Priests warned on bets taking advantage of Church

By Evelyn Macairan
From The Philippine Star
Link: http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=562361&publicationSubCategoryId=63

 
MANILA, Philippines - The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has warned parish priests to be wary of candidates who might take advantage of Church activities this Holy Week to campaign.

CBCP spokesperson Monsignor Pedro Quitorio III said beginning yesterday, Palm Sunday, some candidates might give out palm fronds and campaign fliers to churchgoers.

“The politicians, who may be Catholics, should not use their political agenda during Palm Sunday,” Quitorio said. “We should forewarn the parish priests so that we could avoid these incidents from happening. They (candidates) have been going to mass before and they do not give anything to the people. Anything that would pursue their political agenda is not good.”

Quitorio said churchgoers should burn campaign paraphernalia distributed during the Holy Week.

“Palm Sunday is to welcome Christ to enter our lives,” he said.

Manila Archbishop Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales also encourages the faithful to support the Alay Kapwa collection yesterday.

In a statement, Cardinal Rosales said contributions would be diverted to the disaster-preparedness fund of Caritas Manila.

“This fund is used in times of major crises like we experienced [during typhoon] “Ondoy”. We were also able to extend help to Haiti through this program of Caritas,” Rosales said.