The Catholic bishops’ call for a denial of communion to pro-choice Catholic politicians is an instance of undue interference in governmental affairs and pursuit of sectarian interests.  Their appeal to religious prejudice and penchant for obfuscating issues (lumping together abortion, birth control, reproductive rights and sexual promiscuity) are a bane to intelligent debate on policies that have a bearing not only on their co-religionists but on the Filipino people as a whole, Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists, secular humanists and other citizens of every philosophical persuasion included.

Such religious bigotry is all the more dangerous, given the proliferation of  party-list organizations that are outright lobby groups for religious sects that are neither poor nor lacking in bureaucratic connections (e.g., Mike Velarde’s Buhay Party for zygotes?).  Deference to religious authority is common in societies where the state fails in providing the most basic of social services and relinquishes in whole or in part such functions to religious sects and other similar private organizations.  The United States, though far ahead of the Philippines in economic development, offers lessons on the negative consequences of breaching the institutional wall between church and state. American democracy is fast being eroded with the aid of right-wing Christian sects through tax-funded faith-based initiatives tied to support for the Bush administration’s slashing of welfare and health funds for the poor and infirm, “preventive” wars against unfriendly states and passage of bills that criminalize radical dissent, normalize spying on citizens and legalize torture of suspected terrorists.(Kevin Philips, American Dynasty, Penguin, 2004, Chapters 7-9 and Alfred McCoy, “US Has a Long History of Torture” ZNET, December 9, 2006)

Though the Filipino Christian Right’s level of largesse and social influence nowhere approaches that of its US counterpart, it has in its own way wreaked considerable damage on both our political and civil institutions. Trapos kowtow to religious organizations, on account of their much touted capacity for mustering votes to install favored candidates in public office; one brazen example is erstwhile Manila Mayor Lito Atienza Jr. who issued an executive order, banning condoms and contraceptive pills in all of Manila’s public hospitals and clinics. And most brazen of them all is Gloria Arroyo who invokes divine support for her presidency and buys the political support of church leaders with largesse and concessions to their sectarian interests.

Anti-choice lobbyists often argue that tolerance for contraception leads to promiscuity and abortion on the grounds that the conception of a human person begins with the union of the ovum and the sperm after sexual intercourse and that any contrivance aimed at preventing or terminating such union is a device for the murder of an unborn person.

Let us consider the notion of "moment of conception" invoked by anti-choice lobbyists against artificial birth control. There is, in fact, no such moment of conception.  Cell division does not begin until 38 hours after the sperm has penetrated the ovum, a gradual process involving the union of the cytoplasm of sperm and ovum and subsequent fusion of their nuclei. Implantation in the uterus takes place from the fifth to the thirteenth day over which period, twinning may occur, the one unique individual becoming two. For a fetus to feel, myelination of its nerve pathways must first be consummated. Scientists do not concur with the religious opinion that the fetus has the cognitive organs that enable it to feel during the first three months of the embryo’s implantation in the uterus. Myelination of nerve pathways does not begin until the twentieth week and is completed only after birth. The early fetal responses to stimuli are purely reflex.

Much of the debate on abortion hinges upon what seems to be a scientific question: when does a fertilized egg become a human being? However, the answer cannot be entirely scientific, since it depends in part on objective facts about the biology of human development, and in part on what society regards as a “human person” and on what criterion it privileges biological organisms as worthy of protection. The Catholic doctrine of the sanctity of life in general and of human life in particular withers in the light of scientific and philosophical scrutiny.

First, no one ascribes absolute and equal value to all living organisms regardless of their species and stages of organic development; most civilized societies ascribe to different organisms a value proportional to the range of intelligence, adaptability to human purposes as well as empathy that they exhibit.  However, not even the most rabid “pro-life” opponents of contraception criticize the slaughter of animals for food such as fowl, cattle and swine, beasts that have a proven range of intelligence and empathy not only for their own kind but for their human handlers as well. Thus, it is hypocritical for anti-choice advocates to inveigh against contraception and abortion of human zygotes, while condoning the routine slaughter of domestic animals and the high incidence of unwanted pregnancies and maternal mortality among poor people due to lack of birth spacing, faulty *** education and scant reproductive health facilities.

Second, the religious idea of “natural law” is itself anchored on the false ascription to nature of moral virtues. In reality, nature is neither benign nor evil; nature unleashes earthquakes, tsunamis, plagues and other calamities that afflict the virtuous and the wicked alike just as it showers its bounty on both good and bad people who have the will and the power to extract and harness it.  Nature is wasteful and uncaring in its propensity for overproducing and weeding out organisms without regard to any “standard of fitness” other than adaptability to changing environments and reproductive success in whichever ecological niche an organism thrives. Among human beings, there is an enormous wastage of sperm and ova, and this continues after fertilization, with the loss of at least 50% of embryos and fetuses, mostly in the first three months, and often before the woman knows she is pregnant, and many of the discarded embryos are genetically defective.  Even with this considerable fetal wastage, normal fertile women produce babies far too easily; without any effective means of contraception, a woman could have 20 or so babies over her reproductive lifetime -- far more than most families can provide for adequately. Consequently, women throughout much of history have tragically resorted to infanticide and abortion.

