MANILA, Philippines (CNS) The daughter of former Philippine President Corazon Aquino said her mother’s words as she lay dying "Take care of each other" were "not meant just for our family". Through tears Kris Aquino-Yap delivered her family’s message to more than 2,000 people who attended her mother’s funeral Aug. 5 in the Manila cathedral, reported the Asian church news agency UCA News.
She spoke about her mother’s work after her presidency and highlighted the foundation Aquino set up to finance vocational projects for poor women and scholarships for young people.
Jesuit Father Catalino Arevalo, Aquino’s spiritual director, said it was precisely this concern for the country and its people that inspired Aquino to agree to run against dictator Ferdinand Marcos in the 1986 election.
In his homily for the two-hour Mass, the theologian said the former president offered herself completely to God, to her country and its people, and to her family.
Following the 1983 assassination of her husband, opposition Sen. Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino Jr., she ran against Marcos in a disputed election that spurred the "people power" revolution that swept her to office. She served as president until 1992.
Father Arevalo had accompanied the Aquinos through their struggles since the 1980s, when they lived in exile in Boston. He was with Aquino during her last days at Makati Medical Center, where she died Aug. 1 at age 76.
He recalled how her faithfulness impressed the late Korean Cardinal Stephen Kim Sou-hwan during his visit to Manila when she was president.
"She is pure of heart, with no desire for power," the Jesuit quoted Cardinal Kim telling him after a 45-minute meeting with the president.
He said the tributes people paid her following her death showed that her sacrifices and service did not go unappreciated.
Outside the cathedral, thousands more mourners stood in the rain-drenched grounds on a day the government declared a national holiday in honor of Aquino.
Throngs of people lined the streets or walked behind the hearse as it took Aquino’s coffin to Manila Memorial Park, where she was to be buried next to her husband.
"Cory! Cory!" they chanted, in scenes reminiscent of her presidential campaigns. The streets were a sea of yellow T-shirts and confetti; yellow came to symbolize "people power." Fire trucks along the way blasted their horns and shot water into the air in tribute.
East Timorese President Jose Ramos-Horta, in Manila for the funeral, recounted how the frail cancer-stricken Aquino insisted on seeing him when he visited the Philippines last year.
"I offered to go to her because she was a greater person, but she insisted on coming to my hotel," Horta said. This made him feel "humbled," he said.
Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, wife of Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, offered her family’s condolences to Aquino’s children at the Aug. 2 wake. She cited "Aquino’s generosity and support" during the six years Anwar spent in prison on what people have said were false charges.
Even Aquino’s personal bodyguard, speaking publicly on the eve of the funeral, remembered how she would offer him a bowl of hot noodles that she herself had cooked at the end of a long day.
Aquino "made ordinary people feel special," said business leader Ramon del Rosario Jr. at the same gathering. "She treated the business community not as piggy banks to be shaken, but as a resource to be tapped," to make life better for people, he added.
He told former Cabinet members, politicians, civic and religious leaders who had joined Aquino’s relatives and friends that the greatest tribute to Aquino is to abide by the tenets by which she lived.
"She deserves her rest," the business leader said. He also urged fellow mourners to defend the democracy that Aquino "worked so hard to restore."