Should bishops lead political actions?

Public Lives
By Randy David
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 02:44:00 02/16/2008

MANILA, Philippines -- The Philippine Daily Inquirer’s editorial Friday, titled “Checkmated bishops,” sharply rebukes the Catholic bishops for refusing to take up the activist role that the late Jaime Cardinal Sin had played in past political crises: i.e., “to make clear to the populace what should be done,” and “to lead the people.” The editorial echoes a popular, if dangerous, view. I am sure the editors will not mind this rejoinder in the spirit of democratic debate.

But, first, a disclosure. My younger brother, Pablo Virgilio David, is auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese of San Fernando City in Pampanga province. He is also a member of the permanent council of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP). The proper role of the clergy in the modern world has been a recurrent topic of our conversations. We have looked at the question critically from the perspective of social theory and of Catholic doctrine. I can say in all candor that my bishop-brother is more open to the idea of the clergy playing an activist role in Philippine political matters during crucial moments, than I am willing to concede as a secular democrat.

The Inquirer editorial states: “If there’s any sector that should have the intellectual sophistication and moral conviction to make clear to the populace what should be done, it should be the Catholic bishops.” I grant the intellectual sophistication and moral conviction of many of our Catholic bishops, but I would not want them, as religious leaders, to tell me what to do or what to believe in politics, or law, or science, or art, etc.

To beg them to tell us what to do or to lead us in the fight against an abusive regime is to authorize them to substitute their judgment for the public’s own evolving opinion. It is one thing to welcome a reading of events from the moral standpoint of the clergy, but it is another to allow that interpretation -- for all its sophistication and conviction -- to dominate the entire horizon of our understanding of the world. I am glad that today’s bishops no longer treat us like children. They have prodded us to form “circles of discernment,” to draw strength from the solidarity we can offer to those who risk their lives as they speak the truth, and to decide as a community what forms of action we should undertake. It is all they should do in a society that aspires to be a democracy. That is not an abdication of their moral duty; it is a prudent recognition of the limits of their authority.

Nations that put religious leaders at the forefront of the State are becoming a thing of the past, notwithstanding the resurgence of a kind of religious fundamentalism that seeks to colonize every sphere of society. Our break from such a tradition was decisive at the very moment of our birth as an independent nation -- in the drafting of the Malolos Constitution. We cannot return to it. No doubt, we continue to feel the influence in our modern lives of a moral code supplied by religion. As an element of our moral identity as a people, it has a positive impact on our society. Be that as it may, I think it is a great setback to be waiting for new Cardinal Sins to make clarion calls summoning us to the EDSA highway [site of people power uprisings -- Editor] or to anywhere else, just as I think it is a setback politically when religious leaders dictate government policy to those they have helped install to power.

I share everything else that the Inquirer editorial expresses in urgent tones. “If the administration has become a constitutional wrecking crew, then what should people of conscience do?” the Inquirer asks. We should trust that conscience is not a monopoly of the bishops. Pope Benedict XVI once said that the role of the clergy is to form and educate consciences, and not to substitute their conscience for that of the laity’s. In the face of a political crisis, many of us will find this papal reminder conservative. But, insofar as it springs from a respect for the autonomy of functional spheres, it is correct, modern, and democratic.

To ask the bishops to instruct us to do more, on account of the moral influence they wield, is to follow a shortcut. It is analogous to begging the military to launch a coup to topple a government, using the armed power that the Constitution has placed in their hands. These are shortcuts because they bypass the longer and circuitous route of political conscientization and organization. Consequently, the regime change that is the fruit of the journey cannot be the achievement of the people themselves. They are brought to where they are without knowing where they are. The journey does not teach them anything about themselves or about politics. A new government is formed in their name, but they cannot see themselves as its authors or its stewards.

If all this sounds familiar, it is because we’ve been there before. In our impatience, we, who think of ourselves as intellectually sophisticated, lead the march for change and leave the rest of the people behind. When the dust settles down, seeing that the people are back to where they came from, we ask, perplexed, why they have gone back to their old ways. The fact is they never left. We did not give them the chance to think for themselves, find their own way, and free themselves.

It bothers me to have to write like this when we appear once more on the verge of a regime change, and all that is needed, it seems, is to get our moral elders to lead the way. I beg to disagree. At the risk of being misunderstood, I consider political action resulting from the slow boil of the people’s anger ultimately more enduring than any dish we can cook with microwave heat.

Crisis of truth

Editorial
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 22:46:00 02/28/2008

The pastoral statement of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), issued Tuesday, takes a few small steps forward and one large step back. No wonder the public is confused. What, in fact, are the bishops saying?

Let’s begin with the obvious. The bishops, meeting in an emergency plenary session, did not call on President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to resign. But whoever expected the bishops to make such an appeal is either a political innocent or an incompetent strategist. Even bishops who are politically active against the Arroyo administration had told their friends in the media beforehand that a resignation call was not—and could not have been—in the cards. Politics, even of the episcopal variety, is the art of the possible.

Short of that unrealistic expectation, however, the much-anticipated statement still managed to disappoint.

Don’t get us wrong. The statement is a calm and reasoned argument for greater public accountability. It makes several telling points, both in its introductory passages and in its specific recommendations.

