PHILIPPINES: Overseas Church Scandals Shed Light on Errant Priests

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Marites Sison

MANILA, Jul 5 2002 (IPS) - At the Catholic shrine marking the 1986 uprising against the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos, every mass used to begin or end with a “Prayer for Peace” to help the Philippines in its transition to democracy.

But these days, every service begins with a “Prayer for Priests”, including those who are lonely and tempted to break the vows they made when they joined the priesthood. The prayers asks that priests “won’t do things unworthy of their sublime vocation”.

The change in cause, if you will, is seen largely as a response to the scandal involving paedophile priests in the United States, which has rocked Roman Catholic Churches worldwide for months.

The Philippines, a former Spanish colony where more than 80 percent of 80 million people are Catholic, has not been spared in the aftermath of this scandal.

Shortly after the sex-abuse stories involving Catholic priests in the United States broke in March, newspapers here have been replete with accounts of local as well as foreign priests who reportedly had sexual liaisons with women, nuns, and in a few instances, minors.

One columnist recalls a story she did years ago about an American priest who allegedly raped a girl from an indigenous T’boli community in the southern Philippines.

“I asked the nun if she was sure the girl had been abused and she said yes. She examined her shortly after the crime happened. I asked her why she kept quiet and testified too late on the victim’s behalf,” says the columnist, Ceres Doyo.

“Her answer was: At that time, she thought she had to protect the image of the church,” she recalls.

No charges were ever filed against the priest, who has since left the country.

The recent scandals in the United States also elicited a statement from the government of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who is Catholic. She felt compelled to do so in support of the campaign by the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) against “rogue priests who have committed sexual offenses”.

In the wake of the scandals overseas and Pope John Paul II’s ‘Letter to Priests’ in March, the CBCP vowed to prosecute and defrock priests who commit sexual offenses. It also said that it would come up with guidelines on the conduct of local priests.

But analysts here say the nature of supposed ‘sexual offenses’ by the religious in the Philippines has a different character – so this campaign by the local church needs to go farther.

“While this explosion of ‘mea culpa’ from the Catholic Church is a good development, it seems to focus only on paedophilia and sexual abuse of minors,” adds Doyo. “What about adults abusing adults?”

Some priests and lay people have asked the local church hierarchy to look into cases of priests who have gotten women, including nuns, pregnant or who are living with women.

Activist priest Fr Robert Reyes says that the sex scandals here and abroad would actually be good for the Catholic Church, because they offer an opportunity to correct such wrongs.

“I welcome it as a grace,” he said, adding that some people have frequented his parish at the University of the Philippines, telling him that they were victims of sexual abuses by priests, either as youngsters or adults. He urged them to report these to church superiors.

The English-language daily ‘Philippine Daily Inquirer’ recently ran a story about a charitable institution in the city of Malabon, in metropolitan Manila, which is reportedly known to take in women impregnated by Catholic priests.

“You see, unlike in the United States, our problem here is more about priests who enter into sexual relationships with women as consenting adults,” the ‘Inquirer’ quoted an unnamed priest as having said.

Anthropologists here say there are often close relationships between Filipino women with priests, who they turn to not only for spiritual guidance but marital or relationship problems as well. Such relationships can give rise to intimacy that can be abused, according to Dr Michael Tan.

But many say cases of priests having sexual affairs with members of their flock are nothing new in the Philippine context.

The country’s national hero, Jose Rizal, documents such abuses in his classic 19th century novel ‘Noli Me Tangere’, where his villain, the Spanish friar Padre Damaso, is unveiled as the father of one of the protagonists called Maria Clara.

Filipinos also candidly joke that some of the country’s ‘mestizos’, those with Spanish blood, could well be descendants of Spanish friars who came to Catholicise and colonise the country for four centuries, beginning in the 16th century.

But for all of such talk, the influence of the Catholic Church as an institution remains strong.

Women activists often cite this, for instance, as a major reason why family planning programmes that involve artificial contraceptives have a hard time succeeding in the country. Many politicians are also wary of endorsing these methods, for fear of the church’s reaction especially come voting time.

Thus, one priest who requested anonymity says the sex scandals overseas have not diminished the church’s influence much – or affected attendance in churches that are traditionally full for Sunday masses.

The Philippine Church, he says, is actually more concerned about the growth of cults and religious as well as pseudo-religious movements, especially in remote areas of this poor country.

In June, the country was jolted by the death of 17 members of a cult in the southern province of Surigao del Sur. As authorities came to get him, they came to the defence of their leader who was being arrested for the murder of his wife

“These are signs of the times,” said Ronald Llamas, president of the non-government Akbayan group. “Filipinos are looking for saviours. They’re unhappy with their government. Some are disappointed with the Church, so they seek salvation elsewhere.”