SA KANTO NI MAWE:

MORAL RECOVERY PROGRAM1

Herman L. Licayan

Coming from the perspective of philosophy where the spirit of intellectual honesty
essentially overwhelms its discourses, I personally feel it is always not easy to talk to
politicians. I already have that preconceived notion that politicians are less honest
thinkers. And I think, in so far as they act in behalf of their public offices, they really are.
For a priest like me, it is more than just a challenge, and a responsibility indeed, to talk
about morality to them. Whether or not I was able to convey my message to them, that I
was making sense to them that I really do not know. I believe that in at least, having able
to ‘disturb’ in some way their moral sensibilities, I have already achieved my purpose.
The following reflection already contains some modifications from my classroom
discussions.
The “Moral Recovery and Value Formation Program (MRVFP)” initiated by the
local government sounds to me very intriguing phrase and that it contains big words. I
have to confess of my cynicism, ‘moral recovery’ and ‘value formation’ are truly big
words to me. The trouble is, this afternoon; I will be speaking about them. The word
“recovery” seems to me the most telling since it obviously admits that we are morally
debased. Given the decadent morality that our society and politics have, these “big
words” are to me useless and are but a mere political propaganda if not just a mere group
of words with empty meanings. These words, “Moral Recovery and Value Formation
Program” truly require a great deal of spiritual effort, sincerity of mind, and humility of
heart to make such a phrase as referring to something, that is, a sublime effort to bring
about authentic social integrity and a more morally credible governance. As such, it is a
great challenge. This is the problem we face. And to anybody who is willing to take any
form of challenges in this life no matter how insurmountable they may be, regardless of
the results, the act itself is in fact very much commendable. Thank you for being a part
of this endeavor, and for being one with us.
I had never been in any one of your offices and therefore I cannot deal directly the
actions that are taking place therein everyday. All I can deal with are words which
articulate moral concepts which in a way serve as the guiding ethical principles to be
applied in whatever course of action taking in your offices as public servants. It is
important to note that we are basically dealing here with words and their meanings
whether we like it or not. Let us not too presumptuous that we are dealing with morality
per se for I do not think we are; all the more we can deal with it directly. What is actually
at stake here is the word “morality” and “recovery”, and what we mean by them.
Morality is what we do, what I do as a teacher, and what you do as public servants. What
we are dealing right now are words about the morality of our actions. And words only
make sense in as far as they are stipulations of a certain state of affairs. Ako gyud ning
klaruhon aron di mahulog sa usapang hangin ning atong programa, kung atong i-
kinanto ba… kana bang istoryang dunay tinood, words with content. To put it more
diplomatically, kun di man gani mapugngang di mamakak, at least, kanang mas daghan
ang tinuod kay sa bakak. However, we must be very clear about this, in principle, even if
1
This is a modified paper is delivered in July 17, 2008 to the Agusan del Sur local governments officials
[Mayors, Vice-mayors, Sanguniang Panlalawigan (SP)] with their wives and husbands during their Moral
Recovery and Values Formation Seminar at Plaza Resort, Bulihon, Carmen, Agusan del Norte.
we are telling the people 99% truth that would not justify in any case the 1% bakak that
we have made. Now, this is not entirely simplistic. Such a tough moral principle must be
taken as persuasion to consider our moral actions with sincerity. Thus, in so far as we are
in the moral recovery program, an utmost sincerity and clarity of thoughts is strongly
desired.
Because they are big words to me, it is crucial to define clearly how I do
personally take these words or more precisely how do these words mean to me and to
you. I hope we have the same understanding of these words. Vague linguistic
expressions open the floodgate of politicians fooling people around by their sophistries;
lawyers circumventing the laws by their cleverness, and preachers mesmerizing their
converts with their highfaluting sermons. In cleaning up the moral mess, we got to have
clear understanding of our terms. Now, given that we do already have valid
understanding of the terms in their general sense, the best way to clarify these concepts is
to distinguish it from other similar concepts.

Clarification of terms

Morality is what you do in your offices. All we have to do probably in this talk is
just to clarify significant concepts so we will know clearly which way to go.

Human act
Morality deals with human act. By human act, we don’t necessarily mean act of
man. All actions performed by man are acts of man but not all actions indicate his
humanity. Certainly, man is capable of doing action proper to irrational brutes, and even
worse sometimes, such actions would not make him human. They may not be necessarily
bad or evil act, but they are essentially actions that do not flow from the process of
reason. Most of them are those unreflected and accidental ones, such as taking off our
slippers when we are in the bathrooms, or misplacing the door keys somewhere, or
accidentally step on the toes of your friend, etc. On the other hand, actions which express
one’s humanity are those which are performed with deliberations, that is, conscious and
willed actions such as, would you run again for this coming election, getting into a
political party, or contracting marriage commitment, etc. These are acts which in normal
circumstances product of a well thought of deliberations, hence, human. These are
actions that define the morality of our being human. Take note: it is the consciousness
that makes our actions liable to moral investigations, being good or evil is simply a
product of such investigation, not a condition which they can be investigated. In
actuality, though human acts are more seldom than acts of men, they are however crucial
actions that practically direct us where to go in life. This clarification has to be made as
we are looking forward in dealing with the problems of morality and politics. Let us just
suspend this topic for the time being.

