All Together

     The public is excited about the media circus going on regarding the incoming 2010 presidential elections. There are still more than six months before the poll day, but what’s the election fuss all about?
Maybe because after getting tired of the nine years of very controversial and morally despised Macapagal-Arroyo reign, plus the past four administrations we were under in our lifetime and which many perceived to have failed us of the real change we wished to see, we are going to be involved in a timely chance to elect leaders whom we hope to effect change in our society once again. We are close to the crossroads of making a collective decision that we hope to finally cut the cycle of ineffective and dirty governance.
     The people, with the help of media are doing their part in campaigning for voters’ education and empowerment. The civil society unceasingly calls for clean and honest elections despite the promises laid out by poll automation. The church herself is active in calling for its lay people to practice and participate in Principled Partisan Politics as expression of lay empowerment through the effective means of reflection, education and consultations. This is where we stand now.
     The recent pastoral statement of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) emphasizes the role of the lay people in the political activities and encourages the lay to widen active participation with civil societies in various works in the political arena. This time the appeal is for the people not just to discern but to identify candidates with integrity and competence based on the criteria set by the church. It’s an appeal for collective action more than just an appeal to conscience. The church out rightly persuades her people to get involved in politics in the hope to bring about the long espoused lay empowerment.
     The common tao, the media and the civil society are all actively doing their share and are working together for the same objective of hopefully shifting the miserable conditions of the Philippine society to a far better, effective and morally upright one. This collective effort only means one thing: the society in general is getting tired of immorality in the government and ineffectiveness of its officials. The people are getting emotionally drained of traditional politics and its countless broken promises of a better future.
     With all these, we remain in our promise as the lay people in social action: to do our share of educating and guiding the voters so that in the incoming elections we will be able to choose together the best leaders fit for running a good government ready to take us out of this long standing misery, and that the greater people will suffer no more the effects of deliberate lapses in judgment of the few in power.