NEITHER HERE NOR THERE

Yesterday, the CBCP issued another Pastoral Statement, the pertinent portion on the aspect of impeachment reads as follows:

24. Impeachment. We wish to make the CBCP position clear and unambiguous on the present impeachment plans:

24.1. We are undoubtedly for the search for truth. Therefore, in all sincerity we respect the position of individuals or groups that wish to continue using the impeachment process to arrive at the truth.

24.2. But as Bishops reflecting and acting together as a body in plenary assembly, in the light of previous circumstances, we are not inclined at the present moment to favor the impeachment process as the means for establishing the truth. For unless the process and its rules as well as the mindsets of all participating parties, pro and con, are guided by no other motive than genuine concern for the common good, impeachment will once again serve as an unproductive political exercise, dismaying every citizen, and deepening the citizen’s negative perception of politicians, left, right and center.

For the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines,
Most Rev. Angel N. Lagdameo, D.D.President, CBCP

I’m literally fed up with CBCP’s neither here nor there stance in dealing with this sickening political crisis. If they are really God’s shepherds as they profess to be, then they should at least have a clear political stand on the issues hounding Mrs. Arroyo, most notably on the question of legitimacy. I cannot understand why they still continue to search for the truth when the truth is right before their very eyes! If ordinary people (whose only knowledge about God is how to pray the Hail Mary) can easily discern that cheating is immoral per se, I cannot understand why they cannot, even from a moral standpoint, categorically declare that Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo cheated in the last elections. While it was so easy for the Catholic heirarchy to condemn Joseph Estrada back then, it is very difficult for them to do the same thing to GMA now.

In relation to the Pastoral Statement above, the Bishops seemed to have developed amnesia in a relatively short span of time. Whereas before, they said that the filing of an impeachment complaint is not against the Gospel, that a just political order is best promoted by a preference for constitutional processes and that resolving the crisis has to be within the framework of the Constitution and the laws of the land so as to avoid social chaos, they now abhor the impeachment process as if it is contaminated with an evil disease. In the first place, impeachment under the Constitution was never intended as a venue for arriving at the truth as some would like to project. It is, first and foremost, a political mechanism for removing a President who is no longer fit to continue serving the mandate given him by the electorate. In the course of such proceedings, the truth may or may not come out. The exercise merely involves the question of whether or not a President still deserves the trust of two-thirds of all the members of the Senate. Besides, why would you entrust the quest for truth on 24 Senators who may have already pre-judged the case? Not even the Bishops can claim to know the absolute and unadulterated truth!

What the CBCP does not realize is that impeachment may be the only constitutional remedy left for removing an allegedly disgraced Presidency. Worse, they failed to recognize that it was Mrs. Arroyo herself who contributed much to the erosion of Congress’ credibility in its handling of last year’s impeachment. One doesn’t have to be a Bishop to know the real score.

What’s your alternative then, my dear Bishops, if you say that impeaching Mrs. Arroyo will only be an unproductive political exercise?