Jong Atmosfera

Every conscious thing we do or choice we make is somehow motivated by the pursuit of pleasure or the avoidance of pain. The only variables are the kinds of things that bring varying degrees of pleasure and pain to each individual, the premises on which expectations of pleasure or pain are based, and the ability to delay gratification.

In The Bottomline episode aired last February 4, Red Tani agreed with Boy Abunda that no one actually wins in debates on the existence of God. And I concur because the god concept has too many facets lumped together and discussions often shift from one facet to another.

Such beauty compels some people to conclude that there must be an Intelligent Designer, a Loving Creator who creates and sustains life. However, naturalists argue that it is the sun which is the ultimate sustainer of all life on earth.

The Philippines won the Guiness record for having the largest Ten Commandments tablet. This shouldn't come as a surprise, considering that our country likes claiming to be one of the 'most Catholic' in the world. But will the Philippine Catholic hierarchy be happy and proud of this record? Probably not.

A vegan once asked me why, in spite of my keen awareness of animal suffering, I continue to eat them. While I can justify eating fish and seafood, at least to myself, I regret to say that such awareness never caused me to totally give up meat, including farmed meat. What it did, however, was to make me grow cynical of man's morality and compassion.

In society, Church morality and secular morality often come into conflict with each other because their standards, and especially their underlying premises which dictate these standards, are as different as night and day.

The official news website of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) recently published an article titled "Church and state: Why can't they be friends?" which tells of the Pope's warning on the dangers of secularism. The following are some key excerpts pertinent to the Philippine situation and worthy of analysis, in an attempt to answer the title question why the church and state can't indeed be friends.

One of the arguments against legislating divorce in the Philippines is that spouses will no longer promise to love each other...

"Its general form is to discourage action against some admitted evil by pointing to some other evil which is stated to be worse than the first evil, but about which the user of the argument is making no proposal to do anything."