Cardinal Sin's 'visit'
By Denis Murphy
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 21:34:00 03/19/2008
CARDINAL Jaime Sin came around the corner of my home and across the small garden to where I was sitting under the shade. His white soutana and blood-red cincture gleamed in the morning sun. I hadn't heard the gate open; neither had there been a peep from the neighbor's young dog, which barks at anything, even at small birds in the trees. The cardinal looked as fit as he did in 1974 when he took over the Archdiocese of Manila.
"Denis, I'm glad I caught you in. How are you?" He offered no big embrace as was his wont.
What do you say to such a wonderful ghost? Nothing for a while, then I managed, full of Irish foreboding about the dead.
"Eminence, it's better I ask how are you?"
"Ho, ho, I'm fine, never better, Denis. I'm here about that obituary," he said suddenly. He usually didn't get to business so quickly. "I heard about it from Sister C who joined us the other day." When he said this, he looked up to the clouds and then sat down.
The cardinal's obituary. It was years ago. I had been asked some months before his death to write his obituary for UCAN News Service, so they'd have something on file whenever he died. I agreed to do it, but delayed for one reason or another, till the Cardinal took a bad turn, and I realized I better get busy. When I called Villa San Miguel for an appointment, Sister C wanted to know what my business was. I told her it was about the Cardinal's obituary.
She gasped in horror. "Dear God, you can't do that. What's wrong with you anyway? He's a very sick man. No, No, No! You can't see him."
The cardinal was dead within two weeks.
"We can do it now, the interview," the cardinal told me. "What did you want to ask?"
I was not six feet from him, closer than when I saw him last in his casket in the cathedral, with that wisp of a smile still on his face, a smile that told the mourners, "Don't be so sad. I'm still around."
Why not do the interview?
"All right, Eminence." I turned on a small tape recorder that was on the table between us.
"It was said recently that Rome asked you not to get involved in Edsa I. Is that so?" I began.
He looked at his watch and gestured to my dog to come closer. The poor dog had never seen anything in the garden like the cardinal, dead or alive.
"Not just me, Denis; the other bishops also, all of us. We had written a letter after the "snap election" saying (President Ferdinand) Marcos had lost the moral authority to rule, you remember."
"But you went ahead despite Rome's advice, didn't you?"
"It wasn't the Holy Father's. If it were, we would have stopped. We wouldn't fight him ever. Yes, there was a message from the Vatican, but not from the Holy Father. You know, Denis, I don't hear any criticism of Edsa I where I am now."
"What about Edsa II?"
"I prefer we don't talk about that."
There was a story there and I waited, but that was all he'd say about Edsa II.
"Eminence, what advice do you have for your brother bishops of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines today?"
"Sometimes it's best not to say anything."
"Is that all, Eminence? Many people are criticizing the bishops."
"You know, up above where I am now, there's little talk of presidents and the rich and powerful. Perhaps surprisingly to some, there's also little talk of bishops. The concern up above is for the poor. They talk about the poor, they worry about the poor. Poor people are at the center of their thinking. They have a poor person's point of view. This is how it works."
The cardinal paused for a few moments, then continued, "I was in the Sto. Niño Church in Tondo last week at a Mass for Truth. I'm permitted to do things like that. The quietly inspiring Bishop Broderick Pabillo said the Mass. He talked about truth and corruption. I listened, but my attention focused on the small children of the poor going around the Church barefoot, asking the congregation for a few coins. A little girl passed right in front of me. She was four or five years old, barefoot and wearing a ragged little dress that was gray with dirt. I worried about her. What will happen to her in the years to come? It was nine o'clock at night, so I wondered where she would sleep? I felt bad that in our country there are still little children who are so poor because of corruption."
He stopped. He was winded. "Sorry, I got off the subject, didn't I?"
"Maybe not, Eminence."
"Anyway I wasn't to stress that up above attention is on the poor. We must focus on the poor. That's the main thing. Am I clear?"
"Yes, Eminence, you are. I have my notes and its being recorded. I'll write it up and show it to you."
When I tried to replay the cardinal's words later to write this, I found the tape was empty. There were no words from the cardinal.
The reader will have to take my word that this story is all true.
Denis Murphy works with the Urban Poor Associates. His email address is upa@pldtdsl.net.
