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Heads and Tails
by kalamboan
Volume 01 Issue 01 18 Pages
Politics and Religion
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Sharif Ryan Beldia
With the recent conclusion of the 2022 national elections, the elected by plurality stood up among the candidates with their various schemes of influence and nationalistic heart-throbbing diplomacy. One of these schemes is through religious influence. But even with the two divisions divided by separation of power, religion by political context massively manipulates society, especially the devotee using their control of power through divinity.
Religion and Politics are essentially two sides of the same coin, so to speak. Both serenade the masses with promises and impose fear. This is especially prevalent in the Philippines, wherein religion is embedded in our culture and beliefs. As a country that was colonized by Spanish inquisitors in their search for spices and spread of Christianity, for 333 years, we have been massively brainwashed and exploited in return for being globalized. Today the Philippines bears as a huge Christian country that is still walking tip toe while parent Christian countries like Spain, figuratively run, as contemporary issues like abortion are presently legalized. Leaving that issue, for now, religion and its large influence on the political context provided means of platforms and deplatform for candidates to be arguably considered.
In 1986, Jaime Cardinal Sin urgently persuaded Filipinos to support the revolt against President Ferdinand Marcos on a call on Radio Veritas. Prevalently, this persuasion led to be labeled as the start of the People’s Power Revolution. In another circumstance, recently, minority religious group INC whose members vote as a bloc significantly contributes to the victory of Ferdinand Marcos son Bong Bong Marcos. Albeit its small number, presidential candidates race toward INC for political endorsement aiming to swing the tide in a hotlycontested election.
However, with the heightened prevalence of religion in this land of religious conservatives, the endorsement does not directly guarantee complete victory. Say, for example, the INC endorsement to Eduardo Cojuangco who came in 3rd, or in recent Catholic endorsement to Leni Robredo who fell off 2nd from Marcos immense landslide. Various factors truly provided means for a candidate to win, religion is only among them. Still, when these two imminent forces unite, they can monopolize power. Religion’s strength and authority are derived from divinity, while exploitation and corruption are reportedly induced. But in the minds of extreme devotees in a country whose people rely on higherbeing for solutions, the church’s mission is plainly holy.
Believers cried for deity help for a problem that the society created wherein a government fixes it in a band-aid way that seems to tell us how everything is correlated and can be manipulatively cycled. Moreover, Filipinos’ blatant habit of asking for higher beings’ blessings than working on them, contributes to the repetitive cycle of power manipulation.
With the nearing inauguration, we can remember how the candidates move heavens and earth to muse us with their effective diplomacy. Churches are a vital method that seems to prove as the fastest route to victory sometimes. Albeit, its influence correlates to politics, it’s historically proven effective, especially in a country like the Philippines.
editorial
Volume 01 Issue 01 18 Pages
Allen James Nedamo & Ela Mae Jetigan
A GAME OF TUG-OF-WAR:
The Original Catholic Catechism vs. Same-Sex Marriages & Evolution
The Pew Research Center 2015 conducted research regarding religious compositions by country from 2010-2015. Their results showcase that Christianity is the largest religion or area of faith that people adopt worldwide garnering a 31.1% percentage in 2020. Christianity refers to a world religion based on the teachings, life, and death of Jesus Christ. Additionally, there are three main branches of denominations of belief and practice under Christianity: Catholicism, Protestantism, and Eastern Orthodox. The first among the three is known to be the largest and the most major branch of Christianity.
Roughly 1.1 billion people all around the world is a Roman Catholic. According to Britannica, “there are more Roman Catholics than all other Christians combined and more Roman Catholics than all Buddhists or Hindus. In this alone, it is inherent to say that the Roman Catholics have great power and control in the world – indirectly or directly, whether we like it or not.
The Roman Catholic Church differs from other Christian denominations due to its beliefs in the need to perform sacraments, the importance of the Virgin Mary, and the papacy. In this regard, only the Roman Catholic Church and its stances on prevailing issues of today will be taken into account.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church written in 1994 states in Article 2357 that “homosexuality refers to relations between men or
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between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction towards persons of the same sex.” Additionally, this article says that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered and remain contrary to natural law. Indeed, homosexual acts are not prohibited under all circumstances.
Although the Philippines has been ranked as one of the most gay-friendly nations in the world and the top 1 in Asia, there is still a significant and strong influence of the Roman Catholic Church that contributes to discrimination against them. A recent interview with a devout Catholic and a member of the LGBTQIA+ community reveals that the Catholic Church readily welcomes them, but discrimination will always be part of their story. However, [he] is able to serve the church and be a gay man at a safe time due to the dialogues being conducted to reconcile their faith. According to [him], “it is not that easy, but the acknowledgment that a person has multiple dimensions made it easier for me to live this life.”
Pope Francis, the Bishop of Rome and head of the Catholic Church since 2013 reportedly left a remark regarding gay clergymen in these words: “who am I to judge?” Recently, the Roman Catholic Pope Francis has allowed for the same-sex civil union as well. The pope said, “Homosexual people have a right to be in a family,”. With all these growing intersections between faith and liberalization, where do these two sides find common ground? And to what phenomenon do we owe this intersection?
Secularization brought about by globalization has allowed this intermingling to coexist. According to the SAGE Journal, people nowadays have a choice and a right to determine what is best for them. Before secularization, this would not have been the case, because it would either subscribe to the beliefs, traditions, and ideologies of their religion. Therefore, it is interesting to see that the major catechisms of the churches are being deconstructed and opposed due to the call of the minority groups like the LGBTQIA+ community to be accepted.
But when did the LGBTQIA+ community start to get their voices heard? Thanks to globalization, their plight towards acceptance and acknowledgment of their rights garnered momentum. Globalization has caused the global conversation about sexual orientation and gender identity which led to the rise of new human-rights frontiers like OurRight, Human Rights Campaign, etc. Consequently, the expansion of the LGBTQIA+ movement exposed people everywhere to new identities and sexual orientations that they can assume, thereby spreading this movement even further. This has been even furthered by global media dominating in every aspect of our everyday life.
This intermingling may show that religion might not fully accept same-sex marriage, but adjustments have been made to help people in need. Similarly, religion may not be stricter towards homosexuality than they have been in time past. This might show secularization but in reality, this helps people start to believe in religion because the religion has more understanding of the world’s current situation.
The pope and the church also approve and accept evolution. The pope said that the Big Bang theory and evolution in nature “do not contradict.” With this statement, he has reliably connected a bridge between the scientific and the religious people, stopping the argument of whether or not religion accepts evolution. The help of globalization and the fast travel of knowledge helped the pope accept the fact and connect the two theories and help make a stronger belief.
There has already been a decline in belief in religion. Still, because of the help of globalization influencing the leaders of religion, they started to make religion better by accepting scientific notions and accepting marginalized people. Because of that acceptance, religion has slowly been strengthening back again.
All in all, globalization can be used to help make religion better and, in this case, it helped make people believe and accept the decisions of the Roman Catholic church.
