MANILA, OCTOBER 4, 2010 (STAR) SKETCHES By Ana Marie Pamintuan - The Catholic Church isn't going to turn its back on the only son of Corazon Aquino.
But the Church isn't about to give an inch either on birth control and its concept of the start of life. The Church will continue speaking out, and loudly, against artificial contraception, whoever is president.
President Aquino, for his part, does not seem keen on having a head-on collision with the shepherds of his faith. But he has long been a supporter of the Reproductive Health (RH) bill and he doesn't look like he is about to back down on the promotion of birth control.
RH bill opponents who are telling P-Noy to be like his mother should be reminded that President Cory promoted family planning, giving Filipinos the necessary information and freedom to make a choice.
The bishops should have asked Cory Aquino if she ever resorted to any form of artificial contraception. They should also pose the same question to their favorite president, Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, and demand an honest answer.
Educated women cannot be kept in the dark about their reproductive health. Women must not be prevented by poverty and enforced ignorance from using the pill or making their mates use condoms.
A young woman I know, of limited education and means, is now pregnant out of wedlock. She said her boyfriend always refused to use a condom, telling her that it could be left behind in her genitals and require surgery to extract.
The woman at least is keeping the baby and is preparing for a civil wedding before Christmas. That's one less fetus dumped at the doorstep of a church or in a garbage bin.
Many Filipinos of sufficient means and education know underprivileged women with similar stories, most of them with unhappy endings for both mother and the unborn. The pregnant women's depth of ignorance about their own bodies can be heartbreaking.
P-Noy doesn't have to be told about the level of public support he enjoys in reviving the promotion of birth control. He is surely aware of recent surveys conducted by different pollsters showing some 80 percent of Filipinos wanting a slowdown in population growth.
Even without the surveys, many pious Filipinas have been ignoring the bishops on this one, considering the Church out of touch with reality and presuming the clergy to be ignorant of women's bodies.
The best that the Catholic Church can do is to avoid an aggressive confrontation with the government even as it continues telling its flock about the teachings of the faith. The bishops can then pray that Catholics will make what the Church considers the right choice.
It is silly to raise the possibility of excommunicating anyone over this controversy. The story has been denied by the president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines. But it led to counter-threats from the irreverent that they would excommunicate themselves from their faith, or else excommunicate the bishops, bypassing the messengers to commune directly with God.
The story also led to demands from the irreverent for the excommunication of Catholics found guilty of murder, corruption and other offenses. This, of course, isn't going to happen.
Forgiveness is enshrined in the Catholic Holy Sacraments. Forgiveness is what priests will have to give to the faithful who exercise freedom of conscience and ignore Church teachings on artificial contraception.
This is presuming that women consider birth control a sin that needs to be confessed. Without penance, there is no absolution.
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In the past decades, the Vatican has come under fire from women who feel that their Church is one of the last great bastions of gender discrimination.
Church opposition to keeping the flock fully informed about women's reproductive rights and all methods of birth control can only aggravate that feeling of discrimination.
Also, as P-Noy's aides have pointed out, he is President not just of Catholics. The country has a sizable number of people belonging to Christian denominations, not to mention the growing number of Muslims.
Fidel Ramos, the country's first Protestant president, never had to worry about excommunication.
His health secretary who belonged to the same church, Juan Flavier, actively promoted the use of condoms, with the catchy slogan, "Let's DOH it!"
Flavier went and did it, his immense popularity later landing him a seat in the Senate. The impression at the time was that Ramos had to get Flavier out of the Cabinet and slow down on the family planning program to soften Church opposition to Charter change.
Obviously, the Church is most influential when its support is needed by the political leadership. GMA froze the family planning program, reviving the distribution of condoms only in her final five months in office.
In P-Noy's case, how much does he need Church support to give his reform agenda credibility? So far there is still public faith in his sincerity and integrity. There are no indications that he will attempt to stay in power beyond his term. He can afford to say no to the bishops.
But he can forge ahead with his population program and still be civilized and statesmanlike toward the Church. The bishops should also realize that everyone loses if this debate is conducted in a confrontational manner.
Already the debate over women's reproductive rights has revived memories of Church abuses against the colonized during the Spanish era, when friars competed for power with the Spanish civilian government.
The Catholic Church remains a powerful force for good. It can provide spiritual guidance to its flock without being pugnacious about it. If the bishops' cause is right, they should have confidence that their flock, given full information, will make the correct choice.
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Chief News Editor: Sol Jose Vanzi
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