It acknowledges that the entire country faces “a crisis of truth and the pervading cancer of corruption.” This is a significant departure, or rather development, from the CBCP pastoral statement only last month, when the bishops took pains to distinguish the concerns of Metro Manila from those of the provinces. We are all, indeed, in the throes of a crisis of truth.

In recognizing that “the search for truth in the midst of charges and allegations must be determined and relentless,” the statement also accepts—even if it does not endorse—that what is in question in this crisis is the “moral ascendancy of the present government.” We may have different answers, but we are all, indeed, weighing not the political or economic but the very moral viability of the Arroyo administration.

The Feb. 26 statement also calls on the President to strike Executive Order 464 off the books. Some analysts, not all of them partial to the opposition, think this appeal is redundant or downright useless. The Supreme Court in 2006 famously invalidated two provisions in the EO that could be construed as gag orders. But there’s the rub. The administration and its allies continue to invoke EO 464, or at least their interpretation of the Court’s ruling. In other words, the order, which widened the scope of executive privilege to include even rank-and-file soldiers, continues to have its political uses. Thus, we can only agree: To encourage “those who might have knowledge of any corruption in branches of government” to join the search for truth, EO 464 must be lifted.

The pastoral statement also called on both the Senate and the Office of the Ombudsman to “use their distinct and different powers of inquiry” to discover the truth, “not for their own interests but for the common good.” We read the bishops’ recommendation as an appeal for fairness. (So with the recommendation that the media serve as a “positive resource.”) We agree: The truth is ill-served by a partial or partisan process.

So much to agree with, and much to reflect on. But why is the statement ultimately disappointing? Not because it seeks to redefine People Power as communal action at the grassroots level (the bishops are actually on to something), but because it asks the leader whose moral ascendancy is in question to “take the lead” in forging an answer.

This seems to us to privilege hierarchy—or what in theology is called the state of grace of a person in high position—over the “determined and relentless” search for truth. If a bishop were confronted with persistent allegations of wrongdoing, would the Pope ask him to take the lead in resolving the allegations against his own person? In such an event, process becomes more important than position.

We realize that, in itself, the language of the recommendation (“Urge the President and all the branches of government to take the lead in combating corruption wherever it is found”) seems to be neutral. But in the present context, it actually disregards a fundamental reality. In the scandal over the National Broadband Network, the President and her men have been less than forthright in telling the truth. That, in fact, is one of the reasons we have a crisis in the first place.

Bishops split on Arroyo quit call, But all urge truth in NBN deal, end to corruption

Comment on an excerpt:

"Mass for Truth

"In Legazpi City, Fr. Rex Paul Arjona, chancellor of the Legazpi diocese, said the bishops of Albay province would make their stand known in time.

"It may coincide with the Mass for Truth and Accountability scheduled for Friday in Ligao City, hometown of whistle-blower Lozada.

"The Mass will be celebrated by Auxiliary Bishop Lucilo Quiambao."

The Misa para sa Katotoohan asin Paninimbagan has been postponed to 27 February, Wednesday, due to bad weather. Although the weather has already improved today, the rains, which poured almost daily for more than a week, have caused floods and landslides, making unpassable a number of roads within the province.

The main presider for Wednesday's Mass will still be Bishop Lucilo Quiambao, the Apostolic Administrator (no longer Auxiliary Bishop). The homilist will be Monsignor Ramon Tronqued, Vicar General of the Diocese. In the morning, a meeting of Church lay leaders, NGOs and academe representatives will be held at the Social Action Center to discuss the concrete steps the diocese will be taking as far as "communal action' is concerned.

Bishops split on Arroyo quit call
But all urge truth in NBN deal, end to corruption

By Inquirer Bureaus
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 01:59:00 02/22/2008

MANILA, Philippines -- There is a strong demand among bishops in the provinces for the truth to emerge in the scandal-ridden National Broadband Network (NBN) project, but President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s resignation or ouster is an issue that divides them.

Of the 12 prelates reached by the Philippine Daily Inquirer on Tuesday and Wednesday, only one -- Puerto Princesa Bishop Pedro D. Arigo -- openly said the President should step down.

“She should resign,” Arigo said. “Tama na, sobra na (Enough is enough)!”

Zambales Bishop Florentino Lavarias said he would abide by whatever decision the leaders of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines would reach regarding the calls for Ms Arroyo’s resignation.

Pampanga Bishop Pablo Virgilio David, on the other hand, said he was calling for the resignation of the members of the Arroyo Cabinet.

David said the CBCP was categorical in saying that Catholics should “reject evil.”

No qualified successor

“I ask the Catholics among [the Cabinet officials] to stop receiving communion, confess their lives and make the sacrifice demanded of them -- repair the damage they’ve done to the nation’s soul and well-being,” he said, adding:

“They still have a way out of the hell they are in now.”

Six Church leaders -- Bishops Carlito Cenzon of Baguio, Florentino Cinense of Tarlac, Crispin Varquez of Borongan, Martin Jumoad of Basilan and Juan de Dios Pueblos of Butuan, and Cotabato Auxiliary Bishop Jose Collin Bagaforo -- want Ms Arroyo to complete her term.

Varquez said that while he agreed that Malacañang under Ms Arroyo had committed some blunders, there was no qualified candidate to take her place.

