Osmea: No need to pass RH bill now

THE lone Cebu congressmen who wasnt invited to lunch with Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma because of his known support for the Reproductive Health (RH) bill said he didnt mind the snub. It was expected that I wouldnt get an invitation. I would have felt awkward there anyway, he said. Osmea said he supports the RH bill, which mandates the government to stock up on contraceptives and make available the full range of choices for birth control to Filipino families, as well as require sex education for students from grade 5 to high school. But Osmea said he wont vote in favor of the bill when the House calls for legislators to declare their stand. He said he valued his friendship and alliance with former Rep. Raul del Mar, an anti-RH bill advocate and papal awardee, and gave in to Del Mars request not to vote. Osmea said there is no urgency to pass the RH bill now. There is a difference between desirability and urgency. There is no difference between passing the bill now or next year, he said. He said there was little time left for lengthy House discussions since Congress is on recess and would resume session next month. He said what is more urgent for now is for the government to make a stand against church intervention and to remind the Catholic Church of the separation of church and state. The government has to decide how much they will allow religion to dictate on government. Even the church does not want to dialogue on this. In the church, there is no democracy. What God says, thats it. Its very dogmatic, he said. Correspondent Edison delos Angeles

When RH bill becomes a law

When the latest SWS survey indicated that seven of every 10 respondents do favor the reproductive health bill, chances are, CBCP is correct in thinking that indeed there ought to be money circulating around from a foreign lobby group, this despite SWS claim that the survey is of its own initiative and therefore not a commissioned one in particular. True or false, it is all beyond us. Polling circuits can sometimes do push-polling job at every turn, anyway. One bishop is reported to have said that polling circuits are into this mode they issue some kind of mind-conditioning surveys with the end in view of influencing how people accept or reject the RH bill. It remains of doubtful validity whether or not the findings are reflective at least beyond being merely a statistical trend of how the population looks at the proposed reproductive health bill. It will always be valid to ask whether the respondents have the capacity to understand how they reply to the questionnaires. Suppose that in fact, HB 5043 was unanimously approved at the House of Representatives when Members voted today on Third and Final Reading. Consider further that when transmitted to the Senate, it was likewise approved through a counterpart Senate bill and that in a subsequent bicameral conference, this 14th Congress would in fact have approved the bill for PGMAs final signature and approval. Ergo, we have a new law. What would the days be after today when the law would have been firmly erected to govern the lives of families, married couples, parents, women, children, adults? What will schools, churches, hospitals do? What will be the evolving new moral order? What kind of sociological

phenomenon will evolve among the population that will be affected with the new law? Will not an unfolding scheme and scene be invasive of our psyche? Whose economic holiday will it all be? Will drugstores be the first beneficiary? Will new clinics open to accommodate postabortion cases? Will doctors have more patients that they ever thought there will be? Truly, contraceptive pills will flood the market to the extent that perhaps, young girls can buy them at the nearest sari-sari store in much the same way that young boys can buy every kind of condom from every nearby outlet that perhaps, even cigarette vendors may have to sell condoms as they sell candies and cigarettes in the streets. Pharmaceuticals will produce millions of contraceptive pills per day as they would sell like hot potato. Industries into the sale of silicone or rubber as a raw material will experience a boom. Beauty parlors might even have to sell condoms, pills as well if not in fact have services for IUDS, whatever. The intellectual culture in all educational settings, be them in the campuses of elementary schools, high schools, colleges or universities will dramatically adopt to certain changes brought about by what the law can permit or allow, more than what it cannot permit or disallow. There will be changing attitudes and beliefs that will indicate themselves in changed behavioral patterns from as early as children in their Grade III or Grade IV levels. They shall be exposed to a kind of compulsory sex education. By making condoms or pills very much available from every outlet, students in high school will have little to worry about getting into teen-age or pre-marital sex since the law has opened the door wide open for so-called freedom of choice. This simply means that children have the right over their bodies and this literally enough, includes that right to have an abortion in case they somehow get pregnant and they know their parents would not approve of it. Young boys feel safe and therefore think they can engage in teen-age sex with anyone in the opposite sex comforted with the thought that in using condoms, they dont have to get the girls impregnated. What then will be the resulting moral norm in so far as their young lives are concerned? What about other young couples, women who also would like to have a piece of the action? With pills, even married women can comfortably make love with men other than their husbands, cant they? Or so with men with some packs of condom in their pockets? Who would fear sex with anyone when the law would have opened wide so-called freedom of choice? The RH bill has successfully blurred the traditional notion on when pregnancy begins. It has successfully blurred the traditional notion on when human life begins. How can the law pretend to think that the fetus in the mothers womb may not yet be a human being? Even the field of medical science has been invaded by pseudo-theories of pregnancy or conception. Even the thin moral fabric of our existence has been torn with a kind of attitude that the law will want to popularize. Even the rubric of our traditional social orientation has been altered. USA did not transform itself into a better union, did it? Nor did Europe? Now, RP is the citadel of Christianity, supposed-to-be, but if this law be erected, what would it leave us to? A new world war has just been launched and our nation is under attack. From our parishes to the Papacy, are we still afforded with strong moral moorings so that we dont have to go astray? A whole compendium of literature has already been documented proving how this contemporary social orientation has destroyed the homes, families, marriages, youth, children, women, parents. Are we here to let this happen to our own national domain? The first five years after the law is erected, futuristic wise, will tell just how bad we have gone with the RH bill enacted into law. Then and there will the framers, lobbyists, apologists, beneficiaries, patrons of the bill will realize that in the next generation of children their

very own have just become the victims. So for a few pounds of money, why risk a future? Without risk of being wrong, the embryo is a human being!