Third, personhood is inextricably linked to having the ability to form and recollect memories (which make up our “identity” as a person), as well as to experience emotions (like love and suffering) and not just primal instincts (like hunger, pain and sexual urge). These characteristics are in turn dependent on being a member of a society, interacting with others, communicating one’s thoughts and receiving and comprehending information about other people’s emotions and ideas. The problem is that there are many circumstances in which the personhood of a human organism is disputable. Fetuses are not persons; neither are the individuals who subsist in a vegetative state induced by cerebral damage and who thereby lose civil and other rights such as suffrage and management of their estate. So, while it is indisputable that abortion involves the killing of a biological being that belongs to the human species, it is an entirely different claim and a much less defensible proposition to say that abortion constitutes the murder of a human person.

If anti-choice advocates were consistent in their defense of the “right to life”, they would have to espouse vegetarianism and to reject all non-procreative sexual intercourse including masturbation and even so so-called “natural methods of family planning” including the overrated calendar method that entails wastage of millions of potential human persons.  If it were not for the Pope’s ban on human cloning and stem cell research, the mortality rate of potential human persons from women’s monthly menstruation would warrant -- from a “pro-life” philosophical standpoint -- efforts to extract ova from women’s wombs for artificial fertilization in biogenetic labs.  These inconsistencies reveal that fear of *** and desire to place sexual conduct under church regulation are the anti-choice pro-lifers’ real motives behind their opposition to reproductive rights.  It is mendacious of these anti-choice pro-lifers to claim that *** is sinful if a couple’s motivation for it is pleasure but is made sacred by matrimony (preferably officiated in church by the clergy) and by its being shackled to the goal of breeding as though human persons were stock animals.  Though the anti-choice pro-lifers will surely object to our claim that they are anti-***, their knee jerk reaction to movies such as “The Last Temptation of Christ” and “Da Vinci Code” betray their unhealthy attitude towards ***. They have no objections to cinematic portrayals of Jesus’ expulsion of the merchants from the temple or his use of invectives against unbelievers or even his loss of composure on the cross (He cried out for God the Father not to forsake him though surely he must have known that he was up for resurrection on the third day!), but they take offense at the slightest hint that Jesus could have harbored erotic thoughts about Mary Magdalene!

Lastly, the bishops misrepresent reproductive rights and population management as contrary to a policy of social justice and redistributive reform, as though unregulated population growth that far outstripped economic growth was consistent with the provision of adequate infrastructure, education, health and other social services vital to ensuring every citizen a decent quality of life, gainful employment, security and equitable life-chances. The bishops cite affluent economies such as Japan and Europe that suffer from inadequate replenishment of aging populations as examples unworthy of emulation, but conveniently overlook the chronic poverty and social decay in their own country that compel the many educated citizens to migrate to and take up menial jobs in richer countries often under sweatshop conditions rendered more severe by racial discrimination. In their refusal to recognize women’s reproductive rights and in their imposition of a sexual ethics unworthy of mature persons, the bishops ascribe “natural” status to oppressive social structures that typecast man and woman into provider and child-bearer, guardian and dependent, master and domestic helper, as well as pimp and prostitute, thereby preventing them from becoming co-equal partners in human development on both household and societal scales.  

No society bestows on all human persons the same entitlements without factoring in differences in age, ***, aptitudes and state of physical and mental health. The mere existence of differential entitlements is not in itself a problem, but it becomes so, when their character as social constructs is denied and when social constructs are passed off as “permanent laws of nature” beyond the pale of public scrutiny -- as theologians and priests often do in their defense of religious prohibitions on divorce, contraception and consensual *** between adults outside of marriage and procreative ends.  These religion-based moral laws have no more validity or “natural” status than slavery and other forms of class, *** and race-based stratification that most Christian churches had hitherto endorsed until democratic revolutions dictated their abolition.  Thus, advocates of reproductive rights correctly dismiss religious and ideological notions that impose upon nubile women the compulsory role of mother and homemaker on account of their *** and natural child-bearing capacity.

