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On most Sundays and holy days of obligation Roman Catholic
cathedrals, churches and chapels in this country are invariably
bursting to capacity.
If proof of Filipino religiosity is sought then
all a researcher needs to do is observe church attendance across the
archipelago of this former Spanish colony. What better empirical
evidence is there of Catholicism’s dominance and preeminence in
Philippine society?
In fact, the seeming crush of people who
regularly attend Mass represents a tiny fraction of Filipinos who
claim to be Catholic.
I recall the priest in our Quezon City parish
complain recently that just 10 percent of the Catholics in our
community—a mixture of urban poor and middle-class households, in
addition to a nunnery and a home for retired, mostly foreign-born,
priests—do bother to come to Sunday services regularly.
He added that Mass attendance is not just low,
it is moreover declining. The same trend, he said, is evident in
other parishes throughout the country.
About 85 percent of the population of the
Philippines claims to be Catholic, but only 10 percent of them are
actually active churchgoers. Does this mean then that the Church’s
influence on the rest of society is overestimated—especially by
politicians who quake whenever the clergy take to the pulpit and
take potshots at them?
President Arroyo, for one, is obviously
reluctant to openly dispute church doctrine—even if it is
contradictory to state policy. Her moratorium on capital punishment,
for instance, hews closely to the Vatican’s opposition to the
death penalty.
For another, her administration’s
implementation of the government’s family planning program focuses
only on “natural” birth control and gives no room to artificial
contraception—although state funds have already been earmarked for
the purpose.
Certain church leaders are calling for her
removal from office, but the President apparently continues to
regard herself as catolica cerrada.
Former Health Secretary Alberto Romualdez—despite
his Jesuit education, or maybe because of it—is a tireless
campaigner for family planning, especially artificial contraception.
At the Kapihan sa Sulo media forum last weekend,
he blurted out in exasperation: “I’ve given up on any hope that
this administration would take family planning, reproductive health
and similar issues seriously simply because it cannot afford to
antagonize certain elements in the Church.”
Romualdez pointed out surveys, which show that
artificial contraception for family planning is an “unmet need.”
Millions of Filipino couples, including
Catholics, want to limit the size of their families, Romualdez said.
But they are unable to do so—not because they are devout
Catholics—but because they are denied the means to have fewer
children.
The government has been making a big deal of the
drop in the population growth rate to about 1.9 percent—from the
2.3 percent registered between 1990 and 2000.
“Even at the rate of 1.9 percent, that still
means 200 babies are born every minute in this country,” Romualdez
said. “Anything above 1.5 percent is bad news.”
The shortage of affordable rice and the much
bigger food crisis have been blamed in large part to galloping
population growth—but reproductive health campaigners like
Romualdez do not expect the government to do anything about the
problem.
Ironically, promoting artificial contraception
in order to bring the population growth rate down can be easily done
by the government, Romualdez said, in much the same way that
campaigns have been successfully waged against tuberculosis,
smallpox and iodine deficiency.
“The resources, which really do not amount to
too much, are there. The expertise is there. The experience in
mounting such a huge public health effort is there,” Romualdez
said.
“What is not there is political will,” he
added.
When asked if he sees any of Mrs. Arroyo’s
prospective successors having what it takes to stand up to Church
opposition to artificial contraception, Romualdez replied with a
firm “yes.”
He said that he has helped Sen. Panfilo Lacson—who
is apparently determined to run for president again in 2010—draft
a platform of government, which contains a “realistic”
population policy. “The aim is to achieve 70-percent contraceptive
prevalence,” Romualdez said.
Doesn’t Lacson fear Catholic resistance to his
candidacy because of his open support for artificial contraception?
Romualdez responded by saying that there has
long been a “mismatch between the perceived influence of the
Church and its actual ability” to shape public opinion.
Whether Lacson’s open support for artificial
contraception would be enough to raise him to the presidency is,
however, another matter.
dansoy26@yahoo.com
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