Reproductive Politics, Religion and State Governance in the Philippines

Home , Alfredo Lim, Angelo Reyes, Carlos Celdran, Couples for Christ, EDSA Shrine, Hacienda

Maria Dulce F Natividad

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

2012

ABSTRACT

Reproductive Politics, Religion and State Governance in the Philippines

Maria Dulce F Natividad

Church and the state has developed, policymaking on reproduction, sexuality and health answers to both development goals and religious norms. At the same time, women’s everyday frameworks of

(reproductive) meanings are also inextricably bound with state policies and popular culture.

My ethnographic study examines the relationship between state governance, religion, reproductive politics, and competing understandings of embodied sexual morality. My study argues that at the heart of the complex politics involved in policymaking on reproductive health in the Philippines is the entanglement of national and religious identities. Reproductive policy then operates as a frame through which the politics of the nation, religion and the state get filtered and played out. Taking the

Philippines as a case study, I focus on women’s ‘lived religion’ and practices; the local, national and international institutions and actors that exert influence on reproductive policy and popular sentiment; and how these shape women’s reproductive practices in the context of everyday life. Through the women’s narratives, I show how class, gender and religion work in tension with one another. Lastly, the study also investigates how the historical entanglement between religion and the state configures practices of governance, such as policymaking, in postcolonial contexts.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgments ii

Dedication v

Chapter 1 Policy Worlds and Reproductive Politics 1

Chapter 2 Debating Reproductive Health 32

Chapter 3 Reproducing the Moral Nation: 76

Catholicism and the Politics of Reproduction

Chapter 4 Moral Economy of Survival: Women’s Narratives and Realities 128

Chapter 5 Go Natural, Start Local: Policy Moves Through Government 159

Chapter 6 Conclusion 207

Bibliography 224

Acknowledgments

This dissertation would not have been possible without the support and encouragement of many individuals, groups and communities. First, I wish to thank the women of Sangandaan for sharing their life histories with me. I am grateful for their openness and trust. I extend this gratitude to everyone who participated in my research. I also thank the Sasakawa Young Leaders Fellowship Fund and the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University for supporting both my preliminary research and fieldwork in the Philippines.

I want to thank the members of my dissertation committee: Drs. Carole Vance, Richard Parker,

Lesley Sharp, Alice Miller and Jennifer Hirsch.

I count myself lucky for having a wonderful and dedicated mentor in Carole Vance. Her thorough review of my writing and her challenging comments on my drafts, as well as her tireless focus on my progress, provided a steadying guide throughout the difficult process. She has put a lot of her energy and time into helping me achieve my best. For this, I cannot thank her enough. By her example, I have learned greatly about what it means to be a scholar, mentor and teacher.

Graduate school is an environment for achieving, but it is also a place of survival. I am grateful for the unconditional support that Richard Parker has given me from the time I finished my coursework until now. He trusted me with work, training me in areas of research, writing and academic publishing, and introducing me to a broad network of academic-activists, while at the same time ensuring my survival. All this has informed my own work and will serve me well in my future. I valued greatly the critical points he made on my text.

For never tiring of being excited about my work, Lesley Sharp has given me a generous gift. She always saw the potential and strengths of my research. My conversations with her were for me sessions for crystallizing and messing up ideas. Her urging that I let the voices of my respondents speak is now forever ingrained in my mind.

Despite her move to another university, Ali Miller sustained her commitment to be on my committee. The questions she posed always opened a different complex perspective. Beyond the call of duty, she offered her lovely home as refuge and work space as I finished my revisions.

Stepping in at a final and crucial stage of my dissertation work, Jennifer Hirsch was perfect. Her comments and views challenge me to take my work further.

In the course of my academic work, Drs. Monica Maher and Edgar Rivera Colon, also served as members of my committee for a time. They both helped me work out certain aspects of my dissertation.

I wish to acknowledge other faculty whose quiet support I appreciated a lot. They include Kim Hopper,

Amy Fairchild, Marita Murrman, James Colgrove, Miguel Munoz-Laboy and Robert Sember. I thank

Marni Sommer for her heart and caring for my well-being. Theo Sandfort, my adviser when I did my

MPH at Columbia, deserves special mention. He took me under his wing when I first came to New York.

I also want to give a special mention to my friends, Ernesto Vasquez, Carmen Yon-Leau, and

Shaohua Liu. Although we met each other when were at different stages of our academic lives, the four of us managed to form a tight group of international students. I cherish the love and support they have given me, and miss the laughter and stories that we shared.

For their friendship and being there during the last stages of my dissertation writing, I thank

Ephraim Shapiro, Nancy Worthington, Laura Murray, Raziel Valino, Emily Vasquez, Robert Frey, Jonathan

Garcia and Yessica Diaz. They all made life easier for me.

My Filipino community in New York was a source of immeasurable support. I thank Toinette

Raquiza, Vince Boudreau, and Myrna Alejo, who also live academic lives, for being generous with their advice, opening their homes to me, and comforting me with food. Nora Angeles, another friend and academic based in Vancouver, commented on the rough draft of my dissertation. The Reyes family,

Vicky, Romy, Mark and Anne, welcomed me into their New Jersey home and made me a part of their family.

iii

To my friends and colleagues in the Philippines who served as my cheering squad and updated me on news from home, I say thank you. Jing Pura, Mia Aquino, Lai Mendoza, Mags Lopez, Jojo Garcia,

Alan Ortiz, Randee Cabaces, Chris Bantug, Agnes Camacho, Sheila Espine, Mela Sarenas, Roy Choco, Gus

Cerdena, Mye Cruz and Doby Pineda sustained my spirit. They understood my unwillingness to be distracted by Facebook and endured the inconvenience of regular email to continue communicating with me. Princess Nemenzo, Mercy Fabros, Fe Manapat, Fe Sarmiento, Melvi Gelacio, Bing Concepcion and Ka Dodong Nemenzo provided encouragement and enthusiastic support.

For keeping me company from far away and for many nights, I thank Ian Rintoul.

Lastly, I wish to thank my family for their constant love and support. I thank my siblings, Kuya

Dominic, Doreen, Desiree, and Delight, for keeping me connected to home; and my nephews, Andre and

Jack, and my nieces, Faith and Kim, who give me infinite joy. I owe my parents, Jun and Celia, everything.

I thank them most for believing in me. And although he did not see me finish, my father would have been proudest of this moment.

For my parents, Jun and Celia

CHAPTER ONE

POLICY WORLDS AND REPRODUCTIVE POLITICS

INTRODUCTION

Years ago, I took a political science course that introduced students to the policy process and outlined the steps involved in passing legislation: the drafting of the bill to its subsequent first and second readings, the period of interpellation, the introduction of amendments, voting on the bill, the third and last reading, and finally, the possible exercise of the Presidential veto. This, is how a bill becomes a law. Implied in this step-by-step presentation was an objective analysis of a social problem, a rational sifting of arguments, and a deliberate crafting of the solution to the problem. Understanding this process is key to influencing policy outcomes, students were told.

Far from being an external force that unfolds objectively and which political actors must then take pains to follow, in reality, policymaking and policy itself have complex “social lives” as they may be understood as being embedded within contexts and meanings. As people engage in policymaking, they construct and deploy their own interpretations and meanings of policies, creating new social, political and bureaucratic dynamics. As such, policymaking is a highly contested and unstable process, revealing

“political processes in which actors, agents, concepts and technologies interact in different sites, creating or consolidating new rationalities of governance and regimes of knowledge and power” (Shore et al. 2011: 2). Shore, Wright and Peró (2011) use the term “policy worlds” to refer to this whole complex interactions.