Bagaforo said there was “not enough reason” to support the calls for Ms Arroyo’s resignation, but her administration should rectify the purported corruption.

“My own stand is no resignation,” he said.

Church as ‘energizer’

Bacolod Bishop Vicente Navarra called on the people to back whistle-blower Rodolfo Lozada Jr. and on Commission on Higher Education Chair Romulo Neri to speak the truth about the scrapped NBN deal with China’s ZTE Corp.

But Navarra stopped short of calling for the President’s resignation, saying: “The Church is just an energizer in the campaign against corruption.”

Laguna Bishop Leo Drona said he was one with the CBCP in its call for communal action in the face of the purported bribery and overprice that attended the NBN-ZTE deal.

He said communal action simply meant that the people should “pray together, reflect together, decide together and act together.”

General Santos Bishop Dinualdo Gutierrez said that instead of stepping down, the President should take a leave of absence for some “soul-searching.”

Gutierrez also said he did not expect the CBCP to initiate moves to oust Ms Arroyo. He said that if there would be change, it should start with the people themselves.

“But the initiation should be a product of faith and discernment -- soul-searching, analyzing and asking what is God’s will,” he added.

There are 98 bishops in the country, according to the CBCP.

‘So much corruption’

Jumoad of Basilan said he continued to support the Arroyo administration.

“But at the same time, I also recognize the existence of so much corruption, and I hope [the ongoing protest actions] will wake her up [so she can] correct where she is wrong,” he said.

Pueblos of Butuan, who is known for his closeness to the President, said: “We in the Mindanao bloc [of the CBCP] want GMA (Ms Arroyo) to finish her term until 2010.”

He said the bloc would request a meeting with the CBCP leadership in Manila so it could air its position on the latest scandal to rock the Arroyo administration.

Pueblos conceded that there was a real need to combat “rampant corruption in government,” but said the campaign must “start at the grass roots level and not from the top.”

He said those involved in the NBN-ZTE deal should be criminally charged and tried.

Cenzon of Baguio said he was not among those calling on Ms Arroyo to step down because there were “no established or proven grounds” for her to do so.

Cinense of Tarlac said he could not support the calls for resignation because he had yet to hear the complete story: “I cannot make a judgment based on what I read in newspapers and see on TV. I’m still waiting for more information. I’m still studying the issue.”

Mass for Truth

In Legazpi City, Fr. Rex Paul Arjona, chancellor of the Legazpi diocese, said the bishops of Albay province would make their stand known in time.

It may coincide with the Mass for Truth and Accountability scheduled for Friday in Ligao City, hometown of whistle-blower Lozada.

The Mass will be celebrated by Auxiliary Bishop Lucilo Quiambao.

But a streamer on the concrete fence of the Redemptorist Church in Barangay Gogon carries this message: “Oust Gloria!”

For a while, the message had merely read: “GMA resign!”

Last week, Bishops Ramon Villena (Nueva Vizcaya and Quirino) and Rodolfo Beltran (Mt. Province and Ifugao) and Cagayan Archbishop Diosdado Talamayan issued a statement urging the faithful “not [to] seek confrontation, certainly not revolution or violence” amid the crisis.

They said they wanted “communal action for deep reflection, discernment, sobriety and for the way of peace.”

Slow burn

The CBCP leadership expects a slow-burn anticorruption drive against the administration rather than a sudden toppling of Ms Arroyo.

Jaro Archbishop Angel Lagdameo, the CBCP president, said on Wednesday that apathy and cynicism about the last “people power” revolt that brought Ms Arroyo to power in 2001 meant that many Filipinos were in no rush to take to the streets again despite the NBN-ZTE scandal.

“The Filipino people, we together through communal action, must discover a new brand of people power,” he had said.

Lagdameo called last week for communal action but said civil society groups should take the lead in “a sustained national campaign against graft and corruption.”

Going with people

“We are not actually turning our back to [people power]; we have to go where our people are going,” he told Reuters. “If that (people power) is there ... who are we to stop it?”

Lagdameo also said that even if the CBCP were to call for immediate rallies, he doubted that it would get the hundreds of thousands that poured into the streets in 2001 and 1986.

“Our youth seem to be very satisfied about what is going on in their lives,” he said, smiling. Reports from Julie Alipala, Aquiles Zonio, Orlando Dinoy, Edwin Fernandez, Franklin Caliguid, Ma. Cecilia Rodriguez and Grace Albasin, Inquirer Mindanao; Desiree Caluza, Cristina Arzadon and Yolanda Sotelo-Fuertes, Inquirer Northern Luzon; Russell Arador, Cesar Villa, Carmela Reyes and Tonette Orejas, Inquirer Central Luzon; Redempto Anda, Romulo Ponte and Joanna Los Baños, Inquirer Southern Luzon; Eliza Victoria, Inquirer Research

Dragging the Church into the NBN-ZTE Scandal

A side event to the NBN-ZTE investigations, the latest scandal to hit the present administration (what does the opposition call it now, the "great-grandmother of all scams"?) was a not-often seen (or heard) public tussle between two Catholic Church leaders over the media. The repartee between "Running Priest" Father Robert Reyes and Bayombong Bishop Ramon Villena was aired last 15 February over ABS-CBN's early morning show, Umagang Kay Ganda. The article quoted below details the story.

