Here we are – your STAR is still shining for our dear and faithful readers! And if you want to know how we are doing it, please join us in giving thanks to our Lord for the inspiration and assistance. He has provided us, the way He has never failed before in our most crucial days. I admit that some of our members had been greatly disturbed by what they had believed was going to be the end of their beloved STAR, but see? With prayers and faith alone, we are surviving, and all I can say to those who had lost hope, is to resort to another quote: “O ye of little faith… “
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So we are still on All System Go, and please, dear readers, advertisers and supporters don’t lose faith in us. Of course we are still relying on your help and inspiration to go on. All those 38 years that have kept your STAR going must not go to naught, should it? So please, please continue to help us, support us and, most of all pray for us and inspire us to never lose hope nor faith that the Lord and all His holy angels and saints we call on every day and every moment of stress and threats of despair, also never give up on us!
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And now for business as usual. Let us sympathize with the Muslim community in the United Kingdom where the government has declared a lockdown just hours before the schedule for the celebration of their most important holiday. That must be quite a blow to them and we sympathize with them because how would we feel, also if such a declaration would be made before our special holidays like, say, Holy Week and Christmas Day? But I believe that the Lord understands and absolves us from any infraction of His laws because of what is happening in these times which, I believe He alone can control.
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By the way, reports from the international media revealed that ex-Pope Benedict, who had given up the papacy for health reasons, is now suffering from the very painful disease called shingles. Truth to tell, I do not know what the Ilonggo or even Tagalog name for shingles is, but I am appealing to all Catholics to remember him in their prayers. Even if he had to give up his post as the highest official of the Catholic Church, I believe it was his sheer humility in admitting that his health condition would no longer enable him to serve as the position requires. Such a trait is to be honored, for one would likely think someone in such position would stick on to enjoy the benefits and honors that would be accorded him upon his demise. A living saint, I even would dare to call him.
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How thankful we should be to God for sparing us the problems that the United States is finding itself involved in, like the continued creeping in of discrimination among its citizens who include various colors, but dominantly the black and white ones. Even up to this century, when the cause of it all was slavery, it seems that their pride in what they call democracy, is still troubled by the colors of their skin. Even if they seem to pride themselves in supposedly being the icon of democracy, not all their citizens are convinced about that.
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For some Americans, who must have forgotten that their own ancestors had fled to what they now call the United States, it seems there is still a condescending attitude towards those with skin darker than theirs. And ironically, even in this day and age, illustrations of that discrimination are still noted, and this was blown up with the treatment of the black man, called George Floyd , at the hands, or the heels, of a white policeman. Now the country is in turmoil again, due to that event and the battlecry now is the very expressive “BLACK LIVES MATTER”!
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Again I give thanks that we Filipinos accept each other, even those who are not natives of our place and treat them as our equal. Yes, we have aborigines, the aetas or atis, but they are the ones who prefer to stay in the areas they are used to, but do not get discriminated against when they come to our towns or cities, even as beggars. As for the American blacks, perhaps the discrimination they resent is still due to the historical fact that their ancestors had been brought to America to work in the estates of landed white men.
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But it is clear to see that many of the descendants of such black people have attained success in various walks of life. One of them even became President of the United States and many others are leaders of government units, members of their Congress, who have contributed much to what America is today. It may take a little more time but those with that old mindset will soon pass away, and true democracy will reign and the whole world, now and forever, will realize and accept that, indeed, from the time of creation “All men were created equal”. And women, too, of course!*