In this study, I investigate the policy worlds of the Reproductive Health Bill, first proposed in the

Philippine legislature in 2001. After years of raging public debates, the bill continues to be a source of political eruptions and moral questioning, intensely contested for more than a decade due mainly to opposition from the influential Catholic Church. The Catholic Church is not alone: also engaged are

affiliated groups, policymakers and their legislative staffs, the state and its different agencies, women’s

NGOs and other reproductive health advocacy groups, business and other sectors, as well as diverse media. Instead of focusing solely on the policy text, my research takes the national controversy ignited by the Reproductive Health Bill as its subject, examining the many competing moral perspectives, cultural meanings and political interpretations attached to the policy, as well as the backgrounds of the various interacting actors and the histories they bring to this policy world.

The narrative of the Reproductive Health Bill is not about how a bill becomes a law; rather it is about how a bill continuously fails to be enacted into law despite having public support, and yet, year after year, survives certain death in Congress, to be revived the following year. As an ethnography of policy, this study looks at deeply embedded historical identities and political relationships and how these are implicated in the making and unmaking of policy. To understand this, I analyze the Philippines’ colonial history and how it has shaped the country’s political institutions and traditions, embedding the

Catholic Church in the life of the nation. Intertwined with this religio-political history is the development of Filipino national consciousness, identity and ethics. This history has enabled the Catholic Church to generate a powerful narrative of a Filipino nation whose essence is Catholic. As I show in this study, long-held beliefs about what it means to be a Filipino and what it means to be Catholic have exerted a strong influence on ordinary Filipinos, politicians and state institutions, shaping their responses to the policy debates.

The protracted social conflict over reproductive health, however, has opened spaces for shifts in Filipinos’ religious identities and ethical perspectives, as well as potential changes in the politics of

Church and state in relation to those governed. A marker for this changing religio-political landscape is the emergence of Catholic voices that advance women’s reproductive justice and reproductive health programs, simultaneously claiming their Catholic identities and challenging Catholic Church dogma and political practice.

With the legislative discussions, the policy arena inevitably draws all the actors into its process.

In this instance, the policy process created and mediated the environment for the political engagement between the Catholic Church and its allies, reproductive health advocates and the state. But this is an engagement that refuses to be contained within the halls of Congress, as actors scramble to gain legitimacy for their respective positions at other levels and branches of government – local and international, executive and judicial. As policy travels through governmental spaces, the contradictory responses at these different levels reveal disjunctions in the system, and the multiple channels through which power and resistance flow. This research examines this political interaction and analyzes the politics of reproduction in the Philippines.

Politics is about the distribution of power in society. The policy world of reproductive health reaches long and deep, and it is crowded and noisy. In debating reproductive health, many diverse voices have entered the political sphere and the question of power arises in considering whose voices and decisions matter in shaping policy responses. This study attempts to bring together these many voices – religious and secular, public authorities and social movements, policymakers and program implementers, institutions and individuals - and to describe the political spaces that they inhabit. In doing this, however, I have tried to articulate the experiences and sentiments of urban poor women, whose life conditions form a background to the policy discussions but whose actual voices are almost never heard. For, as crowded and noisy and all encompassing the reproductive health policy world is, it reserves its margins for these women, marking them as both inside and outside of this world. Much like the slum communities in which they live, policy renders urban poor women invisible, while in plain sight.

FRAMING QUESTIONS

Reproductive controversies are never only about reproduction and health. They serve as proxies for more fundamental questions about citizenship, the state, national identity, religious identity, class and gender. In a post-colonial context such as the Philippines, where a particular historical relationship between the Church and the state has developed, policymaking on reproduction, sexuality and health answers to both development goals and religious norms. At the same time, women’s everyday frameworks of (reproductive) meanings are also inextricably bound with state policies and culture.

This study examines the relationship between state governance, religion, reproductive politics, and competing understandings of embodied sexual and reproductive morality. Taking the Philippines as a case study, I focus on women’s ‘lived religion’ and practices; the local, national and international institutions and actors that exert influence on reproductive policy and popular sentiment; and how these shape women’s reproductive practices in the context of everyday life. The study also investigates how the historical entanglement between religion, nation and the state configures practices of governance, such as policymaking, in postcolonial contexts.

By looking at religion outside conventional religious spaces – in congressional halls, campaign meetings, mundane conversations, before and after public mobilizations, this study highlights religion, not as prescribed experience, but as a social practice constantly in the making (Beckford, 2006).

Combining an ethnography of religion – how the institutional church, religious groups, government agencies, and individual women ‘do religion’ in everyday contexts, and an ethnography of the state – how state policies on reproduction claim the social body, are incorporated in women’s daily lives, and are experienced by citizens (Kligman, 1998), this research attempts to integrate everyday practices with macro-level processes that contextualize contestations regarding reproduction.

Moreover, in examining the historical and contextual relations between religion, nation and the state, this study attempts to present an analysis of a reproductive health controversy that veers away

from the framework of religious fundamentalism. Instead, by looking at the political dynamics at play, this study suggests that the intertwining motivations, positions and visions of the state, the nation and the Catholic Church do not make for easy dichotomies between religious and democratic agendas.

Demands to strictly observe secular rules in policymaking, therefore, do not necessarily resolve the conflict over reproductive health.

This study examines three central questions: What is the relationship between the institutional church, ‘lived religion’ and women’s reproductive practices in everyday life? How does the engagement between religion, the state and civil society shape governance and policymaking regarding gender, sexuality and reproduction? How do sentiments and the politics of the nation and of religion intersect with each other in the debates about reproductive health?

Studies on religion point to the tensions between institutional religion, popular religion and personal belief and behavior (Smith 2008; Shepard 2006; Sutcliffe 2004; Tentler 2004). Central to my research is the question of what people actually do, say, think and believe in regard to religion, how this is mediated by family, economic and other social contexts, and what are their implications for reproductive practices. A related question asks how people understand the role and relevance of religion in their lives and how this impacts reproductive decisions. Derivative questions include: How do women negotiate and construct everyday morality in relation to religious teachings and doctrines? How do women interpret, resist and integrate religion in their reproductive and sexual practices and decision- making? At the same time, my research explores how the institutional church accommodates women’s understandings of religious teachings and adjusts its local practices on sexuality and reproduction to take women’s perspectives into account. Lastly, I investigate the consequences of the church’s positions on reproduction and sexuality for women’s daily lives.

Following anthropological interest in colonial and post-colonial discourses, I examine Church-

State relations in the Philippines in order to understand how these relationships have shaped practices

of governance, especially policymaking. I ask: what kinds of state and policy actions are made possible or constrained by the interaction between religious institutions and groups, government agencies, and public culture? What are the discourses and technologies deployed by these political actors to influence policies on gender, sexuality and reproduction? How do these engagements shape Filipino notions of gender, sexuality and reproduction? Further, recognizing that class and gender are dimensions of politics and culture, do poor women participate in politics and policy-making, and if so, how?

