Bishop Junie Maralit
An official of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) said on Friday the outcome of the last elections is "a slap in the face" of the Church's local hierarchy.
Boac Marinduque Bishop and CBCP Episcopal Commission on Social Communication Chairman Marcelino Antonio Maralit expressed his view in an interview posted in Caritas Philippines website.
The Church tacitly endorsed the presidential run of Vice President Maria Leonor "Leni" Robredo, referring to her as "the moral choice." Robredo lost badly to Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr.
Maralit said the question now is "whether we have lost our voice as the hierarchy of the Church." "What happened to our voice? Is it because we're not that credible anymore, and sometimes it's very hard and very painful to ask that question, but credibility when it's a moral choice is based on your own moral ascendancy," he said.
Another possible explanation why the Catholic Church failed to convince the faithful into making the moral choice is that its hierarchy may already be "disconnected with our people," he said.
Maralit admitted that the results of the election is a "slap in the face to wake [the Church hierarchy] up to the reality that we should be really re-thinking about."
"Maybe we still have the morality and the moral
ascendancy but our message does not reach the people... maybe we are not
speaking the same language," the bishop said.
"Maybe we have already failed them by not listening to
them," he added. "The election is just a phase of what our people
were already telling us. It's really hard to give your message when the person
is already disconnected and I think that is another question that we have to
ask."
The Church must accept the challenge "to be instruments of not bringing out the message but bringing in the message to the church from the people," he added.
The trust of the people in the Church has never changed, said Maralit.
"When it comes to the pandemic response, specifically on relief, the people really trusted the Church because we were never questioned when it comes to relief."
Maralit believes this all changed when it comes to governance which was based on disinformation.
"Because the question on whether [Marcos] is credible or not was all based on information and now that was the issue that was played," Maralit said. "And that is where disinformation really did its damage to the Filipino people, I believe."
"So all the narratives that were supposed to create mistrust and distrust on the type of governance that he will offer were already changed because of disinformation which really worked," he said.
He said it is time for the Church to strategize.
"It's really not the problem of the Church. It's just something that we live by. We react. We usually respond when there is a problem. Instead of being proactive, sometimes we are always late. We have to also be preventive. In the sense that we should really start strategizing," Maralit said.
"After this, what do we say about the truth? How do we re-educate our people not only about the truth but also about their values? As a Church we really need to re-assess ourselves, especially the leaders and to rise from the ashes," he said.
This article first appeared in The Manila Times
