‘Practical atheists’

There is one sector in New Zealand, I’ve been told, that is particularly pleased with the growing number of Filipino migrant workers: the Catholic Church.

Wherever our people go, they swell the ranks of the Catholic faithful. In New York at the height (or depth) of the sexual molestation scandal by Catholic priests that bankrupted several dioceses in the United States, a priest in Manhattan’s renowned St. Patrick’s Cathedral happily told me how much he loved the Filipino community. Filipinos, he said, continued to attend Sunday Mass amid falling church attendance.

A Kiwi asked me why, despite the oppression suffered by Filipinos at the hands of Catholic friars during the Spanish colonial period, Protestant faiths brought by the Americans failed to supplant the religion of the Vatican in our islands.

The only theory I could offer was that Filipinos preferred the rituals and celebratory feasts of the Roman Catholic faith, with its focus on extended families rather than the individual. Pinoys also seem to like the idea of having middlemen for divine blessings – saints with specializations, like doctors – one for hopeless causes, another for those who can’t get pregnant, one for sailors, another for animals... the list is endless.

Filipinos are a prayerful people. Public officials love having themselves photographed while attending Mass. It’s not unusual even for murderers to have a favorite saint. Former Calauan mayor Antonio Sanchez, for example, took pride in being a Marian devotee, as if invoking “Mama Mary” repeatedly would clear him of the brutal rape and killing of a University of the Philippines coed and her boyfriend.

Foreigners have also asked me why, with all that religious fervor, there is so much murder and violent mayhem across the country especially during elections, and corruption is deeply entrenched. Also, why is marital infidelity so blatant in the only country without divorce? OK, maybe this last question answers itself.

But don’t the 10 Commandments include prohibitions against stealing, adultery and coveting the neighbor’s wife and goods? Maybe the Catholic faithful turned to lawyers for interpretation of the Commandments. So strictly speaking, adultery is a married woman’s offense, and if you’re a married man coveting a single woman, or several single women all at the same time, where’s the sin in that?

As for corruption, where’s the commandment against accepting bribes and demanding fat commissions? One of the biggest devotees of the Black Nazarene in Quiapo in the previous administration also became embroiled in a corruption scandal.

Greed is one of the Seven Deadly Sins, but what are the parameters of greed in public office? At the height of the ZTE broadband network scandal, when moderating one’s greed became a catch phrase, someone commented that there is no such thing as moderate greed.

Maybe we need something other than religion that can teach the value of honor, integrity, hard work and, yes, creativity – that spark of the divine, invaluable in nation building. These are what we need to get ahead in life, rather than being born with the right surname, having the right connections, membership in a religious group, and praying fervently to hit the lotto jackpot.

For a nation that takes pride in its faith, it can be safely assumed that many of the faithful have lost their spiritual moorings.

Religion, as I have written in the past, can be a powerful force for good. Perhaps the new star of the Catholic Church in the Philippines, Cardinal-designate Luis Antonio Tagle, can help set things right, by returning the principal focus of the Church to spiritual matters.

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As cardinal-designate, Tagle’s initial salvo from the pulpit lambasted “practical atheists.”

“Thank God that the faith is alive but the Pope also says that there is such a thing as practical atheism,” Tagle said over the weekend at the launch of the Year of Faith at the San Fernando de Dilao parish in Paco, Manila.

Explaining, he went on, “There is a kind of atheism that is open, when the people would publicly declare that they do not believe in the existence of God. But there are those who would say that they have faith but in practice it would seem that they also do not have a God.”

He continued: “There are people who, with their eyes closed, would fervently pray during Sunday. But come Monday, they would cheat because of money and would step on other people to reach their ambitions in life. For these people, they might be worshipping money, fame or power.”

I’m pretty sure no public official felt alluded to. Or else they asked, well, what’s wrong with worshipping money, fame or power?

The challenge for Tagle and the Church is staying relevant in this age of instant gratification. People tend to genuinely find religion only when they are nearing death’s door. Beyond that door is the promised Catholic reward for a life of good deeds, and even this is uncertain – never mind the post-coma stories of US neurosurgeon Ebel Alexander.

It probably helps to have a system of seeing wishes fulfilled, through the intercession of a vast array of saints (plus candidates for sainthood), not in the afterlife but in the here and now.

The system thrives on belief in miracles. Not the best thing for building a strong republic, but great for organized religion.