The Shepherds Part II

I have been very vocal about the indifference of bishops.

Right after the junking of the impeachment complaint, the bishops remained inert. However, apparently, some bishops could not remain idly by while the whole country was going down the drain. Some of them could no longer stay in the sidelines while the Left and the born again community claimed the moral upper hand in the struggle for truth and justice.

EDSA 1 and 2 have by and large unleashed the potentials of the bishops as a power bloc. More so, with Cardinal Sin as their de facto leader. But in his absence, the void has largely remained unfilled.

Cardinal Vidal does not have the same charisma. Archbishop Gaudencio Rosales is timid and introspective, Bishop Bacani was stained with a sexual harassment scandal, Bishop Yalung, a compromed prelate exiled to Rome, Bishop Soc Villegas, still a young ‘un, Bishop Fortich, gone but not forgotten, Bishop Cruz, too preoccupied confronting the jueteng lords. We thought none of the bishops would answer the call to lead the flock.

Little did we know that Bishops Yñiguez, Tobias, and Labayen would lift high the banners and sound the clarion call. But even before CPR, they were already among some of the known bishops who called for GMA’s resignation. Yet, when the pastoral statement came out, they towed the party line and submitted to the authority of their brother bishops.

But maybe, they have seen enough, they will not wait for hindsight to act before it is too late, they have heard the cry of their people that compelled them to break away from the status quo. If EDSA unleashed the bishops as a power bloc, CPR unleashed in Bishops Yñiguez et al the potentials as singular power cells to lead the sheep, not to slaughter but to light the darkness.

There is no turning back for the bishops and for this administration. The bishops friendly to GMA and her administration cannot remain loyal to her while she continues to exercise a malevolent conduct towards those who are disagreeable. And now that some of their confreres have become unwilling martyrs of the water cannon, their fealty to her remains all the more untenable. The government accuses the 3 bishops as hypocrites but it is the bishops who side with her that will surface as the true hypocrites if they continue to maintain their deafening silence.

The transformation from a pro-GMA to an anti-GMA bishop is not hard to fathom. All those who seek to search the truth have been waylaid. All those who have an iota of truth to reveal have been repatriated beyond our shores. All those who question her authority have been harassed. In the face of all these underhanded tactics and in the light of the truth of the gospels, how can a bishop, successor to the apostles, remain indifferent to the ongoing perfidy and remain a loyal hound of God? There can only be one answer and it cannot be rationalized in any way, shape or argument.

Let us pray for our bishops for their enlightenment. And too, let us teach our bishops a thing or two about renouncing evil and all its ways. That should have come naturally to them as second skin. But then again, they may have been too invested in their offices and alliances that they failed to see dazzlingly, in the words of John Paul II, the Splendor of Truth.

Let us do so before we all lose faith in them and the Church.