Moral recovery
 When was say “moral recovery” we don’t mean moralizing people. By
“moralizing people” we mean a hard-shell attitude of pointing out mistakes or moral
imperfections of others. Such act is condemning. The uncompromising attitude of
prescribing people what course of action to take with the corresponding actions to be
shunned is a perfection caricature of self-righteousness which is proscribed by Jesus in
the gospels as the common lot of pharisaic tendency. Moralizing people presupposes a
self-proclaimed authority to possess the right of judging others under the pretext of
putting society in order. Of course, this is sometimes necessary but if one is not careful,
the tendency to impose one’s standard on others is always an open possibility. This will
imply then that those immoral people are simply those who do not obediently follow the
prescribed precepts. In using the term “moral recovery” therefore, we must be guarded
by the fact that we are treading at the precipice of both self-righteousness and hypocrisy.
From the Bible’s point of view, self-righteousness is simply understood as that tendency
to impose one’s personal standards on others. Hypocrisy goes one step ahead of self-
righteousness by refusing to apply to himself the standards he or she is imposing on
others. Such is for instance when we demand honesty from our subordinates while keep
on lying to people every single time as part and parcel of our political craft. In this
situation, one’s political career may be strengthened but it is always one’s credibility that
suffers. The authenticity of our moral recovery program, therefore, lies on our careful
awareness in avoiding these pitfalls.