What makes the most vociferous anti-choice pro-lifers even less convincing is that they often include the most willing collaborators of reactionary regimes that murder political dissenters and foist on their countries iniquitous economic policies that result in the chronic poverty and agonizing death of underprivileged people on a mass scale.  Among the most famous of these anti-choice advocates was the late Agnes Gonxha Bojaxiu aka Mother Teresa, recently railroaded into sainthood by the Vatican.  Mother Teresa espoused a brand of Christianity that celebrated mortification of body as the path towards holiness, fiercely opposing women’s control of their own bodies, contraception and abortion.  Despite the millions that she had garnered for her mission, she scrimped on the implements of her Calcutta clinic foregoing the use of isolation wards, pain killers and disposable syringes (she recycled syringes!) that would have saved many of her curable patients or made death less agonizing than it had been for those beyond cure.  Unlike the church progressives who engaged in social work to help empower the poor and ease their way out of poverty, Mother Teresa reveled in the misery of the poor so that they may “partake in the suffering of Jesus Christ.”  While harshly impugning the morals of women who practice birth control, Mother Teresa fawned on unscrupulous patrons such as the Haitian dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier and the American businessman Charles Keating.  She even went out of her way to plead for Keating who in 1992 was sentenced by the Superior Court of Los Angeles to 10 years of imprisonment for defrauding 17,000 small investors of some $252 million. (Aroup Chatterjee, Mother Teresa: The Final Verdict, Kolkata: Meteor Books, 2003, Chapters 6, 7, and 9)

The above discussion shows that the absolute right to life is a myth that religious leaders alternately invoke and ignore at their own convenience--according to their sectarian interests and current expediencies.

The Catholic bishops’ call for a denial of communion to pro-choice Catholic politicians is an instance of undue interference in governmental affairs and pursuit of sectarian interests.  Their appeal to religious prejudice and penchant for obfuscating issues (lumping together abortion, birth control, reproductive rights and sexual promiscuity) are a bane to intelligent debate on policies that have a bearing not only on their co-religionists but on the Filipino people as a whole, Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists, secular humanists and other citizens of every philosophical persuasion included.

Such religious bigotry is all the more dangerous, given the proliferation of  party-list organizations that are outright lobby groups for religious sects that are neither poor nor lacking in bureaucratic connections (e.g., Mike Velarde’s Buhay Party for zygotes?).  Deference to religious authority is common in societies where the state fails in providing the most basic of social services and relinquishes in whole or in part such functions to religious sects and other similar private organizations.  The United States, though far ahead of the Philippines in economic development, offers lessons on the negative consequences of breaching the institutional wall between church and state. American democracy is fast being eroded with the aid of right-wing Christian sects through tax-funded faith-based initiatives tied to support for the Bush administration’s slashing of welfare and health funds for the poor and infirm, “preventive” wars against unfriendly states and passage of bills that criminalize radical dissent, normalize spying on citizens and legalize torture of suspected terrorists.(Kevin Philips, American Dynasty, Penguin, 2004, Chapters 7-9 and Alfred McCoy, “US Has a Long History of Torture” ZNET, December 9, 2006)

Though the Filipino Christian Right’s level of largesse and social influence nowhere approaches that of its US counterpart, it has in its own way wreaked considerable damage on both our political and civil institutions. Trapos kowtow to religious organizations, on account of their much touted capacity for mustering votes to install favored candidates in public office; one brazen example is erstwhile Manila Mayor Lito Atienza Jr. who issued an executive order, banning condoms and contraceptive pills in all of Manila’s public hospitals and clinics. And most brazen of them all is Gloria Arroyo who invokes divine support for her presidency and buys the political support of church leaders with largesse and concessions to their sectarian interests.

Anti-choice lobbyists often argue that tolerance for contraception leads to promiscuity and abortion on the grounds that the conception of a human person begins with the union of the ovum and the sperm after sexual intercourse and that any contrivance aimed at preventing or terminating such union is a device for the murder of an unborn person.

Let us consider the notion of "moment of conception" invoked by anti-choice lobbyists against artificial birth control. There is, in fact, no such moment of conception.  Cell division does not begin until 38 hours after the sperm has penetrated the ovum, a gradual process involving the union of the cytoplasm of sperm and ovum and subsequent fusion of their nuclei. Implantation in the uterus takes place from the fifth to the thirteenth day over which period, twinning may occur, the one unique individual becoming two. For a fetus to feel, myelination of its nerve pathways must first be consummated. Scientists do not concur with the religious opinion that the fetus has the cognitive organs that enable it to feel during the first three months of the embryo’s implantation in the uterus. Myelination of nerve pathways does not begin until the twentieth week and is completed only after birth. The early fetal responses to stimuli are purely reflex.

Much of the debate on abortion hinges upon what seems to be a scientific question: when does a fertilized egg become a human being? However, the answer cannot be entirely scientific, since it depends in part on objective facts about the biology of human development, and in part on what society regards as a “human person” and on what criterion it privileges biological organisms as worthy of protection. The Catholic doctrine of the sanctity of life in general and of human life in particular withers in the light of scientific and philosophical scrutiny.

