It’s Church duty to speak vs abuses, says De Lima

It is the duty of the Catholic Church to speak up against killings, human rights abuses, misogyny and other actions detrimental to dignity being taken by the Duterte administration as these are not purely secular affairs, according to Sen. Leila de Lima.

De Lima made the statement as she came to the defense of the Catholic clergy whom presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo accused of interfering in state affairs and told to stick to spiritual affairs.

“Extrajudicial killings, human rights violations, misogyny and other forms of degradation of human dignity are not purely secular affairs on which the Church ought to be silent,” De Lima said in a statement.

Taking the life of another person is a violation of both state law and divine law, she pointed out.

Law of men

“‘Thou shall not kill’ is the law of both God and man,” she said.

“The State, therefore, has no monopoly of assuring that this law is followed, especially when its leadership itself has chosen to violate it with impunity,” she said.

The Church has to call for an end to the killings when it has become a government policy in its war on drugs, she said.

“And when government does not listen, because it believes that it has the right to kill its own citizens, it cannot expect the Church to stop condemning the killings and the State’s implementation of murderous policy,” she added.

According to her, the Church was just doing its part to help people when it opposes the government’s harmful policies.

Tyrannical rule

“It is protecting the people from the tyranny of its leaders who have already become the very embodiment of evil in this country,” she said.

“Fighting for what is right transcends any barrier—political, social or spiritual,” she added.

Panelo told the Church to stop meddling in state affairs after Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas said the President’s tirades against the clergy may not be good for his health and may be more damaging to him than to the Church.

The chief executive had repeatedly lambasted the Catholic Church amid its criticism of killings and human rights abuses in his war on drugs.

He had accused priests and bishops of corruption and immorality.