DIE HARD III
Herman Tiu Laurel
8/12/2011
Emily Abrera, chairman of the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP), defended the explosively controversial “Kulo” exhibit by saying that one of an artist’s duties is to “challenge prevailing beliefs.” Prelates and politicians, however, would not be assuaged and threats flew — from slashing the CCP’s budget to zero to excommunicating the Center’s culpable officials.
CCP visual arts director, Karen Ocampo-Flores, later submitted her resignation on the pointed end of the artist’s brush so to speak. But when I looked at the so-called “blasphemous” or “offensive” depiction of a penis and ashtray for the nose of a figure unmistakably representing Jesus Christ, that piece of art didn’t look so offensive to me at all (except that I’ve not been a believer for decades now). The artist indeed challenged prevailing beliefs in Philippine society; and the subsequent “Inquisition” only proved it was an immense success.
In a way, Roman Catholicism had set itself up for this. How often has the Church been castigated by other Christian denominations for its use of physical symbols — anthropomorphic at that — believed to be a blatant form of idolatry since early Christianity, which the Bible severely condemns?
This idolatry is, in fact, considered the real blasphemy based on one of the Ten Commandments:
“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments (Exodus 20:4-7).”
Instead, what the Catholic Church promotes is the proliferation of mostly ceramic or wooden anthropomorphic figures that populate countless altars in churches and homes; dashboards of jeepneys, buses, and trucks; Catholic school hallways; nooks and crannies of disheveled squatter homes; and packed whorehouse dormitories, where the poorest or the poor pray amid their poverty and squalor.
If the Catholic Church were to give this up, how much in sales of ceramic and wooden idols, crosses, Mama Mary’s, Santo Niño’s and images of saints would be lost? Tens of millions of pesos, that’s what — raked in by Church-linked businesses that peddle these to the faithful. In that sense, these “idols” are indeed sacred… as profit centers!
It certainly is no different from the Jesuits’ “veneration” of their darling CEO, whom they even offered to be enthroned on the altar of their elitist school for his so-called “accomplishments.”
But then, how could they not when media reported just this week that “Meralco, Maynilad lift MPIC profit” by at least 25 percent through “Higher tariffs at Maynilad and Meralco… (that offset) the slight decline in the contribution from MPTC (Metro Pacific Tollways Corp.) following the expiry of its income tax holiday last year,” which are, in short, from our highest power rates in Asia and one of our highest water rates in the region?
Moreover, even as the Catholic Church and its acolytes in the legislature took up arms over a wooden penis, there is absolutely no “fire and brimstone” over the P80 billion in new loans the Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management (Psalm) Corp. is taking on to keep itself running; this, after siphoning off around $18 billion in 10 years of privatization proceeds without reducing the National Power Corp. (Napocor)’s original debt of $18 billion.
While a fellow Atenean of the Jesuits’ favorite CEO, Rep. Erin Tañada, was heard issuing a token comment on the issue, we don’t expect much since his family is believed to enjoy close ties with a major player in that industry since time immemorial.
Oh, another very Catholic “person for others” from that elite university, Rep. Dina Abad, graciously “helps” the poor as House energy committee chairman by extending the “lifeline rate” subsidy to those who consume below P99/kWh a month but charges this to every average paying Meralco customer while saving her own P382 million pork barrel to herself, with not a single centavo channeled to her beloved poor consumers, whom her heart supposedly bleeds for.
But should that still come as a surprise when other “men for others,” such as high officials of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), are doing very good work too? In their case, though, “others” only refer to bankers.
Despite RP’s foreign exchange reserves hitting $70 billion with our foreign debt still standing at $52 billion (according to BizNewsAsia’s Tony Lopez) or $60 billion (from what I monitor), those Jesuit acolytes continue to uphold annual debt service of up to P800 billion (or around $9 billion) when paying off that debt entirely will still leave the country with enough reserves ($10 to $18 billion) to cover three months of imports as required internationally.
And despite the howls of pain of OFWs, exporters, and business process outsourcing (BPO) firms, the BSP chief still hailed the US’ debt woes and the strengthening of the peso, claiming that this will bring in more foreign capital to the Philippines, when the Philippines already has enough capital of its own (as we cited in previous columns).
We can go on and on about the issues that really matter. But, as long as many of the Catholic prelates and their acolytes in the Senate and House are silent about these and continue to figure in imbroglios that distract public attention, they, in effect — to put it in symbolic terms — are merely sticking their middle finger on all of us Filipinos.
(Tune in to Radyo OpinYon, Monday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m., and Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM; Talk News TV with HTL, on “Mis-Rule of Law: From Edsa Dos to MILF Substate,” with Atty. Alan Paguia, Saturday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com and http://hermantiulaurel.blogspot.com for our articles plus TV and radio archives)