I didn't get to watch the episode but several friends who did told me about it, and expressed how much they didn't like what "that priest" said: that certain bishops regularly receive "donations" from Malacañang, and they are the ones who would not want to say anything perceived as adversarial to their benefactor. Then I asked each of my friends if they thought what Father Robert said was true. Each of them, without exception, immediately stopped their protestations. Just like that. Interesting.

On a less controversial note, Father Albert Alejo. S.J. proposes that this Lent, Church people reflect on integrity and corruption especially within the Church.Father Alejo's proposed Lenten reflection this year is both timely and on the right track. We may argue about the prudence of washing our dirty linens in public, especially at this time. Then again, who says this isn't the proper time for the Church to "reform ourselves and make good our belief in the Gospel"?

This NBN-ZTE scam has the makings of a cleansing fire for many of our institutions, including the Church. For one, it brings to the fore how much we in the Church "practice what we preach" and also how much we "avoid to preach what we fail to practice".
.......

NBN-ZTE scandal creates mixed emotions by Al Jeratso

Mixed emotions have taken their toll on the role players, immediate family members and critics after the anomalous NBN-ZTE scandal erupted in the country's political atmosphere.

Not to be outfaced is the involvement of the Catholic Church in the scandal, that eventually resulted in the exchange of ginger shots between a popular running priest and a bishop in Nueva Ecija over ABS-CBN's early Friday morning program hosted by Mr. Anthony Taberna.

.......

Similarly, running priest Father Robert Reyes has accused the Catholic Church hierarchy of receiving donations from the previous and present presidents of the Philippines. Reyes admitted to Anthony Taberna during the ABS-CBN early morning program that the president is donating huge sums of money to some of the Catholic congregations, which he did not elaborate. Reyes also said that he even received an offer during the time of President Cory Aquino for P100,000 but he declined to receive it.

As a result, Reyes' declaration had infuriated Nueva Ecija bishop Villena, thinking that he was the one being referred to by Father Reyes because he was on the other line during the early morning program. What Reyes said was that the hands of some Catholic Church officials are tied because some of them are receiving donations from top government officials.

According to Reyes, he wouldn't be surprised that until now the Catholic Church hierarchy has kept itself mum on where to stand on the corruption scandal, except the Catholic Bishop Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) which issued a call for communal action on the scandal to resolve the matter peacefully without any bloodshed. Reyes was reminded of the late Cardinal Sin who receives donations from government officials but get back at them when they did wrong to the hapless people. "This is not the case nowadays," Reyes said.

SOS: Calling Cardinal Sin

Bishop Claver, S.J., wants us to focus our attention to what he considers the main thesis of the latest CBCP Pastoral Statement: most, if not all, of our country's social problems today have one common cause, i.e., "the subordination of the good of the many to that of the few. Which subordination, the bishops said, is our besetting sin as a people."

The good bishop also dispenses one good dose of reality check to those looking for another Cardinal Sin among the ranks of the CBCP, and lamenting the situation wherein there seems to be none to fill-in his shoes. Cardinal Sin is not the key element for another people power revolution to happen, it is the people. And the people today have things to worry and get busy about other than toppling the present dispensation.

Apparently, much as some sectors are raring for yet another EDSA or EDSA-like event, majority of the bishops today thinks the time has not yet come for it. And they don't want to provide the shortcut to jump-start such a movement.

Instead, they propose to lay the groundwork for such a movement. "Circles of discernment", reflecting and praying groups, that is what they want to call this not-so-original suggestion. It will be like the sit-ins of the Marcos era.

Once again, the bishops have spoken as from a fount of wisdom and propriety. An inspired, not necessarily stirring, sermon.

Then again, the question has to be asked: it has been several weeks now since the bishop's letter. So much has happened in this brief span of time, e.g., de Venecia's fall from grace and Lozano's (and opposition senators') moment of glory. Has any substantial number of bishops and priests been practicing already what they so wisely preach? How many bishops and priests have already initiated the formation of these "circles of discernment" in their dioceses, parishes and communities?

And no, the quick retort that existing religious organizations and communities may already be considered the embodiment of such circles of discernment, just won't do.

We have to practice what we preach. Otherwise, the pastoral directions the latest CBCP letter propose simply becomes a convenient excuse not to get involved. Apathy, couched in words holy and wise, is apathy still.



















SOS: Calling Cardinal Sin

By Bishop Francisco F. Claver, S.J.
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:21:00 02/13/2008

Cardinal Sin, where art thou?

Exasperation, now and again, is expressed at the Catholic bishops by interest groups who want them to come out strongly against President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. They have been deeply disappointed that there is no Jaime Cardinal Sin among the bishops today to lead a “people power” movement to boot her out.

The exasperation, I’m afraid, is badly misplaced. We actually have had no lack of would-be Cardinal Sins in the past few years since the “Hello, Garci” tapes started the political pot boiling over crazily. There have been at least four or five such bishops; one in fact explicitly called for the people to join a rebellion in one of those strange hotel capers, others supported impeachment moves in Congress, and still others contributed their names to statements and manifestos calling for the President to step down. But nothing has happened. And amazingly, nobody is asking why.

