Mighty Royals of the Kings, Faces of the Queens, Orders of the Dukes, Arsenals of the Generals, Armors of the Knights, Fights of the Cavaliers, Lips of the Poets, Memories of the Slain, Dynasty of Men, Hearts of my Fellow, Sons and Daughters of Young Men Christian Association… I am Jay-Ar Bugayong.
Now, I’ve heard the story about the couple Adam and Eve taking a bite on that “forbidden fruit” which ultimately cause the fall of man. But if I were there long, long time ago in paradise, I shall commit the same for I, just like our very first parents, am human. Easily tempted and blinded by these imaginary pieces on earth: power, influence, money and fame.
Two thousand and seven years of existence is not a long time in strengthening a peaceful world. But to an abandoned dream, it is long enough. Two thousand and seven years is just springtime to a rose flower ready to blossom in the granary but to man it is a journey of transformation. Two thousand and seven years is just a lamp of experience to guerrillas but to a man it is a battle for love and peace.
But wait, isn’t it when God created the world, He never envisioned a world of poverty, chaos and hopelessness? So, He stepped out in His place and looked around and said, “Before destruction the heart of man is haughty and before honor is humility. Be not afraid of sudden fear, neither of the desolation of wicked when it comes and do not withhold good from those to whom it is due when it is the power of your hand to do so.”
For the past century, long before we were formed within our mother’s womb, we had witnessed Hitler’s incursion of the globe; evil forces destroying the entire humanity. He shaped a field of travesty, felony, immorality and even hypocrisy baptizing a new generation in the name of evil.
But look! God does not allow evils dominate the world and what happened? Though incongruent in ideology, Russia, America and Britain stood together as one to protect and save the lives of many. And the Allies did it. The few good men did it. But Hitler and his nefarious troops didn’t make it for the ground they cultivated is not watered by the hands of God…it is futile, therefore, it cannot triumph.
Great apartheids where the Blacks were isolated from the Whites and caste systems in Asia speak largely of discrimination between the high class and the mediocre ones. There were inequalities in treatment, justice and liberty. Nationalists like Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. sacrificed themselves to grant the people freedom from slavery. Let the framed principles and objectives of Abraham Lincoln govern each among all nations, “of the people, by the people and for the people”. Since gaining independence means losing lives, it is then gloomy that these heroes were ruined by the brutal bang-bang of guns.
But Sir, man is created innocent. He has no idea that he was naked! That nakedness protects him from sins. When he gained knowledge of having no covering, simultaneously, he acquired the fruit of sinfulness, too. If before, he has no thoughts of an uprightness and an atrocity, now he has an awareness of both and worse, he tends to practice more the wicked appraisals because of so many enticements around. But to a word of the Almighty Divine, it is very difficult for him to have it discern. Man is too obstinate to follow a brilliant order making him intelligently foolish. Sir, that’s why sometimes, it is then better to be devoid of perception of fact or truth because you’re free from any viciousness that you might commit than having a knowledge of a thing which makes you a transgressor. If a man has a state of knowing, on some occasions, it leads to a ghastly venture or ill-timed havoc although his heart is pure and decent and even if he has no intention of sparking anything spiteful. Just like Albert Einstein, the grand exponent of the equation, “Theory of Relativity”, spelled as E=mc², he stated however that he disliked weapons and violence but his ideas helped propagate such with the discovery of the atomic bomb, a product of his exceptional perspicacity.
This world of ours resembles a crevice, altogether a delirium where the verses of the apostles were not even speak of, where cries and murmurs of humans seem to be unreached by any single ear, lost in total darkness…. And God said, “Let there be light”, and there was Sir Isaac Newton. There was, two centuries later, Thomas Alva Edison. They illuminated the world with the truth of light and perfection of wisdom.
Out of this dismal world came a light full of hope because God does not neglect His children who call upon Him.
I may not worship the same gods the Hindus worship. I do not eat the foods the Greeks enjoy during their meals. You do not speak the same language those ancient civilizations do. But it is not at all a matter of race, religion, tongue, culture, tradition and even of age. The thing is we must live harmoniously adhered by the love, faith and comfort under the umbrella of God.
I shall be glad to see country by country, separated by geography, though different identity but a mankind of equality. Oh! At last! A peaceful humanity! But how soon would this world achieve a real peace after I die?
Pen name - ngitingbatis
(A speech I wrote sometime in September 2007 during the YMCA Poem/ Speech Recital Competition in Tapuac District, Dagupan City).