My column last July 6 titled “Sinner or saint” was controversial because of its gutsy idea.

The main point of my column is a quixotic dream: to elect a transformational leader who will transform our political culture from bad to lawful. Consequently, it should also transform our constituency from mediocre to knowledgeable.

We suggested that the concept to be communicated to the public was an unexpected one:  “Sa 2016 ipagdasal mo, pangulong santo.”

When asked for comments, many readers reacted with deafening silence and wide-eyed wonder. Dumbfounded. I guess quixotic dreams are better kept to one’s self.

The promise is sound.

We are a Christian country with a Christian culture. We can tap this culture as the springboard for strategizing and planning for a transformational leader and consequently, a transformational constituency. Hence, the plan is spiritual: “Sa 2016 ipagdasal mo, pangulong santo.”

Immediately a text message came from my former client and friend, Henry Yao, who said, “It won’t work. History is full of samples where the idea failed.”

Henry is my source of oriental wisdom culled from Chinese antiquity.

My friend Greg Garcia III, a veteran political propagandist, echoes Henry’s conclusion. Greg cited the failures of Eddie Villanueva, who heads the Jesus is Lord congregation, in getting elected, and the frustrated priest Among Ed of Pampanga who tried to bring integrity and honesty to his provincial offices.

Divisiveness

Following Greg and Henry’s observation, Gandhi, the Holy Man of India, also failed to transform the vast and multi-layered societies of India. And the Dalai Lama, as a spiritual and temporal leader, is in limbo nowadays. The theocratic leaders in the Middle East are now bedeviled by the divisiveness of fundamentalists, the result of  heady freedom spawned by the Arab spring.

Quixotic it may be, nobody disagreed with the noble intent of the proposal: “Sa 2016 ipagdasal mo, pangulong santo.”

The big hurdle is assigning holiness as a credential for a transformational political leader. The people’s problem is lack of faith.

On hindsight, to pray for the election of a holy president may require that the one who prays must be in pursuit of holiness himself.

One cannot be an angel while the other remains a mediocre supplicant.

The gigantic task is for the Filipino Catholics themselves to pursue holiness as a people.

“Be ye perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.”

“Without me you can do nothing.”

Bishop Soc Villegas, head of the Catholic Bishop Conference of the Philippines, in a recent TV interview, was asked by Tina Monzon-Palma how the Catholic Church can help transform our society. The good Bishop answered, “The Catholic schools must produce saints.”

This is not the first time Bishop Soc said this.

In a talk delivered to Catholic school administrators a couple of years ago, Bishop Soc said the same thing: “Catholic schools must produce saints.”

Up to now, we do not know whether the management of Catholic schools have come up with a creative template to fulfill Bishop Soc’s exhortations. School authorities could still be wide-eyed and dumbfounded, too.

The pursuit of sainthood, sanctity or holiness is one and the same thing.

However, some misconceptions exist.

People in today’s generation may regard sainthood or holiness as intimidating.

The idea of sainthood was a principal undertaking of clerics in the Middle Ages, when the Church canonized many saints.

Not chic

It sounds ancient. Not chic for modern times.

The popular images of saints pertain to the early Christian martyrs who were fed to the lions in the Roman coliseum; cloistered monks or nuns; monastics who shunned the outside world for its sinfulness; priests and religious orders who took the vow of celibacy, poverty and obedience to concentrate on a life of prayer and acts of piety; or missionaries who died for their faith in the hands of pagan tribes in foreign lands, like our own saints, St. Lorenzo Ruiz and St. Pedro Calungsod.

Rejoice! Today’s men and women have a winsome way to holiness. It’s user-friendly and doable for all individuals who live in our modern society.

The winsome way to holiness is called sanctification of work. And the support system is the patronage of Divine Filiation.

This concept is put forward by St. Josemaria Escriva, a saint for the modern times. His ideas are deeply rooted in the New Testament.

As a young priest in 1928, St. Josemaria experienced a vision for a “mobilization of Christians disposed to sacrifice their lives with joy for others to render divine all the ways of man on earth, sanctifying every upright work, every honest labor, every earthly occupation.”

There blossomed from St. Josemaria’s vision a behavior and attitude, a palpable, close relationship with God due to  human work sanctified and a vivified awareness of the fatherhood of God.  It’s so imitative of the life of Jesus Christ as the carpenter from Galilee doing his Father’s will on earth as the God-man, the second person of the Holy Trinity.

Sanctification of work embraces everything, manual or mental. Every work habit is imbued with holiness. Every work becomes a prayer offering: the student studying his lesson, the father earning a living, the mother keeping the house tidy and orderly, the businessman making an honest profit, the doctor healing the sick, the government bureaucrat giving unselfish service, the rock star belting out his song, the basketball hero shooting his triples, the poet writing poetry, the painter creating an obra maestra, the janitor cleaning the washroom. The list is endless.

Tribute

Everything that man can do to be the best that he can be, sanctified as a form of personal prayer, is his tribute to God.

All good work when offered to God is constant, and linked with God’s grace. It gets its sustenance from the sanctifying grace given in the sacraments, especially from frequent confession and the reception of the Holy Eucharist. The inner peace and joy that resonate naturally become  man’s love for his family, his neighbor, his fellow Filipinos, the whole human kind.

When all lay Catholics begin to pursue holiness seriously through their earthly work and duties, their sanctification of work takes effect to enable a transformational leader, and consequently a transformational constituency.

The concept of “Sa 2016 ipagdasal mo, pangulong santo” will not be an impossible dream anymore. There will be no lack of faith. We will move mountains.

“Ask and it will be given.”

“Seek and you shall find.”

“Knock and the door will be opened.”

My friend, the late saintly Jesuit priest Fr. James Reuter, counselor and idol to thousands of youth and married couples, has a beautiful prayer. Before our every performance in the Ateneo Glee Club, he would lead us to say this prayer before the curtains open.

“Lord God, look down upon us this day, this hour. Regardless of what has gone before or what will come after.

“Give us the grace to consecrate this time entirely to You, all the actions of our body and soul.

“May the thoughts that come to us be true.

“May all the things to which our hearts go out be beautiful with the beauty of God.

“May all the things we want be good.

“Give us the light to see your will and the grace to love it, and the courage and strength to do it.

“We ask you this through Christ our Lord. Amen.”

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