Most simply, the reason is that the people did not respond. Period. Hardly anyone took to the streets in answer to their calls. And I don’t think the reason was that those bishops were not cardinals of Manila.

A closer look at our experience of people power in the past -- and the fast-approaching 22nd anniversary of EDSA People Power I is an opportune time to do so -- brings out this little fact: On the surface it looks like it was Cardinal Sin who was responsible for EDSA I. Likewise for EDSA II. I would say he helped -- and helped tremendously. But he wasn’t the real decision-maker for their occurrence. The people were -- a fact which supports what I pointed out in an earlier column: that the real king-makers (or -un-makers) are not the bishops but the people.

Thus, in the first EDSA, the snap elections that preceded it made clear what the people wanted. The bishops supported their will and Cardinal Sin followed the lead of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines. At EDSA II, it was the texting students gathered at the EDSA Shrine who asked for his support, and he gave it. In both instances, it was clear where the people stood. In 1986 they voted for change in a real electoral exercise. And in 2001, they voted with their feet. Only after they clearly expressed their will did the cardinal come in. If people power succeeded both times, it was because the people wanted it to.

All this is to point out that the exasperation of those who are worked up uselessly about the bishops’ failure to assume the kind of leadership being urged on them for another people-power overthrow of a sitting President should be directed at the non-responding people. And they should be asking seriously: Where are they? And why don’t they come out to answer their calls?

Indeed, where are they? They are out there, watching, waiting, going about the hard business of daily living. And thinking. Their concerns are not those of would-be revolutionaries. The bishops equivalently said as much in their reading of the national situation in their last pastoral statement.

Commentators on that statement zeroed in critically on what they saw to be the bishops’ faulty reading of the differences between Manila’s perceptions and the provinces’ regarding the current political problems of the nation. Not much was said about the statement’s more substantive conclusion that those problems, though diversely perceived, had one common cause: the subordination of the good of the many to that of the few. Which subordination, the bishops said, is our besetting sin as a people.

And they asked that this Lenten season we do something serious about it. They asked for a very simple thing: that at every level of the Catholic Church we form “circles of discernment,” reflecting and praying groups of the faithful coming together to see how we can by ourselves attain a form of self-conversion, not just of ourselves as individuals but as whole communities.

It hasn’t occurred to anyone of our commentators yet, it seems, but those discerning groups, if they take place in sufficient numbers all over the country, may well in effect be a massive teach-in regarding our unyielding culture of corruption and a veritable referendum on our present crop of politicians and the most recent scandals. What happens after they have conscientized themselves?

It strikes me that one of the worst things about our national practice of corruption is that hardly anybody ever admits culpability and says “mea culpa” as Rodolfo Noel Lozada Jr. did in his Senate testimony last week. Yet admission of wrong-doing and being sorry for it is the first step to the self-reform that the bishops are asking of all of us. There is a great need for more Lozadas. That is why the bishops requested that the kind of discerning they are pushing for should be done also by Malacañang, Congress, and provincial, municipal and “barangay” [village] governments.

A quixotic quest? It most probably is, but it shows how desperate things are and how there is all the more need for all of us to work our own hope out, as the bishops insistently ask, together, everyone doing his/her own little share.

That’s what people power is all about.

The bishops, between center and periphery

yet another comment on the latest CBCP statement "Reform your lives..." this time, John Nery takes issue with the bishops' convenient manila-provinces dichotomy. while it is good policy for the Church not to easily intervene in politics, esp in light (or should we say darkness?) of recent events, still it is also bad policy to stay at the sidelines while the rest of the country suffers from the greed of the few. discussions and dialogue.. more discussions and dialogue...

The bishops, between center and periphepry

John Nery
Published: PDI, Febraury 5, 2008

The Catholic bishops’ latest pastoral statement held no surprises; indeed, it said things that needed to be said. And yet this loyal son of the Church, who eagerly awaited the statement’s release, must confess to a deep sense of disappointment.

I feel let down, not because of what the statement did not say (it did not, for example, call the Arroyo administration to account for any specific allegation -- but that was to be expected); I was disappointed because of how it said the things it did say.

I winced, for example, when the bishops attempted a blithe contrast between the country’s problems as perceived in Manila and the problems as perceived everywhere else. They listed five issues -- corruption now allegedly at its worst, the possible return of military rule, renewed attempts to change the Constitution, “extra-judicial” killings, the imminent implementation of a national ID system -- and then pronounced them Manila-centric. “The above are more or less the problems of the nation as seen from the center that is Manila.”

They then made another list, including the “depreciation” in the value of OFW remittances, continuing problems in land reform, “unabated fighting -- or the threat of it” in certain areas, frustrated election reform, the promotion of mining and the abuse of natural resources and, not least, the continued flourishing of political dynasties, and concluded: “What emerge from the periphery -- the provinces -- are concerns quite different from the above.”

I’m afraid the bishops have been less than intellectually honest. The problems they place in the box labeled Manila are in fact nationwide in scope. Let me cite just one instance; most of the politically motivated killings took place outside Metro Manila. In other words, the blood of hundreds of victims watered the countryside, not the capital. Indeed, as the Alston final report indicated, the large cities of Davao and Cebu have also been stained by the blood of victims, killed extra-judicially. These two cities, under Rodrigo Duterte and Tomas Osmeña, are the center of major archdioceses too, under the pastoral care of two of the country’s most influential prelates. The last time I looked, neither city was part of Manila.