Based on these questions, this study describes how religion, the state, social movements and private lives interact to shape everyday sexual morality and policies on reproductive health. In proceeding with this, the study analyzes the discourses about reproduction and sexual morality deployed by religious authorities, the state, media, NGOs and community women, examining how these define the terms of the debates around reproductive health and rights. At the same time, I also describe how major institutions advancing programs of sexual and reproductive morality mobilize their organizational strength and symbolic weight to influence reproductive and sexual health policy. Lastly, I explore the everyday frameworks of meaning, as well as ‘lived religion and belief’, of poor women who interpret and follow but also resist religious doctrines and practices, as these relate to reproduction, sexuality, ideas of justice and citizenship.

REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH TERRAIN

Policymaking, especially regarding gender, sexuality and reproduction, has become a central arena for engagement between the state, religion, and civil society in the Philippines. As in many parts of the global South, reproductive policies in the country have been invariably tied to the issue of population control and poverty. With a population of about 95.8 million and 22.6 percent of its people living below $1.25/day (UN Human Development Indicators Report 2011), the Philippines assumes the adverse effects of a high population growth on family, community and national welfare and the urgency of controlling population growth to achieve development. The first national population policy, launched

as part of the martial law reforms (Lorenzo 1976), achieved its goal of reducing population growth by employing rigid demographic targets, a strict quota system for health workers, and economic incentives and disincentives for poor women (Gorospe 1976). This policy has been criticized as being coercive, its incentives and disincentives making it hard for women and health workers who had few economic options to say “no” to sterilization and family planning programs. The policy was abandoned when the administration of Corazon Aquino, taking counsel from the Catholic Church, halted all family planning services except for “natural” family planning in the late 1980s. During this period the provision recognizing “the equal protection of the mother and the unborn child” was enshrined in the 1987

Constitution, enabled by a strong religious representation in the Constitutional Commission (Fabros et al. 1998). From 1992 to 2001, the administrations of Fidel Ramos and Joseph Estrada distanced themselves from religious authority and re-introduced family planning programs which integrated the language of reproductive health, population management and sustainable development, following cues from the International Conference on Population Development and the Fourth World Conference on

Women (Jain et al. 2002).

In the past ten years, a number of legislators with the support of women’s non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have attempted to pass a bill that seeks to institutionalize policies upholding sexual and reproductive health and rights, while ensuring programmatic continuity from one administration to another. Introduced in the same year as the proposed laws on divorce and non- discrimination (protecting lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender people), the reproductive health care bill (subsequently the Responsible Parenthood and Population Management bill) became a platform through which the Catholic Church and affiliated groups pursued moral objectives about gender, sexuality and the family. Religious authorities denounced these bills as “anti-God, anti-family and anti-Filipino.” The Church’s attack sharply polarized civic discourse and caused some members of

Congress to withdraw support. Recognizing the Church’s strong opposition to the bill, legislators also

felt pressured to include Church representatives in committee hearings, opening the policymaking process to religious interference. Yet even as legislators feel vulnerable to the Catholic Church’s positions on reproductive issues, annual surveys show that majority of Filipinos, despite the Church’s teachings, support ‘artificial’ contraception and would vote for candidates who favor family planning and ‘artificial’ contraception. The monopoly exercised by the Catholic Church over the population may have ensured the formal dominance of Catholicism, but this may also be the reason why Filipinos adhere minimally to Catholic Church teachings. It is important to note, however, that Filipinos’ support for contraception does not translate to practice as only 36 percent of married women use modern family planning methods (National Demographic and Health Survey [NDHS], Philippines, 2008).

With competing actors influencing policymaking, the result is a reproductive health agenda that is incoherent and a state discourse on reproduction, sexuality and population that is contradictory. On the one hand, former President Macapagal-Arroyo poured funds into supporting the Church’s campaign on ‘natural’ family planning while shifting the responsibility for providing contraceptive pills to NGOs. On the other hand, health officials raised alarm about maternal deaths and identified reproductive health and safe motherhood as priority concerns, while economists stressed the risks of a ballooning population. In the politically charged debate on reproduction, sexual morality and health, the discourses that posit sexuality and population as threats to moral values, national welfare or development goals has overpowered women’s sexual and reproductive self-determination. At the same time, discussions of reproductive and sexual rights have been conflated with the objectives of population and development. Whether they tend to be ‘anti-natalist’ or ‘pro-natalist’, the main target of these reproductive policies are poor women, who are viewed as having uncontrolled sexuality and rampant fertility. Poor women also suffer the impact of these policies, reflected in their stories about guilt and shame, forced sterilizations, unsafe abortion complications, maternal deaths and a general lack of health and life options.

Building on these critical events, this research investigates how religion, the state, social movements and private lives interact to shape everyday sexual morality and policies on reproduction.

Considering that morality and policies are negotiated spaces, I am interested in the process of engagement among the multiple actors involved and the effects of this engagement on policies and people’s daily lives. This research analyzes the different discourses about sexual morality, reproduction, rights and citizenship deployed by the different political actors engaged in the debate. The convergences, divergences, continuities and overlaps between these discourses as well as the dilemmas and contradictions these pose for the different actors involved are examined.

Specifically, the research explores how the interaction between religious institutions and the state shapes policymaking on reproductive health and rights. I describe the strategies, technologies and resources that the Church mobilizes in its campaigns. The level of influence that the Church has on state policies, however, is not only enabled by its institutional capacity; rather, it is the product of the kind of

Church-state relations that have been established historically in the particular context of the Philippines.

Moreover, I look beyond institutions and examine how Filipino urban poor women construct their own sexual and reproductive moralities as they engage with the teachings of the Catholic Church. This focus on “lived religion” examines how women interpret, follow and resist Church doctrines and practices as these relate to sexuality, reproduction and citizenship.

The debates on reproductive health serve as proxies for more fundamental questions about citizenship, the state, the nation, and women. The Catholic Church, policymakers and women’s NGOs are essentially asking the following questions: What are the problems of the nation and who defines them? What kind of people are Filipinos? What kind of a society will reproductive policies produce?

What future do these policies offer the country? These questions point to implicit beliefs about progress and backwardness for a “third world” country such as the Philippines, the role of the state in modernizing the nation, the values of a “modern” and “moral” nation, as well as “modern” and “moral”

national subjects, and the place of religion in steering the nation on the right path. More importantly, they reveal reproduction as a site for the struggle over these issues.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK AND LITERATURE REVIEW

Reproductive Politics, Morality and the State

I locate my research within the intersecting scholarship on the politics of reproduction, religion and politics, and power, agency and citizenship.

This research builds on the scholarship that takes reproduction as a site of political contestation

(Petchesky 2003, Jolly and Ram 2001, Obermeyer 2001, Petchesky and Judd 1998, Ginsburg and Rapp

1995, 1991, Correa and Reichmann 1994, Sen and Snow 1994, Van Dyck 1995, Joffe 1986). Reproductive controversies about abortion, contraception, population and assisted reproduction that debate questions about sexual morality, the obligations of the state, and the place of women in society are a particular expression of this political struggle. Social hierarchies such as gender, class, ethnicity, race, and age shape these struggles, too. These reproductive contestations, moreover, demonstrate how reproduction becomes a medium through which other forms of power struggles can be waged. Going beyond the view of reproduction as a biological process, this research emphasizes reproduction as a process that connects the material, the moral and the political (Thomas 2003, Grayson 2000, Morgan

2000, Neresini and Bembi 2000, Townsend 1997, Inhorn 1994, Strathern 1992, Raphael 1973). As such,

Ginsburg and Rapp (1995) state, reproduction is an “entry point” to the “study of social life” and, as a political process, “provides an arena for investigating and theorizing about the production of culture” (p.

