By Reni M. Valenzuela
If you think Manny Pacquiao makes sense only in boxing, think again as he stood his ground in Philippine Congress opposing a bill that would virtually kill life and decency in his country.
While I strongly disagree with Pacman as a boxer each time he manifests his intention to fight Timothy Bradley in a disgraceful rematch, I am absolutely one with him as a “born-man” whenever he reiterates his position on the highly controversial and divisive Reproductive Health bill. He made the most sense in the Lower House during a plenary debate to interpolate Rep. Edcel Lagman, co-author of the bill.
Rep. Emmanuel Dapidran Pacquiao fights to protect life. He argues, “Families should be God-centric. Government should teach Filipinos how to plan their families without having to promote artificial contraceptives. Couples must learn to control their sexual urges if they plan to have smaller families.” But equally important, if I may add, is the imperative of enlightening and encouraging the people not to engage in sex outside of the marriage bond.
Scoff at Pacquiao and Sen. Tito Sotto as being narrow-minded lawmakers in defending the defenseless unborn, but consider the following to reconsider what is right, truly broad and best for the nation:
Poverty is the problem. But why look at poverty as if RH Bill is the solution?
How simplistic it is to conclude that curbing human births would alleviate our plight as a hungry nation. And how reckless it is to compare the Philippines to other so-called “developed” nations whose churches are empty any day of the week, and who may soon be doomed to destruction and desolation. Worse, why should we allow ourselves to be dictated upon by powerful international institutions which are mostly run by atheists, agnostics and infidels?
As opposed to Karl Marx’s poison: God is not the opium of the people, God is the life of the people.
May we go further than our inane “technocratic” thinking and dig deeper into the real causes of poverty in the country other than “overpopulation” in order to unearth the scroll that contains modern day answers, and before total darkness hit all of us.
Who says that the Philippines is overpopulated? Yes, overpopulated, probably with people who are corrupt and depraved, but not with people whom our leaders are supposed to feed and people who are supposed to occupy our vast land and make productive use of the nation’s untapped, massive rich natural resources.
“Overpopulation” is not the problem but over-centralization and non-education of our people.
The government’s problem is “over-centralization” in the sense that Metro Manila is too small to accommodate our whole population. The present administration and those that would follow next should mainly focus on developing key cities all over the country to produce duplicates of Metro Manila, but certainly not at the expense of nature and environment. Politicians, economists, business leaders and even churches have key roles to play in this great endeavor. Let’s give the people in the provinces a reason not to leave their native lands because that’s the way to stop their deluge in Metro Manila just as Metro Manila has erroneously become our leaders’ gauge of population problem to make it appear like the whole country is “overpopulated,” economy-wise.
Second is “non-education” in the sense that unschooled and poor people, particularly those in the slum areas and poverty-stricken communities which have become breeding grounds for low-profile criminals. The poor need to be cared for by way of educating each member of the household about family life and natural birth control while inculcating in them good values such as hard work and Godly living. The birth control topic must be exclusive to parents.
The middle and upper class Filipinos are mostly educated enough to know the number of children they should want. Hence even without the aid of artificial methods such as oral or hormonal contraceptives and the like, they are able to limit their children to a manageable number as exactly what my wife and I did. Therefore the focus would be more on the poor or underprivileged sector of society.
Instead of buying all sorts of “gadgets” for artificial birth control worth several billions of pesos to be distributed free of charge, it would do much exceedingly well for government to channel all the funds to educating the parents and families through regular barangay seminars and some kind of “values-formation” teaching sessions while giving incentives to parents who would be able to limit their number of children to an ideal two. A regular weekly meeting can be held in each community through the coordinated efforts of barangay officials and ecumenical religious groups in the area. And, wow! It would be such a widespread national revival towards the un-mistakenly “Daang Matuwid.” And President Noynoy Aquino should be first to be happy.
The RH Bill, if approved and implemented, could result to untold number of new and worse problems, while eternally promising to reduce “overpopulation” and ultimately accomplishing nothing to alleviate poverty, except killing the unborn. Ponder that.
“So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground.’ Then God said, ‘I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.” (Genesis 1:27-29)
Life is simple.
Progress is good, but “progress” is bad if it destroys human lives and nature like the highly advanced weapons of war and “weapons” of abortion in our very midst, mercilessly butchering babies even before they are born. I’m glad my parents didn’t do that to me, being the fourth among the six (the seventh was aborted) of their children. Had I not been born, how can I now defend myself against a proposed “cruelty” that could have deprived me of life outside of a mother’s womb?
Imagine yourself as the fetus baby in the uterus (or in the mind of God) who would be among those about to be legally “mass-slaughtered” by your government. But shortly prior to your “execution,” do a flashback to reminisce precious moments of the past that should belong to your tomorrows.
You never solve a problem by committing murder.
God is intelligent enough to know what He’s doing, and He knows when to end His creations. God promised not to destroy the earth with flood again as in the days of Noah. And God is certainly not apt to contradict Himself by making overpopulation as a means to banish human beings from the planet. If ever the world is practically headed to destruction or unimaginable miseries as “experts” would always prognosticate, it certainly is not due to overpopulation, but due to the “ingenuity” of man’s wickedness and society’s abounding evils.
Rep. Pacquiao proposes: “Bakit hindi na lang tayo gumawa ng batas na siyang magiging kasagutan sa kahirapan ng ating bansa? (Why don’t we just create laws that will be the answer to the problem of poverty in the country?)”
Man complicates things to fall for his own snare.
Don’t let the good intentions of the bill be spent for naught. RH deserves major-surgery amendments or complete overhaul, if not utter detestation. Life, indeed, is simple. Let us all stand! The fight is on.
But boxing is different because it is a fight just between two pugilists in the ring and inside their respective hearts. So let the fighting congressman stand up to his own two feet to scribble alone a final closing chapter with Juan Manuel Marquez and to make the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight soonest as the most rousing standing ovation in boxing history could be awaiting him and Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the arena, theaters and living rooms everywhere in the world.
The Pacquiao-Mayweather is worth the long, long wait, but certainly no longer beyond May of next year.
renimvalenzuela@yahoo.com
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