Promising start

WE WELCOME the recent announcement that Malacañang and the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines have agreed to launch a “universally acceptable” information campaign on reproductive health (RH), following earlier reports that the CBCP and the Philippine Medical Association (PMA), the biggest group of physicians in the country, share the same view on the beginning of human life—that is, “during fertilization”—the stage when the male gamete or sperm combines with the female gamete or ovum (MedicineNet.org).

The point at which human life begins has always been a contentious issue in the long-running RH debate. Some advocates of the RH bill now under rigorous scrutiny in Congress had claimed that life begins at implantation, defined (see MedicineNet.org again) as “the attachment of the fertilized egg to the uterine lining, which occurs approximately 6 or 7 days after conception (fertilization).”

The CBCP-PMA consensus should put to rest the issue on the beginning of human life, and the Palace-CBCP agreement on the RH information drive bodes well for future cooperation and more successful dialogues.

To be sure, there are other controversial issues in the RH bill that are yet to be resolved. Take sex education: Should it be included at all in school curricula? If so, when should it be introduced, what should its content be, what should be required for one to qualify to teach it? How about the right to conscience as against the right to health?

The RH bill remains controversial because many aspects of it lack the details that would define them to the core, and so the opposing sides tend to argue from widely divergent, if not conflicting, premises. Outside of the dialogue table, these issues would have very little, if any, chance of reaching a resolution.

We thus give the Catholic bishops credit for their decision to follow a regime of dialogue with government officials and with scientific and medical experts. The Catholic Church has been seen as the biggest and most obstinate obstacle in the government’s push for reproductive health. With the two agreements, the very influential bishops have affirmed, with a remarkable display of openness, that even the most divisive of issues can be resolved on the dialogue table—and these include the non-RH issues bedeviling our country.

Cruelest end

LEST WE be misunderstood, allow us to emphasize: We are for regulating population growth, but we are against intentional abortion in any form (but for some critical exceptions in life-and-death situations). We are also against its legalization by any measure.

It is grossly irresponsible for a society to leave a runaway population alone, knowing full well that the necessary infrastructure, even for basic social services like health and education, is sorely wanting. This need, however, cannot justify the deliberate killing of the unborn.

We reiterate this point today (Tuesday), on the occasion of the Catholic Church’s Feast of the Holy Innocents, mindful of the dilemma our nation agonizes over to urgently come up with a practicable population control program anchored on realities, and a reproductive health policy that protects not only the rights to health and dignity, but also the right to conscience and the right to life, not least the unborn’s. The biblical story that inspired today’s observance must be all-too-familiar in this predominantly Christian country:

“Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, was in a furious rage, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and all in that region who were two years old or under, according to the time which he had ascertained from the wise men. Then was fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah:

“A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation: Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled because they were no more.” (Matthew 2:13-18)

In the polarizing, often emotionally charged debate on the RH bill, we would do well if all of us, our lawmakers especially, bear in mind that haunting, plaintive reminder from the Holy Book: The deliberate killing of totally helpless, innocent children is beyond consolation—it is the worst form of inhumanity. –Philippine Daily Inquirer