Jose Rizal

Think of it: If, just before he was executed by the order of Catholic Spanish friars, Rizal retracted from his series of attacks against the abuses of the church, Rizal could have been the first saint the Catholic Philippines ever canonized. After all, in the sainthood roster, virtually all of the saints of the church were first sinners, and then in the end found themselves kneeling down before the power of God, a.k.a. the Roman Catholic Church. For my part, after I am dead and I meet with God, this is what I will say: “God, when will you stop bragging about your supernatural power? Please go and visit the Philippines. Please God, see for yourself just exactly how, during these past five hundred years, Christianity has kept the Filipino mindless as a people still stuck under your divine wisdom; and has kept the Philippines heartless as a nation still stuck under your divine guidance.” In the meantime, we Filipinos could have been 500 years ahead of our time if it hadn't been for the Catholic Church dragging science and human dignity down the drain and executing our best thinkers by musketry like it did our Dr. Jose Rizal. A Filipino who wrote: “be careful, choose well, for this world is full of deceit, and deceivers” - cannot be anything but a great thinker. Rizal, indeed, was the greatest Filipino thinker. He had the courage to introduce social sanity in our society where the Catholic religion has only given birth to social stupidity. Poch Suzara