OPPOSITION lawmakers yesterday conceded that the refusal of the bishops to support their impeachment campaign was a blow to their efforts but said this did not mean that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo was off the hook.
The President’s loyal supporters in Congress welcomed the statement of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), saying it knocked the moral basis out of the opposition bid to oust Ms Arroyo.
“It cannot be denied that their decision not to support us is a loss for now but this will not delay or lessen the determination of those pushing for impeachment,” House Minority Leader Francis Escudero said in Filipino.
Read this and cry.
Malacañang distributed cash to bishops
Conrad de quiros:
I myself got a lot of calls and text messages from dumbfounded friends wondering how the CBCP, given that its leadership has been wrested by progressive minds from reactionary ones, settled for this. I myself suspect the wording of the position, if not the position itself, is the product of much compromise, reflecting the continuing divisions within that body. And I myself believe the revelations of Archbishop Oscar Cruz that Malacañang tried to buy off the bishops and think they succeeded (in)famously with some of them....
The bishops worry that by going through another unproductive political exercise we will only encourage the public to distrust politicians some more? They should worry that by taking the wishy-washy position that they have, they will only encourage the (un)faithful to distrust the clergy some more.
I guess this administration was able to netotiate and include language that favors them in the CBCP pastoral letter.
Lito Banayo:
The Constitution tells us that impeachment is the legal way to try a sitting president for acts that betray the public trust. Yet politicians last year shamelessly used impeachment as a means to fatten their pockets and advance their self-interests. Such brazenness on the part of the bribe-takers and the bribe-giver should have been enough proof that truth was being forcibly hidden. If it was not the political truth, if it was not the legal truth, surely it is the moral truth.
And that is what being bishops are about. That is what being men of the Lord is all about. But the majority of our bishops whose business it is to advocate and insist that morality is the North Star of all private and public acts, would now refuse "to favor" the legally-sanctioned way of discovering the truth. It qualifies the process and the mindsets of those who participate in the process, saying that discovering the truth "must be guided by no other motive than the common good".
But is not truth an end to itself? Are our bishops saying that falsehood can ever be "for the common good", and that truth, because it is ugly, can be justifiably hidden by a "concern for the common good"? That is not what catechism lessons or Thomas Aquinas or even the Holy Bible taught us.
Have not our lord bishops, in their collective contemplation, realized that when they qualify the search for truth in terms of whether or not it is productive or "unproductive", or whether or not it "dismays every citizen", or whether or not it "deepens the negative perception of politicians, left, right or center", they stray from their mandate of morality and jump into the realm of pure politics?
The truth shall set us free. But our bishops ask, will discovering truth be productive? Will the truth not dismay our citizens? Will the truth not worsen our perception of our politicians?
Is this God’s way?
Most "undoubtedly", and "in all sincerity", I submit not.
Ducky Paredes:
What bothers me about this are two things. The first of this is that the rest of the pastoral letter is silent on the search for truth. If impeachment is not the vehicle to use in searching for the truth, what is the proper vehicle, then?
....
The second thing that bothers me about this is the fact that some bishops had dinner with Gloria in Malacañang before the pastoral letter was finalized.
If politicians mulling over national issues had gone to Malacañang for a meal before finalizing their draft, certainly they would be under suspicion that what they had was much more than just a meal with Gloria.
Same thing applies to judges and justices. If they had been seen with her before a watered-down decision was rendered on an issue that concerned the presidency, wouldn’t we be suspicious?
How about Comelec commissioners, and district and regional directors of the Comelec? Wouldn’t we be as suspicious of them as we would of judges, politicians, journalists, ambassadors and anyone else? The timing of the meal is all-important.
Why couldn’t those bishops wait until the pastoral letter was out before accepting an invitation from the President? Didn’t they want to protect the integrity of the process? Or did these bishops think that being of the frock, they are above suspicion? Well, let me tell them that they are not.
And Ducky hits the nail on the head with this comment:
Said the bishops: "We reiterate our call for a thorough reform of the Commission of Elections to restore trust in our electoral process. The call for resignation or even prosecution of a number of the Commissioners should not be lightly brushed aside. The electoral process, including counting of votes, needs to be reformed and modernized before the next elections."
They ought to ask themselves: Who did the cheating in the 2004 elections? Was it the Comelec or was it an operation organized and funded and run by Malacañang? So, if Malacañang did the cheating, why reform the Comelec? How will that help?
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