The President and the Cardinal

CEBU, Philippines - The meeting in Malaca?ang between the President and the Cardinal landed in the news a while back.  The Freeman carried a photo of the meeting. The visit was unplanned and unscheduled, according to the media liaison officer of the Archdiocese of Cebu.  His Eminence went to Manila to attend a social event and to meet Vice President Leni Robredo. 

The Cardinal can actually be of very much help to the President’s wholehearted efforts to effect a lasting change in our society.  What with the numerous, almost innumerable members of the Cardinal’s ‘prayer brigade’ – the madres, the monghas, the religious brothers, etc., who can all storm heaven with their supplications.

The Chinese philosophy of the Yin-Yang can be applied to both of them: Inside the white portion there is a black spot, inside the black portion there is white spot.  Applied to human beings, in the best of us there is something bad. In the worst of us there is something good.

Some members of the Roman Catholic hierarchy and clergy had said that the Davao City mayor was the worst candidate for president in the last May elections.  However, the photo mentioned above shows something good in President Duterte, by his apparent great respect for Cardinal Vidal, who at age 85, is already retired.  (That is why he has the title “Emeritus” after the title “Cardinal”.)

On the other hand, there hardly is anybody who does not like  Cardinal Vidal.  He facilitated my dispensation from the promise to remain single or celibate. No less than Pope St. John Paul II approved it 11 years after I filed it during the incumbency of Cardinal Rosales.

But the black spot is when he, together with Archbishop  Ramon Arguelles of Lipa, Batangas and other prelates, such as Villena, Bactol, etc. – for reasons  all  their own – spearheaded the movement to urge  former President Aquino  to step down more than one year prior to the end of the former President’s term.

Let us hope  that Cardinal Vidal’s efforts to curb the anomalies of some clerics and President Duterte’s promise to rid our country of illegal drugs and criminality will not end up with the theme song of Cervantes’ “The Man from La Mancha”: “To dream the impossible dream…”  Hoping for the best, let us pray for the two of them, because with God nothing is impossible. (FREEMAN)