Easter: 'We Too Shall Rise'

source: mb.com.ph

MANILA, Philippines — This year, two important celebrations take place one after the other.

The first takes place today, the Feast of the Resurrection.

The second takes place tomorrow, the Araw ng Kagitingan – which used to be referred to as the day of the “Fall of Bataan.”

As a young boy, I used to ask my father why we, Filipinos, seem to have a penchant for celebrating defeats. Why should we mark a “Fall”, I used to prod him for an answer.

He always had one. My father used to say that April 9 is not so much about a small peninsula falling into the hands of invaders. It’s more about the valor and tenacity of the Filipinos who defended it – so tenacious was their stand that the timetable of the enemy for conquest was shattered and other countries spared from invasion.

On a hill in that small peninsula stands a giant white cross, Dambana ng Kagitingan, it is called. My father said it used to be that on a clear day, one can see that cross from Antipolo. I asked him what that cross is doing there. He said, “To remind us all that we are one brave race.”

“But I am not brave,” I used to argue with him. “I feel nervous before an exam or before a basketball game,” I remember telling him.

“Bravery does not mean not being nervous,” was his answer. “Bravery does not mean not being afraid,” he used to explain. “It means not letting your nervousness or your fear stop you from doing what you must do,” he underscored.

I never forgot that nugget of wisdom.

That advice made me realize the braveness of the people of our province. It requires that one be brave in order to rebuild from the rubble of a major natural calamity. Like Ondoy, for example. Those who succumb to “being afraid” would have stayed down after a calamity have taken away everything they have.

But not for the brave.

The brave would stand up, pick up what is left from his home, or his life and reputation, and slowly rebuild – until the traces of the fall would have almost completely vanished.

Yet, he has to leave something to remind him that he once was down so he never forgets that he has within him what it takes one to muster the courage to stand up and rebuild.

I guess that is the very same reason for marking the Feast of the Resurrection – so we would never forget that life always offers a chance for a new beginning; and that we have within us what it takes for one to muster the courage to stand up and rebuild.

April 9, 1942, the day, the brave Filipino defenders of Bataan surrendered, was a Wednesday of the week after that fateful year’s Semana Santa. It was, so to speak, Wednesday of Easter Week. It may be safe to presume that our soldiers who made that brave stand had taken a lot of inspiration from the reflections they heard on the Easter Sunday before the Fall.

One such reflection was broadcast over a clandestine radio station then still operating. The voice over the airwaves was that of a Filipino who spoke eloquent English, Carlos P. Romulo.

That historic broadcast underscored the spirit of Courage that comes with the Resurrection. I remember this particular excerpt from that broadcast since some of my high school classmates in Marist used it as a declamation piece.

General Carlos P. Romulo speaking:

“To those who look upon us from afar, it must seem that the Filipino people have now descended into hell — into the valley of death. But we know that the patient and watchful men who said their simple prayers this morning in the hills of Bataan have not lost faith... We, too, shall rise. We shall rise in the name of freedom, and the East shall be alight with the glory of our liberation! Until then, people of the Philippines — be not afraid!”

We, too, shall rise.

Ah, that is the wonderful promise of the Resurrection.

Filipinos must have clung to it during that harrowing period of our history on the Easter Week of 1942.

But those beautiful words of the Angel in the New Testament must have rung clear in their hearts.

“Be not afraid!” the Angel said.

And Filipinos of the generations which followed that of the Defenders of Bataan proudly said:

We shall not be!

A glorious Easter to all.

source: mb.com.ph