Bro. Eddie launches prayer for the PHL

Fights among cagers on the hardcourt may be against the rules but the bleacher fans love it. “Alegre,” one fan was heard saying. “Unta ingon ani pirme.”

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 “That’s why our teams or players must show top-class performance on the hardcourt so the fans won’t hope for skirmishes on the court,” one school official said.

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Bro. Eddie Villanueva, leader of the Jesus is Lord (JIL) movement, has launched what he calls the 12 noon time habit of praying for the Philippines. He suggests that at the stroke of 12 noon everyday, Filipinos should utter: “God bless the Philippines.”

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Commenting on Bro. Eddie’s suggestion, a Catholic lay minister of my acquaintance said: “This is a simple prayer laced with patriotic fervor. It should be met with easy approval from all those who have faith in God and those who love this country.”

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 “Come to think of it,” the same lay minister said. “Even if only 50 percent of the 95 million Filipinos would utter ‘God bless the Philippines’ together, we are sure to score something big in Heaven.”

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Right. My lay minister acquaintance is right. But in this country, non-conformists abound and argue, especially in matters concerning religion. What someone would say about one’s sentiments about God is almost always shot down by another from another religious group. As if his God is different from the God of the members of another religion.

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E-mail from Danny Templo: “Some SK officials were found to be enjoying a pot session in a Negros Oriental town. Not only that — they were also found coddling a woman they ‘ordered’ from outside their hotel. Doesn’t this strongly support the clamor by many that that SK be abolished?”

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 “What’s the latest on the reported amendment of the so-called Juvenile Justice Law,” Mrs. Leoning Olbes, our neighbor here on V. Gullas St., asked me the other day. I said the Congress honorables are working on it and its amendment may be forthcoming.

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 “Unta dili lang amendment kundili repeal gyud,” Mrs. Olbes said. “This law must be overhauled,” she said. “And the overhaul must take effect soon to stop or even just slow down juvenile criminality.”

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Because of the news reportings and discussions on TV about All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day in Tagalog, many Cebuanos are now calling these two days “undas” not anymore “kalag-kalag,” which has been for generations our term for the “feast of the dead.” Just proves to you how TV could effectively influence the people’s language, no?