There is only one God and it is not the one in Malacañang.
This was the message of Senator Leila de Lima on Monday as she backed Catholic church leaders who criticized President Rodrigo Duterte’s bloody war on drugs, saying the church is simply issuing a “wake-up call to a nation that is in a nightmare.”
“Ang ating kaisa-isang Panginoon ay ang Diyos Ama sa langit pa rin, hindi ang huwad na poon sa Palasyo ng Malacañang,” De Lima said in a statement.
(There is only one God and that is God the Father who is in heaven, not the fake one in Malacañang Palace.)
The CBCP, in a pastoral letter read out at Mass services starting Saturday night, criticized the government’s anti-narcotics crackdown for terrorizing the poor and reiterated that killing people was not the answer to the drug menace.’
“An even greater cause of concern is the indifference of many to this kind of wrong. It is considered as normal, and, even worse, something that (according to them) needs to be done,” the bishops said.
Malacañang on Sunday belied the CBCP letter, saying Filipinos are feeling a “reign of peace” since the drug war began.
Read: Catholic Church criticizes drug war in sermons
A top critic of the President, De Lima said the pastoral letter is merely a reminder of universal moral values that were apparently lost since the drug war began.
“As the statement says, life as a universal value cannot be debated. Due process as a basic civil right cannot be dispensed with. Care, love, and empathy for our fellow countrymen who were carried away from the mainstream because of poverty is a spiritual and social obligation that is unconditional,” she said.
De Lima also defended the CBCP from Malacañang’s statement that Church leaders were “out of touch” with the faithful, saying it is Duterte who is out of touch with reality.
“It is the President who is out of touch with reality, when he thinks he can dispense of these basic values in his drug war and still manage to keep the country’s spiritual and moral fabric intact,” she said.
“This country cannot survive much longer with this outlandish dismissal of our universal moral values, where killing and death is seen as the solution to every problem of the nation,” she added.
Senator Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan also expressed his support to the CBCP, saying the campaign against illegal drugs should not cost lives, especially of the innocent.
“We are one with the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) in making a collective stand against the killing of drug suspects and the strong government push to reimpose the death penalty,” he said.
“Our government must uphold its responsibility to protect our people, to promote their welfare, and make them safe. It must pursue justice to the families who have lost their loved ones to criminals,” he added.
The war on drugs which was launched seven months ago, has been heavily criticized by human rights groups for leaving thousands dead, mostly in police operations.
This story first appeared on ABS-CBN News Online and is republished with permission.
