{"id":198210,"date":"2019-01-18T01:34:05","date_gmt":"2019-01-18T06:34:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=198210"},"modified":"2019-01-18T01:34:05","modified_gmt":"2019-01-18T06:34:05","slug":"dont-react-if-youre-not-being-alluded-to-palace-to-bishops","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/01\/18\/dont-react-if-youre-not-being-alluded-to-palace-to-bishops\/","title":{"rendered":"Don\u2019t react if you\u2019re not being alluded to: Palace to bishops"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Panelo made the remark after Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas, reminded him to respect the Pope, bishops, and priests (File Photo<\/a>: Office of the Presidential Spokesperson\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0— No matter how many verbal attacks President Rodrigo R. Duterte hurls against the Catholic Church, bishops and priests living in luxury, clergymen should not react if they\u2019re not being alluded to, Malaca\u00f1ang said Thursday.<\/p>\n

Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo made the remark after Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas, in an open letter to his godson published on his Facebook account, reminded him to respect the Pope, bishops, and priests.<\/p>\n

Villegas did not mention names, but tackled issues related to the President\u2019s strong criticism of the Catholic Church and its members.<\/p>\n

Villegas, former president of the Catholic Bishops\u2019 Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), also said that he is not worried about criticism against the Church because despite crooked acts done by some of its members, the institution has lasted for 2,000 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they are affected by the criticism or hypocrisy of certain members, if they are not alluded to, then why should they be reacting?\u201d Panelo said in a Palace briefing.<\/p>\n

He said he does not buy Villegas\u2019 statement that bishops are not worried about criticisms, noting that they continued to make negative comments against the President.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccording to Bishop Socrates, it does not affect the Church.\u00a0So anong problema doon<\/em>\u00a0(what\u2019s the problem there)? If it does not affect the Church,\u00a0eh di wala. Kahit na anong word war na gamitin mo diyan, parang<\/em>\u00a0(then they should not react. Whatever word war is waged against them, it\u2019s like) they\u2019re just engaged in polemics,\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith more reason, they should not be concerned, alarmed, or angry at any tirade against the Church because as he correctly says, it\u2019s been there for a thousand years. It\u2019s entrenched, so\u00a0di maapektuhan<\/em>\u00a0(they won\u2019t be affected),\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Panelo reiterated that the President cannot be stopped from speaking his mind on any particular matter that to his mind is important, the same way bishops do.<\/p>\n

He, meanwhile, urged clergymen to stick to their job of spreading the teachings of Jesus Christ to the Catholic faithful and leave the government to do its own job.<\/p>\n

\u201cAng sinasabi lang namin<\/em>\u00a0if you are men of the cloth,\u00a0ang talagang trabaho mo ay spiritual awakening sa faithful<\/em>\u00a0(What we\u2019re saying is, if you are men of cloth, your job is the spiritual awakening of the faithful),\u201d Panelo said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHuwag mo nang pakialaman ang estado with respect doon sa mga methods na ginagawa ng estado na sa kabutihan naman ng bayan<\/em>(Don\u2019t interfere with the state with respect to its methods, which are for the good of its citizens),\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Villegas, in the same post, also expressed concern for Duterte\u2019s tirades against the Church being harmful to his health and stature.<\/p>\n

Panelo, however, said that if Villegas is concerned for the President\u2019s well-being, he should be praying for Duterte instead of making negative remarks against him.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf he\u2019s worried then he should pray for the President. Maybe he should help the President. Then he should do something positive rather than attack the administration,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Asked if the Palace is concerned that more bishops are speaking out against the President, Panelo said this is just part of \u201cfreedom of expression.\u201d<\/p>\n

Villegas is the third bishop to call the President out for his negative remarks against the Church. The other two are Novaliches Bishop Emeritus Teodoro Bacani Jr. and Balanga, Bataan Bishop Ruperto Santos.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0— No matter how many verbal attacks President Rodrigo R. Duterte hurls against the Catholic Church, bishops and priests living …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":186250,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1145,16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-198210","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-azer-parrocha","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=198210"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198210\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/186250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=198210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=198210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=198210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}