Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma. Photo from https://www.cbcponline.net/
The top official of the influential Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) on Saturday warned Catholic schools and teachers to toe the Church line or they may end up in trouble.
Archbishop Jose Palma of Cebu, president of the CBCP, said Catholic schools might be stripped of their affiliation with the Church if they violate religious and ethical teachings.
“If we are a Catholic school, we should not teach anything contrary to the official teaching of the church,” Palma said in an interview posted on the CBCP website.
Palma noted that the CBCP acknowledges that there are some differences in the beliefs of teachers and Church teachings on topics like reproductive health.
“In some places, we first talk to them because some teachers may have some misunderstanding of what they think of freedom of conscience or academic freedom,” said Palma. “In some of the universities, we say that if you want to teach that idea, do not do it in a Catholic school because we are confusing the students… do it in other universities,” he said. Kristine L. Alave