The problems the bishops privilege as emerging exclusively from the provinces can be found in Metro Manila’s all-too-convenient box too. Let me cite just two instances. The deep longing for election reform is not unknown in the national capital. (Unsatisfied for so long, it almost approximates our spiritual thirst; it too is like a deer that yearns for running streams.) And the unfortunate effect of a strong peso on a remittance-fueled economy is felt as keenly in Metro Manila as it is in the provinces. Why, are there no OFW families in the capital?

Perhaps I am wrong; perhaps mental dishonesty is imprecise. Perhaps what our bishops were trying to do was indulge a quasi-Kantian rage for symmetry. First this, then that. There is the center, and there is the periphery. In doing so, however, in making a false distinction between the signs of the times in Metro Manila and in the rest of the country, the bishops of my own Church, I fear, have slighted truth itself.

I am also somewhat bothered by the difference in language used. The appeal for closure to long-running controversies (the content of many news stories) is couched diffidently, in the language of qualification. “Today we often hear that ‘closure’ has to be made to various issues ranging from the elections of 2004 to present charges of corruption in high places.” When we parse this passage, we see that the bishops are not directly saying closure is needed; they have merely acknowledged that the call for closure is often heard.

Contrast this with the stirring language of assertion in the latter passages, with, say, their (profound) analysis of the root cause of our many ills. “We zero in on what we say is the basic fault in our communities’ political and social life: the subordinating of the common good to private good. We see how this flaw in our national character evinces itself in our community life. We need to seek ways and means of correcting it in whatever way we can ... We have to form ourselves into real communities of faith-discernment and -action.”

Perhaps qualification was needed to arrive at a consensus among shepherds. (Another example: “For we live today as a people almost without hope, it would seem.”) But it is the language of assertion that guides the sheep.

* * *

In direct answer to the bishops’ call for the formation of faith communities, major Catholic institutions involved in education and in election reform will launch “A Year of Social Engagement” on Wednesday, Ash Wednesday, at 1 p.m., at the Manila Cathedral. (Not the periphery!) The idea, political science professor Benjie Tolosa writes, is “to foster social consciousness and engagement that would help build democratic institutions and hope in sociopolitical action.” It is a project I believe the late Jaime Cardinal Sin would have approved of.

CBCP Statement : "Reform Yourselves and Believe in the Gospel!" - in other words...

Talk about a different view. How many times have we read and heard the lament that bishops and priests no longer speak up against the ills that plague our country, particularly the wrongdoings of the current dispensation, the way bishops and priests in the past used to? In a way, this latest CBCP statement answers such lament in three ways:

1. All of us are to blame for the mire of corruption our country has sinked itself in. And it starts by the way most of our voters elect bad politicians, despite their fully knowing those they are voting for are bad. Simply put, such an act constitutes "political mortal sin". Our catechism tells us, mortal sins are sins that kill. Political mortal sins are killing the soul of this nation.

2. The transformation of our society begins with everyone of us working hard for it. The bishops dug up the 1986 CBCP post-snap election statement, calling everyone once again to "pray together, reason together, decide together, act together." Why, indeed, pin the responsibility on bishops for checking out governmental abuses, when the truth is it is everyone's job?

3. There is hope. Things are not as bad as they seem. Many people in many parts of this country are doing positive things, coming out with bright effective ideas to make lives better, and inspiring more and more to do the same.

Nice words. Then again, are all bishops and priests really sold into it? I mean, not just sold enough to let the CBCP president release this pastoral statement with these bold (though at the same time, admittedly Malacañang spin-friendly) words in it, but sold enough to risk time, effort and reputation to get these national pastoral suggestions into actual concrete diocesan programs and priorities? Are bishops and priests in dioceses and parishes ready to inspire, support, and call for the creation of such laity movements as corruption watchdogs, anti-mining campaigns, human rights advocacies, election modernization lobbies, extra-judicial killing safe havens, agrarian reform promotion, etc? And I mean not just to inspire and support in a one-time event or pastoral letter but to really "journey together" with the people?

The reality is not all bishops and priests are that sold into it. And a few reluctant priests, and bishops most especially, are always one too many. The test of the pudding is in the eating. In which case, the oft-repeated lament stated in the beginning is not that off-tangent after all. And we have not even delved into the reasons as to why some bishops and priests don't feel right partaking of the pudding they are serving.

I am all praises for the drafters, promoters and supporters of this latest CBCP statement. What about the riders, bystanders and fence-sitters in the hierarchy and the rest of the clergy? Don't you find it odd that the pastoral statement said almost every safe and wise thing that could be said about our present situation, almost, that is, except this one thing?

And, no, the question isn't rhetorical at all. The answer to it may actually spell the difference between a truly effective pastoral letter and one that just feels a tad too obligatory to come up with after every CBCP plenary assembly.