10).

At the macro-level, reproductive politics finds expression in the link between reproduction and the survival of the nation. In colonial contexts, women’s sexuality and reproductive capacity were used as symbols of nationalist aspirations and purity and, thus, had to be protected from contamination from colonial powers. As such, women were called on to reproduce and sustain the threatened colonized

nation (Klausen 2004, Kaler 2003, Briggs 2002, Jolly 2001, Davin 1997, Stoler 1997, Chatterjee 1990,

Yuval-Davis 1997). This same reproductive capacity, however, can be seen as a danger to a nation’s development and progress. In the context of developing countries, governments have implemented programs and policies regulating women’s fertility to curb rapid population growth in keeping with development and economic goals (Maternowska 2006; Rao 2005, Schoen 2005, Robynson 2001, Ram

2001, Whittaker 2001b, Dwyer 2000, Lopez 1998, Ross 1998, Bandarage 1997, Flieger and Smith, 1975).

Conversely, in situations where below-replacement level fertility threatens the growth of labor force and industries, governments have instituted incentives to encourage reproduction (Hanson 2004, Jolly

2001b, Lock 1998, Horn 1994). Other studies exploring the political and historical processes shaping struggles around reproduction have focused specifically on the role of religion in these struggles

(Blofield 2006, Shepard 2006, Ortiz-Ortega 2005, Whittaker 2004a, Martin 2000, Gebara 1999, Kissling

1999, Ginsburg 1998, Freedman 1997, Blanchard 1994). These studies emphasize reproduction as a political process involving negotiation, accommodation, resistance and shifts in perspectives which render the body as public or national space.

My research also builds on studies that investigate reproductive decision-making and the considerations that inform reproductive choices (Paxson, 2004, Koster 2003, El Dawla et al. 1998, Fabros et al. 1998, Raj et al. 1998). Studies on reproductive decision-making have shown that women’s decisions – whether to get pregnant, have more children, undergo an abortion or be sterilized – are more often a result of negotiated positioning in relation to partners, families, work and economic situations, community moral prescriptions, and availability of adequate health services. In their multi- country research, Petchesky and Judd (1998) discuss the notion of “negotiated self.” Reproductive decisions by women are not experienced as conflicts between self and others; rather, women view themselves as integrated with others and this relationality is reflected in their reproductive actions and decisions.

While studies on reproductive decision-making tend to focus on the immediate context of the individual or the micro-level, research on political reproductive struggles emphasize the broader, macro- level processes. My project integrates these two levels by interrogating both the role of religion in women’s reproductive lives and the institutional practices of religion that impinge on politics and governance. By doing this, I hope to achieve a more complete picture of the dynamic and complex relationship between reproduction, religion and politics.

At the same time, I also try to elaborate the global dimension by linking the activities of religious and political institutions and groups in the Philippines to those in the Vatican and the United States.

Considering the strong ties between the Philippine Catholic Church and the Vatican, as well as the continuing influence of American culture and politics on Philippine institutions and the public, examining how these global relationships unfold on the ground will clarify how external influences become embedded, incorporated or modified in the practices and discourses of local actors.

An important aspect of my research is the investigation of the social class dimensions of women’s reproductive decision-making and the constitution of sexual morality through social position. I do not suggest that poor women have a separate reproductive agency or subjectivity. But I take

Browner and Sargent’s (1996) suggestion that a “fuller understanding of how ethnicity and social class mold women’s wishes, expectations and behavior within the reproductive domain” will move us to

“articulating multiple paradigms of maternity held by different groups of women within heterogeneous societies and their relationship to broader societal principles and structural processes” (p. 232). Further,

I am interested in how social class, gender and religion work in tension with one another in women’s everyday decisions and how the constraints and opportunities that poor women encounter in their everyday lives are enabled by the state and its institutions.

Reproduction is a process that connects the material, the political and the moral. The notion of

“moral economy” (Biehl 2005, Kleinman et al 1997, Scott 1976) is useful as it may serve as “a tool for

understanding the way in which a given society reproduces itself morally and what people do to maintain or establish what they consider to be a preferable social balance when direct political action is not on the agenda” of the poor or marginalized (Vike 1997: 197). Vike further notes that what morality and norms regulate is “not ‘justice’ in an absolute sense, but rather the relationship between people’s ideas of a reasonable order and what we may call social performance.” In his classic work on the moral economy of the peasant, Scott (1976) explained that he was not investigating the causes of peasant rebellion; rather, he was interested in peasants’ notion of economic justice and exploitation, and what to them were tolerable and intolerable claims on the products of their labor. Particularly instructive is

Scott’s perspective that a study of the moral economy of peasants “can tell us what makes them angry and what is likely, other things being equal, to generate an explosive situation” (1976: 4). My interest in moral economy goes beyond exploring women’s covert or overt resistances, accommodations or negotiations regarding reproductive decisions. Rather, I want to understand how guilt, shame, suffering and sacrifice get incorporated into religious morality while at the same time these emotions can be actively deployed by women for their sense of redemption and source of authentic morality. Here I take into account the marginalization of urban poor women who are targeted by state policies but whose economic position has excluded them from effectively participating in most socio-political processes that affect their lives. Political upheavals in the past few years have deepened awareness of class divisions in the Philippines; masses of urban poor violently protested against the “contempt” with which society – the elite and middle classes, the government and the Catholic Church – has treated them1. This contempt extends to the way Filipino upper classes and institutions have viewed poor women with

1 On May 1, 2001, after several days of vigil at the Our Lady of EDSA Shrine, hundreds of thousands of urban poor marched to the Presidential Palace to protest the ouster of populist president, Joseph Estrada, by the elite and middle classes, the Catholic Church and the military. For the urban poor, Estrada was their defender. The “Poor People Power,” as it was called by the media, turned into a bloody, violent riot that lasted for more than twelve hours. With rage as their only weapon, the slum dwellers, the so-called “masa,” took on the police, the media, and anybody who stood in their way. The rampage resulted in the death of several individuals and in the injury of countless others as well as in the destruction of property worth millions of pesos.

“undesirable fertility” and “undeserved motherhood”. How does this social exclusion shape the moral economy by which women negotiate reproduction and sexuality?

Development and Population

The population issue has long been a quandary in the discourse on reproductive health and rights, and fiercely debated within the international women’s health movement (Silliman et al 1999;

Johnson and Turnbull 1995; McIntosh and Finkle 1995; Dunlop et al n.d.) In the 1980s up until the 1990s, opposing perspectives had developed, with one view of population positing the possibility of a feminist population policy and another view arguing against reproductive rights, viewing it as an individualistic framework that removed women’s bodies from their wider socio-political context and which the population movement employed. (For contrasting views, see separate articles by Akhter, Berer, and

Hartmann, Proceedings of International and Women and Health Meeting [IWHM], 1992.) The experience of population control by women in developing countries served as a critical point in the debate. While reproductive health and rights would gain international acceptance and consensus during the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo and the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, the issue of population and demographic-driven development remained contentious (Danguilan, 1997; Johnson and Turnbull 1995; McIntosh and Finkle 1995; Dunlop et al n.d.).

