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First off, just today I went to Eddie Viilanueva’s campaign site at broeddie2004.com and none of the links work. You have links about his different views, including a political platform, but none brings you anywhere. Perhaps this portends the kind of presidency Bro. Eddie will have: a facade of good and “righteous” governance but with no substance that leads to nowhere.

Ok, ok, so it just might be the error of the webmaster. But the least thing his gung-ho people can do is check the links of an important undertaking such as a Web site, which can be viewed globally. Unless, of course, the good preacher doesn’t care much about Net denizens (who number in the millions, by the way).

Moreover, his Web site mirrors his candidacy. Like FPJ he’s a reluctant candidate, prodded perhaps by his ego when fellow pastors endorsed him as a “righteous” leader who can “save” the country from its present ills. And this is what I’m genuinely afraid of; someone running with a messianic motivation (or should I say, ‘complex’?). He did, after all, admit that God told him to run.

I’m not saying he won’t be a good president. He probably will. He might even be able to truly harness God’s power and bring the Philippines out of her doldrums. But he must learn to wield political, social, religious balance so he can first earn the trust of a majority of his countrymen and unite a divided nation.

Saying that God told him to run is hardly a good beginning to his campaign. It isolates too many people and raises too many questions.

Thus saith me.

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Once upon a time in America televangelist Pat Robertson said that God told him to run for President and he did. And he lost.

Now, in the Philippines, we have charismatic preacher Eddie Villanueva announce that God told him to run for President in the coming May elections. However, he qualified this by saying that God did not tell him he was going to win, but just to run.

Granted that God’s thoughts are higher than man, we still wonder why God would tell Bro. Eddie to run with no promise to win. Is it because in the last elections Christian demagogue Coney Reyes publicly “prophesied” over national TV that Joe de Venecia was going to win the elections and didn’t? Reyes belongs to Bro. Eddie’s flock and they were hard-pressed to explain how God’s bet lost.

Perhaps the Almighty wants the good pastor to muddle the elections in hope that Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo would get the plurality vote. Maybe Gloria is God’s bet this time.

The story goes that, in a meeting of a council of pastors coming from different denominations, they were tryng to get a consensus of who to endorse in the coming elections. Finding none, a pastor then suggested that they pick someone who is righteous. At this time Villanueva excused himself to go to the toilet. While he was gone, someone suggested it should be Eddie Villanueva. When Villanueva came back to the room, his name was on the blackboard as a Presidentiable.

He then told the council that he was only going to run if they could convince his family to make him run. Apparently they did. Then, after hours of prayer, Pastor Eddie emerged to say God had told him to run.

Villanueva’s church, Jesus is Lord Fellowship, boasts of 7 million members nationwide. But they are not as cohesive as the Iglesia Ni Kristo, which always votes as a political bloc. Both the JIL and INK are always courted by politicians during elections.

In the last elections, the JIL endorsed de Venecia. while the INK endorsed Joseph Estrada. We all know who won. But Estrada was ousted and Gloria Arroyo, the running vice-president of de Venecia ascended to the Presidency.

Perhaps someone other than Villanueva will win the Presidential elections and he/she will once again be ousted and Bro. Eddie will somehow find himself taking the Presidential oath.

If that’s how God works, I’d rather be an atheist.

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