The Philippines like any other democratic, republican states has an inherent power to protect citizens and to protect means the common good must prevail – not the interest of the few. Speaking of iilan or some individuals, no Church or any religious denomination or sect must receive certain favor from the State because the separation of Church and State must be inviolable.
What must we do or undo in order to “promote the common good” [“…(to) conserve and develop our patrimony, and secure to ourselves and our posterity the blessings of independence and democracy under the rule of law and a regime of truth, justice, freedom, love, equality, and peace”]? (Preamble of the Constitution, 1987)
Heavy stuff. But we can count the Police Power ways without need of license to practice the legal profession because ignorance of the law excuses neither you nor me from compliance therewith (“ignorantia legis non excusat”):
Government regulations are in place. Without regulating freedoms/rights/privileges, governance cannot effectively maintain order and majesty of law. The judicial bodies and quasi-judicial ones, the local government units, and the national departments, offices, commissions, agencies, bureaus, and task forces regulate their actions and ours. You struggle for nine long months, give birth to, and raise a child, you cannot say, “It’s my turn to be served by the child.” (You cannot tell that to the government either.) Under the Family Code, Civil Code, the 37-year-old charter’s declaration of principles and State policies, bill of rights, universal declaration of related rights, and social welfare (DSWD) and education (DepEd) departmental operations, you (and people in government, too) are duty-bound to send your child to school like any other parents or guardians. While privately-owned schools, colleges, and universities, help the government in the educative mission, they are not allowed to haphazardly impose their own standards and undertakings like tuition hikes, and hiring and firing processes. Owners of private institutions know fully well that while they may exercise management prerogatives, labor force disputes and doubts must generally be resolved in favor of labor.
Thus, Police Power is not the power of the police. When erring cops are ashamed before the sala of a judge, that judge and all of us possess no original plan of pamamahiya (shaming). The primordial goal of correcting the detected wrong of not just the policewomen and men but also all the women and men? So that the right must be maintained, the wrong be detected and be punished and, ultimately, the common good be promoted.
Enter Robinhood. The good-looking – or good senator and husband of a fellow actor (na maganda na, kung bakit kailangan pang…?) – is correct in his knowledge that there is a constitutional law on separation between Church and State. He may also have the tacit knowledge that it “shall be inviolable.” Who knows? What needs to be rectified (by his staff, by his fellow senators, by us if they do not do that) is his own interpretation of the Church-State separation which comes on the heels of inquiries by both chambers of Congress on his friend “Appointed Son of God” Apollo Quiboloy who is wanted by the FBI, with California judge Terry Hatter Jr. unsealing the warrants against the Davao City-based (not anymore?) televangelist and other defendants last week “upon application of the government and for good cause shown.”
“Strong fences make good neighbors,” says a maxim which is almost always used in court decisions and mentioned in Justice Isagani Cruz’s award-winning book Philippine Political Law (2002). The strong fences indicate the demarcation line, and the good neighbors are the Church and State. This resembles Jesus’ teaching on “render unto Caesar” in Matthew 22:21. Moreover, there are some of us who, albeit without considering themselves as part of dominant religious groups, are constitutionally protected anyway. The doctrine of separation can also be understood by using the totality of the Constitution, including the non-establishment clause and the free exercise clause both found in Section 5 of the Constitution’s Bill of Rights. (Bernas, n.d.)
This religious group’s statement has been duly noted by an SC decision: “The separation of Church and State prohibits the State from interfering in Church matters, and prohibits the State from having a State religion. It does not imply a division between belief and public actions, between moral principles and political choices. In fact, the freedom of religion upheld by our Constitution protects the right of believers and religious groups to practice their faith and act on their values in public life. The Constitution guarantees the right of each citizen to exercise his or her religion… (Their) moral convictions (brought) into public life do not threaten democracy or pluralism but rather enrich the nation and its political life… The exercise of this faithful citizenship means that when they go to the polls to vote they should not leave God.” (CBCP, 2009)
Padilla contends that holding the “Appointed Son” in contempt encroaches on religion and goes against the Church-State separation. Indeed nothing can separate us from the actor-turned-politician’s patawa.
DC Alviar
Professor DC Alviar serves as a member of the steering committee of the Philippine International Studies Organization (PHISO). He was part of National University’s community extension project that imparted the five disciplines of a learning organization (Senge, 1990) to communities in a local government unit. He writes and edits local reports for Mega Scene. He graduated with a master’s degree in development communication from the University of the Philippines Open University in Los Baños. He recently defended a dissertation proposal for his doctorate degree in communication at the same graduate school under a Philippine government scholarship grant. He was editor-in-chief of his high school paper Ang Ugat and the Adamson News.