Within the context of the developing world since the 1950s, the population issue has come to be framed as a crisis and a risk to the nation. In the discourse of demography, “population” was transformed from a neutral category of people into a volatile relationship among too many people, too little food, a degraded environment, an unstable political system, poverty and underdevelopment. This apocalyptic image of the future has fed into the collective imagining of an insecure and dangerous world that has defined and driven much of the debate around population. This, at times, has reduced the complexity of the world’s problems to a single issue, paralleling the reduction of historical and dynamic

international conflicts to the issue of terrorism. It has been pointed out that the “global crisis model” debuted during the era of population control (Foley and Hendrixson 2011).

Addressing the “crisis” of rapid population growth became a development strategy in order for developing countries to achieve progress. This demographic thinking echoed the spirit of progress and anti-backwardness found in the discourses of nation-building, especially in the context of a “third world” country such as the Philippines. As a decolonizing nation in the 1960s, the Philippines found itself embracing this progressive spirit as it aspired to modernize and claim the promised benefits of development. Following the model of development peddled by the West, the country during the Marcos regime undertook an export-oriented industrialization program and instituted a population policy.

Coinciding with the period of martial law, the efforts at industrialization and population control were undertaken as a nationalist project, one that will ensure the progress of the country and present it as a modern nation to the international community. But while the fruits of the industrialization program were eventually partitioned between Marcos and his cronies and the country’s resources drained by mounting foreign debt servicing and constricting structural adjustment programs, the population control policy, with its system of incentives and disincentives, had its biggest success at this period.

This project of modernization relied on a development model, which was criticized during the

Marcos years but nevertheless subscribed to by succeeding governments through the years. Resting on the tenets of liberalization, deregulation and privatization, while unresponsive to the unequal class structure in society (Bello, 2004), this growth-focused, efficiency-obsessed development paradigm borrowed from the West was contested then and continues to be contested until today. An assumption of this model is that progress in “third world” countries will be achieved if they followed the same development path taken by developed nations. Demographic and population thinking is embedded in this modernization theory with its linking of fertility decline with Western-associated socio-economic modernization, industrialization, modern education and political liberalization (Asdar Ali, 1996). In the

Philippines, the formulation and enforcement of population policies is another marker for its continuing struggle to achieve development and modernity.

Religion, Nation and Politics

Scholars have written on the relationship between religion and politics, tracing the complex connections between religion and nationalism, and complicating secular assumptions, especially in post- colonial contexts (Asad, 2003; Jelen and Wilcox 2002; Menon 2002; van der Veer 2001; Bose 1998; van der Veer 1995; Moen and Gustafson 1992; Rafael 1988). As broad frames within which to understand the relationship between religion and politics, these studies explain the ‘rise’ and ‘decline’ in the social influence of religion as well as the changing dynamics between institutional religion and individual personal experience. Spickard (2006) identifies five narratives that contemporary scholars have proposed about religion: secularization, fundamentalism, religious reorganization, religious individualization, and religions as competitors for religious consumers. As a particular case, the

Philippines has interpreted secularization as part of the modernizing process. Yet while the disestablishment of the Catholic Church in the post-colonial period has officially de-linked state affairs from religious institutions, the Church hierarchy has retained its political clout. As in Latin America, the

Church in the Philippines has developed its own “institutions of secular powers” such as parochial schools, universities, radio and television stations, banks and businesses, and community based organizations (Blofield, 2006, Shepard 2006, Chestnut 2003), which can easily be mobilized to promote its agenda. Instead of occupying state functions, the Church mobilizes civil society institutions and groups to influence state actions and policymaking to align the latter with the religious interests.

Because of its hegemonic position, the Catholic Church is not only able to utilize appeals to moral values but is also able to threaten state officials by virtue of its perceived command constituency. This becomes crucial during elections when the Church endorses or threatens to campaign against certain candidates based on how politicians vote on Church issues.

Religious fundamentalism is a standard frame used to explain the rise or reemergence of religion in the political and public spheres. However, its common usage as a description for a broad range of religious and political activities and movements has made it a contested term. The uncritical deployment of the concept to cover all forms of conservative religious beliefs or depict a particular religion as extremist or violent is especially problematic. Studies have attempted to show how various fundamentalist movements within the different major religions have emerged historically, examining how the forces of globalization and modernity as well as specific political contexts became the impetus for the growth of these movements (Brekke 2012; Mårtensson et al 2011; Bruce 2008). While scholars recognize that many fundamentalisms exist, they also argue that fundamentalist movements are similar in both form (Marty 1993; Marty 1991) and in origins (Brekke 2012), notwithstanding the differences in their ideological content. In the Philippine context, the Catholic Church’s conservative views on gender, sexuality and reproduction and its opposition to the reproductive health bill have been labeled fundamentalist. Yet, the Church, in the post-colonial period, has also been viewed as a progressive force in Philippine politics. While characterizing the Church as fundamentalist may arguably be an appropriate description and has its utility in political debates, this assertion fails to explain the political dynamics involved in the policy debates on reproductive health and the relationship between the Catholic Church, the state and civil society that impinge on the policy arena. I am interested in exploring conceptual frames that can explain the social and political influence of the Church despite the decline in its doctrinal authority, while taking into consideration the lens of religious fundamentalism.

With an overwhelming majority of Filipinos identifying as Catholics2, the Catholic Church exercises a monopoly over the ‘religious market’. As Spickard (2006) notes, however, this monopoly may have ensured the dominance of Catholicism but this may also be the reason why Filipinos only nominally practice their faith. This illustrates the religious individualization narrative, which shifts focus from

2 The Philippines has an indigenous Muslim population who are mostly in the Mindano Region. An active Muslim secessionist movement in the region asserts that Mindano, which was never colonized, is not part of the Philippines.

institutional religion to the growing autonomy of believers who choose to not conform to established church doctrines. Yet not conforming to official religion does not necessarily mean that individuals do not hold deep religious belief or feelings. In her discussion of folk or vernacular religion, Bowman (2004:

4) describes it as the “unexpressed, inarticulate, but often deeply felt religion of ordinary folk who would not usually describe themselves as Church-going Christians yet feel themselves to have some sort of Christian allegiance,” which is not an aberration or a pejorative description but a constant element of religion. She then further asserts that the relationship between official religion, vernacular religion and individual beliefs are three components of religious experience that must be studied to get a fuller understanding of religion in its broadest sense.

Specifically pertinent to my research are anthropological studies that examine vernacular interpretations of religion that translate into cultural and political resistances (Gullick 1993, Rafael 1988,

Ileto 1979) and the formation of an ethics of the self (Mahmood 2005, Corrigan 2004, Thomson et al.

