Thursday, June 30, 2005
We are under the yoke of clerics
A nation under the yoke of clerics First posted 01:32am (Mla time) June 30, 2005 Inquirer News Service Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the June 30, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
JOSE Rizal was shot in 1896, but after over 100 years the country is still ruled by clerics. Mexico, Spain, France and Italy (Catholic countries all) have managed to throw off the yoke of the Catholic Church and have zealously guarded their governments against all attempts by clerics to interfere in state matters.
Yet in the Philippines, we have a daily dose of priests, bishops and even nuns and seminarians, preaching with pomposity or with condescension on how government should manage its affairs and what government policies ought to be. Hiding behind their cassocks and claiming to speak in furtherance of a self-serving pastoral mission, these clerics, who hold neither elective nor appointive office, would impose their vision of administration on those whom the people have elected. Since these priests and bishops seem to have an opinion on everything, then perhaps they should run for mayor, governor, congressman, senator and even for president. If they win, then that is the only time they should seek to preach and dictate, give refuge to subversives and fugitives from justice, engage in demagoguery, and let’s face it -- seek the power over State affairs, which they now so persistently and actively seek while hiding behind their religious robes. It seems that Spain’s most lasting legacy in the Philippines has been a continuing subservience of a population cowed by friars and clerics.
And these friars and clerics pay no real estate taxes, no value added tax on what they sell, no income tax on their Sunday collections. They consider themselves beyond the reach of ordinary men’s libel laws, they foment disorder and civil disobedience and then jump up and pray for peace and think they have done a good thing.
"Ad maiorem Dei gloriam" [For the greater glory of God]!
HADRIAN V. ARROYO, MBC Bldg., V. Sotto Street, CCP Complex, Roxas Boulevard, Pasay City
JOSE Rizal was shot in 1896, but after over 100 years the country is still ruled by clerics. Mexico, Spain, France and Italy (Catholic countries all) have managed to throw off the yoke of the Catholic Church and have zealously guarded their governments against all attempts by clerics to interfere in state matters.
Yet in the Philippines, we have a daily dose of priests, bishops and even nuns and seminarians, preaching with pomposity or with condescension on how government should manage its affairs and what government policies ought to be. Hiding behind their cassocks and claiming to speak in furtherance of a self-serving pastoral mission, these clerics, who hold neither elective nor appointive office, would impose their vision of administration on those whom the people have elected. Since these priests and bishops seem to have an opinion on everything, then perhaps they should run for mayor, governor, congressman, senator and even for president. If they win, then that is the only time they should seek to preach and dictate, give refuge to subversives and fugitives from justice, engage in demagoguery, and let’s face it -- seek the power over State affairs, which they now so persistently and actively seek while hiding behind their religious robes. It seems that Spain’s most lasting legacy in the Philippines has been a continuing subservience of a population cowed by friars and clerics.
And these friars and clerics pay no real estate taxes, no value added tax on what they sell, no income tax on their Sunday collections. They consider themselves beyond the reach of ordinary men’s libel laws, they foment disorder and civil disobedience and then jump up and pray for peace and think they have done a good thing.
"Ad maiorem Dei gloriam" [For the greater glory of God]!
HADRIAN V. ARROYO, MBC Bldg., V. Sotto Street, CCP Complex, Roxas Boulevard, Pasay City
# posted by ge @ 9:50 AM 
