How to be a true patriot in this challenging time
Author Charlie Gamboa’s latest book, “The Country I Love: My Philippines,” is remarkable for several reasons.
First, he wrote it shortly after he moved, late in life, to another country. Perhaps this is his way of reaffirming his undying love for the land of his birth. (At present, he divides his time between the Philippines and Canada.)
Second, it is the only recent book I know which has taken a close look at the serious social ills and challenges our country faces today, puts them in perspective according to the author’s personal insights, and suggests a holistic and practical approach to addressing them in our daily lives.
And third, the author’s zealous love of country, born of deep introspection, shines throughout the whole work, springing from and driven by the solid Christian values and teachings he grew up with.
I realized all this when I read the initial manuscript Gamboa sent me after I agreed to his request to write the foreword for his book. Hopefully, my contribution not only gives an idea of the timeliness of his work, but also of his unique way of expressing everyday patriotism, using as examples the lives of ordinary Filipinos he has known. Below is what I wrote.
Passionate
To fully appreciate this latest book of Gamboa, “The Country I Love: My Philippines,” one needs to have a good idea of the author himself, the essential Charlie Gamboa.
Gamboa never does anything half-baked. He is passionate about everything he believes in, and his undertakings in various aspects of life carry his unique brand of zealousness. The title of his autobiography, “Audacious Journey of Hope,” very aptly describes his bold attitude and approach to living.
He has manifested this trait from his youth to today’s mature years—from joining the La Salle Christian Brothers in his college years, to taking his young family along to become a lay missionary in Pakistan; from being a serious boxing enthusiast who put up his own boxing gym, to being an avid motorcycle rider who has traversed the length of the country on his big bike; from being an entrepreneur venturing into diverse businesses, to uprooting himself from his comfort zone and moving to a foreign land later in life to build a second home and immerse himself in a new culture—and new pursuits.
For Gamboa, all his significant life activities have always been undertaken as part of his search for meaning and purpose: a quest for what life is all about by fully experiencing life itself through the diverse opportunities it presents to him.
Being both introspective and analytical, Gamboa has always managed to extract his unique insights, and glean the essential meaning and purpose behind life events—from a spiritual perspective based on Christian principles and his solid Catholic upbringing. His last book before this one, launched earlier in 2023, titled “The End in Mind,” is a dramatic example of Charlie’s penchant for deep introspection in his approach to life’s ultimate purpose. Briefly, Gamboa’s key message in that book is that a person should be clear on how to live his life by viewing it as its end, and working backwards to see whether the way he lived conforms to its ultimate goal from an eternal perspective.
In this new work, Gamboa has shifted focus to delve into the development and the significant aspects of his personal patriotism, i.e. his love for his country.
Faith, hope, and love
He has also included some chapters on the different perspectives and experiences of some of our Filipino countrymen on the subject.
His basic insight and message are simple but powerful: loving God through our Christian/Catholic religion also calls for loving our neighbors, i.e. our countrymen, and hence our country, with the same fervor and commitment. To do this, the most essential values our religion has ingrained in us are the same basic foundation we can build on and use to give concrete expression to our love of country: faith, hope, and love. In short, the theological virtues applied further.
Of these three, Gamboa emphasizes hope, the value strongly rooted in the Filipino character which is constantly manifested in our famous resilience as a people, in the face of every kind of adversity—natural disasters, armed conflicts, below-subsistence-level poverty, and most especially our so-called leaders’ gross misgovernance and endemic corruption, which keep our country mired in a seemingly endless vicious cycle.
The author takes us on his progressively enlightening personal journey, especially through his exposure to the lives of ordinary fellow Filipinos—struggling and courageously persevering—who as a whole are the true backbone and movers of our country. For a wider and more intimate perspective, he has also included the personal accounts of fellow Filipinos from different sectors of our society.
The essence of this richly insightful and paradigm-shifting book can be best captured in the words of out-of-the-box thinker and audacious author Gamboa himself:
“A gradual paradigm shift from love of God alone to love of country with faith occurred in me as I witnessed the significance and meaning of being psychologically and spiritually aware of the humongous social and political problems we have in the Philippines. Religion alone cannot save our country. But a combination of our faith and patriotism is vital in seeking a solution to resolve the social and political ills of our nation.”
“The Country I Love: My Philippines” by Charlie Gamboa is available on Amazon. Call tel. no. 0917-8503681 or email cugamboa@yahoo.com.