CBCP Statement : "Reform Yourselves and Believe in the Gospel!" (Mark 1:15)

Beloved People of God:

Our Holy Father in his most recent letter to us reminds us of the gift of faith and hope: that when we believe, we hope; and that when we hope, we live differently (see Benedict XVI, Spe Salvi, November 30, 2007, no. 2). These convictions on faith and hope set the tone of our own letter to you in the present pastoral situation.

The Darkness of Our Situation-the Common Good Subordinated

For we live today as a people almost without hope, it would seem. We look at our landscape and see darkness everywhere. Many of us are more than aware that many problems are simply rumors, fears, suspicions, imagined wrongs. Because these are reported in the newspapers, we begin to believe that they are true.

In such a pastoral situation we are being asked again for guidance on various specific problems currently bothering us. The following have been brought to our attention:

(a) the perception that corruption in government is at its worst, fraudulent projects going on unchecked despite the bad publicity given them in the media, investigations into the truth of allegations of bribery often stymied or their results unreported;

(b) the suspicion that martial law will be imposed as a response to the likelihood that destabilizing coups against the government are still being planned by disgruntled elements of the military allegedly with some civilian support;

(c) the constant talk about plans and moves for Charter change being made by politicians which to all intents and purposes appear to be nothing but a ploy for the sole purpose of their staying on in power-not the kind and method of making the right kind of change in the nation's basic law;

(d) the "extra-judicial" killing of suspected leftists and their sympathizers, as well as media men, and the inexplicable lack of action on them despite strong suspicions about their perpetrators in the military establishment;

(e) the imminence of a law establishing a national ID system and the fear of some that this is being pushed simply for easier control of socially active elements of the general population.

The above are more or less the problems of the nation as seen from the center that is Manila. They are by no means universal as far as the entirety of our people is concerned. What emerge from the periphery-the provinces-are concerns quite different from the above. The following were brought to our attention by many of our people:

(a) the appreciation of the peso against the dollar resulting in the depreciation of OFWs' remittances, contributing not a little to the continuance and exacerbation of the endemic poverty of the countryside;

(b) the lack of support for the improvement of the general welfare of rural folk, the slow progress especially of the land-reform program which is due to end this year unsatisfactorily funded and implemented;

(c) the bad peace and order situation obtaining in areas where the unabated fighting-or the threat of it-between the military and the NPA and the MILF/MNLF continues to cause unrest;

(d) the long-awaited and fought over reform of COMELEC which up to now has not been enacted;

(e) the pushing of mining concerns against the best interests of our people, especially of indigenous groups in disregard of the provisions in their behalf that the Indigenous Peoples' Rights Act guarantees;

(f) the continuing abuse of our natural resources, of forest and marine life in particular, and the corruption in agencies that are meant to protect these resources; and

(g) the growth and proliferation of family political dynasties in many provinces and cities which only serve to institutionalize more intensely the concentration of power and unsavory economic opportunity in the hands of the few.

In the two sets of problems that have been listed above, for all their apparent differences, we see nothing new. They are the same old problems, or variations of them, which have been plaguing our nation for years on end, through successive political administrations. Nothing or very little seems to have been done about them.

In them all we see the all too patent subordination of the common good to private good.

This is the basic fault in our country's political culture that the Church in its preaching of Christ's Gospel of social justice and charity has been bringing to our attention all these years and asking us and our communities to respond to as effectively as we can. It is the reason we make concern for the common good a crucial criterion for the choice of public officials. The persistence of that deep-seated fault pushes us to conclude in sorrow that we as a people are still devoid of a real social conscience.

Today we often hear that "closure" has to be made to various issues ranging from the elections of 2004 to present charges of corruption in high places. That the political order is accused too often with moral bankruptcy with nary an exception is a sad sign of the general cynicism and frustration of our people. Most unfortunately there does not seem to be any way of achieving closure. For the process and results of standard democratic inquiries, sometimes including those by the Supreme Court, are received with skepticism and cynicism, given political interests, alliances, and allegiances.

And we hear the general cry from the periphery: "Enough of the paralyzing divisions in the body politic. Bring issues to the courts and trust them to do their jobs. And help us get on with our lives, with our concern for livelihood."

In the Darkness, Light

In such a pastoral situation of frustration, cynicism and apparent hopelessness, we need to be aware of the deep resources of our faith in the Lord for whom all things are possible. We take our faith for granted in daily life. Often we act and behave contrary to faith. We resort to faith as a last resort and not as a daily catalyst.

Yet it is only from the perspective of faith and hope that we are able to see light in the darkness, liberation from darkness.

So if what we have brought to your attention seems to be only the dark side of our national situation, we should be able in the same faith and hope to see glimmers of light shining through-glimmers that must be of our own creation. But not entirely: for despite the prevailing darkness, we see everything is not thoroughly evil. There is good everywhere, even in those we often criticize, and it is our task to critically collaborate with them even as we critically oppose the not too good. This is integral to the challenge being put to us.

Journey to the Light-Start with Ourselves

If you agree with what we said above that the lack of a social conscience is, indeed, our common sin, is there anything we can do about it?

To journey to the light, we need first to realize that we have contributed not a little to the common malaise-because of decisions we have made, decisions that flowed from what we have become and because of our unconcern, inaction, apathy, often thinking only of our interests. And so with little sense of the future of our country, we vote for people we should not vote for.

