Criminal words
The Pope has said insulting religions is a no-no, and I get that. I agree we shouldn't go around slagging the core beliefs of the various populations of this earth, that tolerance must be adhered to and practiced rigorously. (Religiously?) But really, what does that have to do with Carlos Celdran?
Carlos is a man who has been twice convicted - by the Regional Trial Court and the Court of Appeals - of offending the religious feelings of Roman Catholics. This is a crime in our antiquated penal code that has been carried over from the dark days when religion ran supreme. All it needs for a person to be sent packing off to jail is to commit some as yet undefined act in a place of worship that can bruise some faithful's feelings.
What did Carlos do? In a period costume, he went into a cathedral where several Church VIP's were, and held up a placard with the word "Damaso" in it. Why did he do it? To protest the massive offensive the Catholic Church leaders had instigated in trying to block the passage of the crucial Reproductive Health Bill passed.
So, my question is, was this an insult to the Catholic Church? What does Damaso mean, anyway? Damaso was a fictional priest in a much acclaimed novel who exemplified the abuses of the Church during the Spanish era. (Did he really father Maria Clara? I forget).
Why would reminding priests not to be abusive, as Damaso was, be insulting to the bishops and cardinals in the cathedral? Are they not really intended to go forth and serve, anyway? Are they not supposed to be humble? Aren't they supposed to be swearing off material luxuries and observing simplicity, like the Pope just said? So for a member of the flock, even if he calls himself "cafeteria Catholic", to remind them of these vows, much like the Pope did, via a reference to a fictional character, does not in the least smell to me like an insult.
Celdran clarifies there was no mass going on in the cathedral. There was a meeting of various church dignitaries, but no rites and prayers. So it was just a meeting of leaders which a follower crashed. Unfortunately, the follower had a very vocal opinion which put to task his own leaders. A member of the church disagreed with the direction of his leaders, and expressed it. Is that a crime? Should it be a crime?
This is where Celdran and his lawyer, the force of nature that is Harry Roque, are right in pointing to the constitutional right to freedom of expression. Celdran should be able to tell his religious leaders he disagreed with them. Even if the leaders didn't like what he was saying, Celdran had the freedom to disagree, and say it to their faces.
Celdran's case is even stronger, considering he is a Catholic. If he wasn't, that could have been seized upon by an onion-skinned member of the flock as proof that Celdran was out to insult the religion. But Celdran is Catholic. He might be an acerbic, irreverent, in your face Catholic, but a Catholic, nonetheless. So how does that compute in the scheme of things? Can one be prohibited from insulting his own religion? Would not that be the effect of this law, an impingement on a person's ability to critique what he finds wrong in the faith? Or are we saying critiquing and disagreeing should never be allowed?
Of course, i am collapsing the concepts of "insulting" and "offending". Insulting seems more severe, and dependent on the intent of the speaker, while offending connotes a lower degree of sensitivity, and relates more to what the audience feels as a result of the speech, not what the speaker intended them to feel. Unfortunately, our country seeks to penalize even just the offensive sort, and not even the insulting types.
That for me, again, is another reason to characterize this law as a crack down on freedom of expression. Rather than going into the speaker's motivations, the statute forces us to analyze what those who heard the speech felt, which is very subjective. All it takes is some hysterical strumpet to scream she was offended, and mightily so, for a judge to be forced to convict.
Shouldn't the analysis be, what did the speaker intend to accomplish in saying what he said? It doesn't matter what his audience felt, whether ecstasy, epiphany, eroticism, or even anger. People can manufacture what they felt, or delude themselves into believing what they think they felt. Should we allow punishment on the basis of the mere say-so of the audience on his feelings? (And on that point, the Catholic Bishops Conference had said it was not insulted by Celdran).
The State shouldn't go around punishing citizens for the impact of their words on other people's emotions. We already have protection for those words that impact on people's reputations, via our libel and defamation laws. But do we really need to protect citizen's emotions? And religious emotions, at that?
It's off to the Supreme Court for Carlos Celdran and lawyer Harry Roque. I'm hoping the intellectual exercise this involves doesn't get tangled up in the predominantly Catholic court's religious sensitivities. If it does, and Celdran's conviction gets affirmed, it's all up to President Noynoy Aquino, for the pardon.
Well, at least, on his views on separation of Church and State, I have more faith.
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