2001, Cannell 1999, Howland 1999, Mellor and Shilling 1997, Metcalf 1990, Ayoub 1987), as well as those that look at the dynamics of state-church relations in colonial and contemporary contexts (Clark and Kaiser 2003, Douglas and Mitchell 2000, Parekh 1999, Neusner 1996, Haynes 1993, Verhoogt 1993,

Benavides 1987). Ileto’s (1979) and Rafael’s (1988) studies provide critical analyses of the basis in folk

Catholic tradition of Philippine popular resistance movements during the Spanish period. Mahmood

(2005), in her study on the women’s mosque movement in Egypt, and Metcalf (1990), in her translation and analysis of Bihishti Zewar, the Indian guide for respectable women, both tackle the embodiment of piety as a cultivation of a gendered, ethical self. These studies illustrate that the re-interpretation and subversion of religion is a space within which resistances and agency can emerge and which can become a source of self-mastery or power. The tension between institutional religion and ‘lived’ religion is highlighted in the way Filipinos conscientiously follow religious public rituals but listen to their

‘conscience’ when it comes to private matters. Yet following one’s conscience does not necessarily

mean a guiltless, shameless or sinless life. As one of my informants during my preliminary research said, the role of the Church in moral matters is “to protect you and redeem you. Guilt is the mechanism by which that protection and redemption work.” Sometimes we think of moral subjects as acting subjects; we focus on their concrete actions but forget what happens inside the person. Taking Mahmood and

Metcalf’s focus on the cultivation of the self, I want to explore how forgiveness, suffering, guilt and shame figure in the formation of a moral subject and relate this to women’s reproductive decisions and actions.

I attempt to build on this scholarship by combining an ethnography of religion – how the institutional church, religious groups, government agencies, and individual women ‘do religion’ in everyday contexts, and an ethnography of the state – how state policies on reproduction claim the social body, are incorporated in women’s daily lives, and are experienced by citizens. Moreover, I examine how religion and the Catholic Church, in particular, both in colonial and post-colonial contexts, have been involved in a process of co-construction of state governance and policymaking in the

Philippines. This has implications on policymaking, governance and development goals for the nation. By centering on reproductive policies, I hope to complicate the ongoing discussions about religion, secularism and politics by bringing in gender and sexuality frames (which have been ignored in contexts other than gender and Islam).

Citizenship and State Policies

Rights are central to the notion of citizenship as they define the legal relationship between states, individuals and collectivities. Feminist scholars have discussed the struggles to expand the scope of rights and citizenship to take into account women’s realities. Recognizing reproductive rights and principles of bodily integrity, personhood, and diversity is viewed as crucial in attaining citizenship for women (Chandiramani 2005, Chavkin and Chesler 2005, Cervantes-Carson 2004, Silliman et al. 2004,

Takeshita 2004, Pillai and Wang 1999, Correa and Reichmann 1994, Fried 1999). In addition,

reproductive rights as part of the right to health, although still heavily contested, have gained legitimacy after the series of UN conferences in the 1990s (Pillai and Wang 1999, Hardon and Hayes 1997,

Danguilan 1997).

Other feminist scholars have interrogated the conception of citizenship in liberal democracies

(Kapur 2005, Yuval-Davis 1997, Mouffe 1992 , Pateman 1988, Nash 1988, Randall 1988). For these scholars, citizenship is always gendered and the state incorporates women in different ways than men

(Waylen, 1998). The state’s masculine bias and façade of neutrality excludes women from full citizenship. As Yuval-Davis (1997: 37) argues, “women’s membership in their national and ethnic collectivities is of a double nature” for “women, like men, are members of the collectivity” but there are

“specific rules and regulations which relate to women as women.” Given women’s categorization as the symbol and reproducers of the nation as well as cultural values, what citizenship rights can women who do not measure up to these expectations lay claim to?

Being a member of the underclass (viewed with “contempt” and “disgust”) has implications for the participation of the poor in social and political processes. Thus, I explore how “contempt” and

“disgust” become part of the content and mechanism of citizenship in the way that ideas of equality and social justice orient the relationship between individuals, the state and civil society.

The research also builds on ethnographic work on policy, particularly the insight that “[policies] are crowded spaces already filled with moral values and preconceptions” (Shore and Wright (1997: 21).

In this vein, studies on reproductive and population policies, whether pro-natalist (as in Ceaucescu’s

Romania, Kligman 1998, Kligman 1995) or anti-natalist (as in China’s one-child policy, Jing-Bao 2005,

Agnanost 1995), illuminate the practices and competing goals of state and citizens, as well as open debates about what it means to be a “modern” state or a “good” citizen.

Shore and Wright (1997) propose that anthropologists examine how policies work as instruments of governance, as ideological vehicles and as agents for constructing subjectivities and

organizing people within systems of power and authority. This will entail that policies on sexuality and reproduction are studied not only in their written form; policies cover the institutional mechanisms of decision-making in the negotiation of policies, the experience of people in their interaction with implementors of policies, the language and symbols mobilized to legitimize or undermine policies and decision-makers, the contradictions emerging from their interpretation and implementation, and the identities created by these policies. In the Philippine context, this also includes the interpretation of existing reproductive policies at the constitutional, legislative and programmatic levels to shape the outcome of ongoing legislative debates on the reproductive health care bill.

POSITIONALITY OF THE RESEARCHER

This work grew from my involvement in the women’s health movement in the Philippines throughout the 1990s until the early 2000s. My interest in women’s issues was first sparked by the 6th

International Women and Health Meeting held in Manila in 1990, which gathered about 500 advocates from all over the globe. Listening to all those women discuss reproductive rights and the women’s health movements in different contexts introduced me to feminist perspectives that would sustain my commitment to gender equality through the years. At a time when abortion, sexuality, and lesbian rights were rarely discussed publicly in the country, the conference sparked an explosion of ideas and visions for many Filipino feminists.

During this period, reproductive rights and the idea of women’s sexual and reproductive self- determination became core issues that linked other women’s issues, such as domestic violence, sexual health, lesbian rights, and economic autonomy. The broader women’s movement mobilized around reproductive rights, and the issue injected the movement with a new political vigor. At the same time, because of the strong links of the women’s movement with nationalist and socialist movements in the country, we made sure to highlight the connections between the struggle for health rights and the broader call for social justice and equality. This meant simultaneously advancing women’s health issues

and mobilizing around issues such as the foreign debt, trade liberalization, privatization of social services, political reforms and democracy, and imperialism. Although in the period after martial law we were more at home taking these issues to the parliament of the streets, we had also begun to take policy advocacy seriously. Proof of this was the eight-year battle to pass an anti-rape law which became a test of the women’s movement’s mettle in the policy arena, and prepared groups for the longer contestation over the reproductive health bill.

Feminists and activists shared a sentiment that viewed the Catholic Church as a formidable influence in policy questions regarding women’s sexuality and reproduction. However, the Church’s position in the political milieu represents a conundrum for many, as Church leaders were also important, even indispensable, allies in other progressive causes. In the early years of the reproductive health bill, a common response by many groups and individuals to the Church’s political exertions against the bill was to not engage and avoid tussling with religious authorities. As an act of self-preservation, this was a pragmatic decision. This stance, however, proved untenable, as the Catholic Church became the single- most obstacle to policies and programs seeking to promote reproductive health.

Our experiences on the ground have strengthened my belief that any reproductive health program must consider larger social, economic, and global contexts that structure everyday reproductive and sexual experiences and health outcomes, attending to inequalities that these processes produce. This advocacy has focused my attention on marginalized communities that do not have the capacity to enter or engage in public discussions and whose views therefore are left out of policy decisions. This work has shaped my ethnographic study on policy, as I made sure to include urban poor women and show that, even though they were marginal in the reproductive health debates, they had developed and distinctive opinions and perspectives on an issue that so directly affected their lives.

