The Word of God leads to salvation

The Roman Catholic Church is giving us opportune time to rediscover our love and zeal for the Lord through the deepening of our knowledge and understanding of the Sacred Scriptures.

There is a reason why, during the early years, the Church forbade people from reading the Bible. The Church only wanted to be sure that when people read the Bible, they would understand the message and what the writer of the Bible meant. That the message of the literature in the Bible would not be taken out of context.

This Third Sunday of Ordinary Time is marked as the “Sunday of the Word of God” to spend some time and effort to get to know more about the Word of God contained in the Scriptures.

Jesus went to Galilee, a region that was mainly centered in Jerusalem and Judea back then, because it was highly symbolic and meaningful as it represented the Lord’s desire to gather back all of His scattered people and to restore the honor of the people of God, and at the same time call upon the people from distant lands and from the pagan nations to embrace the truth and love God.

And in the Gospel today, again that same prophecy from the prophet Isaiah was repeated, proclaiming the coming of God’s salvation as made true and real by the actions that the Lord carried out in Galilee, as He called His first disciples and gathered them all, choosing the 12 among them to be His Apostles, while performing many miracles and wonders, healing the sick who came to Him and were brought to Him. He went from place to place, healing the sick, casting out demons, making the blind see again, opening the ears of the deaf, and loosening the tongues of the mute, fulfilling the many prophecies that Isaiah and the other prophets had been proclaiming about the Messiah.

Like the Apostles, we have received the same truth and Good News, and it was through them and their successors that we have received this truth, passed down successively through the generations through the Church of God.

Today, we are reminded that as we commemorate this “Sunday of the Word of God” we have been called by God to various ministries and callings in life, depending on the various gifts, talents, and abilities that He has given us. All of us have been called to embrace the Lord’s calling of not only just knowing and appreciating the Word of God more in our lives, but also proclaiming the Word of God and the truth of God in the midst of our respective communities, in our schools and workplaces, with our families, relatives and circle of friends and acquaintances, and even to strangers whom we encounter daily in our lives. And we cannot be effective and faithful servants of the Lord and His Word unless we have good knowledge and understanding of the Scriptures.

All of us are encouraged to read the Sacred Scriptures and deepen our knowledge and understanding of it. However, it is important that we also deepen our knowledge and understanding of the teachings of the Church as well because if we read the Scriptures and interpret them based on our own understanding and comprehension, then as history has shown us, this can lead us to the path of error, as the many heresies and the false paths had done.

That is why, first of all, we need to spend more time reading the Scriptures because how can we even begin to discern if something we heard from elsewhere or others is true or false? Especially during this time of rapid information exchange and greater availability of information from all sources, it is very easy to be swayed by falsehoods, just as misinformation and fake news have been making the rounds of the world in the past few years.

It is also important that we help one another stay on the path of truth by sharing with one another whatever insight and understanding we have of the Scriptures, rooted in the traditions and teachings of the Church and the Apostles.

“Especially during this time of rapid information exchange and greater availability of information from all sources, it is very easy to be swayed by falsehoods.

“Like the Apostles, we have received the same truth and Good News, and it was through them and their successors that we have received this truth.

“A Just like Ressa and Robredo, those who praised the Court of Tax Appeals decision as a victory for press freedom have it all wrong.

acquitting Ressa. The Court of Tax Appeals ruled that the transaction between Rappler and Omidyar did not give rise to a taxable income on the part of Rappler.

In other words, it was a simple tax case resolved in favor of the taxpayer, nothing more, nothing less.

Right after the Court of Tax Appeals came out with its ruling, Ressa announced to the media that her acquittal was not only welcome news to her, but a victory for everyone unjustly accused of wrongdoing.

That notwithstanding, Ressa’s supporters, the gullible and politicized ones in particular, made it appear to the public that her tax evasion case was an attempt by the administration of then-President Rodrigo Duterte to censor Rappler because of its commentaries critical of Duterte.

One of these was former Vice President Leni Robredo, a known Ressa supporter. Robredo suddenly came out of her political oblivion and social irrelevance and sweepingly declared the appellate court’s decision a victory for press freedom.

Good heavens! Robredo gave a public statement without bothering to fully comprehend the nature of Ressa’s tax evasion case. Robredo’s habit of talking without first thinking is one of the many reasons why the bulk of the electorate rejected her in the 2022 presidential election.

Other groups exploited the situation by claiming that Ressa’s acquittal was a triumph over government censorship and mouthing similar mantras espoused by communists and their sympathizers.

Just like Ressa and Robredo, those who praised the Court of Tax Appeals decision as a victory for press freedom have it all wrong.

The Supreme Court has already categorically ruled that a news media organization, just like other private enterprises in the Philippines, must pay taxes on all of its taxable transactions.

In other words, a news media organization is not exempt from paying income tax just because its business of disseminating the news is protected by the free press clause of the Constitution. To repeat, the Supreme Court said so.

Thus, when the BIR believed that the Omidyar transaction created an income tax liability on the part of Rappler, and that Rappler did not pay the required income tax due on the transaction, the former instituted tax evasion charges against Ressa, as head of Rappler.

To repeat, the tax aspect of the case was very complicated, and the possibility of an acquittal for Ressa was not improbable on the legal premises.

The case Ressa won is simply a tax evasion case which the Court of Tax Appeals resolved in her favor. Ressa’s acquittal has nothing to do with press freedom. In fact, from the start of the tax evasion case until Ressa’s acquittal, Rappler was never closed down by the government. Rappler even continued its business of disseminating the news completely unimpeded, up to the present.

Even if Ressa’s conviction were sustained by the Court of Tax Appeals, and later by the Supreme Court, Rappler can continue to operate freely, and without censorship from the government.

Where then is the press freedom issue in the acquittal of Ressa in the tax evasion case against her? There isn’t any. The fanfare Ressa and her allies are creating is simply a lot of brouhahas.