Bishops’ lament: DepEd ‘God-loving’ no more?

Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop and CBCP president Socrates Villegas. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has found it “unfortunate” that the Department of Education (DepEd) removed the phrase “God-loving” from its vision statement.

“A vision statement is not an empty platitude. It guides the articulation of policy. It orientates plans of action,” said CBCP president and Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas in a statement.

“Unfortunately, in its 2013 version, there is no more mention of God, nor of the salutary fear of Him that, Scripture tells us, is the beginning of all wisdom,” he lamented.

DepEd’s old vision statement reads: “By 2030, DepEd is globally recognized for good governance and for developing functionally-literate and God-loving Filipinos.”

Last year, the DepEd released its new vision statement: “We dream of Filipinos who passionately love their country and whose values and competencies enable them to realize their full potential and contribute meaningfully to building the nation,” sparking criticisms from netizens and various lay organizations.

Still a core value

The DepEd, however, retained “Maka-Diyos” as one of its core values.

Villegas said the Church maintains that the “formation of God-fearing pupils and students is a vision that cannot be surrendered.”

“This sacred synod likewise declares that children and young people have a right to be motivated to appraise moral values with a right conscience, to embrace them with a personal adherence, together with a deeper knowledge and love of God,” he said.

The prelate emphasized that the right of a child to recognize and love God “cannot be harmful to anyone else, believer or not.”

Respect for pluralism

According to him, our pluralistic society “indeed accords respect for the option of some to believe and for others not to.”

“This respect for pluralism does not compel civil society to expunge the name of God from public life, especially when the majority of Filipinos continue to acknowledge God’s sovereignty and to trust in Divine Providence,” Villegas said.

“Furthermore, the attitude of our laws in the Philippines towards religion is characterized as ‘benevolent neutrality’: the accommodation of religion whenever such accommodation does not offend law or public policy,” he added.

Villegas exhorted Catholic laity in public elementary and high schools to be zealous in the apostolate of forming pupils and students.

“Do not get tired of teaching that God is the beginning and the end of all things, that he is the Father who wishes all to have life, and to have it to the full!” he said.

“This, our dear public school teachers, is your particular mission in the life of the Church, the dignity of your calling as evangelizers within the world and its concerns. It is a challenge of particular urgency in this, the Year of the Laity. Stand up for God. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,” he said.

DepEd, for its part, said its vision, mission and values statements “is one document and should be read in its entirety to grasp the full meaning.”

 ‘Living document’

“It is a living document that is meant to reinvigorate our agency and society as a whole. It is meant to permeate and to affect the way we behave and how we find solutions to complex issues. It is meant to be part of public discourse and personal transformation. It is not static and not intended for mere posting on walls and tables,” DepEd said in a statement posted on its website.

Filipino Freethinkers earlier wrote an open letter, apparently denouncing DepEd’s use of the terms “God-loving” and “Maka-Diyos” in its vision statement and core values for being “clear violations of the principle of secularism.”

“They enshrine theism as a preferred belief system and imply that those who do not subscribe to belief in a deity are at best second-class citizens who have flawed or incomplete values,” the group said in its letter.

“With this, we strongly urge the Department of Education to act on this matter through the omission or replacement of the said clauses with more universal values that apply to both theists and non-theists alike,” the group said.