Piercing Pens

Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz recently said that public sinners should not be given the Holy communion. News reports said he was referring to Mrs. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo — the Philippines’ de facto president who is accused of election fraud and corruption. But the maverick archbishop denied he called Arroyo a public sinner who should not be given communion.

He told CBCPNews that all he stated was, according to the teachings of the Church, a public sinner should not be given communion.

He had earlier wrote on his blog:

“This is why as a matter of doctrinal principle and moral norm, someone known to the public as reasonably perceived or actually known guilty not simply of one, neither only three nor merely five but more grave or mortal sins of such as gross stealing, flagrant graft and corrupt practices, and other glaring big moral misdeeds with extensive and intensive adverse effects to society, fits the reality of a public sinner. To conclude otherwise, i.e., that the person concerned is holy or saintly, is not only irrational but also futile. And to give the Most Sacred Body and Blood of Christ to the same, is not simply highly offensive to the sensitivity of the simple Christian faithful in general but also—and primarily so—means a big contempt of inherent divinity and intrinsic sanctity of Christ Himself. That is why giving Holy Communion in public to a public sinner is a public scandal.

Romulo Macalintal, Arroyo’s election lawyer, said the archbishop’s statement was judgmental. He said a lay minister does not have the right to refuse the Holy Communion to anyone.

(more…)

Archbishop Oscar Cruz, though an entry on his blog, has asked Pope Benedict XVI not to accept President Arroyo’s invitation to visit the Philippines.

His Excellency wrote that “a papal visit to the country might be neither wise nor prudent these times.”

“The country is anything but safe and crime free. The visit will give the government officials the salivating occasion to make money for themselves. Furthermore, a papal visit would dignify a national leadership that is suffering from dire lack of moral ascendancy not to mention its big socio-political liabilities,” Archbishop Cruz continued. (more…)

Ang Kapatiran or Alliance for Common Good, a lesser-known political party that promotes “politics of virtue” and “politics of duty”, appears to be popular in cyberspace. Its website was not functioning properly when I visited it yesterday. Today, it reports that it has “experienced a surge in members wanting to register, and have run into problems with our new website.” (more…)

Some religions are truly the opium of the masses.

While the Roman Catholic Church in the Philippines expressed its opposition to the increase in VAT (as well as Charter change), and members of other Christian denominations are protesting in the streets against the VAT bill, the Iglesia ni Manalo–errr, Iglesia ni Cristo (INC)– is reportedly supporting it. (more…)

Found this at David Hopkin’s blog. I copied the entire post:

As part of “Piss-Off-Bush Monday”, here’s an interesting bit of satire from Mad magazine. (Historical sidenote– Mad was created by EC, a popular comic book company from the early days of the industry. During the ’50s, EC was destroyed by a government council researching the involvement of comics in contributing to juvenile deliquency.)