First, no one ascribes absolute and equal value to all living organisms regardless of their species and stages of organic development; most civilized societies ascribe to different organisms a value proportional to the range of intelligence, adaptability to human purposes as well as empathy that they exhibit.  However, not even the most rabid “pro-life” opponents of contraception criticize the slaughter of animals for food such as fowl, cattle and swine, beasts that have a proven range of intelligence and empathy not only for their own kind but for their human handlers as well. Thus, it is hypocritical for anti-choice advocates to inveigh against contraception and abortion of human zygotes, while condoning the routine slaughter of domestic animals and the high incidence of unwanted pregnancies and maternal mortality among poor people due to lack of birth spacing, faulty *** education and scant reproductive health facilities.

Second, the religious idea of “natural law” is itself anchored on the false ascription to nature of moral virtues. In reality, nature is neither benign nor evil; nature unleashes earthquakes, tsunamis, plagues and other calamities that afflict the virtuous and the wicked alike just as it showers its bounty on both good and bad people who have the will and the power to extract and harness it.  Nature is wasteful and uncaring in its propensity for overproducing and weeding out organisms without regard to any “standard of fitness” other than adaptability to changing environments and reproductive success in whichever ecological niche an organism thrives. Among human beings, there is an enormous wastage of sperm and ova, and this continues after fertilization, with the loss of at least 50% of embryos and fetuses, mostly in the first three months, and often before the woman knows she is pregnant, and many of the discarded embryos are genetically defective.  Even with this considerable fetal wastage, normal fertile women produce babies far too easily; without any effective means of contraception, a woman could have 20 or so babies over her reproductive lifetime -- far more than most families can provide for adequately. Consequently, women throughout much of history have tragically resorted to infanticide and abortion.

Third, personhood is inextricably linked to having the ability to form and recollect memories (which make up our “identity” as a person), as well as to experience emotions (like love and suffering) and not just primal instincts (like hunger, pain and sexual urge). These characteristics are in turn dependent on being a member of a society, interacting with others, communicating one’s thoughts and receiving and comprehending information about other people’s emotions and ideas. The problem is that there are many circumstances in which the personhood of a human organism is disputable. Fetuses are not persons; neither are the individuals who subsist in a vegetative state induced by cerebral damage and who thereby lose civil and other rights such as suffrage and management of their estate. So, while it is indisputable that abortion involves the killing of a biological being that belongs to the human species, it is an entirely different claim and a much less defensible proposition to say that abortion constitutes the murder of a human person.

If anti-choice advocates were consistent in their defense of the “right to life”, they would have to espouse vegetarianism and to reject all non-procreative sexual intercourse including masturbation and even so so-called “natural methods of family planning” including the overrated calendar method that entails wastage of millions of potential human persons.  If it were not for the Pope’s ban on human cloning and stem cell research, the mortality rate of potential human persons from women’s monthly menstruation would warrant -- from a “pro-life” philosophical standpoint -- efforts to extract ova from women’s wombs for artificial fertilization in biogenetic labs.  These inconsistencies reveal that fear of *** and desire to place sexual conduct under church regulation are the anti-choice pro-lifers’ real motives behind their opposition to reproductive rights.  It is mendacious of these anti-choice pro-lifers to claim that *** is sinful if a couple’s motivation for it is pleasure but is made sacred by matrimony (preferably officiated in church by the clergy) and by its being shackled to the goal of breeding as though human persons were stock animals.  Though the anti-choice pro-lifers will surely object to our claim that they are anti-***, their knee jerk reaction to movies such as “The Last Temptation of Christ” and “Da Vinci Code” betray their unhealthy attitude towards ***. They have no objections to cinematic portrayals of Jesus’ expulsion of the merchants from the temple or his use of invectives against unbelievers or even his loss of composure on the cross (He cried out for God the Father not to forsake him though surely he must have known that he was up for resurrection on the third day!), but they take offense at the slightest hint that Jesus could have harbored erotic thoughts about Mary Magdalene!

Lastly, the bishops misrepresent reproductive rights and population management as contrary to a policy of social justice and redistributive reform, as though unregulated population growth that far outstripped economic growth was consistent with the provision of adequate infrastructure, education, health and other social services vital to ensuring every citizen a decent quality of life, gainful employment, security and equitable life-chances. The bishops cite affluent economies such as Japan and Europe that suffer from inadequate replenishment of aging populations as examples unworthy of emulation, but conveniently overlook the chronic poverty and social decay in their own country that compel the many educated citizens to migrate to and take up menial jobs in richer countries often under sweatshop conditions rendered more severe by racial discrimination. In their refusal to recognize women’s reproductive rights and in their imposition of a sexual ethics unworthy of mature persons, the bishops ascribe “natural” status to oppressive social structures that typecast man and woman into provider and child-bearer, guardian and dependent, master and domestic helper, as well as pimp and prostitute, thereby preventing them from becoming co-equal partners in human development on both household and societal scales.  

