Recognition Is No Arrogance

IS IT MAKING judgment over the late president Ferdinand Marcos to not grant his burial with state honor? Is it arrogance to see him as a dictator when no court of law ruled on him as such? A Catholic Church worker even ventured to quote the Gospel of Saint Luke (6:41): “Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own? 

First, it must be made clear that no judgment is needed of the late strongman because history, and the Filipino people, has already judged him. The fall of his regime is a proof in history that the people has passed judgment on the evils he spawned, and no single person of today can claim better judgment on Marcos than those who put him out of power.

Second, in a perfect judicial system, anyone judged by law is presumed guilty; while anyone not judged by it is presumed innocent. Unfortunately, the Philippine judicial system is very far from perfect. In fact, no judicial system in the world can claim such perfection. Thus, it is reasonable to presume that not all judged in court as guilt may not be truly guilt; and not all not judged in court may not be truly innocent. Is Marcos found guilty in the court of law? Certainly not; at least not in the Philippine courts. In fact, no case even has been filed against him, and can be filed against him now that he is already dead. But was he guilty of the evils that history has accused him of? Certainly. The Filipino people have seen it, gone through it, and finally made a judgment that carried the consequence of bringing him down from power.

This brings us down to the third contention that Marcos loyalists throw against those who refused state honors to Marcos at his burial. Is the refusal an act of noticing the “splinter” in a brother’s eye, while not perceiving the “wooden beam” in one’s own? That’s a definite “no."

Applying that statement of Jesus in this context is misinterpreting that statement. The prohibition is not against recognizing the faults of others (or of seeing the truth on what faults can are there to be seen), but against passing judgment in a spirit of arrogance, forgetful of one’s own faults. For Jesus, it is good to see the truth, in fact he encouraged his disciples to live in truth, whether it is one’s own faults or others’. In this context, witnessing the evils that Marcos had let loose in the country is no more judgmental than seeing that bread with molds, and not eat it. I believe that President Benigno Simeon Aquino III simply does that.

Using this statement to presume that President Aquino “does not see” his own faults, making him arrogant in doing so, is in fact an act of judgmentalism on the part of someone who use the statement this way. It makes an erroneous presumption; thus betrays the user’s arrogance instead.

The issue on the Marcos burial, which the House of Representatives had given life, brings to the fore the issue between evil and tolerance. What Senator Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. is asking is not only proper burial but a public, government-sanctioned vindication of his late father in the absence of any recognition that such evils have been committed. He wants to clear his father’s name in the records of Philippine history. What people in their right mind who vindicates the leader who oppressed them? And isn’t the current government that of the Filipino people?

In the name of the so-called “reconciliation of a divided nation,” Senator Marcos wants the Filipino people to show tolerance to the evils of his father’s regime by giving his remains a state honor. And here’s where the twist in logic occurs. The Filipino people who suffered the injustices and unhealed wounds of the Marcos regime is asked, not just to forget about the people who disappeared without trace during the martial law years, but also to honor the president of that martial law years. And it is obvious that the Marcoses are biding time, waiting for the right administration to give them what they want. How would you explain why they did not bury Marcos when former president Fidel Ramos had in fact allowed state honor at burial.

To think that evil must be tolerated instead of prosecuted in the name of compassion is to invalidate the bases for establishing the civil judicial system to try criminals in court, and bring justice to those who suffer from the evil of others. To think that way is to choose to subjugate good people under the evil ones, making corrupt governments thrive and multiply. That’s the reason why the country cannot seem to get over having corrupt presidents running it and its institutions to hell.

Is it then proper to tolerate evil—manslaughter, corruption, what have you—in the name of compassion to the offender? Should people wait in helpless submission to the evil that certain people will do in hope that evil people will find the error in their ways and repent? Certainly not. Even Jesus knows and respects the role of civil government in the spiritual growth of his disciples.


At the end of the day, recognition of faults and evils is not arrogance but a sincere exercise of the divine gift of discernment; of determining which one is good, and which one is evil. History has already put judgment on the memory of the late dictator. Not giving honor to such a memory is a ministerial duty that President Aquino must perform for the Filipino people. And only he knows his personal faults; something that no other person must rightly presume that he does not notice himself.