A NOT-SO STEADY BALANCE

One afternoon in September 2008, I arrived at the North Wing of the House of Representatives, and was met by a crush of people -- women, some with their children, men, young people -- spilling out of the driveway onto the lawn in front of the building, waiting in a mish-mash of lines for their turn to get frisked and for their bags to be scanned through the security area. When I saw a familiar person assisting the crowd to get through more quickly, I realized that the people were from the poor communities where members of the Reproductive Health Advocacy Network worked. The glass doors on the opposite side were also opened for other visitors, including members of the Catholic Women’s

League and Pro-Life Philippines; only, there were no scanners on that side. I opted to go through the scanner and was waved to the second floor, which I had figured was reserved for less important people.

There, I was stopped by two security personnel who asked, “Kanino kayo?” (“Whose side are you on?”).

Mildly irritated at the way the security staff were directing people into clear-cut opposing camps, which

I felt reinforced a war mentality among the interest groups, I answered coldly, “Wala” (“None”), and added I was there just to observe. Not knowing how to deal with my answer, the security staff then allowed me to enter and left me alone to find my own seat.

While I resisted the categorization of people into warring camps and made an effort to show independence from both sides, even as I talked and associated with individuals from the two groups, the sense of war that permeated the events connected to the reproductive health bill made me watchful of my own behavior and demeanor. Sitting in a gallery occupied mostly by opponents of the bill that afternoon, I found myself consciously trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. From participating in many rallies and demonstrations as a political activist, I have learned that in an organized mobilization where members, and even common strangers, know each other relatively well, an unfamiliar face can raise a silent alarm in the minds of members and may arouse suspicion of potential trouble. Having been told by a pro-life interviewee that she had doubted my research motive, saying I could have been

“planted”, and knowing my personal position on the issue, I worried that Pro-life members would think I was spying.

I felt the same discomfort when I sat in the gallery with reproductive health advocates. As my involvement in the feminist movement in the Philippines started with reproductive rights, I counted many in the reproductive health advocacy network as part of my immediate political circle. But during my research, I was concerned about being spotted and identified with them so much so that at one point I implored two young male colleagues not to sit beside me during a plenary hearing; and when I did sit or talk to colleagues, I would unconsciously put on my serious researcher face to strike a

“neutral” pose and communicate to anyone who cared to see that no information was being spilled and no one was being betrayed. Conducting research among the lead protagonists in the midst of intense competition between pro-life groups and reproductive health advocates was a hard balancing act, a balancing act, in fact, that never found a steady fulcrum throughout and which I had resigned to live with for the duration of the fieldwork.

FIELDWORK AND SETTING

Exploratory fieldwork in the summer of 2006, to observe forums, demonstrations, and campaigns involving religious groups, NGOs, the government and communities, laid the necessary groundwork for my research. I collected data for this ethnographic research between September 2007 and March 2009, and this was conducted in multiple sites in Metro Manila, Philippines. Since I set out to investigate practices, policies, discourses, narratives, and histories of diverse political actors, I moved constantly between different spaces: the House of Representatives and the Senate, where committee hearings and plenary sessions on the reproductive health bill were being held; national government agencies and local government units, through which state responses to the policy battle were being defined and articulated; the various public and lobbying activities of reproductive health advocacy networks and pro- life groups, for and against the proposed measure; and urban poor communities in Quezon City and

Manila, where I met with women willing to share with me their stories. In these spaces, I talked and engaged with legislators and their staff, government program officials, Catholic Church leaders and their representatives, pro-life members and supporters, reproductive health and family planning advocates, academics and women in urban poor communities. My research methods included participant observation, life history interviews, in-depth interviews, community case studies, and archival research.

The general site of my fieldwork was Metro Manila, or the National Capital Region, constituting sixteen cities and one municipality. Metro Manila is a mega city, bursting with frenzied energy from its more than 11 million inhabitants. In a day’s time, about 20 million people, many of whom come from nearby provinces, go through the traffic and the busy circuits of the city. Within this urban setting, I moved between the two major cities of Manila and Quezon City. Both cities are the main sites of state governance in the country: Malacañang or the Presidential Office, the Senate and agencies such as the

Department of Health are in Manila while the House of Representatives, the Department of Social

Welfare and Development, the National Housing Authority and other government agencies are in

Quezon City. The state university and the major Catholic universities in the country, which all figured in the public discussions on reproductive health, are also clustered in these cities. Because of their political significance, both cities have been traditional sites of rallies, protests and mobilizations.

Manila, the country’s capital, was the seat of the Spanish colonial government. As a consequence of this historical link, the Catholic Church maintains its present offices and popular cathedrals in the city. Moreover, Manila provides the Rizal Park for the weekly gathering of the

Catholic-supported evangelical El Shaddai movement, whose members are in the millions. Manila’s connection to religious authorities extends to policymaking as the immediate former mayor of the city, who is an active member of Opus Dei, successfully instituted an executive order effectively banning the use of public funds for ‘artificial’ contraceptives.

Quezon City is known as the hub of non-government organizations (NGOs) and advocacy groups, a significant number of which are women’s groups working on the issue of reproductive health and rights. Both the Reproductive Health Action Network (RHAN), a coalition campaigning for reproductive health legislation, and Pro-life Philippines, housed within the Good Shephered Convent compound, had their offices here. The city has also outpaced Manila in terms of hosting the largest population of slum dwellers in the metropolitan area. Sangandaan, the community in which I immersed myself, is a squatters’ village located behind government agencies. It is home to more than a thousand families living in makeshift houses, without access to proper water, electricity or drainage system. In contrast to

Manila, the Quezon City Council enacted an ordinance providing for reproductive health programs and services in all of its public health facilities.

Research Methods

My prior work experience with women’s health NGOs in the Philippines facilitated my movement between and access to these different spaces during fieldwork. It meant that I already have valuable contacts with organizations and individuals involved in the campaign to pass the reproductive health bill.

Being an insider in the broader NGO community also provided me with knowledge on and links to the other key actors engaged in the debate, such as Church affiliated groups, legislators, and government officials. Further, this insider perspective gave me familiarity with the history of the bill, the issues in the debate, and the dynamics among the various actors.

As part of my participant observation, I regularly attended meetings – planning, strategizing, assessment – of the Reproductive Health Advocacy Network. I was also invited to the network’s press conferences, mobilizations, public events as well as meetings with legislator allies and other informal conversations. Being plugged into RHAN’s activities gave me access to critical information, such as the schedule of legislative committee hearings, the filing of the court petition regarding the contraceptive ban in Manila, and developments in the policy arena. RHAN was also a source of other contacts. Because

of my close connections with the members and previous membership in a couple of organizations in the network, my position as an independent researcher – not as a representative of any group – had to made clear during a general assembly. This meant I could participate in the discussions, but my ideas would not be taken as representing the position of any group I was involved in.

At the same time, I was also attending seminars, conferences, mobilizations and prayer rallies organized by Pro-life Philippines, the Catholic Church and its allied groups. Although my participation in these activities was not as intense as my involvement in RHAN, it allowed me to establish a respectful and friendly relationship with a few members of Pro-life. This entailed, when asked, being upfront about my sentiments about the reproductive health policy, but not letting my own thinking define the course of the conversations with my respondents. My disclosure was never met with antagonism, except in one interview session when I thought my respondent would end the conversation even before we had begun. I had become a familiar face in the campaign environment that on one occasion, after another tense committee hearing, leaders of pro-life groups invited me to a debriefing meeting. It was an opportunity that a researcher should grab, but I balked at the idea and declined. I hadn’t found my political footing then and wasn’t sure if I would be committing an ethical breach should I accept. Given the animosity between the two camps, my own identity as a women’s health activist and plan to re- engage with the political movement once back in Manila, I decided that a healthy distance was the better political option at the time.

