Rosales to flock: Use Easter's lessons to pick new leaders

The lessons of Christ's resurrection at Easter should inspire Filipinos to choose wisely their next leaders in the May 10 elections instead of lapsing back to the "business as usual" mindset, or the old way of life. Manila Archbishop Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales stressed this Saturday in his Easter message, as he called for prayerful judgment in choosing who to vote for. "How beautiful is the coincidence that Easter always precedes a National Election because the lessons of the Resurrection lead to new life and a new encouraging service. Discern with prayerful judgment as to who the nation should entrust with the task of new and inspiring honest leadership that leads to unity and peace," he said in his message, posted Saturday afternoon on the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines news site. www.cbcpnews.com. Rosales stressed the triumph of Christ over sin and the evils that humans learned and still continue to do, and over death itself, means that after the Resurrection, it can never be “business as usual." He noted that when Christ was resurrected, "He would not be found where we wished to meet Him in the usual spots in the past." Thus, he said Christ's Resurrection announced a new way of behaving, a new way of loving, a new way of serving and how all could be bound by Peace. "After the Resurrection no more shall there be compromising with deceit, dishonesty, and the worship of money and power," he said. Earlier, CBCP president Tandag Bishop Nereo Odchimar urged Filipinos to remain hopeful amid fears of electoral fraud, killings, poverty and other crises that continue to hound the nation in these trying times. "Electoral processes are manipulated by some influential politicians. Suffrage is curtailed by vote-buying-and-selling, various forms of threat, and erratic understanding of Utang na Loob (debt of gratitude)," Odchimar said in his Easter message. —LBG, GMANews.TV