Religious ethics
Since it is safe to assume that all of us are Christians, with due respect to the
Muslims and Indigenous, it cannot be denied that our religious faith has a great influence
to our moral sensibilities. As such is very much obvious in us today. It is very much
evident because almost all of us here, if not practically all, are at the same time members
of the Alliance of the Twin Hearts of Jesus and Mary or any Catholic Charismatic groups.
And since, participants of its activities are mostly Catholics, then, there is not much of a
problem at all. Thus, it is not truly surprising to associate the MRVFP with the
charismatic activities. But on other hand, it is not also wise to be less sensitive to the
moral sentiments of the minority. It is of prime importance to remember that this is
basically a government program, and though our Catholic faith is undoubtedly extending
its great help, the identity of the program as a government initiative must be preserved
notwithstanding the fact that we principally draw our funds from the government. Thus,
it has to be made clear from the outset that even if given all of us are Catholics, this
program will not in any case contravene the principle of total separation between the
church and the state (Such topic will be duly dealt with later).
To distinguish this program from Catholic evangelization is not just for the sake
of preserving the principles held by the constitution, nor to delimit the influence of our
Catholic faith thereby crippling her mission towards our society, but this is in order to
give room for other denominations of different faith who as human as they are have the
same moral sensitivities with us. When this program becomes so much identified with
Catholic charismatic group, though indeed commendable because of course it is in our
favor, it is nevertheless my fear that it will appear repulsive to the minority non-Catholic
and Muslims. Such should not be the case and I do not think we have the right to do that
simply because we are the majority. Because we are the majority, we should have the
greater responsibility to be more sensitive to other forms of moral expressions. If this is a
government program, then Catholics can only spearhead its activity but by no means have
the right to monopolize its initiatives and worse impose in its plans. The other extreme
must also be avoided, that is, in order to give way for the others; Catholics will wait for
them to do the task first. Let us warn ourselves, that just like the Catholics, other
religious denominations, or some minority groups, also have the same tendencies to
impose their idiosyncrasies with the rest of the populace. Both of these extremes violate
the very principle of universality of which we are to discuss later. It is not however clear
which way for Catholics to go, at least for the time being it is just enough to be aware of
both extremes.
Another thing to be clarified here is the relationship between religious expression
and moral conduct. It is normally accepted that religion and morality must go together.
That is, a religious person is expected to be a moral person, and that a moral person in
some way or another possesses religious faith in order to back up his moral conviction.
And so, in our context, a man or a woman of integrity is often tied up with any religious
institution which guarantees his or her religious belief. Hence, the actions that he/she
performs are always looked at to as in consonance with the religious teachings he/she has
in his/her church. It is not uncommon that candidates who have some kind of a religious
image also have a good moral standing in the community and therefore most likely to win
at the outcome of the election, fraudulence besides. Notwithstanding of the abuses of
some, this is not necessarily bad. In so far as the harmonious relationship between
religious faith and moral action are concern, there is certainly no much problem about
that. In such a case, there is no need to distinguish one’s religiosity from his/her moral
aptitude because in the first place, I don’t think they can be distinguished.
The real problem that we face however is the fact that this is not always the case.
In fairness with the politicians, our Christian faith as a whole is split in practice. That
means, people believe in one thing and practice another thing. It is often complained
particularly to public servants, priests and politicians alike, but more to politicians who
can perform earnestly profound religious acts in the church yet conduct their affairs in
government offices in corruption, fraudulence, and dishonesty. Rumors have it that some
of their corrupted fund from the government coppers is donated to the church just to
make up a bit in their moral misgivings. The churchmen too, who turned out to be
beneficiaries enjoy themselves in maintaining good relationships with the politicians in
spite of being aware of their morally questionable reputations. Churchmen then do not
deserve to be called accomplice since it is entirely irreconcilable to their religious
ministry yet they are. Theologians call it split Christianity. And both of them are split.
Now, I just want to be very clear about what we are trying to drive at here. There
is a very enticing terrible mistake that one can have: To ask who are these politicians and
churchmen whom we are referring to is convalescence nonsense. Such a question
plunges our discussion into the pitfall of moralization we have been trying to avoid from
the start. It leads us into throwing accusations on others while driving us away from the
real issue at stake. Sa laktud nga pagkasulti, mahimong personalan. Dili na mao. Let
us not loss sight of the fact that we are talking here about the relationship between
religion and morality. And that the point which we want to drive at is that religious faith
must not be confused with moral integrity for a simple reason that sometimes there are
religious men who are immoral and moral person who are not apparently religious. Thus,
being religious does not guarantee good morality. Likewise, people who are not
perceived to be religious are not necessarily immoral and can possibly be more moral
than the religious ones. This is very important distinction so as people will not be
mislead to believe that religious candidates necessarily ensure sincere public service.
That is to say that the religious affiliation of the person should not blind us from seeing
critically the moral character to the one of whom we entrust our pledge in performing a
credible social function. While it is always commendable to seek for a harmonious
expression of religious faith to that of moral action that we perform; it is however wise
not to confuse them altogether.
We may even add in the case of the Bible. Of course, we Christians take it as the
standard of moral action. But aside from the fact that there are some of us here who are
not Christians and therefore do not hold the Bible as their religious and moral standard;
there are also undeniable moral problem in the Sacred Scriptures itself. The early Old
testament presents this problem which absolutely necessitates scholarly readings in order
not to fall into the erroneous interpretations which are often the lot of the fundamentalist.
Insistence of the authority of the Bible as the standard of our moral action should always
be upheld, but it should be understood in a very scholarly cautious and reasonable
manner with the minimum of intellectual prejudice and the maximum of Christian
charity.
There is no question once again that religious belief reinforces moral values, and
vice versa. We don’t think there is much of a debate if we propose that even the pettiest
moral good that we upheld has a deep religious content. For this reason, we don’t exert
much effort in trying to distinguish the program from religious activity. In this case, there
is a convergence between religious and civil concerns in questions of morality. But in
practice while this is true most of the times, unfortunately, this is not however true all of
the time. We must reckon ourselves to the fact that there are instances where political and
social values stand squarely in conflict with the religious beliefs of certain religion.
Reversely, some religious expressions are incompatible to that of which the state wanted
to promote. Take, for instance, the celebrated case of the Department of Education
(DepEd) vs. Jehovah Witness in Cebu where Jehovah’s Witness members refuse to allow
their children to join Flag ceremonies in public schools since it is a form of idolatry for
them. The DepEd argues that as citizens, regardless of religious faith, everybody is
bound to pay respect to the national symbol and that it has nothing to do with religious
adoration. The Supreme Court in fact ruled in favor of religious freedom. Whether or not
the Jehovah Witness or the SC is justifiable in its ruling is out of the question here. Even
teachings of the Catholic Church have many problematic stands against some of the
values being promoted by government programs like issues on populations, ecology,
reproductive health, etc. To point out such issues is just enough to say that we must
caution ourselves from confusing religious and secular values, not because we want to
put one set of values over another.
 Morality and Politics

Ngitngit pas alkitran

Morality and politics are always a burning issue in our society ever since. And
people who cannot bear to face head on the critical eye of moral principles towards
political actions that are performed are often resolved in dissociating politics and
morality. In so far as our Caraga region is concern, there is that belief that morality has
no place in politics, or should not, and that in order to survive in the political arena, one
has to set aside his/her moral convictions. Even if we know it is not what politics ought
to be, the fact is, it is. This is not exactly what we like, but this is real. What is right may
not be necessarily true and what is evil may, of course, is not necessarily false. Even the
most principled person trashes his/her moral conviction on the day one of his political
life. Inspired by Machiavellianism, one can do whatever he wants so long as he achieves
his purpose: The end justifies the means. In politics, this view believes, craft and
shrewdness are essential, not moral beliefs. It may be commendable to act according to
moral beliefs but when conflicts come, one must be ready to let go moral principles.
Thus, one has to make a choice whether to set aside moral beliefs and engage himself
into the quagmire of political game or uphold his principle and give up willingly one’s
political career (for the sake of the Kingdom, if your are religious). The truth is: you
cannot take them together. Morality and political are just unmixable like tubig at langis.
Now, this is the real situation of our politics and there is nothing we can do about it.
Open your eyes; there have already been hundreds of attempts made by people of good
faith to change this system. Their good intention has brought no good at all, it has
resulted to the sufferings of their personal lives; their families have been affected while
the system remains. And so if you are not willing to give up moral conviction, don’t get
into politics. And if you really want to make a difference, and stubbornly uphold your
morality, then go ahead, commit suicide. You will never win the contest anyway. And
even if some honest candidates do win, still they get corrupted in the long run. This is
what Jun Lozada says that the worst form of corruption is the corruption of the best.
When the best men become corrupt, then there are no way better men can do better.
We must admit this view is real and therefore compelling, yet it also projects a
very gloomy picture of reality backed up by the shadow of despair. Our society will be
heading towards hopeless and our future as a people is doomed. Kaugmaong ngitngit
pas alkitran. This is a social perspective that does not offer anything but confined itself
in the given, tied up in what is there, and nothing else can possibly be done but to do
things what that have been commonly done. Let us call this view as Hanaw’ng
Panlantaw (HP). Of course, this is realistic, but a reality that does not leave room for
poetry and imagination is in fact an illusion. And if we really want to get real, and
abjectly succumb to this view, then we should not be here in the first place.

