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PHILIPPINE ASIAN NEWS TODAY January 16 - 31, 2019
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CBCP breaks silence on Duterte’s tirades:
We must learn to be brave
The Catholic Bishops Conference
of the Philippines broke its silence
on the constant verbal attacks by
President Rodrigo Duterte on the
Catholic Church on Monday.
The episcopal conference issued
a statement through the CBCP news.
They said that while they are aware
church members have been waiting
for guidance on how to deal with the
attacks on their faith, “we too needed
to be guided properly in prayer and
discernment before we could guide
you.”
‘Best response is silence and
prayer’
While the statement addresses
key issues related to tensions between
church leaders and the president, they
did not address Duterte by name.
There was only one instance
where the CBCP addressed the
president directly, and that was after
he cursed Pope Francis in 2015 prior
to his presidential campaign.
While some church leaders have
spoken out against the president’s
attacks individually, this is the first
official response by the CBCP. “We
have taken our cue from Pope Francis
who tells us that in some instances,
‘…the best response is silence and
prayer,’” they said.
Only rarely does the CBCP address
politicians directly, and even more
rarely do they mention the name’s of
government leaders.
The only other time the church
addressed one other president prior
to Duterte was when it condemned
the results of the February 1986 snap
election as fraudulent.
The statement follows the twin
bombings of a Catholic Church in
Jolo, Sulu, that killed at least 20
people and injured at least 97 others
on Sunday.
The president earlier said he was
angered and disappointed over the
bombings.
No license to insult
While the CBCP said they respect
people who may have left the Church
because of the differences with the
administration, they said that “freedom
of expression does not include a
license to insult other people’s faith,
especially our core beliefs.”
Duterte frequently brings the book
“Altar of Secrets” by the investigative
journalist Aries Rufo to public events
— a book that brought to light
alleged corruption and sex scandals
in the Philippine Catholic Church —
to make his point about his belief that
the Church is being hypocritical when
it criticizes his administration.
The president said that he is
“willing to be crucified” if priests could
dispute allegations in Rufo’s book.
But Rufo, who passed away in
2013, was a practicing Catholic and
senior investigative reporter at news
site Rappler, said in 2013 that he
didn’t write the book to “destroy” the
Church as some hardline Catholics
had accused him of in the past.
Not against war on drugs
The letter said, however, that
they are not necessarily against the
administration’s war on drugs itself.
“It was when we started hearing
of mostly poor people being brutally
murdered on mere suspicion of being
small-time drug users and peddlers
while the big-time smugglers and
drug lords went scot-free, that we
Catholic Archbishop of Davao, and president of Catholic Bishop’s Conference
of the Philippines (CBCP), Romulo Valles (C) speaks while fellow bishops Pablo
Virgilio David (L) of the archdiocese of Manila, and Antonio Ledesma of the
archdiocese of Cagayan de Oro (R) listen during a press conference in Manila
on January 28, 2019. Ted Aljibe/Agence France-Presse
started wondering about the direction
this “drug war” was taking.”
It was only in January 2017 when
the CBCP said it would start speaking
out against the state’s record on
human rights abuses in the war on
drugs.
“The church right now is
asserting its influence, that’s why in
the coming months the church will
be at the forefront in leading against
extrajudicial killings,” said Fr. Jerome
Secillano, the CBCP’s public affairs
chief to reporters then.
“There is no way we can call
ourselves a civilized society if we
hold children in conflict with the law
criminally liable,” the letter read.
The statement said that from the
“perspective of mercy,” being civilized
is not only about advancements in
technology and infrastructure “but
about being more humane to the
poor.”
It added, “the weak, the
disadvantaged, the elderly, the
children, those with special needs
and all those who tend to be left out
in society.”
Conquering good with evil
In its final section titled “conquering
good with evil,” the letter said that “the
battle we fight our spiritual.”
The letter concluded that “as
members of God’s flock, we must
learn to be brave, to stick together,
and look after one another.”
“Let this moment be a time to pray,
to be strong, wise, and committed.
Let this be also a teaching moment
for us all — a moment for relearning
the core beliefs, principles and values
of our faith, and what it means to be
a Catholic Christian at this time,” it
said. (R. Macasero, PS)
Duterte again shuts door on peace talks amid attacks
PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte has
again shut the door on the peace
process with the communist rebels
amid their continued attacks on
government troops and civilians.
In a speech during his visit to
Jolo, Sulu a day after twin explosions
hit a Roman Catholic church in the
town, Duterte assailed the communist
group’s armed wing, the New People’s
Army (NPA), for attacking military and
police personnel.
“Ganun rin sa NPA. Hindi na
ako makipag-usap sa inyo. Eh
walang magawa eh. Magpakabuti
ka, pasunud-sunuran ka lang, istorya
ganun. You practically begged na…
‘Adre mag-istorya lang tayo (Also with
the NPA. I will never talk to you. I can’t
do anything. You do something good
to them you follow their whims, that’s
it. You practically begged… Comrade,
we are just fooling each other),’”
Duterte said.
“Tapos in return ito ang ibigay
ninyo sa akin. Mga kabaong pati iyong
mga naputol mga paa. Ay p***** i**.
Hindi ako… ‘Di na bale ako makulong
pagkatapos nito. Akin lahat ‘yan, akin
lahat(Then in return you give this to
me: Coffins and dismembered limbs.
Son of a bitch. Not me… Never mind
if I go to jail after this. That’s all mine,
all mine),” he said.
Duterte made the statement the
same day a roadside bomb struck
police vehicles in Magpet, North
Cotabato.
A police officer was killed while
eight others sustained injuries in
the incident believed to have been
perpetrated by NPA rebels.
A firefight between the police and
an undetermined number of NPA
rebels, led by a certain Commander
Alon, ensued after the blast but the
WWW.PHILIPPINEASIANNEWSTODAY.COM
insurgents withdrew afterward.
This came few weeks after the
President said he would “leave even
a small opening” for the resumption
of the peace negotiation as long as
the communist rebels won’t demand
a coalition government.
The peace talks between the
government and the communist
group broke down in November
2017 as the administration cited its
continued attacks again state forces
despite ongoing negotiations.
In November 2018, Duterte
formally ended the government’s
peace talks with the communists and
ordered the military to “destroy” the
rebel group a month later.
The government then pursued
localized talks with the rebels.
The NPA rebels have been waging
war against the government for the
past 50 years, which is considered
as the world’s longest-running
communist rebellion. (C. VALENTE,
TMT)