No society bestows on all human persons the same entitlements without factoring in differences in age, ***, aptitudes and state of physical and mental health. The mere existence of differential entitlements is not in itself a problem, but it becomes so, when their character as social constructs is denied and when social constructs are passed off as “permanent laws of nature” beyond the pale of public scrutiny -- as theologians and priests often do in their defense of religious prohibitions on divorce, contraception and consensual *** between adults outside of marriage and procreative ends.  These religion-based moral laws have no more validity or “natural” status than slavery and other forms of class, *** and race-based stratification that most Christian churches had hitherto endorsed until democratic revolutions dictated their abolition.  Thus, advocates of reproductive rights correctly dismiss religious and ideological notions that impose upon nubile women the compulsory role of mother and homemaker on account of their *** and natural child-bearing capacity.

What makes the most vociferous anti-choice pro-lifers even less convincing is that they often include the most willing collaborators of reactionary regimes that murder political dissenters and foist on their countries iniquitous economic policies that result in the chronic poverty and agonizing death of underprivileged people on a mass scale.  Among the most famous of these anti-choice advocates was the late Agnes Gonxha Bojaxiu aka Mother Teresa, recently railroaded into sainthood by the Vatican.  Mother Teresa espoused a brand of Christianity that celebrated mortification of body as the path towards holiness, fiercely opposing women’s control of their own bodies, contraception and abortion.  Despite the millions that she had garnered for her mission, she scrimped on the implements of her Calcutta clinic foregoing the use of isolation wards, pain killers and disposable syringes (she recycled syringes!) that would have saved many of her curable patients or made death less agonizing than it had been for those beyond cure.  Unlike the church progressives who engaged in social work to help empower the poor and ease their way out of poverty, Mother Teresa reveled in the misery of the poor so that they may “partake in the suffering of Jesus Christ.”  While harshly impugning the morals of women who practice birth control, Mother Teresa fawned on unscrupulous patrons such as the Haitian dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier and the American businessman Charles Keating.  She even went out of her way to plead for Keating who in 1992 was sentenced by the Superior Court of Los Angeles to 10 years of imprisonment for defrauding 17,000 small investors of some $252 million. (Aroup Chatterjee, Mother Teresa: The Final Verdict, Kolkata: Meteor Books, 2003, Chapters 6, 7, and 9)

The above discussion shows that the absolute right to life is a myth that religious leaders alternately invoke and ignore at their own convenience--according to their sectarian interests and current expediencies.

lets go back to the basics of economics....  the main problem of the Philippines now is food shortage and rising inflation.. right??

 supply and demand....

too much people, but the supply of food getting tighter..... causing prices to soar.....causing hunger... poverty.. crime.....

but if we minimize population growth, then supply of food will get bigger........ food prices & cost of basic commodities will go down....

also causing bigger family budgets for education, other wishes for their children & families....

so what is the root cause of our problems?????? overpopulation....

the church always says --- PRO----LIFE.. well let me say this::: by using a condom, you are not killing anyone, because life starts at the moment of conception.. but when you use a condom... and the sperm never fertilizes the egg, then there is no conception, therefore there is no life lost---no sin is committed...

if we follow the logic, that each time sperm released, doesnt meet with the egg is the same as killing a potential baby??? then does that also mean that each time a boy masturbates, he is killing a potentila baby???? i think it is high time that---the church starts getting real....

 

Peace_Syndrome:

lets go back to the basics of economics....  the main problem of the Philippines now is food shortage and rising inflation.. right??

 supply and demand....

too much people, but the supply of food getting tighter..... causing prices to soar.....causing hunger... poverty.. crime.....

but if we minimize population growth, then supply of food will get bigger........ food prices & cost of basic commodities will go down....

also causing bigger family budgets for education, other wishes for their children & families....

so what is the root cause of our problems?????? overpopulation....

the church always says --- PRO----LIFE.. well let me say this::: by using a condom, you are not killing anyone, because life starts at the moment of conception.. but when you use a condom... and the sperm never fertilizes the egg, then there is no conception, therefore there is no life lost---no sin is committed...

if we follow the logic, that each time sperm released, doesnt meet with the egg is the same as killing a potential baby??? then does that also mean that each time a boy masturbates, he is killing a potentila baby???? i think it is high time that---the church starts getting real....

