Saturday, December 23, 2006 Carvajal: Church reflection this Christmas By Orlando P. Carvajal Break Point
IT CAME as no surprise that some quarters were bitterly harsh (almost like they had a chip on their shoulders) in berating the Church for the failure to draw the promised half a million people and for making character change the battle cry at the prayer rally.
The failure of the half-million to materialize (supposedly to make cold fear run down the administration’s spine) was probably not the bishops’ fault. After all it was a prayer rally that they called for and not an indignation rally. Had civil society wanted an indignation rally they should have organized one and just invited the bishops. Besides, you have to credit the administration for raising the communist bogey that, I am sure, gave rise to second thoughts about attending.
I welcome, however, the criticism about the bishops’ call for character change as stone throwing from a glass house. Character change means going, among other things, from lies to truth, from secretive to transparent, and from arrogant to humble. The bishops as guardians of morality must take responsibility for this Christian nation’s having leaders that lack these good character traits.
Most of our corrupt, arrogant and insensitive politicians come from church-going families, were educated by church-going teachers in public schools or better still, taught by priests and nuns in Catholic institutions. As the only remaining absolute monarchy, however, the Church is in no position to teach our future rulers transparency, truth and accountability. These are not the hallmarks of a monarchy.
The Church as a monarchy with an infallible head will always be arrogant. It will always stifle dissent and continue to demand absolute obedience. Very few people know, for instance, that a parish priest has only one vow upon ordination and that is the vow of obedience to the bishop. How can a parish priest then become accountable to the members of his parish if his vow requires him to be accountable to the bishop? (Celibacy is not a vow but a requirement for the priesthood).
The Church hierarchy, therefore, is in no position to demand character change from our rulers when they are modeling the opposite of what they want our rulers to be. The correct thing to do at that rally was for them to say “mea culpa” and announce changes in their structure and character that politicians can follow. (In Cebu, the Catholic Church should encourage the erring priest to come out and say “mea culpa” so morality can triumph over legality).
We need to find Christ again in a manger on Christmas. He seems nowhere to be found in the archaic organizational structure of the Catholic Church.
Christ’s peace be with us all this Christmas and always.
