 |
| Top to bottom clockwise: The Jackie Robinson statue outside Dodger Stadium, Pope Francis, a Pakistani female footballer (from Benjamin Zand's report), and Mashal Khan who was killed by a mob. |
An Easter Reflection
by rick olivares
In his Easter Sunday, April 16,
message to the faithful, Pope Francis reminded all to recall “the risen Christ”
and not to ignore the plight of those seeking refuge from war, hunger, poverty,
and social injustice.
A timely and pressing message in
this day and age. Rising above it. Boy, do I know all about that. And how.
How poignant is the day?
Coincidentally and interestingly,
on the same day, in the United States -- 12-15 hours behind us in the
Philippines -- it was the 20th Anniversary of the league-wide
retirement of Jackie Robinson’s #42.
April 15, 1947 was the day where
Robinson smashed the color barrier when he played first base for the Brooklyn
Dodgers to begin a trying but ultimately remarkable 10-year career in Major
League Baseball. Twenty years ago, the late Robinson’s number was retired from
use from all professional baseball teams. It was a decree that was well met by
both teams and their fans.
Thousands of miles away, British
Broadcasting Corporation reporter Benjamin Zand’s photo and video report about
Karachi, Pakistan, was posted on the broadcaster’s website. Zand met up with
some forward thinking people working to remove the stain of the Taliban and
violence in that country and to make Pakistan a better place.
In his report, Zand reported
about the plight of female footballers who aren’t only widely accepted but have
to deal with the violent backlash by the Taliban. Noted Zand, “However, those
working towards reform, including members of the nation’s growing music
community, feel that the reward is worth the risk.”
Imagine that? Your life is at
risk for playing a game of football? All because some people would rather have
you live like a stone aged hermit?
I think these two matters – an
event and a report – distinctly unrelated yet are so important to the next step
we the human race take especially with the world a more dangerous place today.
Especially for Pakistan that is
still reeling from the death of college student Mashal Khan last Friday, April
14, at the hands of a mob that blamed him for blasphemous comments about Islam
on social media. As investigations have shown, the Facebook comments that was
allegedly posted by Khan, is fake. The Facebook page has since been
mysteriously taken down. No doubt, the it was a deliberate attempt to blackmail
him following the student’s complaints surrounding mismanagement of Abdul Wali
Khan University by certain officials. And whoever put up the fake account
achieved their nefarious and malicious intentions because Khan was killed at
the hands of a brutal and mindless mob that never bothered to check the
veracity of the reports.
The extreme times we live in are
dangerous. It’s difficult to filter the demoralizing news that never seems to
run out and I find myself reading with great interest a CNN International
report that asks, “Can Dubai become the world’s happiest city?”
It’s odd that this city created
out of a desert is bent on transforming Dubai into a smart and happy city. I,
who eschew emojis as a means of showing my feelings, wonder if these digital
icons can indeed bring good cheer in an otherwise insane world.
And that brings me back to Pope
Francis’ message of “rising above it” and to “have hope” as personified by
Jesus Christ’s resurrection. And we as individuals and as a people should “break down all the walls that keep us
locked in our sterile pessimism, in our carefully constructed ivory towers that
isolate us from life, in our compulsive need for security and in boundless
ambition that can make us compromise the dignity of others."
The Pope also denounced the systems and bureaucracies "that strips them (people) of their rights and
shatters their dreams."
And the message is crystal clear
– to break down the walls just as Robinson did and to battle of systems and
bureaucracies that shatter dreams like the female footballers in Karachi.
Life is tough. We make
sacrifices. We break down And we do what we can.
As Zand put it congruently, the
rewards are great.
No comments:
Post a Comment