A glimmer of hope
Thanks for your presence. I would rather say that the very fact that you are here
today tells me that there is a grimmer of hope. This belief will only make sense if we
assume that you are coming here in good faith. First and foremost, the MRVFP and
socio-political despair cannot co-exist side by side. It must be made clear to each and
everyone of us that your sheer presence here is a tacit indication that you don’t subscribe
to that view and therefore you believe in hope that change is possible. You may be
expecting a message from me. Little do you know that you already have delivered your
message first. Your presence here brings me a message that it is possible to talk about
morality in our midst, particularly to politicians like you. In other words, without giving
me a word, without moving your lips, and without any sound that flows forth from your
mouth, your have already delivered me a message that we can possibly make a difference
and share our dreams. MRCVFR is an act of defiance against HP. And even if in some
way or another, we dwell in the realm of HP hence a part of it, today obviously your are
counted among the advocates of this program, and no more part of the reason why this
program exist. The thing that saddens us is not that this belief does not pave the way to
moral recovery; it even pulls us away from what this program wants to achieve.
Our insistence here which does not accept compromise is that we are all dealing
here with rational people. This insistence can also be taken as an appeal to be reasonable
for if one refuses to apply the standard of reason, there will be nothing we can do about it
but to hope that he or she has his/her own reason to do so. Take note: no one escapes
rational scrutiny even for those who consciously refuse to be so. At this juncture, the
best way to deal with HP is to examine critically the logical terrain of such belief in order
to expose its own problems in the process of its own reasoning.

Baliktad nga nirasonan

We said previously that man’s actions which are beyond the jurisdiction of moral
scrutiny are those which happen to be done unconsciously or without deliberation. A
well planned action can never be exempted from moral investigation. Political actions
are in most cases, one of the most well thought of act that we do. It cannot therefore
escape the measurements of moral principles.
Actions that are done by craft cannot be without intention. You don’t manipulate,
concoct, control, and circumvent accidentally. Shrewd people can never be naïve.
Political crafts are always conceptualized by the clever. As they say, walang tuso’ng
taga. The sneaky is always one step ahead of the simple. The innocent cannot outsmart
the learned. The subtleties of insidious moves are often executed by the intelligent.
Deliberation is always the business of the wise. Politicians are neither pretentious nor
evil men; they simply outsmarted the precipitous multitude. And since they are one step
ahead of the populace, their actions as such, in so far as they are conscious and therefore
human, are highly moral act. Hence their actions must always fall under the scrutiny of
moral evaluations. Any attempt to dissociate political act from the clutches of moral
principle is a recognition in fact that such an action cannot stand by the light of day. This
is an institutionalization of Adam’s concealment of his guilt after the fall, e.i., going to
hiding. Political actions are moral actions. You cannot dissociate politics from morality
without being intellectually dishonest. In fact, if we are to be sincere, the dissociation of
politics from morality is motivated by a tacit acceptance that political actions are doomed
to fail under the uncompromising canon of moral test. To say therefore that morality has
nothing to do with politics is only an expression of fear sometimes camouflaged by
power and influence but certainly not of reason and of courage. In this life, according to
Kant, regardless from what point view whether religious or morality, or politics, all of us
must bend our knees before the authority of reason and the principle of right. Actions
cannot be justified without any set of standard. And even if we are fallen by making
mistakes from time to time, still it is not reasonable to throw away the idea of rightness in
order to go on doing exact what we are doing unmindful of morality’s critical sight.
But if we insist on moral standard, what exactly is the standard of morality in
the first place? Or is there really such thing as moral standard? These are perennial
questions that trouble the moralist from time immemorial. And because, it has to be
admitted, moral philosophy has not truly found a definitive answer yet, if there are any,
the lure of relativism is almost irresistible. In our case, we don’t pretend to find what
philosophy has failed through the ages. But because the issue is indispensable, even if
there might be no answers to these questions at all; even if every attempt made is doomed
to failure; even if we will suffer the same fate with the philosophers of the past, still we
will not shy away from dealing the problem head on. Secondly, we will not also want to
pretend that this is another new way of dealing the problem. There is nothing novel of
what I am going to say. In fact, everything that I will be saying in the next pages had
been already said by Emmanuel Kant, the Father of rationalism, more than two hundred
years ago. Because I find Kant’s thought as the only feasible moral theory so far, I would
like to share his thoughts with you. Now, please don’t forget that we are not exactly
interested with Emmanuel Kant; we must take at a look at his idea because we are now
facing the same problem that he faced hundreds of years ago—the problem of the ground
of morality.

