brave strewn and now lying in its rich soil having fought valiantly against the invaders. We fought, so terrible indeed, that the Japanese did not actually have time to even put a dent of their culture on us.

All of these selfless acts stirred by their hearts desire for freedom, and fed from the Spanish yoke as well as from the treachery of war conjoined to form the base of our foundation, a young nation under God, with freedom to steer our nation towards development. These are those who composed our fathers of the Republic. Even if some of them happened by chance to have been affected by envy and greed, let us continue to honor them, to learn from their struggles and to continue the vision that they had for our country. Probably, it was Rizal who laid the vision for a republic in the hearts of our people, his vision was clearly written in his “100 years hence prophetic essay” that could have helped any president had they even tried reading it and not merely judge his piece as a mere idealist writing. Laid here deeply is his heart for the republic that he wanted to see but only saw its development. It was in his heart in the first place to actually set a government by the people and for the people that would be ruled with integrity and wisdom. I will not belabor his other points but suffice to know that we have a root and we are not floating in chaos about our origin.

Biblical parallels

There are biblical parallels for the nations because God called Israel as His first born son (see Exodus 4:22), every nation have been called as children of the Lord, and in Asia, it is the birth right of the Philippines to be called the first democratic nation and the first Christian nation. One biblical precedent of this is that before Israel was called a son, he was first hidden or oppressed in Egypt for 400 years until the time that was ripe for heaven to send Moses to call his son out of Egypt from the land of bondage into the land flowing with milk and honey. That is why He said, I called my son out of Egypt because that is where God first took Israel. In our case, the Philippines had been ruled and oppressed by the very nation that wanted it to be a Christian in the very first place. There was great separation between what the priests and the explorers conquered us for and what happened afterwards that they found the land rich in silver and gold. Man’s motivation is not only tied to the land but also with its gold and there is no stronger motivation for the natural man than gold and the ignorance of the real heirs of their properties and resources.

Thus, no matter how good the motive of Spain was in bringing Christianity to the natives, the mixture that they heaped upon us becomes evident with the way they propagated a religion that lacked the sanctity of Christlikeness in its dealings. God never introduced nor was happy about oppression. He gave dominion to Adam but to the nations likewise, He has set every boundary over which these nations should establish their influence, trades and commerce. He called every individuals conformed to His image and every nation on earth conformed to the City of God, the New Jerusalem, where His abode is found. But never once it is mentioned in the Bible that we have to take dominion over the people. Dominion is taking a mandate to rule over the earth, a territory and resource but not to oppress or yoke another group of people.

To this, He elaborated by saying in Acts 17:26-30 “And He made from one, every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times, and the boundaries of their habitation, that they should seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His offspring.’ “Being then the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man.” And further He still says, “But in every nation the man who fears Him and does what is right, is welcome to Him” (Acts 10:35). Just as Israel was the first born son of the Lord, In Asia, the Philippines is also His first born, there are erring sons and daughters but our country was dedicated to God by those who discovered it, those who gave their lives to find our nation because it cannot be that His son in the fullness of time remain hidden.

And when we can stand already, apart from mere crying and crawling during those times that  we have been entrusted to the care of Spain, we stood and called for the time to separate. Spain’s motive to spread the good news was good and essentially, without Spain, without Magellan and Pigaffeta there could have been no awakening in our midst of the consciousness of God. We could have remained as idol worshippers, animists who worshipped anything from the sun to the moon and to the stars and even the caves, subject to the futility of nature. Even so, we have not always been cared or nurtured by our mother. She has not taught us the Scriptures to know the truth, but often, we were even lied at and taught what was not right.

If Spain was our mother, the United States was the neighbor who saw what was being done to us, her child, and asked the Son of Man to take us from her custody because of the abuses. She adopted us, cared for us, and saw how Spain used to beat us until we were in her arms. Thus there were actually two mothers who first cared for us, Catholic Spain in which we got the cross and the Spanish priests as well as their system of education and the next one is Protestant America which also taught us better how to read the Scriptures and find our destiny. Note however that both of these guardians were imperfect but they functioned to bring order and to bring us up into a fairly advanced society compared to living in the barrio or in the woods and worshipping trees and the elements of nature.

They were imperfect, both made with a mixture of gold and clay, they brought the cross, and the Bible but also their own dross with them. This was not the case for Israel, but for 400 years she was strictly under Egyptian rule but God started to teach her by the time she was moving in the wilderness. She got her laws and constitution when Moses took the stone tablets from the hand of God. Just as the main call of Israel was to proclaim the righteousness of God, we were thrust into the same calling, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; for you once were not a people, but now you are the people of God; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy” (1 Peter 2:9-10).