Last Wednesday, January 18, Presidential Peace Adviser Jesus “Jess” Dureza posted about his visit to the Vatican, wherein he revealed that Pope Francis said he will bless President Rodrigo Duterte.
“I said: “Bless the Philippines, Your Holiness” Pope Francis: “I will also bless your president,”” Dureza wrote in his Facebook post, captioning photos of him kissing the Pope’s hand.
Dureza was in Rome, Italy to join the third round of talks with the National Democratic Front of the Philippines. His visit to meet the Pope for a baciamano, the traditional kissing of the Pope’s hand held every Wednesday, was a side trip, reported the Philippine Star.
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Foreign Affairs Secretary Perfecto Yasay also hand delivered Duterte’s letter to the Pope, wherein the Philippine president said his warmest greetings and respect to the Catholic leader and thanked him for visiting the Philippines in 2015. This is Duterte’s second letter to the Pope.
Remember then-presidential candidate Duterte’s controversial comment about the traffic in Manila during Pope Francis’ visit in January 2016? He cursed the Pope, but everything ended well after the Vatican sent Duterte a letter on February 24, 2016 in response to Duterte’s letter to the Pope dated January 21 of the same year. The letter from the Vatican said, “The Holy Father offers the assurance of his prayers for you, as he invokes upon you the divine blessings of wisdom and peace.”
However, the Pope’s blessing for Duterte has been twisted by several blogs and Duterte fan pages with a misleading title to an otherwise genuine piece of news.
PTV News reported about how Pope Francis received Duterte’s second letter and how the Holy Father responded by saying that he will pray for the Philippine leader.
However, blogs like medianewscentral.com and pinoytribune.com uploaded that video along with several other news report clips and used the title “Breaking: Santo Papa Pumanig Kay Pangulong Duterte.” And we ask, why does the Pope need to side with anybody and side over what?
What made it worse is that the Duterte fan pages shared the article with the misleading title with this caption: “Si Pope nakakaintindi sa pangyayari sa Pilipinas dahil hindi siya bayaran tulad ng ibang pari sa Pilipinas na pera ang sinasamba at hindi diyos sa simbahan.”
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The blogs are reading too much into the Pope’s action to bless Duterte. While Duterte and the Catholic Church in the Philippines might be exchanging words over the issue of the war on drugs, it has nothing to do with the Pope saying he will also bless Duterte. And it certainly has nothing to do with what the Duterte Facebook fan pages implied – that the Pope knew what’s happening between Duterte and some Catholic priests so he sided with Duterte.
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The Pope is very generous with his blessings and forgiveness. In fact, in November last year, Pope Francis announced an indefinite extension to the power of Catholic priests to forgive those who committed abortions as a part of the Year of Mercy, but emphasized that the Catholic Church still considers abortion as a “grave sin.”
It should also be noted that as the leader of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis has issued warnings to Vatican leaders and Catholic priests about abusing children, gossiping, failing to practice self-criticism, declining spiritual faculties, hypocrisy, and more.
Sources: (rappler.com, facebook.com, beta.philstar.com, youtube.com, edition.cnn.com, theguardian.com, washingtonpost.com)
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