A time to reflect

The Holy Week is the last week of Lent, or the week that immediately precedes Easter Sunday. To us Christians, this is a time to commemorate and enact the Passion and death of Jesus Christ through various observances and services of worship.

To enable us to have more time for spiritual reflection during these important Christian holidays, Malacanang has announced that Holy Wednesday and Black Saturday are non-working holidays, giving government personnel a five-day vacation that will culminate on Easter Sunday.

Unfortunately, to many, the Holy Week is just another long vacation. As early as this afternoon, for sure, long queues of vehicles, including government-owned, would be rushing to Baguio City or to the beaches of Pangasinan and La Union.

In most towns in the country, the Holy Week, like Christmas, is a time for reunions because it is usually at this time of the year when family members and friends working in faraway places come home for vacation.

But even while the faithful take time out to pray and meditate, with this prevailing scenario, the essence of the Holy Week is hardly felt. Hardly will anyone remember anymore its spiritual dimension. Hardly will anyone remember that the Holy Week is the commemoration of Christ’s death and suffering.

According to the Christian Resource Institute (CRI), a global and ecumenical ministry dedicated to providing biblical and theological resources for growing Christians, Holy Week commemorations call us “to move behind the joyful celebrations of Palm Sunday and Easter, and focus on the suffering, humiliation, and death that is part of Holy Week.”

“It is important to place the hope of the Resurrection, the promise of newness and life, against the background of death and endings,” the CRI said.

“It is only in walking through the shadows and darkness of Holy Week and Good Friday, only in realizing the horror and magnitude of sin and its consequences in the world incarnated in the dying Jesus on the cross, only in contemplating the ending and despair that the disciples felt on Holy Saturday, that we can truly understand the light and hope of Sunday morning!” it added.

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Officials of the National Transmission Corp. (Transco) and Digital Telecommunications Inc. (Digitel) could not hide their displeasure over the continuing pilferage of their lines, causing millions of pesos worth of lost opportunities during power shutdowns and Internet downtimes.

These thieves simply climb the poles, cut the wires and sell these to junkshops for a fast buck.

These thieves must be very brave. They know that transmission lines have high voltage and it could cost their lives at the slightest mistake. The same is true with Digitel distribution lines, which are installed in high poles.

But what is making these pilferers bolder and more daring is the fact that they can easily run away with their crime because they have yet to see a wire thief sentenced and sent to jail. Or junkshop owners for that matter, who patronize the stolen items.

Maybe, we now should look at wire pilferage in terms of its economic implications. When a Digitel line is cut, think of the millions of pesos worth of opportunities lost, the phone and online transactions that are stopped. When a Transco transmission line is stolen, think of the power outage and its immediate impact on the economy of affected areas.

But coupled with stiffer penalties, there should also be citizens’ awareness and participation in this endeavor. The people should be made to understand it is not Transco or Digitel that is losing to wire pilferers but the country, and consequently, they, as its citizens, who are the big losers.

This way, maybe, they become more concerned and aware of their responsibilities and protective of these precious wires.

ENDNOTES: With people flocking to the Bonuan Beach this Holy Week, concerned city authorities should stop some unscrupulous beach shed owners from imposing exorbitant rental fees to beachgoers and to ensure that prices of softdrinks and other commodities are not grossly overpriced. Finally, let us tell our visitors to bring home with them their trash. Maybe we can encourage this by distributing to them free trash bags.
QUOTE: Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude. -- W.W. Ziege