Affirming its commitment to shun politics, the new leadership of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) said yesterday it would focus on pastoral reforms and the renewal of the Church in the country.
CBCP president Jaro, Iloilo Archbishop Angel Lagdameo has vowed to uphold the decrees of the second Plenary Council of the Philippines (PCP-II) and the National Pastoral Consultation on Church Renewal (NPCCR) that he feels have never been fully implemented.
"Renewal and evangelization are the challenges facing the Philippine Church. If we focus more on our pastoral mission, we might not get the impression that we are just responding to political crisis," Lagdameo said.
Various quarters — and even some member-bishops — earlier called on the new CBCP leadership to stay away from political issues and instead focus on pressing concerns facing the Church.
The PCP-II was a month-long gathering of Filipino Catholics held in January 1991 at the San Carlos Seminary in Guadalupe, Makati City to seek renewal in the Church.
It was during this assembly that the Church and the laity agreed "to transform the Church into a ‘community of disciples’ where the poor have preferential and participative functions."
The objective then was to engage in a "renewed integral evangelization" with its dual message of salvation and liberation.
Among the priorities agreed in the plenary, according to Lagdameo, was the implementation of the Basic Ecclesial Community (BEC).
The decrees of the PCP-II received canonical recognition from Rome on April 25, 1992 and the promulgation of decrees took place on July 22, 1992.
A decade after, representatives of the vicariates, prelatures, dioceses and archdioceses of the Philippines gathered anew at the San Carlos Pastoral Formation Complex for the National Pastoral Consultation on Church Renewal (NPCCR) to reflect on the progress they made in their quest to fulfill the grand vision and mission proposed by PCP-II.
Lagdameo said it was found during the assessment that most of the objectives during the PCP-II "have not that visible for many people."
In a statement issued on Jan. 27, 2001, the CBCP acknowledged its difficulties in achieving the objectives: "The Church in the Philippines has, to our shame, also remained unchanged in some respects. Due to weakness in formation and education, the lack of defined diocesan pastoral directions and programs and deficiencies in structures, many prescriptions of PCP-II have not been implemented."
For this reason, Lagdameo said he will again raise the issues concerning the PCP-II decrees in an upcoming meeting of the executive secretaries of CBCP Commissions.
"The working heart of the CBCP are the commissions," he said. "So all commissions should focus on the pastoral priorities for the people to see what have been agreed upon."
Lagdameo likewise believes that these "priorities" should be examined thoroughly to find out under whose commission or cluster they should be assigned.