Categorical Imperative
Basta ug asa malipay
What is good for me is good for me; what is good for the other is good for the
other; and what is bad for me may be good for the other; what is bad for the other might
be good for me—relativism isn’t it? How many of us subscribe to this view? People say
that is how our world works today. This is in fact how people practice morality: basta
kung saan ka masaya susuportaan kita, basta ang mahalaga ay masaya. Well, they are
wrong if they think this view is just practiced today. We know well in philosophy that this
is as old as philosophy itself but probably only gaining more momentum in these recent
centuries because of postmodernism. If our ultimate pursuit in life is happiness, then
what else do we want? With hedonistic touch, we often ask, Bahala’g asa ko makakita’g
kalipay basta lipay, unsa pa ba’y gipangita? There is really no question about morality
is nothing but a pursuit in happiness. Even Aristotle agrees with the hedonist to a certain
extent, the trouble always lies on what we do mean by happiness for certainly hedonism
can never accommodate Aristotle’s έυδαιμονία. Here, we are going around the circle.
Hence, relativism simply abandons the quest for the ground of morality and replaces it
with the pursuit of happiness often in materialistic understanding. Relativism is a
morality of despair. To prove that relativism is wrong I think is a useless enterprise; it is
more beneficial to just deal with the man’s undeniable tendency to follow the pathways of
hope rather than despair; and to me, Kant lead us the way. We must be reminded
however that this is not a study of Kant’s moral philosophy. We are simply taking Kant’s
thoughts in order to deal with our preoccupation of recovering the nobility of moral
values that had been trashed out in our political system.

Naa gyuy sukdanan

 Mayor Fred Lim used to put this reminder in all over the street walls of the City
of Manila: The law applies to everyone, or else to no one. The existence of the law
depends in its rigors. They may sound uncompromisingly steeled, but it is just what was
said by the Romans, duro lex sed lex. As such, this is not attractive to our modern
sentiment. When the seminarians of St. John Mary Vianney in Cagayan de Oro were
formulating their rules of life, one seminarian precipitously reacted to their formator:
Why often use the phrase, “The seminarians should…” or “You must…” it is too
imposing. The priest replied with wisdom and a mixture of impatience: Ug unsa man
diay gusto nimong atong gamiton… “perhaps” ug “maybe”? For those who may not
like the idea of the force of law, I wonder if they realized how ridiculous our community
ordinances and decrees would become if their predilections are followed. For instance,
municipal ordinance will appear like this: Throw your peanut shells in the garbage can,
or else you may be fined by 100 Pesos; or a COMELEC liquor ban will run as follows:
Please try your best not to take liquor the day before and during election; or Senate rules
will be formulated in this fashion: The witnesses in the senate investigation may appear
to the senate of the Republic of the Philippines if ever they receive summon and perhaps
answer the questions if they are willing. Certainly these sound very gentle and diplomatic
but they provoke more laughter than order.
The only way to avoid the pitfalls of relativism is to find some grounds. The law
cannot be the ground of morality of course, but the idea which does not accept exemption
sounds very tough. For Kant, either morality is respected or there is no morality at all;
halfway measures will not measure anything and therefore good as nothing. The breach
of such moral principle does not in any way necessarily invalidate the principle itself.
Ordinarily, if not everybody uses the pedestrian lane, the police apprehends those
malefactors, not remove the lane. That is the essence of moral standard, to objectify a
bearing from which we can possibly measure human actions. We naturally expect
negative reactions to such unbending principles but, take note, we are trying to look for
grounds here, not exceptions. And so Kant offers his moral criteria.

