Help Me Believe

I think I am the only Filipino who’s virtually unaffected by Jun Lozada’s terrible expose. The President and all the people accused must be shivering in their toes while desperately planning to discredit him. The rest of the Filipino people must be rightfully excited and hopeful thinking that finally corruption would be unmasked and destroyed.
Yet on the outside, I am numb to the proceedings and hearings. I watch them occasionally, and I must admit that I believe in Lozada’s words. He looks sincere, and his testimony is logical and simple; which is very unlike what the Administration wants us to believe.
On the inside, however, I am ambivalent. I want to believe that justice would be served. I want corruption to end. I want change, real change. My country doesn’t deserve this kind of leadership. It doesn’t deserve to slowly rot under its own grime and refuse.
Nevertheless, the cynic in me does not believe that justice can be found in this world. If it were so, the victims of the Enron fiasco would have been repaid with what thieves and deceivers owed them. The perpetrators would have faced jail, and not die in luxury while waiting for the next trial. The blood of the slain journalists in my country would have been appeased by the punishment of those who killed them. Their families have only empty promises in their hands. The victims of the Khmer Rouge would have seen these criminals suffer for the brutality of their reign. Two decades have passed, but not even one has paid.
I am like the man in Mark 9:11-29 praying to Jesus for his son to be freed from an evil spirit. I know that God can do what I think is impossible, and I want to believe that he still does it. This country would then be a far cry from where we are now when honesty becomes the norm and not the exception, when high profile criminals are served justice, and when the money for government actually goes to government projects and not to politicians’ pouches.
“Lord, I believe… Please help my unbelief.”