“CHEER as the victor passes by,” states an old school dictum for losers.

In life it is winning that matters to all and losers never get much help since they failed in the contest or match.

Good sportsmanship means one has to be prepared with all his mind and body and spirit to achieve a certain goal. Then after having trained for years and years and reaching a noteworthy level of skill one competes for the higher goal and…loses.

For the individual especially, this is a reversal of fortune, a downturn, a negative result of something hoped for. In such cases, we are advised by gurus in sports and even in the theatre of life to take it like a man and admit to having done only as a second and not first. Then we are advised to cheer as the victor goes by harboring no rancor in our hearts.

In the just-concluded political competition for the U.S. presidency, we have two individuals formally vested to run for a specific political party – George W. Bush and John Kerry. Like any competition held in full view of the public in the area of political and social life, there were followers, a cheering squad so to speak, for either of the two contestants.

And there may have been betting in cash or in kind not only in the U.S. but all over the world.

Who won was the candidate who is recorded to have received the vote of the majority of the population. Thereafter, the winning is only the beginning of another fight – serving.

Not obvious to many citizens is the fact that once in office, the day-to-day decision-making is another type of fight to win. Deciding for a cause is also gauged on whether it was a winning decision for the majority or not.
And this decision-making, fact-finding process is a cycle that goes on and on until the end of the term – which is four years.

Viewed from the spiritual and non-material aspect, philosophers often say, “Winning is not everything…but making second best is also worthy of praise.” For the gambler or achiever, the motto is, “Winning is not everything. But it is the only thing!”

And when one like this person does not make it, to him it is like the end of the world, yes his world perhaps. But life goes on for the second best or the loser.

In fact, life teaches us to take losing as a winning element and a learning process.

We learn from setbacks, faults, mistakes and others which actually constitutes loses. When you fall, get up and move on is another dictum.
Speaking one day to a non-Christian observer, this author was taken aback when he said that Christianity goes by a philosophy of losers. For the gentleman referred to was a devout and practicing Buddhist. For in his religion, life is to be lived and to be won.

Buddha himself is prosperous and not emaciated. He said looking up at the Crucifix, “How can you follow a teaching that begins with defeat…like your leader on the Cross. To us that is a loser and not a winner.”

So, perhaps this summarizes many young uninformed Christians desirous of practicing his Christian beliefs and teachings from Christ when he is faced with so many restrictions on behavior, morality and way of living.

Then he sees crass materialistic values around him practiced by other Christian sects or denominations which unlike the Roman Catholic religion whose doctrines are defined by the Holy Father in Rome and forbidden under pain of eternal damnation.

In some cases, Filipino homegrown Catholics of pre Vatican II discipline are rigid so that the younger generation of Catholic Filipinos who come and live in the U.S. observe U.S. Catholics and say that the latter is more ‘practical” vis a vis the Filipino brand of Catholicism which is punitive.

For it must be understood that when Spain took over the Philippines it imposed a national religion which was Catholicism. Other religions at the time were banned in the country until later years when sober minds redefined how Filipino Catholics would behave.

But until the late 50s, incidents in Philippine society still reeked of puritanism.

But that is the subject for another column.

Posted 12/13/2004