When PNP Chief Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa warned Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop and outgoing Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines president, Socrates Villegas, not to go on “fishing expedition” for rogue policemen to serve as witnesses to the alleged extrajudicial killings of drug suspects, it was a word of caution against those bigoted clergy. The PNP chief warned they might be offering rogue policemen to testify but in truth have their own personal motivation. He was more civil because the inducement by Church and its confederates in the opposition is not really about the alleged EJK but the danger of being used as unwitting tool to discredit and eventually destabilize the government.
Whether or not these alleged witnesses have something to testify on is secondary. Rather, the Church should re-examine its antagonism to President Rodrigo “Digong” Duterte. It seems that archbishop Socrates Villegas has muddled his understanding of Section 6 of Article II of the Constitution which states that “The separation of the Church and State shall be inviolable.” Maybe this archbishop has in mind that physical separation does not include policy pronouncements that by his exhortation already constitutes a violation of that separation.
Even college students know that this was incorporated not only to safeguard the Church against the State from violating religious freedom but equally for the Church not to interfere in the affairs of the State. Most important, defending the right of the Church refers to freedom of worship. While the Church can voice out its concern over human rights abuses, it should not go beyond by actively encouraging witnesses to testify against it for that would amount to usurping its power by acting as prosecutors to an institution that extended to it protection and assures its existence as religious organization.
Dela Rosa is right in calling them ingrates because the relations of the Church and the State go beyond the principle of separation. The Bill of Rights provides that “No law shall be made respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. The free exercise and enjoyment of religious profession and worship, without discrimination or preference, shall forever be allowed. No religious test shall be required for the exercise of civil or political rights.”
In layman’s term, it assures the Church that the State will not sponsor the establishment of any religious organization or give preference thereof, and that members of the clergy shall be guaranteed the free exercise of their profession without imposing any test pursuant to the free exercise thereof. Most gratuitous, the Church, not given by most countries, enjoys the privilege of tax exemption. That includes exemption in the payment of duties, tax on real estate, grants, endowments, donations and contributions.
This is why many are wondering why the Catholic Church is actively shaming and humiliating the government that guarantees its existence as an institution. Whether the campaign against drugs would result in human rights violation, the Church should be more circumspect because not all followers will support it. There will always be opposition that in the end will be detrimental to it. It is self-defeating because the Church is no longer considered infallible.
The killing of man is immoral, and there is no room for any mitigating or exculpatory circumstance. In our case, people have their doubts whether the issue is meant to protect lives or merely to secure their interest. This explains why in most underdeveloped countries, where the understanding and interpretation of the dogma has yet to reach maturity, the Church is prone to be exploited by foreign intelligence services like the CIA. Ignorant clerics take it to themselves to interpret certain state policies to make them confrontational instead of supplanting its shortcomings to enlighten the soul of the faithful.
This is why the Church ends up supporting anti-people elements. Such is the natural inclination because some clerics cannot redefine its position to allow them to distinguish what is essentially mundane and what is essentially spiritual. Our consciousness is open to foreign manipulation. As a result these clerics tend to prejudge the policy of the state, and not in teaching its followers to obey the law to lay down the foundation of an orderly society and to allow the proliferation of their congregation.
Cultism is rampant and is often exploited to commit savagery, yet nobody from among them says that brutality constitutes human rights violation. The elite, the oligarchy, the landlords, the corrupt politicians, the smugglers, the tax evaders, the radical Left and all sorts of ideological fringe exploit them because they distorted and tampered state policies to suit the interest of the leaders. Those that oppose are called traitors and there is much room for liquidation.
Even the radical Left has lost track of their ideology that they have become more political than ideological. For instance, their unrelenting attacks on Ferdinand Marcos are telling that their approach has become less ideological, but to make it palatable they equate the past to their present enemies. They refuse to examine whether his policies were more in line to their ideology for fear that it could expose them as mindless stooge of foreign interest groups. They continue their virulent attacks on the former President because many of their leaders were incarcerated during martial law without them asking why their group made that foolish decision to challenge the authority of the state.
The same can be said of the mainstream media. The mainstream media practitioners have failed to examine that behind their new identity, it is still big business, the oligarchy and the foreign interest groups that controls and manipulates them. They have succeeded in presenting their reactionary ideas as progressives such that many of our ignorant masses think of them as progressives and not trolls mouthing the position of the neoliberals and even the fascist ideology.
It is for this why ordinary Filipinos think of the clerics like Socrates Villegas, Roberto Reyes, Broderick Pabillo, Sister Mary John Mananzan, and many others as progressives and enlightened. They do not know that these modern-day impresarios of reaction are disguised spokesman of the moneyed class. This happens because people do not know that their ideology has been reformatted to make it appear progressive, democratic, freedom loving and is championing the cause of human right but in truths the same cold blooded puppets propped up by the US.
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