 

well said bro, as I was saying, the church permits witjdrawal, when a guy commits coitus interruptus, where does he spill the sperm?Either the bedsheets or the floor. What is the difference when you put a plastic barrier between the ejecting sperm from the man's genitals and the woman's organ?? It's the same. Not to mention that during ejaculation,millions of sperm is released but only one meets the egg on it's way to become a baby and sometimes, S_e_x does not guaranteed that a woman will be pregnant. Does it mean murder?/ of course not. The Roman Politic Church is DUMB in scientific knowledge. They waste their time memorizing songs in latin that they don't have biology or economic courses in the seminary.

jacobus1982:

Peace_Syndrome:

lets go back to the basics of economics....  the main problem of the Philippines now is food shortage and rising inflation.. right??

 supply and demand....

too much people, but the supply of food getting tighter..... causing prices to soar.....causing hunger... poverty.. crime.....

but if we minimize population growth, then supply of food will get bigger........ food prices & cost of basic commodities will go down....

also causing bigger family budgets for education, other wishes for their children & families....

so what is the root cause of our problems?????? overpopulation....

the church always says --- PRO----LIFE.. well let me say this::: by using a condom, you are not killing anyone, because life starts at the moment of conception.. but when you use a condom... and the sperm never fertilizes the egg, then there is no conception, therefore there is no life lost---no sin is committed...

if we follow the logic, that each time sperm released, doesnt meet with the egg is the same as killing a potential baby??? then does that also mean that each time a boy masturbates, he is killing a potentila baby???? i think it is high time that---the church starts getting real....

 

well said bro, as I was saying, the church permits witjdrawal, when a guy commits coitus interruptus, where does he spill the sperm?Either the bedsheets or the floor. What is the difference when you put a plastic barrier between the ejecting sperm from the man's genitals and the woman's organ?? It's the same. Not to mention that during ejaculation,millions of sperm is released but only one meets the egg on it's way to become a baby and sometimes, S_e_x does not guaranteed that a woman will be pregnant. Does it mean murder?/ of course not. The Roman Politic Church is DUMB in scientific knowledge. They waste their time memorizing songs in latin that they don't have biology or economic courses in the seminary.

 

