MANILA, Philippines??We are a people who know how to turn suffering into the gold of the Spirit, into the gold of our character.?

This, to Sr. Teresa of Jesus and Mary, OCD, (well-known former professor and writer Josefina Constantino), a contemplative Carmelite nun in Quezon City, is what Filipinos showed the world during the 1986 EDSA People Power Revolution.

We have lived up to Every Filipino?s name, which is Juan de la Cruz, which is also the name of the Spanish Carmelite mystic St. John of the Cross, Sr. Teresa says. ?Yes, Juan de la Cruz whose doctrine we have interiorized, that the Cross is the royal road to perfection.?

Sr. Teresa recalls that when the late Manila Archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin called on the people to go to EDSA (Epifanio delos Santos Avenue), the contemplatives could not be there physically, ?so we prostrated ourselves in prayer.?

The nuns were literally down on the floor many hours of the day.

At that time, presidential candidate Corazon Aquino, overtaken by events, had to take refuge at a Carmelite monastery in Cebu.

?Through that call, the Spirit worked on all our people, on all those who had hoped and longed for a call like this,? Sr. Teresa says.

?And the Holy Spirit moved the hearts of all and brought them in multitudes to EDSA,? she adds.

?We are a Marian people and in God?s own time Mary, spouse of the Holy Spirit, gathered us her children to await God?s call to announce to the world that we are a special people who understand the nature of evil, the mystery of suffering and the unconditional love of God.?

Message to world

To Sr. Teresa, that was ?the message of EDSA and our people to the world.?

?We hope that we are learning to live by it. Obedient to God?s design, we are a people always, both and at once crucified and risen?crucified to our own self-love and self-interest, and risen in the Spirit, empowered always to be a new creation every single day for the glory of God and the salvation of all mankind,? she says.

But 23 years after those heady, mystifying days at EDSA, there are those who would downplay its spiritual, political and sociological significance and its message to all nations.

Filipino grit

?Those who are trying to downgrade it now did not understand what it meant,? political analyst Antonio Gatmaitan muses. ?EDSA was our one brief shining moment, our stab at history. The Filipino grit was measured while the world was watching.?

With biblical allusions, Gatmaitan explains: ?Tinimbang tayo nila at hindi tayo nagkulang. Ganun yun (The world weighed us and we were not found wanting. That was what it was.) You cannot recapture that moment but that cannot be taken away or negated. In the perspective of time, you appreciate what it was worth. It was right versus wrong.?

Gift to the world

Journalist Ken Kashiwahara goes back even further: ?People power began with a single shot to the head of the country?s brightest hope in the darkest days of martial law.?

Kashiwahara was traveling with his brother-in-law, former Sen. Benigno Aquino Jr., when the latter was assassinated upon stepping on Philippine soil on Aug. 21, 1983. Aquino was coming home after three years of exile.

?When I heard the shot and saw Ninoy?s bloodied body, I thought all hope had died with him,? Kashiwahara recalls.

?But then I saw the hundreds of thousands who filed past his casket at his home and at Santo Domingo Church and the millions who paid their respects at the funeral. I saw people displaying a rare sense of caring and compassion, not just for the Aquino family but for each other,? he says.

?Three years later, in 1986, that absence of palpable anger and violent confrontation turned into people power, the peaceful overthrow of a brutal dictatorship. It was a message of nonviolent change that echoed in countries around the world, from Asia to Eastern Europe, where people power became a rallying cry for others who demanded freedom and democracy. Ninoy?s gift to this country became the country?s gift to the world.?

Identity, community

?Yes, EDSA 1986 was the Filipino people?s gift to the world,? veteran grass-roots development worker Oscar ?Oca? Francisco agrees.

?It showed what collective action can do to oust a dictatorship. It was our contribution to the growing trend toward democratization, away from outright repressive and authoritarian rule,? he says.

Francisco, who has spent more than three decades in social development among underprivileged communities, says: ?We also showed to the world the power of identity and the people?s sense of community.?

?At EDSA 1986, we were all of a sudden one people. This suggests to us and to the world that in the face of the current global crisis, we should find ways how to go about with the process of renewing identity and solidarity,? he says.

Something special

New Zealand-based Filipino psychiatrist Antonio Fernando, who has done extensive research on happiness, says: ?Even in those desperate times we showed to the world our connectedness to one another. Even the military felt connected with the people. The Filipinos? level of connectivity with one another is something special.?

?I never thought that would happen because we never had that before,? says Inquirer founding chair Eugenia Apostol, still amazed by it all. ?It was our gift to the world. We have no other way to call it.?

Many years have passed since EDSA 1986, a whole generation of Filipinos has been born, but the Filipino people?s message to the world during ?that one brief shining moment? remains unchanged. It has long entered into world history.