Church defends drive vs RH bill

MANILA, Oct. 6, 2008Is the Catholic Church exerting pressure on lawmakers why some of them withdrew their support on the controversial Reproductive Health bill? As far an official of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines is concerned, its not pressure but a strong advocacy against efforts to threaten the sanctity of life and the family. We dont pressure them but we respect them because they are our representatives in Congress. They have their personal decisions and they follow the principles of their own conscience, said Aniceto who chairs the CBCPs Episcopal Commission on Family and Life (CBCP-ECFL). Our advocacy is ongoing but there is no pressure... these are mature people, he added. The prelate was reacting to oft-repeated criticisms that the Catholic Church was all but bullying legislators into rejecting policies intended to control the countrys growing population. One of these criticisms came no other than from RH bills principal author Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman, a Catholic. He earlier called on the bishops not to resort to scare tactics such threatening RH bill supporters in Congress to deny them of communion or urging people to reject politicians supportive of the bill. Lagman said such approach will not help address the problems caused by a burgeoning population amid deteriorating poverty. A signature campaign is currently ongoing in various dioceses nationwide to rally the faithful to prevent the RH bill from being enacted into law. Church leaders and other pro-life groups tagged the bill as promoting abortion and the use of artificial birth control methods such as pills and condoms. Lagman, however, said the bill merely gives couples the free choice to plan their family. An effort of many bishops and priests to reach out to their respective lawmakers also shows no sign of letting up to ensure their support for the Churchs position against the bill. CBCP-ECFL executive secretary Fr. Melvin Castro said the Church will not allow a bill that would provide widespread access to artificial contraceptives to become law. (Roy Lagarde)

Opinion
I HAVE been following the debates on the RH Bill not just in the recent House sessions but practically since its start. In the process, because of what I have said and written (where I have not joined the attack dogs against the RH Bill), I have been called a Judas by a high-ranking cleric, I am considered a heretic in a wealthy barangay where some members have urged that I should leave the Church (which is insane), and one of those who regularly hears my Mass in the Ateneo Chapel in Rockwell came to me disturbed by my position. I feel therefore that I owe some explanation to those who listen to me or read my writings. First, let me start by saying that I adhere to the teaching of the Church on artificial contraception even if I am aware that the teaching on the subject is not considered infallible doctrine by those who know more theology than I do. Moreover, I am still considered a Catholic and Jesuit in good standing by my superiors, critics notwithstanding! Second (very important for me as a student of the Constitution and of church-state relations), I am very much aware of the fact that we live in a pluralist society where various religious groups have differing beliefs about the morality of artificial contraception. But freedom of religion means more than just the freedom to believe. It also means the freedom to act or not to act according to what one believes. Hence, the state should not prevent people from practicing responsible parenthood according to their religious belief nor may churchmen compel President Aquino, by whatever means, to prevent people from acting according to their religious belief. As the Compendium on the Social Teaching of the Catholic Church says, Because of its historical and cultural ties to a nation, a religious community might be given special recognition on the part of the State. Such recognition must in no way create discrimination within the civil or social order for other religious groups and Those responsible for government are required to interpret the common good of their country not only according to the guidelines of the majority but also according to the effective good of all the members of the community, including the minority. Third, I am dismayed by preachers telling parishioners that support for the RH Bill ipso facto is a serious sin or merits excommunication! I find this to be irresponsible. Fourth, I have never held that the RH Bill is perfect. But if we have to have an RH law, I intend to contribute to its improvement as much as I can. Because of this, I and a number of my colleagues have offered ways of improving it and specifying areas that can be the subject of intelligent discussion. (Yes, there are intelligent people in our country.) For that purpose we jointly prepared and I published in my column what we called talking points on the bill. Fifth, specifically I advocate removal of the provision on mandatory sexual education in public schools without the consent of parents. (I assume that those who send their children to Catholic schools accept the program of Catholic schools on the subject.) My reason for requiring the consent of parents is, among others, the constitutional provision which recognizes the sanctity of the human family and the natural and primary right of parents in the rearing of the youth for civic efficiency and the development of moral character. (Article II, Section 12) Sixth, I am pleased that the bill reiterates the prohibition of abortion as an assault against the right to life. Abortifacient pills and devices, if there are any in the market, should be banned by the Food and Drug Administration. But whether or not there are such is a question of scientific fact of which I am no judge. Seventh, I hold that there already is abortion any time a fertilized ovum is expelled. The Constitution commands that the life of the unborn be protected from conception. For me this means that sacred life begins at fertilization and not at implantation.

Eighth, it has already been pointed out that the obligation of employers with regard to the sexual and reproductive health of employees is already dealt with in the Labor Code. If the provision needs improvement or nuancing, let it be done through an examination of the Labor Code provision. Ninth, there are many valuable points in the bills Declaration of Policy and Guiding Principles which can serve the welfare of the nation and especially of poor women who cannot afford the cost of medical service. There are specific provisions which give substance to these good points. They should be saved. Tenth, I hold that public money may be spent for the promotion of reproductive health in ways that do not violate the Constitution. Public money is neither Catholic, nor Protestant, nor Muslim or what have you and may be appropriated by Congress for the public good without violating the Constitution. Eleventh, I leave the debate on population control to sociologists. Finally, I am happy that the CBCP has disowned the self-destructive views of some clerics.