Filipinos respect CBCP for upholding Church law

Many top-ranking Filipinos sharply critical of the Arroyo administration told The Manila Times they respect the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines for upholding Church doctrine in its pastoral statements issued in response to the political crisis engulfing the nation.

These Filipinos appreciate the CBCP’s restraint in not calling for the resignation or ouster of President Gloria Arroyo unlike her other foes who have spoken and written against the Catholic Episcopal conference for not joining in their anti-Arroyo struggle.

Among these high-ranking and well-respected Filipinos are the Aquino presidency’s Finance Secretary Jesus P. Estanislao and central bank governor Jose Cuisia as well as the majority of the 80 former Cabinet members and chairpersons of Constitutional commissions who have formed themselves as the Former Senior Government Officials group.

That group has roundly criticized President Arroyo’s administration for its lack of transparency, bad governance and indifference to corruption.

They said they have come to believe, as a result of Mrs. Arroyo’s refusal to attend to their demands, that Mrs. Arroyo is central to the corruption in her government.
Some members of the group are calling on President Arroyo to resign.

But some would not go that far for the moment because, former Secretary Estanislao told The Times, “the FSGO has decided as a group to wage the campaign to pressure the administration to institute drastic reforms ‘incrementally.’ ”

The Times learned that most of the 80-plus FSGO members do agree that the CBCP has served the Roman Catholic Church well by observing the Canon Law and doctrine forbidding clerics from engaging in political action unless it is of momentous urgency in defense of the Church.

Estanislao explained that not only Church doctrine and Canon law make it prudent for bishops not to act about political and economic problems beyond their duty to teach about the moral aspects and to give guidelines to the faithful.

“It is also better to let the laity to do the work of protesting and taking action. We can take stronger action than priests and bishops can,”

he said.

Top bankers

"Three of the country’s top bankers The Times talked to also declared their appreciation of the CBCP’s restraint. They disagreed with the politicians who have been attacking the bishops for not being as “bold and as politically concerned"

as the late Jaime Cardinal Sin.

They all requested not to be named—in keeping with their apolitical posture. But one of them asked this writer to tell Times readers that they should heed the CBCP’s call for “prayer and communal reflection in their Basic Ecclessial Communities and their parishes, and then act as one to pressure the government into reforming.”

An insurance-group executive, George Winternitz, managing director of Winternitz Associates Insurance Inc., did not mind being named and quoted as saying that he and scores of his colleagues would like to see corruption disappear in the government and the private sector.

“We all should take the bishops’ exhortation seriously though.

We should also examine ourselves, all of us businessmen, and workers in businesses, to reform ourselves. Little acts of graft may be tiny compared to the US dollar millions they are talking about in Senate investigations,”

Winternitz said.

“But these also contribute to creating that continuing culture of corruption that the CBCP is asking the government to combat.”

Stockbrokers who want President Arroyo to resign talked to our reporter Likha Cuevas.

They also expressed agreement with the CBCP for the bishops’ refusal to be drawn into taking sides politically.

One of them said,

“The CBCP is right and I think what the bishops want is really what the silent majority want.”

Our reporter Jomar Canlas talked to Atty. Samson Alcantara, president of ABAKADA Guro Inc., a teachers and lawyers’ group fighting for social justice and against corruption. He is a bar topnotcher and the petitioner who won the case in the Supreme Court for the removal of the Pandacan Oil Depots.

Alcantara is happy with the CBCP for being apolitical now.

He has always been upset by the political activism of various religious and church groups.

“It is a strong statement recognizing corruption in the government but done in a subtle manner made by the members of the cloth. It is a strong stand. Everybody says there is corruption. But they cannot condemn because there is no proof.”

He said it is up to laymen to work and provide the proof.

Among the country’s topmost politicians, Makati’s Mayor Jejomar Binay—who is an ardent activist against President Arroyo and the president of the United Opposition—is strongly faithful to the Catholic bishops and the CBCP.

Binay told The Times the CBCP decided correctly in not asking for the resignation of President Gloria Arroyo but strongly condemning her administration’s corruption.
Manila’s Mayor Lim is also respectful of the CBCP stand.

my regards

well these priest are just like frailes, they are the one whose always right, but for mayor lim, i think he respects the CBCP because its a catholic thing, as a catholic i disagree that these politicians are using the church in able to do what they want, such as money, cardinal sin was involve with that too during aquino's emergence.

but i still respect the house of god. not those people who uses the image of the prophet in able to get money, that is tremendously rudeness for our lives.