I AM LOOKING for proof otherwise but found none. Thus, I still fear that a government, and its laws, detached from the moral teachings of the Ancient Christian Church, the Roman Catholic Church, will eventually become a government who does not believe in a good God, and even takes a dangerous course of governing its affairs based on the often tainted and self-serving motives of those who interprete its laws.
In the United States of America, such Godless government policies and laws have spurned the ghastly pro-abortion law through the historic decision of the Supreme Court of the United States on 22 January 1973 on the case of Roe v. Wade. Writing the ruling, Justice Harry Blackmun asserted that the "right of privacy... is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy."
One of the two dissenting justices to the ruling, Senior Associate Justice Byron White wrote: "I find nothing in the language or history of the Constitution to support the Court's judgment. The Court simply fashions and announces a new constitutional right for pregnant mothers and, with scarcely any reason or authority for its action, invests that right with sufficient substance to override most existing state abortion statutes. The upshot is that the people and the legislatures of the 50 States are constitutionally disentitled to weigh the relative importance of the continud existence and development of the fetus, on the one hand, against a spectrum of possible impacts on the mother, on the other hand."
In the history of international judicial decisionmaking, including that of the United States of America and our own, there were critical times when enlightened justices of the courts had the minority in numbers in High Court deliberations. The controversies the current Philippine Supreme Court have found itself in show how the limits of men and women on the bench can bring about problems more than it can resolve.
And apart from the moral lights coming from the Church, such laws on life and ethics can lead to disastrous results.
Separation of Church and State
In his letter to the Danbuy Baptists Association in 1802, Thomas Jefferson pioneered the principle of separation of the Church and the State: "I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between Church & State."
The United States Supreme Court first quoted the phrase in 1878. And series of cases starting in 1947 adopted the same. It did not appear in the U. S. Constitution until its First Amendment came: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."
This principle has been effective in restraining any religious organization from interferring in State affairs. That way it prevented self-serving religions from imposing their beliefs into government; thus, avoiding potential for religious wars, oppression based on religious prejudicies, and injustices that all religious organizations of any persuasion throughout human history had not been able to avoid committing, be it as official teachings or the execution of unjust activities with their consents.
But, like the walled society of communism in the former East Germany and Soviet Russia, such a legal wall also prevents the legal system from making use of the enlightened teachings of such religions, particularly that of Christianity. A government whose policies and laws exclude the enlightenment found only in religion can become a tool of oppressing its people, particularly the poor, for the benefit of those in power.
At the same time it also fragments each person into a person of belief and a person under the civil law. As a result, people acts differently, sometimes in stark opposition, of what they believe. And goodness in people's behavior towards others becomes relative to what the people in charge of laws define as "legally" good.
A State Enlightened by the Church
The only possible option for a State to avoid degeneration in its laws is to make use of the precepts of goodness found in the teachings of established religions. The State may not have an official state religion but its laws must ensure that any laws it creates must be enlightened by the teachings of the Christian Church.
First, a State must acknowledge the God of Christians if the majority of the States are professed Christians. Professing a belief in God as an official state policy makes it imperative for lawmaking bodies to make laws consistent with the good teachings inspired in the revelation of that God. Doing so avoids the disconnect found in the American laws that believes a God in their government policies, as seen in their paper money's statement "In God We Trust," while its legislations and rulings of law betray a pagan machination that does not believe in God. It is only, as far as I know, in the history of the American judiciary that a Chief Justice was removed for placing a monument of the Ten Commandments in its court hall.
Second, to avoid intolerance of other religions, the State can adopt a Constitutional policy of tolerance towards plurality of religions, which in itself is not contradictory to the goodness of the Christian God. The current Philippine Constitution already embodies that policy. At this point in time, the Christian religion has already matured enough to avoid the narrow-mindedness of its anti-religious plurality in the past.
Third, the limit of religious involvement in State affairs must be placed within the realm of providing for a safe, just and humane society within that State. Religious impulses at imposing their respective doctrines and beliefs on others must be restrained under Constitutional law. Inputs from religious authorities shall be on consulational bases only, and the Congress shall be put to task in putting into laws the best policies obtained from religious inputs for the sake of the people. The same must govern in the interpretation of laws in the judiciary system.
A Need Towards Enlightened Change
The need for a change in the tone of our present legislation and justice systems to incorporate traditional Christian values may not be easily perceptible. But our times has a definite need for it in order to protect our society from the evil policies of laws (such as abortion laws) spawned from the misguided minds of certain interpreters of law in judicial bastions around the world and throughout history.
A nation predominantly Christians, with the Roman Catholic Church having the most members, our nation cannot stay very long outside the influence of Christian faith in its policies and laws. Doing so will court the strong probability that it will end up a pagan government of "Christian" citizens. It is either the Filipinos ceases to be Christians in their public life or must live such Christianity in the halls of government.
It is time that the laws of the land make use of the gifts found in Christian religion in order to guide its decisions using the positive precepts of Christianity. It makes for an integrated societal institutions. It makes for integrated Filipino citizens who are active members of the Christian community.
At the end of the day, if we believe that being Christians makes Filipinos good citizens, integrating Christian precepts into laws will ensure that our leaders govern the nation under the mandate of God and the Filipino people.
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