Second of Two Parts/Read Part 1
WE LIVE IN a great paradox: Our leaders breed, not eradicate, corruption; they fuel, not douse, dissent.  So the Moro rebellion and communist insurgency have flourished; the radical Left, the militant civil society and the political opposition are ganging up against the government.
Alienation fuelled by injustice is the root of [...]

First of two parts
IS THE PHILIPPINES destined to be in eternal crisis? The Moro rebellion and the communist insurgency have defied five presidents – two of them longest-reigning. Multi-level corruption has defied solution.  And they will most likely continue defying presidents after 2010.
Flashback

From President Manuel A. Roxas to President Diosdado P. Macapagal (1946-1965) were 20 [...]

FROM KING PYRRHUS of Epirus in Ancient Greece derived Pyrrhic, meaning “achieved at excessive cost” – associated with the king’s very costly victory over the Romans, thus, the expression “Pyrrhic victory.”
From the Martial Law Philippines First Lady Imelda R. Marcos derived Imeldific, meaning “extravagant and excessive”; also, “penchant for grandeur – the true, the beautiful, [...]

ON “CLERIC”: Since when has a Muslim religious leader become “cleric”? Item: “Cleric tortured in military camp – kin” (INQUIRER.net, March 24). This is my latest encounter with the usage. I’ve seen this usage a number of times in other national and community papers.
The dictionary is clear: “cleric” means “member of the clergy”.  And, “clergy” [...]

THE BISHOPS appear to be one in confirming the unity of CBCP. Archbishop Quevedo, asserting that the “oft-mentioned ‘divided hierarchy’ is false”, said that “CBCP consists of 115 Bishops, 100 of them active voting members. Less than ten of the 100 are ‘pro-resign’. Such numbers do not make a ‘divided’ CBCP.”
But Bishop Juan de Dios Pueblos [...]

NO TALK, NO MISTAKE; less talk, less mistakes; more talk, more mistakes.
This is a very popular Chinese adage.  By not heeding this, some Bishops gave impressions strengthening perceptions that the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines is pro-Arroyo, inconsistent and divided in their pastoral statement, “Seeking the Truth, Restoring Integrity.”
As a collegial body, the [...]

THE CATHOLIC Bishops have intervened again as pastors as the Philippines is as ever in a state of “restlessness and confusion”, facing “a crisis of truth and the pervading cancer of corruption”. They, in their Pastoral Statement, said: “We must seek the truth and we must restore integrity.”
The search must be “relentless and determined, and the way [...]

THE CATHOLIC BISHOPS, in their pastoral statement, “Seeking the Truth, Restoring Integrity,” stated the root of our national crisis: “We face today a crisis of truth and the pervading cancer of corruption.  We must seek the truth and we must restore integrity.  These are moral values needing spiritual and moral insights.”
They stated, too, the manner [...]

PRESIDENT GLORIA Macapagal-Arroyo will lead the four-day commemoration of EDSA I, its 22md anniversary.  Of the four icons of EDSA I, only former President Fidel V. Ramos will share the limelight with her. Former President Corazon C. Aquino, the soul of EDSA I, has opted out – presumably to have no part in a historic hypocrisy. [...]

IN CLASSICAL TRAGEDY, light moments break tense emotional episodes. These are called comic relief. In Shakespeare, comic relief may be interposed by fools or other lesser characters. The light moments are for the relief of the audience more than
of the tragic characters.