‘Duterte attacks should strengthen Catholic faith’
Credit to Author: RALPH VILLANUEVA| Date: Wed, 02 Jan 2019 17:17:13 +0000
MALACAÑANG on Wednesday said the Catholic faithful should not be offended but instead “welcome” statements made by President Rodrigo Duterte against the Church, as these are his ways of triggering “intellectual discussion.”
Palace spokesman Salvador Panelo said such pronouncements of Duterte, who days earlier called the biblical teachings of the Holy Trinity as “silly,” were his “way of shaking long-held religious tenets and beliefs that instead of molding them (the faithful) into being righteous individuals make them cling to religion as an opium.”
“In so doing, the President puts to a test the validity of the religious rituals bordering to fanaticism as against the practice of genuine spirituality as taught by the different personifications of one God,” Panelo said in a statement.
The spokesman said Duterte’s statements should serve as a “process to strengthen further their faith or enlighten those who seek the truth of what they have embraced.”
“His intention being, to initiate an intellectual discussion for the faithful’s enlightenment and spiritual awakening which could lead them to thread the path of uprightness so necessary in the moral regeneration of a nation so abundant with religiosity but wanting in spirituality,” Panelo said.
He also said that the President pushes the envelope of freedom of expression through his outlandish statements.
“In fulfilling his constitutional duty to serve and to protect the people, the President endeavors to be creative, using means that may be unnerving to the conservatives unused to his ways of governance but effective in putting across message he wants to convey to the majority of the people,” Panelo said.
Panelo said that he did not see any decrease in supporters of the President as manifested by recent survey results showing that 74 percent of adult Filipinos were satisfied with Duterte’s performance and nine of 10 Filipinos were entering 2019 with hope.
Duterte has had strong words against the Catholic faith even before he took his oath as President.
In 2016, he cursed Pope Francis because of the traffic his January 2015 visit caused.
He also called the Christian God “stupid,” and called bishops “useless.”
The government and the Catholic Church reached a moratorium on strong statements after the President formed a task force to talk to the Catholic clergy, but Duterte broke it shortly after.
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