Church starts ‘novena for life’ to counter passage of RH bill

MANILA, Philippines—The Catholic Church began a nine-day novena-for-life on the “auspicious” day of the beatification of Pope John Paul II, again to step up its campaign against a legislative measure that will put birth control back on the Philippine development agenda.

Msgr. Pedro Quitorio, media director of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), said the novena-for-life will end on May 9, the day Congress will again take up the reproductive health (RH) bill.

The bill will institutionalize family planning promotion, including sex education in schools. The Catholic Church is against modern birth control methods.

“This novena has one intention, that all Filipinos may be enlightened about the Gospel of Life of Pope John Paul II,” said Quitorio in an interview Sunday night.

The Gospel of Life or Evangelium Vitae is the encyclical written by the late pontiff expressing the Catholic Church’s stance on the value and sacredness of human life. He issued the letter in March 1995.

Quitorio said it was “fairly auspicious” to start the novena on the day the Vatican marked the last formal step before Pope John Paul’s sainthood and also on the day the Catholic Church observed Divine Mercy Sunday.

Supported by the Church hierarchy, the novena is spearheaded by Church-run Radio Veritas, the CBCP Media Office, member organizations of the Sangguniang Laiko ng Pilipinas and various youth groups, said Quitorio.

The nine-day vigil is held from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. daily at the chapel of the Arzobispado in Intramuros, Manila.

The novena to stop the RH bill will be replicated in several dioceses in the capital, he said.

A novena is a private or public devotion consisting of a prayer repeated for nine consecutive days to obtain special graces.

They will be praying that the RH bill, renamed the responsible parenthood bill, would be rejected by the legislators.

Proponents, however, say the bill will stop the see-saw family planning policies of the government. Family planning programs were strongly promoted by the Marcos, Estrada and Ramos administrations. However, the Arroyo administration followed the Catholic line and limited family planning promotion to the Church-approved “natural” method.