MANILA, July 25, 2008─There is no such thing as a “population crisis” in the Philippines and the controversial “Reproductive Health and Population Development Act of 2007 “is not needed to solve a problem,” said a leading social scientist.
Dr. Stephen M. Krason, J. D., President of the Society of Catholic Social Scientists and Professor of Political Science and Legal Studies at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, USA said the Philippine birthrate has steadily declined since 1970. United Nations projections revealed that by 2030 “merely 22 years away – the Philippine birthrate will be below 2 per woman-under the replacement level of 2.1.”
Krason, based at the Franciscan University at Steubenville said “once countries sink to very low birth rates and people have become accustomed to an anti-natal way of thinking─as is typical in Europe─it is very difficult, even with incentives, to increase births.”
He said the outcome can be disastrous to a developing nation like the Philippines.
“There is no doubt in my mind that the Catholic bishops of the Philippines are correct in their assessment of the dangers that it represents,” he said.
He said Pope Paul VI had some sober lessons from the encyclical Humanae Vitae where the Successor of Peter “warned about all the personal and social maladies that would result from the acceptance of contraceptive use, and they have happened.”
Noting the mandatory sex education program for young pupils in the repro health bill, the academician suggested Arroyo should consider Pope John Paul II’s apostolic exhortation Familiaris Consortio because “it talked about the dangers of such sex education, and how it both distorts the moral sense of children and undercuts the natural rights of parents.”
Social Scientist’s views
“As a social scientist, I have readily seen the adverse effects of contraceptive family planning in the USA and other Western countries,” Krason said.
He declared the practice of contraception and “its further encouragement by government policy has led to the breakdown of sexual morality and the further acceptance of a range of deviant and unnatural sexual behaviors, including massive premarital sexual activity, cohabitation, adultery, and homosexual acts.”
Krason noted the developer of the birth control pill “lamented how the pill’s availability had made young people sexually irresponsible.” He added he could tell from his extensive research on the abortion issue in the United States “that the acceptance of contraception leads sooner or later to the acceptance of abortion” because “self-restraint is weakened and an atmosphere of laxity about sex takes hold and abortion because a back-up contraceptive.”
He also pointed out the increase in divorce and family breakdown as another adverse effect to society of the legalization and ready availability of contraception.
Krason cited juvenile delinquency, teen and pre-teen promiscuity, illicit drug use, child abuse, the feminization of poverty due to single parenting as social consequences now being experienced by western countries.
The academician said he is disturbed by the specter of coercion and potential threat to religious liberty presented by the pending bill.
“It is my understanding that the bill has provisions establishing population officers for all areas of the country and setting goals for population limitation open the door to a regimen of coercion,” he said.
Well documented coercive and deceptive tactics
Krason revealed the Population Research International, Human Life International and the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute have documented the widespread coercive and deceptive tactics of international population control organizations including UNFPA which happens to be the major promoters and funding sources for family limitation in the Philippines.
He added the bill “also disfavors children from families with more than two children for college scholarships – which are a very important consideration for a country like the Philippines where increased education means more development.”
He referred to the financial disincentives used to discourage large families in Singapore in the 1960s-1970s.
“Today, Singapore has come to regret such actions, as their population decreased so sharply that it was harming the country economically and otherwise,” Krason said.
Today, the Singaporean government gives incentives to couples to have more children.
Threat to religious freedom
The SCSS president expressed his concern the bill may be stepping on a person’s right to religious freedom because of the “apparent requirements that Catholic and other religious schools teach sex education, and that health care workers dispense certain contraceptives against their religious convictions.”
He added they have seen “attempts in Canada, Europe and even the USA to silence and criminally punish clergy and other opponents of homosexual practice who dare to speak up against it.” He explained “as the proponents of a regime of sexual license gain the upper hand, they show their intolerance, using their power to not only deceive people into accepting their views, but suppressing those who will not.
Krason said “Catholic social teaching, not population control ideology, provides the basis for securing the true development of nations.” He said these teachings “developed in renowned encyclicals and other documents over a period of 150 or more years and rooted squarely in the Gospel and Natural Law and informed by the latest developments in the social sciences and economic theory, the modern social teaching of the Church provides a set of sound, highly reasonable principles for the just and human economic development of nations.”
He underscored the need for pro-human dignity principles of Catholic social teaching and the tradition of Catholic social thought that has issued forth from many great Catholic thinkers.
Krason said the Philippines “has a great advantage in being able to more readily implement these principles, if its leaders have the will, because it is a Catholic country.”
“I urge you and your Congress to follow the thinking of your bishops about the proposed reproductive health and population management bill,” the academician appealed.
Krason, Brian Scarnecchia, President of the International Solidarity and Human Rights Institute and Terrence McKeegan, from the European Center for Law and Justice at the Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland are the three principal speakers in an international conference sponsored by the Catholic Social Scientists of the Philippines under Professor Emma R. Roxas, SCSS coordinator for Asia and the Pacific at the University of Asia and the Pacific, Ortigas Complex, Pasig City. (Melo Acuna)