IT  IS VERY IRONIC ...ANG MGA MAHIHIRAP NAG PIPILIT MABUHAY KAHIT NA PUROS PAHIRAP ANG GINAGAWA NG GOBYERNO...   PERO ANG MGA MAYAYAMAN TULAD NI GMA NA NASA GOBYERNO HINDI PA NASIYAHAN SA KANILANG YAMAN,  NINANAKAW PA NILA ANG PERA NG BAYAN KAYA LALO SILANG YUMAYAMAN...GASTOS DITO GASTOS DOON...PASYAL DITO PASYAL DOON..PASYAL DITO PASYAL DOON PASYAL DITO PASYAL DOON... UTANG DITO UTANG DOON ....UTANG DITO UTANG DOON....UTANG DITO UTANG DOON...UTANG DITO UTANG DOON...KAHIT HINDI KAILANGAN NANGUNGUTANG UPANG MAG KAROON NG DAHILAN ANG KANILANG PAG NANAKAW...    HINDI PA MAN ISINISILANG ANG ISANG PINOY MAYROON NA ITONG NAPAKALAKING UTANG NA DAPAT BAYARAN!   ANG LIFESTYLE NILA NA SOBRANG LUHO NA ANG PINANG GAGALINGAN NAMAN AY PERA NG BAYAN...NAG DADRIVE NG MAMAHALANG AIRCONDITIONED NA MGA SASAKYAN, NAKATIRA SA MAGAGANDANG BAHAY, MARAMING MGA KATULONG, YAYA PARA SA MGA ANAK AT APO, NAG SSTAY SA MGA EXPENSIVE HOTELS, NAG DADAMIT NG MAMAHALIN, AT KUNG ANU ANO PANG LUHO...   AT PAG NAUBOS ANG KABAN NG YAMAN...ANG REMEDYO NILA, PANIBAGONG TAX PARA SA MAMAMAYAN......   AT PAG NAG HIHIRAP ANG BAYAN DAHIL SA WALANG KATAPUSANG CORRUPTION ANG SISIHIN NILA ANG MGA MAHIHIRAP NA FILIPINO..... *** GMA MADE THE COUNTRY POORER..OR SHOULD I SAY BECAME POOREST .....KAYA NGA SA PANAHON NIYA TUMAAS ANG SOBRANG KAHIRAPAN WHICH MEANS LUMAKI ANG CORRUPTION NG MGA MAG NANAKAW....  NA PINAMUMUNUAN NIYA!    LALAKI BA ANG NAKOCOLLECT NILANG MGA TAXES NA BILYON BILYON ANG HALAGA KUNDI RIN SA MGA FILIPINO?      by MALOU MANGAHAS  UNLIQUIDATED CASH advances, “loans” without records, donations diverted to uses not prescribed by donors, understated expenses, and overstated accounts, in the hundreds of millions of pesos, all sourced from taxpayers' money.   SEAL of the President of the Philippines These irregular transactions in clear breach of government accounting and auditing rules mark financial transactions in the Office of the President (OP) under Gloria Macapagal Arroyo in 2007, according to Commission on Audit (COA) report, a copy of which was obtained by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ).   The report on the presidency for 2007 contained 11 qualified comments and observations on these erroneous entries — mostly the same errors COA had noted in its 2006 audit of the same office. COA also pointed out that of the 11 audit recommendations it made in the 2006 audit, only four were fully implemented, three partially implemented, and four not implemented at all by Malacañang.  Thus, for the second year in a row, COA rendered “a qualified opinion on the fairness of the presentation of the financial statements of the OP.”  The OP Proper consists of  “the Private offices, the Presidential Assistant System, the Executive Offices, the General Government Administration Staff, the Internal Audit Service Unit, the Locally Funded/Foreign Assisted Projects, and the Other Executive Offices.” The OP also “directly supervises 58 other executive offices, agencies, commissions, and committees that warrant the special attention of the President.”  The OP kitty is obviously substantial. In 2007, the OP received total cash inflows of P3.38 billion, or 13 percent more than the P2.99 billion it got in 2006. Of the 2007 figure, P2.31 billion came from notices of cash allocation from the Department of Budget and Management. The OP collected another P1.06 billion as its share in the net earnings of the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (Pagcor) and the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO).   The OP likewise raised service income of P9.3 million, interest income of P4.05 million, and miscellaneous income of P3.3 million.   COA said that the OP’s total cash outflows reported in 2007 amounted to P2.67 billion, or 13 percent more than the P2.36 billion in 2006.  NON-EMPLOYEES GOT MONEY Where those monies went can be gleaned from the COA audit — somewhat. In its latest audit of the presidency signed by COA Director IV Bato S. Ali Jr., the agency said that as of December 31, 2007, Arroyo's Malacañang had:  Failed to liquidate a total of P632.9 million of cash advances and receivables from officers, employees and other persons, on account of foreign and domestic travels that the president made, typically with a large retinue of political deputies and allies. Of the total, P594 million represented “cash advances granted to persons who are not employees of the OP.”   Diverted “donations” totaling P37.3 million to expenses “outside of intended purposes,” contrary to provisions of the General Appropriations Act of 2007. Erroneously remitted and deposited collections on income from OP Bus Service Fares (P1.86 million collected from Malacañang employees) and entrance fees for the Presidential Museum (P1.74 million) in a Special Account in the Bureau of the Treasury (Btr), and not in the unappropriated surplus of the General Fund. Granted “loans” from the President’s Social Fund (PSF) using money from Pagcor in CY 2003 and January 2004 totaling P269.5 million without complete records. Erroneously classified collections and disbursements on electricity and water expenses of other agencies and government-owned and -controlled corporations in the books of accounts, resulting in the understatement of Other Payables account by P4.1 million, and overstatement of the Due to Other NGAs and Due to GOCCs accounts by P4.1 million and P21,422.23, respectively. (NGAs are national government agencies and GOCCs are government-owned and -controlled corporations.) Failed to reconcile physical count of office supplies, as well as of property and plant equipment, with balances per books, resulting in “the overstatement/understatement of various supplies” and “casting doubt on their reliability.” Failed to provide property, plant and equipment worth a total of P914.8 million with depreciation, “thus understating both the accumulated depreciation and depreciation expense accounts.” Enrolled balances of P186.7 million as “Due to Other NGAs” and P42.07 million as “Due to Other GOCCs” accounts that remain “doubtful” because of “unreconciled beginning balance” of P181.9 million, and P42.05 million, respectively. *****     IKAW NGA ANG MAG EXPLAIN NG MGA UNACCOUNTED EXPENSES NG BOSS MO?

Filed under: MODERATE YOUR GREED!

 SIGURO DAPAT ITONG MGA CORRUPT NA ITO ANG SIYANG MAG CONTROL NG PAG LAGO NG KANILANG MGA LAHI NG MABAWASAN NA ANG MGA MAG NANAKAW SA GOBYERNO!

That post is for a different thread. It missed the part on whether the Roman Politic church should be hold accountable for our poverty issues. We are not in poverty because of corruption ALONE. It is a big factor but not the only factor.Population ranks either # 2 or 3. If corruption is eliminated, is it a good thing?? Yes but how about we eliminate corruption and over population. That is better. The church has done a good job of hiding their accountability to poverty by pointing fingers at the goverment when they have a big part in the issue too.Compare to the church,despite the corruption of the government (and we do not tolerate it), the government has practical solutions .The church is playing chess with the government, problem is the church can blame the government but the government is afraid to blame the prayles even though both have their flaws. You just don't ignore the church's impractical solutions to poverty. Now if you want to discuss government corruption in another thread, I will be glad to defend you that the government is corrupt but  just because it is corrupt it does not mean we should be blind to the dictatorship of the priest who promotes a God of free will and yet does not respect FREE WILL

well said: the church has its good points, but with regards to birth control in the Philippines i think they "just don't get it".

unlike in America where the church and state are totally seperate entities, in the Philippines, the boundary is just too vague, everybody in the Philippines is so afraid of the church, but now that fear has already become unhealthy for the nations prosperity, admit it or not, the church is holding the Arroyo govt as it's hostage....

im sure the govt would have long ago implemented drastic population control measures such as the one child policy, or mandatory use of contraceptives, if not for the church. and we would not have had this food crisis that we are facing now.

the sad situation inthe Philippines is that too many people have put too much faith in the church, that they forgot about God's words... "God helps those who help themselves".. what most people in the Philippines are good at now is complacently fingerpointing the government, and suggesting dumbfounded solutions, instead of really thinking of creative ways to weather the difficulties which we are encountering now...

