The Church and The State

There is no such thing as a “population crisis” in the Philippines and the controversial “Reproductive Health and Population Development Act of 2007 “is not needed to solve a problem,” said a leading social scientist.

This “leading social scientist” just happens to be the President of the Society of Catholic Social Scientists and Professor of Political Science and Legal Studies at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, USA. (As if getting a foreigner as a resource person equals credibility). I wonder if this scientist ever visited the slums of Manila and encountered the many children there. I wonder if he knows how many children have stopped going to school because their parents can only afford to send one child among six. I wonder if he knows how someone in this country who earns less than minimum wage can afford to feed six children everyday. I wonder how someone far away in Ohio, USA can make the statement that “there is no such thing as a population crisis in the Philippines.” I don’t think one should just look at the numbers but look at the entire picture.

I don’t have the data but most probably, the reason there was a general decline in the number of children born in the Philippines in the last couple of years is that the middle-class and those who can actually afford to have a lot of children are now into “family planning”. Traditionally, Filipino families have a lot of children but due to the continuous increase of living expenses, people opted to be more practical and limit the number of children to two to three per family. This is not the case in the poverty stricken areas. There are couples there who still have four, six, even ten, twelve children! The parents can’t afford to feed themselves let alone their children.

The full article lists down the possible ill effects of the Reproductive Health Bill, citing what happened to the “morals” of other countries which adapted and encouraged the use of contraceptives.

…the practice of contraception and “its further encouragement by government policy has led to the breakdown of sexual morality and the further acceptance of a range of deviant and unnatural sexual behaviors, including massive premarital sexual activity, cohabitation, adultery, and homosexual acts.”

As if educating the masses about family planning and making resources available to them is equal to declaring to everyone to “go ahead and have sex with anyone you want because you can’t have babies! We have contraceptives! We’re all going to burn in hell!”

Apparently, Catholic leaders also believe that using contraceptives is the same as having an abortion. They’d rather that people use “natural” ways of not getting pregnant–withdrawal and rhythm method–techniques proven to be less effective than artificial contraceptives.

Such is the Church’s reaction over the proposed Reproductive Health Bill–a law lobbied to promote gender equality and reproductive rights in the Philippines.

Supporters of the bill are refused communion and are called atheists or even “alagad ni Satanas” (slaves of Satan). The Catholic Church also admitted to having a group of people whose obligation is to check on the bill’s progress. The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines sent an emissary to Malacañan itself to talk personally to the President about the proposed bill.

Yet, the CBCP denies getting involved in politics. They’re not meddling. According to them, it is the politicians who are meddling into the Church’s teachings.

The Philippine Constitution clearly insists that there should be a clear separation between the Church and State. No matter how much they deny it, what the Church is doing does not adhere to the constitution. They claim that they are just voicing out their disagreement with the bill but not everyone can get a personal “visit” with the President to just “voice out” a disagreement. There is also an obvious effort to coerce lawmakers to lobby their way.

I support the Reproductive Health Bill not because I’m a heathen and a sinner. I support it because it lobbies for the proper education of the masses about sex and reproductive health. Having an educated public helps them make informed choices and will ultimately lead to healthier mothers and more responsible couples. No, I don’t believe sex education and contraceptives will promote promiscuity. The Church has to realize that sex is inevitable–they can’t prevent it. What we can do is make sure that the people who are actually doing it are safe and well-informed. Let the State do its job by informing and educating the public–let the family (and the Church) take care of the morals from home. Responsible parents will teach their kids to be responsible.

It is common for families in poverty-stricken areas to have four to ten children–children the parents can’t afford to feed or send to school. They have children because they don’t know any better. I’m not saying that having a lot of kids is bad–as long as you can feed, clothe and give them all of their basic needs, then go ahead and have ten children! What’s worse is that the Church seems to fuel the wrong belief that children should be “used” by parents as a way out of poverty–a cultural value of old that children should somehow “repay” their parents by getting rich and or by supporting them the rest of their lives.

My parents told me that it was their responsibility to raise me; to give me a roof over my head, to feed and clothe me, to send me to school. They told me I don’t owe them anything but they expect me to do the same to my children someday. My father always tells me that he didn’t have children so he doesn’t have to work–he has to work because he has children.

This has always been my problem with the Catholic Church: it seems to me that they would prefer blind followers. People who follow without asking or thinking are less trouble after all. Bottom line, the Church has to trust its constituents to think for themselves. Their tirade against the Reproductive Health Bill is another proof that one of the reasons why this country will never move forward is that the Church, despite what it believes are its good intentions, keep holding the State back.