My dad followed her a few months after. There, all three of us siblings were born.
I now carry a blue passport. It’s a privilege I’m very thankful for.
My wife, Dinah, went to New Zealand a few months after graduating from college to take up a second degree in fashion design.
Three years after, she was granted her citizenship.
She’s now a Kiwi.
In the future, our kids will have the precious option of choosing between U.S. or N.Z. citizenship.
What a privilege indeed. Despite our foreign citizenships, however, whenever someone asks my wife or me what’s our nationality, it’s automatic for us to say “Filipino”.
Even when I’m in the U.S., I don’t tell people I’m American. I say, “I was born in New York” and let them conclude that I’m a citizen.
But nothing will take away the fact that I’m a Filipino — no matter what my passport says.
All that said, before I am a citizen of this great country, I am first and foremost a citizen of heaven.
Born from the very heart of God, a product of His love, a masterpiece design by His own hand.
You are, too. And even if every now and then we choose to reside in sin, travel astray or even migrate to other gods, nothing can take away the fact that we are His children. Not a few have given the term “Filipino” a negative connotation. All sorts of preconceived notions come along with this identity. But deep within, I believe the Filipino is great.
Because every Filipino is first and foremost a child of God.
We have a great Father. We just have to strive to be like Him.
I hope and pray this new series will help you do just that.
And if you attend faithfully and consistently this month, I believe you will walk away with a renewed sense of pride and desire to bring out and sing about your true magnificence.
Are you ready?
Handa… awit!
In Him,
GEORGE GABRIEL
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