Universability
In The Metaphysics of Morals, Kant states, “Act only according to that maxim
whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law”. Now, let
us not be too quick to think that this is highly idealist theory for we always think that
there cannot be an unbending universal norm of morality. Well, that is not exactly how
Kant is interpreted by contemporary philosophers. On the contrary, Jurgen Habermas and
Hans Georg Gadamer saw tremendous realism in Kant’s thought. Understanding
presupposes universality and that’s why people talk; they communicate, they establish
dialogue so that universality in reality means acceptability and consensus among the
people involved. Understanding is always possible through a dialogue; and unilateral
solution is trashed out.
Ayaw buhata sa uban ang dili nimo gustong buhaton nila kanimo, says the
Gospel. Anything that you hold as good for yourself must also be good for the others,
anything evil that befalls on others cannot be good to you. Thus, universality means that
moral act in order to be good must be universal, that is, it can be done by all and still
morally good. In fact, on the level of rationality, losing candidates are not complaining
because they lost, losing is universable, the legitimacy of such complain is based on the
alleged fraudulence. Again the gospel says, whatever be the measure you use to measure
others will be measured back to you. The gospels condemn the hypocrites because they
refuse to apply to themselves the standards they use to impose on others. In principle,
there must be the same standard for all. The repercussions of this principle are
overwhelmingly immense. Of course, we don’t mean to conduct one by one survey in
order to ascertain which way we should go. This means that moral standard is accessible
to all, and that the best way to come up with a certain course of action, especially in
crucial situations, should be through a rational discourse. To say therefore that Former
Governor Angel Amante lost mayoralty contest in Butuan City because she is a Muslim
may have some bearing in reality but obviously it is not universable for a Catholic
candidate will never win an election against a Muslim opponent in Lanao City.
Habermas insists that morality is not decided by one person of authority, nor by the
predilections of the majority; moral act is done through a communicative process which
allows the concerned parties to be part of the process in decision making. But there is a
lot of rethinking we have to do here. What become important are no longer necessarily
the results but the process. Thus, from being result oriented, we become process
oriented. Result oriented action seeks for strategies in order to bring ourselves to an end;
process oriented action seeks for a means to establish communication with the hope to
arrive at a certain consensus. Result oriented action aims for solution; process oriented
action seeks for understanding. Gadamer calls it, fusion of horizon.
Openness, sincerity, and reasonableness are crucial. The most important
prerequisite here is allowing one’s reasonable position to be criticized by the other; and
openly lay criticisms in turn over the positions of opposite parties. In this case, talking to
opposition is equally important to having discussion with the administration. In a
democratic society, opposition is harnessed not suppressed. It is said, love your enemies,
they tell you your faults.
Let us apply this principle to real problems that we face; the communist rebels for
instance. Under Palparan’s mind set, being a Machiavellian of course, militarization is
the only solution. So far, this seems to be a failure. But dialogue has also equally failed
for the last fifty years. There seem to be no other options left. Is it not because we are
trying to employ irreconcilable method? What in fact we are doing is to employ
militarization with the intermission to do a dialogue. After we set on the table for peace
dialogue, taking a breath a bit, we then go back to the battle fields for the continuing
rounds of militarization. Truce becomes simply to take a break from war, and to fill the
gap we do dialogue without believing the philosophy behind communicative process.
Little did we know that in principle, militarization does not believe in talks, and talks are
irreconcilable with militarization. If Palparan is correct, why engage in a dialogue?
From rational point of view, it is preferable to engage in peace talks forever rather kill
each other in the combat. Sec. Norbert Gonzales rightly insists that arm struggle is no
longer applicable to evoke social change in the twentieth century. He was perfectly
correct then. The only problem was that he only had in mind the communist rebels, not
the government and all the more not the United States. In US invasion to Iraq, he was
one of the advisers of the president to support the US. This is what Noam Chomsky
calls distorted morality. If one truly believes in a dialogue, the first step he/she has to do
is to dismiss military options as soon as possible or else it undermines the talk. But in
principle, I would say Sec. Gonzales was still correct. There is a Tagalog saying, ang
madadaan sa paupo, wag gagawin sa patayo. But such principle should not only be
addressed to the communist rebels but to the government as well if we really are sincere
in addressing the problem.
We must abandon the idea that Communist rebels are the problem and the
government is the solution to the problem. The truth is both sides are part of the problem
and part of the solution. Both parties are aware of that. Until we continue talking about
government’s victory over the rebel in their military campaigns, or the rebel’s against
military, there will always be bloodshed. It is a gross mistake to think that in order to
stop rebellion, we must kill the rebels for we are all potential rebels and high-rank rebels
are all potential civic leaders. The only way to deal (not necessarily solve) the problem
that is in consonance with the principle of universality is dialogue. Dialogue may not give
us outright solutions, but if we can bring together both parties on the table, even if
solution is not achieved, the hope of achieving it is always there. And if we learn to
move our orientation to process rather than solution, then there is always a room for
understanding. Understanding implies consensus, and by the term, consensus means
acceptability to the conditions of parties involved. When we put stress on the process, we
don’t mean that it will not bring any result at all or that we don’t long for a result. What
we do mean is that we must come to terms with tentative results, and the most concrete
initial result that happens in every talk is that, at least, bloodshed is prevented to happen.
Nonetheless, if definitive solution is achieved, by a lucky break, then it is an ultimate
bonus, but that cannot be a condition sine qua non for having dialogues.

