CBCP to Catholic voters: Don’t vote for candidates with ‘morally reprehensible’ stand on issues

With barely a week left before the May 9 elections, Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) president Archbishop Socrates Villegas advised Catholic voters against choosing  a candidate who takes “morally reprehensible” positions on important issues.

In a pastoral statement posted on the CBCP website Sunday, Villegas said the public has been given a glimpse of what candidates, particularly those who are running for president, believe in through the recent televised debates and their actions and statements in public.

Stressing the “fundamental difference” between right and wrong and the reality that “not everything is fair game in politics,” Villegas said: “A choice for a candidate who takes positions that are not only politically precarious but worse, morally reprehensible, cannot and should not be made by the Catholic faithful and those who take their allegiance to Christ and his Kingship seriously.”

“One cannot proclaim Christ as King and at the same time accept the governance of one whose thoughts, speech and demeanor are diametrically opposed to the demands of submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ,” he added.

Although the desire for change is understandable, Villegas said people cannot act on that longing by supporting a candidate “whose speech and actions, whose plans and projects show scant regard for the rights of all, who has openly declared indifference if not dislike and disregard for the Church specially her moral teachings.”

And while the Catholic Church does not endorse ant candidate, the prelate said the Church “has always demanded of Catholic voters that they cast their votes as an act not only of citizenship but also as a public declaration of faith.”

Quoting an excerpt from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Villegas said at the beginning of his statement that it is a part of the Church’s mission “to pass moral judgments even in matters related to politics, whenever the fundamental rights of man or the salvation of souls requires it.”

“The means, the only means, she may use are those which are in accord with the Gospel and the welfare of all men according to the diversity of times and circumstances,” he said, citing the Church's teachings.

In light of the upcoming elections, Villegas urged the Catholic faithful to pray the rosary daily and receive the Holy Communion until May 9.

He also appealed to candidates to “allow each Filipino the free and untrammeled right to an informed choice” by uttering falsehoolds and misleading statements. He asked them to pray so that they would be aware of who God's chosen leader for the country is.

Once the elections are over and winners have been proclaimed, Villegas asked those who would be put in power to remember that they would be calling on God as their witness when they take their oath.

He assured those who would win the elections fairly and squarely of the Church's support with the goal of nation-building.

“Whoever wins honestly, whoever takes the oath of his or her office seriously, whoever strives to heal the wounds of the divisiveness of politics, whoever respects the rights of all and is earnest in his or her fear of God and is zealous for his precepts has the support of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, and we will do everything together with our priests so that all our people, to the remotest barangays to which we minister, may rally around a just and God-fearing government that visits no vengeance on foes but is characterized by mercy and compassion for all, not only for allies!” Villegas said. — APG, GMA News