Therefore, in the much needed regeneration of our politics and social life, this is where we have to start: with ourselves, as individuals, families, communities.

We have always put the blame on people we have chosen to govern us. Today we have become more aware that despite efforts, successful or not, to remove the incompetent or corrupt, our problems have remained. We have looked at the enemy as only outside of us.

But now we ask: In the face of the many persistent and unresolved crises of today can we together make a determined start, by making a conscious effort at changing our mind-sets towards a greater and more efficacious concern for the good of the nation?

Personal and Communal Conversion towards a Social Conscience

We are asking you, our beloved people, to be with us in the moral-spiritual reform of our nation by beginning with ourselves. This is what we need-conversion, real conversion, to put it in terms of our faith, for all of us to deliberately, consciously develop that social conscience that we say we sorely lack and to begin subordinating our private interests to the common good. This conversion is for all of us: laity, religious, priests, bishops.

But we have to go about it not only as individuals but just as importantly as whole communities. We have to face a common problem and map out deliberately and communally how to go about the work of self-reform. It is nothing less than what St. Paul speaks about: "Do not conform yourselves to the standards of this world, but let God transform you inwardly by a complete change of your mind. Then you will be able to know the will of God-what is good and pleasing to him and is perfect" (Rom. 12: 2).

Renewal of Faith-Communities, Civil Society, Political Leaders

We have to come together then as communities of faith, as we your Bishops said back in 1986 after the Snap Elections of that year, to "pray together, reason together, decide together, act together," form groups of thinking and praying people-in our schools, seminaries, parishes, mandated organizations, lay movements, social action groups, most especially in basic ecclesial communities which the Rural Congress we will be holding this year looks to as a crucial instrument in the forbidding task of rural development.

We zero in on what we say is the basic fault in our communities' political and social life: the subordinating of the common good to private good. We see how this flaw in our national character evinces itself in our community life. We need to seek ways and mean of correcting it in whatever way we can-but always according to the principles of active-non violence-together, creatively and imaginatively, as we bishops exhorted in 1986. We have to form ourselves into real communities of faith-discernment and -action.

We ask this of explicitly Church groups. But we will ask it too of all citizens who have a concern for the nation's good, especially those who hold the reins of power, from Malacañang on to Congress, provincial and municipal governments, all the way down to barangay councils. People in government-and as well as all other civic and business groupings-can they too reflect together in all manner of associations and look into themselves to see if, in all their actuations, the demands of the common good are in fact captive to merely personal and selfish interests? And if they are, can they rise up to the challenge and decide themselves to contribute to the general effort?

This must sound like a preposterous request, but we make it anyway for we believe that what it seeks is the critical need of the moment. Already it is being responded to here and there by various concerned groups such as those that have been organized and trained to fight corruption. So we seek a wider response from all our faithful towards a more vigorous work for good governance and a more active promotion of responsible citizenship in our society in the light of the Gospel and the social teachings of the Church.

If in your minds, corruption-the worst offender against our common good-is rampant today, sparing no level of social and political life, and most glaringly and reportedly so in the various corridors of power, we have to confess that corruption is in truth our greatest shame as a people. But if it goes on unhindered, it is because, as we have had occasion to point out in the past, we all too often condone it as part of the perquisites of power and public office.

Lent-the Time to Journey Together toward Transformation

Lent will soon be upon us, a time of penance, of sorrow for sin, of self-reform. Soon we shall hear again the clarion call of the Lord Jesus: "Reform your lives and believe in the Gospel!" (Mk 1: 15). This season is the appropriate beginning for profound reform and conversion. It is the time for a spiritual combat against the enemy within, our pride and greed, our lust for power and wealth, etc.

And so we exhort you, our beloved people: As a special project for this year's Lenten observance and in the spirit of penance, let us come together in little groups of reflection and discernment. In these groups we look seriously at our part in the many evils of our day-as individuals, as families, as communities- and discern what action we can do together.

Alay Kapwa is our traditional Lenten Program of sharing time, treasure and talent for evangelization. This Lent, without forgetting the treasure part, we zero in, in a very special way, on time and talent, asking what we can offer of these for the common effort towards the correction of our social ills. These would be evangelization of the most authentic kind. For it means a real acceptance of the Lord's mandate to us as Christians to be concerned about one another, to go beyond ourselves and reach out to others. This attitude in the pattern of Christ himself is at the heart of Christian identity.

Hence other already existing movements and efforts (like the Pondo ng Pinoy) aimed at the transformation of Filipino culture through little acts of kindness for the neighbor and motivated only by the love of God-these too must be intensified as essential to our Lenten program of reform.

In our coming together, in our exchanging of ideas and discerning on them, in our praying and acting together, we bring hope to our despairing land-the hope that our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, says in his most recent encyclical is the great need of our modern world.

With Mary, Mother of Hope, on the Journey of Renewal

We beg Mary to intercede for us with her Son Jesus. In the midst of the disciples who hoped for the renewal of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, she stood as their Mother, our Mother, of hope. Mary, Star of the Sea, guide us on our journey of renewal that we may more faithfully follow your Son Jesus in his loving care of all our brothers and sisters.

For the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines,

+ANGEL N. LAGDAMEO, D.D.
Archbishop of Jaro
CBCP President
January 27, 2008