“The pervasive frailty of the Filipino people believing that the goodness of God will protect them have lulled everyone into a culture of complacency,” ----sad but true...

 

 

It will hold any future government in hostage, The problem is the church will NEVER pay for the hospital bills of those poor kids if they get sick, they will NEVER send them to school and they will NEVER provide for them their daily bread. By the way, there is a new version of Hail Mary in the internet

Tanda ng Krus

Sa ngalan ng baryang talamak at paring pulitiko Amen

Aba Ginoong Barya

Aba Ginoong Barya
Napupuno ang yong alkansya
Ang pari'y sugapa sa iyo
Ubod kang diktaturya
Nakilam sa lahat
at pinulitika lahat pati ang di naman sanyo

Santa Barya
Inggit sa syensya
Ipanalangin ang aming hapag kainan
Sa pagdami, sa gutom ay mamamatay Syanawa

Sa ngalan ng baryang talamak at paring pulitiko Amen

 

jacobus1982:

It will hold any future government in hostage, The problem is the church will NEVER pay for the hospital bills of those poor kids if they get sick, they will NEVER send them to school and they will NEVER provide for them their daily bread. By the way, there is a new version of Hail Mary in the internet

Tanda ng Krus

Sa ngalan ng baryang talamak at paring pulitiko Amen

Aba Ginoong Barya

Aba Ginoong Barya
Napupuno ang yong alkansya
Ang pari'y sugapa sa iyo
Ubod kang diktaturya
Nakilam sa lahat
at pinulitika lahat pati ang di naman sanyo

Santa Barya
Inggit sa syensya
Ipanalangin ang aming hapag kainan
Sa pagdami, sa gutom ay mamamatay Syanawa

Sa ngalan ng baryang talamak at paring pulitiko Amen

 

 

DONATION TO THE CHURCH IS VOLUNTARY....PAYING TAXES IS COMPULSORY! 

when you pay taxes, a good percentage of that goes to the pockets of politicians ( we all know that), a certain percentage really goes to the international revenue and eventually to projects, but when you donate to the church,how rare does it go to the poor people and not for the modification of their castles or to the Vatican???

What percentage of church donations are given to the squatters who have way too many children than they can support. I mean go to churches today and even holy water is "sold" (or given to you for a generous specific amount donation if you do not want to believe that the church is a marketing genius)

jacobus1982:

when you pay taxes, a good percentage of that goes to the pockets of politicians ( we all know that), a certain percentage really goes to the international revenue and eventually to projects, but when you donate to the church,how rare does it go to the poor people and not for the modification of their castles or to the Vatican???

What percentage of church donations are given to the squatters who have way too many children than they can support. I mean go to churches today and even holy water is "sold" (or given to you for a generous specific amount donation if you do not want to believe that the church is a marketing genius)

 

HOW DID YOU KNOW THAT THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IS NOT DOING ANYTHING FOR THE POOR?   

 

I'D LIKE TO CORRECT MYSELF... 

CATHOLIC CHURCH NEVER DEMAND FOR DONATION...IT'S VOLUNTARY

 UNLIKE OTHER RELIGIOUS GROUPS WHERE THEY ASK FOR 10%, 20% OR MORE OF YOUR MONTHLY EARNINGS..

 

EVERYBODY HAS A CHOICE....IF THEY DON'T LIKE WHAT THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IS PREACHING THEN THEY'RE FREE TO GO OUT...

THE WORDS OF GOD CANNOT BE CHANGED UNLIKE THE CONSTITUTION....

 

IT'S UP FOR THE PEOPLE TO DECIDE! 

 

  

 

 

unless you live in the metropolis, look outside the churches or let's go to Quiapo for example,is Quiapo church beggar free outside?

ANyway I have notice we kinda strayed a bit from the topic,let's get back on track. SInce you mentioned  that it is up for the people to decide,is there anything wrong in passing the bill and letting the people decide which family planning method is the best for them?? Whether it be what artificial or natural, why not we give our countrymen the choice,as I said, and you said it all comes down to freedom to choose right?? DOn't you think that the priest's sanctions is an interference in the right to choose??

 

Not only legislators, but also those who are anti-Life.

Not only legislators, but also those who are anti-Life.