CITY OF SAN FERNANDO – Catholic bishops “share in the indignation” of Filipinos amid the allegations of corruption in government but they wanted to act more as shepherds to guide their flock through the crisis, Pampanga Bishop Pablo Virgilio David said.

“Bishops share in the indignation but define their role more clearly as that of pastors, not of political powerbrokers,” said David, who attended the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines’ emergency meeting in Manila on Tuesday.

“They welcomed the laity’s involvement in civil society’s initiatives toward genuine societal change that would not be limited to simple leader change,” he said.

The bishops, David said, urged caution so the call for “communal action” is not exploited by “sheer power play.”

He said the quest for truth on the cancelled National Broadband Network project was the focus of the discussion in the meeting.

But the bishops, he said, respected the option to call for resignation of President Macapagal-Arroyo if that was a “product of discernment.”

The CBCP also recognized the questions on the moral ascendancy of government, he said.

In Dagupan City, Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz said he was not disappointed with the CBCP’s statement as he knew that the bishops would never adopt an extreme position on any issue, “like I do.”

Cruz said he did not attend the meeting because the other bishops already knew his position on the calls for Ms Arroyo’s resignation.

“I do not have to be there. The bishops who should be there are those who are more moderate in their perspective and are not radical, the more sober ones,” Cruz said in a telephone interview on Wednesday.

Cruz has been calling for Ms Arroyo’s resignation in view of the corruption scandals and allegations of election cheating hounding her administration.

Cruz said he expected the CBCP statement to take the “middle ground” as the bishops “never came out with radical decisions on any issue.”

“The decisions the CBCP takes are neither left nor right, but always center,” he said. “The decisions are always guided by prudence and prudence is a cardinal virtue.”

Asked if the statement would have taken a different form if he attended the meeting, Cruz, a former CBCP president, said: “I am just one voice [and] nobody listens to me.”

“I have been president of the CBCP. I know how it works. I knew all along that it will not adopt a yes or no, a black or white, but it will be between black and white,” he said. Tonette Orejas and Anselmo Roque, Inquirer Central Luzon, and Yolanda Sotelo-Fuertes, Inquirer Northern Luzon