Ash Wednesday in Congress

Published by the Visayan Daily Star Publications, Inc.

NINFA R. LEONARDIA Editor-in-Chief & President

CARLA P. GOMEZ Editor GUILLERMO TEJIDA III Desk Editor NANETTE L. GUADALQUIVER Busines Editor CEDELF P. TUPAS Sports Editor (On Leave) RENE GENOVE Bureau Chief, Dumaguete MAJA P. DELY Advertising Coordinator

CARLOS ANTONIO L. LEONARDIA Administrative Officer

Catholics the world over will troop to their churches today for the ceremony that marks the beginning of the Holy Season of Lent. On this day, those who belong to the faith humbly submit themselves to the imposition of the holy ashes in a sign of the Cross on their foreheads. This practice, observed all these years, is intended to be a reminder of our mortality, as well as of the fact that, as the Holy Book says, man had been created from a lump of clay, of earth, that is, and that no matter what stature we achieve in life, how much in earthly possessions we accumulate, all these will be for naught when the time comes for us to pass away.

Our mortal bodies will turn to dust and blend with the earth from whence it came. Then there will be no distinction among all of us. No matter what our race, color or position may be, that would be our inevitable end.

How timely it has proven to be that we enter this holy season when our own country has just gone through a painful upheaval that has once again illustrated the faithlessness of human beings, the treachery they do not hesitate to employ, and the recklessness with which they will tread over their fellows in the pursuit of their greed and ambitions.

Only a day ago, the Lower House, or the other body that makes up our law-making institution, went through a crisis during which the members repudiated the leader who had steered them through more than a decade of crafting, proposing and passing laws supposed to help improve the situation of our country and its people.

Just as it had been in the first season of Lent, there was also betrayal, abandonment, sorrow, and, many suspect, money involved, too. Under the circumstances could there be therefore restoration or even just a change in attitudes of those people we had chosen to be our leaders?

Hopefully Ash Wednesday, even if they belong to other faiths, will also serve to remind them that they, too, are mortal.*