The Church and State on social issues
The State should not and could not entirely ignore the Church in addressing the social issues of the times. The Church also cannot just contend itself with mere criticisms. The Church should help and the State should welcome the role of the Church in serving the best interests of the people. After all, both State and Church are serving the same constituencies. The State can be likened to the father of the family, and the Church is the mother. After all, it is called the Mother Church. They are looking after the welfare of the same children.The papal visit highlighted the need for the unity of Church and State.
The social issues include population and the related subject of family planning. Also included are the issues of poverty among the vast majority of the people, and the concomitant phenomena of unemployment, underemployment, labor migration, trafficking in persons, prostitution and sex tourism. To further exacerbate our social ills, we should look at the rising incidence of crimes, drugs, gambling and illicit and immoral acts. To top it all, we cannot close our eyes to the cybersex, the loosening of morals among the youth, teen-age pregnancies, abortions and HIV/AIDS.We should also assess the grave social costs of and the negative impact of outward labor migration.
The Church has very strong positions on many of these issues, and most of these are directly colliding with the policies and decisions of the State. On population, the State acting through the government has made certain policies and legislative measures, and some of these are condemned by the Church as sinful and immoral. We think that the Church does not "per se" objects to managing population. What the Church opposes is the State making decisions that only couples can conscientiously decide. The Church also opposes artificial contraception, and condemns abortion as virtual murders of the innocent unborn. The State should respect this.
The government however cannot merely stand idly with a population of more than 100 million people. The growth of the economy may be improving but its rate has never caught up with the rate of population increases every year. Moreover, the economic growth has never trickled down to the poor, not to mention the poorest of the poor. Millions are jobless and homeless, and have no access to decent housing and habitable environment, excluded from quality education and affordable medical care. The minimum wage is below the levels of poverty line and living wage. Pope Francis said the inequality is scandalous. Social Injustice is a result of sin, of greed.
The government policy to push the country's human capital to outward labor migration is destructive to the Philippines' long-term and strategic economic development. More importantly, this diaspora of mothers and fathers leaving the young to work abroad is destroying the family as the basic institution. Dysfunctional homes and families weaken the moral fibers of the nation and produce morally-awkward young generations. The future leaders of the land have had wounded childhood, deprived of the moral guidance of absentee parents. The State should reexamine its migration and employment policies.
Indeed, the State and the Church leaders should meet as mature pillars of our society, to talk in dialogue and consultation and find a viable solution to our social problems. We have had enough of conflicts and criticisms between the Church and the State. The time has come for them to sit down and listen to each other. Failing in this, both of them shall have failed.
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