Arrest preachers bringing drugs to Bilibid—bishops

AN OFFICIAL of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines said the government should arrest and prosecute any religious group proven to be involved in the illegal drugs trade.

“If there is evidence against any religious group allegedly peddling drugs, the government is duty-bound to arrest, prosecute and put them behind bars,” said Fr. Jerome Secillano on Saturday.

Secillano is the executive secretary of the CBCP’s Permanent Committee on Public
Affairs.

The priest issued the statement in reaction to reports that a religious group was a conduit for illegal drugs and prostitution entering the New Bilibid Prison (NBP).

Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre had said that a religious group was involved in illegal drugs inside the national penitentiary, and that the group even had a chapel at the prison.

The revelation prompted a temporary ban on preaching and other religious activities inside the NBP.

Secillano said that no one should be above the law in the war against illegal drugs.

He said that Aguirre was right in no longer allowing the religious group “to operate under the guise of proclaiming the faith” and that the group should be stopped from fooling the people.

“Religious groups are supposed to build and not destroy lives; they are to preach hope and not ruin the future; they are expected to help reform prisoners and not condone an anomalous lifestyle,” Secillano said.

As this developed, another CBCP official assailed the alarming spate of vigilante-style killings as a “barbaric way” of fighting the illegal drug menace.

Rudy Diamante, executive secretary of the CBCP’s Episcopal Commission on Prison Pastoral Care, said the way that some people had taken the law into their own hands was “alarming.

“It is a barbaric way of addressing crime and does not really solve the problem. The vigilantes become part of the problem and the solution,” Diamante said over Church-run Radio Veritas.

420 killed so far
Since President Duterte assumed office on June 30, 420 people have been killed in police operations and summary executions.

For his part, Digos Bishop Guillermo Afable urged the authorities to allow drug pushers and users to surrender, and not to kill them outright.

“Those tasked to look for them, arrest them, but do not be rash in killing if it can be avoided. Always value life. You should not kill. Duterte said, ‘I want the peace of the living, not the dead,’” said Afable in a separate interview over Radio Veritas.

Radio Veritas president Fr. Anton Pascual stressed the sanctity of each human life, and said that killing could not be justified since it ran against moral decency.

“Christian humanism in the world absolutely respects every human person, thus making the killing of anyone, whether legal or illegal, not justifiable and truly against moral decency and civility,” he said.