Categorical
From utilitarian and pragmatic perspective, morality is based on its use or on its
consequence. Action can have only moral value if it renders practical results. That is,
what really matters is for things to be made used by men, at all cost. Thus, instead of
talking about true or false, right or wrong, moral or immoral, we rather discuss whether
or not such an action works, or produces results. In his Pragmatism (1907) William
James asks,
Grant an idea or belief to be true, what concrete difference will its
being true make in any one’s actual life? How will the truth be realized?
What experiences will be different from those which would obtain if the
belief were false? What, in short, is the truth cash-value in experiential
terms?
The impact of James and the pragmatists’ thoughts was so great that it become a
dominant North American philosophy, if not THE American philosophy. So much so that
Americans are easily associated the attitude of practicality. Because of its practical label
it has an overwhelming influence in all walks of life especially in the grassroots level.
And without us being aware of it, its influence is gaining more and more momentum even
among us Filipinos. And so, when things seem to be no longer working, and thus, not
render any practical results, we hear people say: cut it off! Or forget about that! In
relationships for instance we often hear people say, “well if you marriage doesn’t work
anymore, break it up and move on with your life, martyrdom is a thing in the past…”
Even Jesus in the Gospel has a pragmatic touch in his instruction to his apostles: if you
are not accepted in one place, go to the next. Obviously this kind of trend measures the
morality of the act from the point view of its ends or results… morality is that which
renders results. And for many of us in good faith uncritically buy to this philosophy.
We don’t hold that pragmatism is wrong. Nevertheless, we got to be critical about
it. Like all moral theory, it has a lot of negative repercussion of which we ought to be
aware of. Under pragmatic criteria, parents who do everything for their children, teach
them moral values, send them to highly expensive universities, give them spiritual
guidance, show them love and affection could still be immoral if their children turn out to
be delinquent. It is not seldom that for all the children misdeeds, society tends to blame
the parents. All of you, public servants, who are pouring so much your time and energy
helping the poor to alleviate their situation will never get any moral credit at all if the
poor remains as they are. Your honest governance will be the source of disappointment if
corruption is not reduced. Police officers are having no moral integrity if crimes are not
eradicated. This MRVFP is just a complete waste of government funds if the level of
public perception towards government officials remains as low as ever. And all sermons
delivered in the pulpit are just a waste of breathe if people continue to commit their sins.
Hence, we say: the ends cannot define the morality of the act; results cannot be the
measure of our moral standard. Pragmatism can only make sense to certain extend but
that cannot be the ground of morality because, even for its advocates, it is not meant to
be. If pragmatism is not the theory that we are looking for, then let us move on in our
search.

Ang maayong binuhatan, maayo!

This expression is obviously tautological. We heard this from our katigulangan,
and this is exactly what Kant exactly says. Don’t make mistake of underestimating the
profundity of our ancestors wisdom expressed herein. Take note: the goodness lies on the
binuhatan, not on the sangputanan. This doesn’t mean that si lolo ug si lola have no
concern about the sangpunatan. Of course they do, but what are they trying to say is that
the binuhatan has its own moral gravity independent to that of the end. When you know
you had been doing your best, spend so hard time in study in order to pass the exam the
next day yet you still fail, you have not made a mistake contrary to what the pragmatist
might say. The belief that fraudulence and deception are necessary components in
winning election stands in a crisis in the cases of Capt. Trellianes and Fr. Panlilio, and
Grace Gabaca. In the same manner, if you are trying to be honest in your governance yet
the government as a whole remains corrupt, your effort was not morally useless. And if
we push the situation to the extreme, given our government is beyond redemption from
corruption, at least, still one moral option is left, don’t be apart of it. If evil is inevitable,
at least, don’t participate. The common counsel of despair says: if you can’t beat them
join them. So we hear people in the government today, so what can we do, it’s just how
government works?2 This is undoubtedly true. But I don’t think, people are not aware of
such shrewd justification reinforced by foolish method of reasoning. The act of justifying
evil is evil twice. I don’t think God made us to be savior of the world… but if you can’t
save the world, at least, save yourself, don’t sink yourself together with the whole ship.
The ancient philosophers said, virtue is its own reward. Kant follows this
thought: Doing good for goodness’ sake. And so why we ought to do good? Because it
is good to do good. Obviously a tautology that good is categorical good. That means
2
Please see my article Mao man Gyud Na!
what is good for one is good for the other; and if it is evil for the other, it cannot be good
for you. Because running honestly during election does not favor the possibility of
winning, would it then be justifiable to engage into fraudulence in order to win for what
else does a candidate seek but to win? Since we are already done with pragmatism, let us
ask another way of questioning in line with Kant’s thought. Given an honest candidate,
with moral integrity lost the election, was his being honest a mistake? I don’t think a
reasonable person would answer to this question affirmatively. He loses his candidacy
not self-respect. He does not loss himself, people lost him. His goodness can’t become
evil simply because he did not win. One must continue doing good. A politician of “high
standing” told me head on in one of my talks, but how can you do good if you lose? I
was reduced to silence for a moment because I realized my mistake of looking so highly
of him for his question reveals to me that he was actually of “low standing”. Actually, I
don’t understand what he exactly meant for his question appeared to me as that there is
no way one can do good if he/she lose the public office. This is dreadful. I suspect he
wanted to tell me COMELEC official victorious declaration justifies all fraudulence that
was happening during the whole electoral process. Absurd reasoning, isn’t it? Just like
any other traditional politicians, he thinks that winning is everything that matters thereby
justifying all the means in order to get to the ends. He admittedly said, mao gyud Padir.
I was not able to say a word for a while and was taken aback because I was thinking all
the while that I was dealing with leaders, people who make moral decisions in behalf of
the Agusanon, including myself, and realizing his way of moral reasoning made me feel
that our future as citizens is doomed. When I heard from him without hesitation mao
gyud na Padir, I said to myself, patay! Because I strongly believe otherwise, that is, good
acts do not require public office. Truly I appreciated his honesty but at the same time it
gave me an idea that this Moral Recovery and Value Formation Program has still a very
long way to go.

