What have we become?

Just because Pope Francis appears to have a liberal streak doesn't mean members of the clergy should push the envelope on certain matters that are clearly not in open favor with the Roman Catholic Church. Specifically, it was downright malicious for three priests in Iloilo who have sired children out of open co-habitation to baptize some of these children within days of the pope's visit.

I have nothing against children and, as a Catholic, unequivocally believe in their baptism. What I strongly disapprove of are priests co-habiting and having children and having these children baptized while remaining active as priests contrary to the norm. I resent their provocative and disrespectful flaunting of their uncelebate status at a time when the national focus is on the pope, who heads an institution that requires celebacy of its clergy.

What are these priests trying to prove? Have they timed their insensitive stunt to deliberately rock the boat on such a sensitive issue while the pope is here? Who gave them the right to put the entire nation on the spot, and the pope in an uncomfortable situation? Why have they chosen to scandalize instead of to be sensible? Why are they trying to drive a schism at a time when the call is for unity and strength?

Sadly, regrettably, and painfully, like rubbing salt on a fresh and open wound, pretty much of the blame goes right up to the doorstep of the Roman Catholic Church itself. Given that one of the priests has four children and the other two have three and two, respectively, only shows the forbidden fruit had continuously been eaten with the Church apparently just looking the other way.

I do not buy the self-serving argument that baptism extends dignity to the children. What dignity do you think awaits these children when they grow up to learn that their fathers are priests? If these reverend "fathers" truly want dignity for their kids, they should leave the priesthood first, marry the women they are living with, and only then should they have their children baptized.

That way, they not only give their women the respect they deserve in marriage but also their children a life and future that are theirs to inherit, free of the emotional and psychological encumbrances that may litter their way if they grow up in the environment of scandal and controversy they are presently in. These priests cannot knowingly and willfully thrust their children into a life and future whose certainty they cannot guarantee.

Okay, these priests may have their own appreciation and understanding of what is right and good for their own lives and for their children. But they have to realize as well that they do not live in their own esoteric world of blissfully married priests. The undeniable fact is that they constitute a very small minority, a mere drop in the bucket of conventionality.

And for as long as no sea change happens on the matter of priestly celebacy, their children will have to eventually come face to face with the stark reality that they are, in fact, pariahs and outcasts in a larger, and often unforgiving, society. Thrust insensibly into such an environment, these children are certain to be damaged and not know why.

And it will all be the fault of their reverend "fathers" who opted to stick it out with their prideful and self-righteous biases and prejudices, priests who want to have their cake and eat it too, clerics who refuse to keep a simple matter simple, preferring to complicate things just because they cannot take no for an answer.

I say it is a simple matter because that is, in fact, what it is. If you feel you are not of the stuff of which priests are supposed to be made, then do not enter the priesthood. If you are not sure you can comply with priestly regulations, do not take your chances. If you are already a priest but eventually changed your mind, get the heck out. Do not inconvenience or make other people suffer just because you want to have the best of both worlds.

Priests are supposed to be good and chosen followers. They are supposed to be paragons of obedience. But how can they effectively teach and pass on these virtues if they themselves are the ones setting the bad example of intransigence and selfishness. By what moral authority can a priest tell a society this is good and that is bad when he cannot, and is not willing to, make the same distinction himself.

Ordinary men do not spend years and years of preparing to become not just shepherds but good shephers. That is why when a sheep strays it is not the sheep that gets blamed but the shepherd. That is why a priest cannot be like an ordinary guy. Their measurements are simply not the same. In the same manner are their children weighed. Believe me, a bastard child born to an errant married man has less chances of getting as ostracized as a priest's child, though both be baptized.

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