Sense of ought
Finally, Kant insists that goodness is not just an option, it is a duty. Knowledge of
the good is always accompanied by inclination to do it. As in medieval metaphysics:
good is desirable. Reversely speaking, again for anybody with right reason, evil naturally
bridges repugnance. This is precisely why Kant called his moral theory, imperative.
Doing good is a must. But he was very quick to clarify that this imperative is by no
means imposed from the outside. It compels the moral person from within for any
external factor would eventually constitute such the act to have no moral merit.
Autonomy of the will is crucial in moral action. A good act even if it renders good results
but without freedom, or even if freedom is just partially curtailed, do not constitute a
moral act. Furthermore, Kant says that the expression “I will” implies “I can”. A man
of moral integrity does not simply stands neutral before the good. Deep down in him,
there seem to be an inner force embedded in his nature that catapults him to do it. Failure
to do the good, constitute the victory of evil. For evil to triumph it is enough that good
men will do nothing, the popular dictum goes.
There is no question that Kant always links his moral imperative to his belief in
God and therefore the groundings of morality have always spiritual dimensions. For
Kant, moral law is holy. It must be inviolable. Moral law is held with reverence and that
no one must abominate. Value formation hinges on the lofty ideal of moral principles.
When leaders are without possession of these ideals, I don’t think they can resist the
pitfalls of the morality of the base, such as, winning is all that matters.

Gyges
Before I end my exhortation let me share with you the parable of Gyges from The
Republic of Plato. This story in fact was common to the inhabitants of the ancient city of
Athens during the heyday of philosophy in Greece. Gyges is a name of a person who
happened to be one of the many shepherds of a king. He was a simple person with
simple ambition in life yet had a very strong sense of morality. Being a highly moral
person he was contend with what he already had and that to be able to render his service
to the king with all sincerity and earn something enough to raise his little family. One day
when he was tending the flock the weather seems to be bad, the storm came, the clouds
were thick which darken the place, and an earthquake shook the field creating a crack on
the ground that some of the sheep fell into it. And so Gyges looked after them down in
almost zero visibility. He did his best to save but some were already covered under and
that situation was getting more dangerous so that he cannot afford to risk himself too
much. Gyges was compelled to let go some of his sheep. At any rate, mysteriously he
saw an image of a man somewhat naked with a ring in his finger. Since he does not have
time, he simply took the ring and went up back for safety. The next day, Gyges went to
the inventory meeting of the king’s shepherd. Seated at the last seat, Gyges happened to
be wearing the ring. At certain point Gyges noticed his fellow shepherds looking for him
when he was just practically in their company. At first he did not understand what was
going on but he realized later on that whenever he turned the vessel of the ring inside
himself he becomes invisible. Gyges did it again and again, and it did work. When he
realized that he had the powers to become invisible, the first thing that he did was to
make his way up to the court of the king, murdered him, seduced the queen, and usurped
the throne. Plato closes this parable with a question: If you are guaranteed to be able to
do anything without anybody knowing it, would you do it? Given the powers that are in
you right now, and that in spite of being public persons you still have plenty of rooms for
doing actions which the public will never know, would you do it? Or would you
succumb to the same pitfalls of Gyges?

Conclusion
For a man in the street, the previous discussion may sound too academic in spite
of the fact that we truly do not mean it to be. But cautious of simplifying Kantian moral
philosophy too much, it can be taken as an appeal to conscience. The whole discussion in
fact reinforces the voice of conscience inscribed by God in each and everyone’s heart so
that by our freedom, we sometimes defy it. Yet, such defiance will not reward us with
self-respect in fact bring us away from the nobility of the profound happiness of which
we can only ignore but not relinquish. The joy which conscience can give us is
irreplaceable. And if morality is a pursuit for man’s well-being, then what else can it be
offered to us if not from the obedience of our conscience. We are always reticent in all
form of happiness of which bad faith brings. On the contrary, the deepest human
satisfaction that a person can have it that which come out from an informed conscience.
An informed conscience is that which being submitted into full exposure vis-à-vis with
other consciences. Conscience is crucial if we want to be truly human. I do not know
how to figure out human beings trashing their conscience in doing moral actions and
continue to think of themselves as humans. If one ignores his conscience, he/she must
redefine his idea what is it to be truly human. Politicians who continue lying and
deceiving their own people to whom they pledge their service have therefore a very hard
time setting things straight if they do still believe in morality.