Attending legislative committee hearings and plenary sessions, both in the House of

Representatives and the Senate, was a major part of the research, enabling me to follow the official policy discourses on reproductive health and to identify other key personalities who were potential informants. These legislative sessions could be as short as thirty minutes or as long as five hours, and were always jam-packed events covered by the media. At the time of my fieldwork, House representatives managed to pass the reproductive health bill at the committee level, finally paving the

way for the plenary debates in the Lower House. In the Senate, however, the discussions remained at the committee level. By the time I left the field, the legislative debates had stalled because hearings on the budget had to be prioritized. Soon after, the attention of legislators shifted to campaigning for the impending 2010 national elections.

Apart from doing participant observation within the context of RHAN, Pro-life Philippines, and legislative activities, I also conducted in-depth interviews with four groups of informants. These were legislators and their staff; government health and population officials and program personnel; Catholic

Church officials, representatives, and members of allied groups; and reproductive health advocates, including academics and former government officials. The semi-structured interviews focused on a) public discourses on reproduction, sexual morality, and religion, b) state policies on health, sexuality, reproduction and their significance to women’s lives, and c) the organizational goals and agendas as well as the personal views of these key actors about the debates on reproductive health and rights. A total of

43 in-depth interviews were conducted.

My immersion in Sangandaan was facilitated by a colleague who was a community organizer and came from the ranks of the urban poor herself. Ka Nora Protacio, who was also a recognized urban poor leader and women’s health advocate, brought me to Sangandaan and introduced me to four of the women with whom she was working. During that first meeting in a small roadside eatery, I met Mila,

Cora, Hilda and Lourdes, who kindly agreed to talk to other women about my research project. In subsequent visits to the community, these four women took turns bringing me to the houses of potential respondents and helped me convince the other women to take part in the research. Mila,

Cora, Hilda and Lourdes would also become part of the group of twenty women who shared with me their life histories.

Before conducting any formal interview, I organized small group conversations with the women, holding these in Cora’s house. This was meant to build rapport with the women and to give us an

opportunity to get more familiar with each other as we partook of snacks and shared laughter. It was during one of these group chats that the women assured me that I could ask them anything. As they casually pointed out, the crowded conditions made it impossible to keep anything private. They said they had nothing to hide from each other and didn’t have any pretensions about each other’s lives. In fact, except for one, all of the women wanted me to use their real names in the dissertation.

The life history interviews with each woman took three sessions, with each session approximately 1-2 hours. Most of the interviews took place in the women’s homes, and a few sessions were held in the two parks just across the community. A couple of interviews were held in the barangay hall where a couple of the women did odd jobs. The staggered sessions aided in the reflection process for the informants, preparing them for subsequent sessions which explored their experiences with reproduction and sexuality, religion, sexual morality and health.

Outside of these interviews, I also visited Sangandaan regularly, going to the women’s homes for chats, staying for a few hours in the area and participating in community activities and family gatherings.

Through participant observation, I gathered information on the women’s family and community lives as these reflect their practices and ideas about reproduction, ‘lived religion’, and social issues. The extended observation of and participation in community activities presented me with opportunities to just be in the background while letting community dynamics to unfold, which would not have been visible through a strictly standardized research method.

To get us out of our usual environment, I also organized picnics in the park for the women and their families. I would bring the food and they would bring the mats and other supplies, and we had games and prizes. During one picnic, I invited a friend who was a professional photographer and asked her to take pictures of the women with their partners, husbands and children. My reason for doing this was simple: I wanted to give the women a real gift, something that did not look like charity, which they were accustomed to receiving. I also wanted them to have mementos that showed them looking their

best and did not showcase their poverty. For the photo session, the women took care to dress up and gamely posed for the camera. It proved to be invaluable, as I realized that the women, who could not afford cameras, did not have family pictures. For weeks, the women constantly asked me when they would get the photographs, and when they finally did, their excitement and appreciation were undeniable.

The community case studies focused on Manila and Quezon City, providing comparative data on the factors that shaped policymaking on reproductive health at the local government level. For this segment of the fieldwork, I attended hearings on the reproductive health ordinance being discussed in

Quezon City and monitored the court petition and activities related to the campaign to overturn the contraceptive ban in Manila. A total of 22 key informant interviews were conducted, with local government officials, public health officials and practitioners, NGO practitioners, community women and clients of clinics based in these areas. The Manila case study also brought me to two slum areas, a dump site and a notorious port area, to interview women affected by the policy against contraceptives.

For the archival research, I examined documents about health policies and Church-state relations (historical and contemporary), Constitutional debates on reproductive health and rights, congressional hearings on reproductive issues, Church policies and statements, and NGO studies. I used the resources of the University of the Philippines, congressional libraries and the resource centers of

NGOs.

All interviews were taped with the permission of informants. Notes were also taken during the interviews to capture conversational nuances. All interviews were conducted in Filipino/Tagalog or

‘Taglish’, a combination of Tagalog and English commonly used in many parts of the country and is the main language spoken in Manila. As a Filipino myself, I speak the language and understand the nuances of the culture. A pool of five persons helped me with transcribing almost all of the interviews. I did all the translation of selected sections of interviews from Filipino to English.

Human Subjects and Informed Consent

My research proposal was approved by the Institutional Review Board at Columbia University and the Research Ethics Committee of the Department of Health in the Philippines. As part of the protocol, I developed an informed consent form which I discussed with my life history and key informants at the beginning of the interview. However, to avoid jeopardizing my ability to build rapport and trust with my informants, I asked for their oral consent (which I recorded), as an alternative to written and signed informed consent.

CHAPTER TWO

DEBATING REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH

A DAY OF DEBATE, OR A DEBATABLE DAY

On that September afternoon in 2008, the day of the debate, legislators who opposed the reproductive health bill were ready for the battle. One by one, they took to the podium and raised their issues. “The bill should be read in full, not only the title,” demanded a legislator, claiming copies were not distributed. “Why are we rushing this bill?” fumed another. “I am withdrawing my signature on page

8,” a female legislator announced. And finally, “We need a warm body (sic)…There is no quorum, Mr.

Speaker,” asserted a grandstanding opponent, whose English grammar sent snickers across the packed hall.

In little over an hour, and after the session had been suspended at least thrice, a second roll was called. The Speaker of the House, affirming the lack of quorum, banged his gavel and declared the first session of the plenary debates on the reproductive health bill adjourned. Victorious clapping was heard in one section of the gallery, while indignation hung in the air for others. The hall was filled with noise, which until then had only been in the background – creaking springs as seats collectively folded up, footsteps released by a wave of jostling bodies, whispers and chatter ascending into full-blown stories of frustration. As people streamed outside the gallery, a crowd of supporters had gathered around the authors of the bill inside the congressional hall, all wanting to hear the inside story about the spectacle that had unfolded on the floor. In another corner, opponents of the bill could also be seen debriefing with their legislative allies. Outside, advocates of reproductive health spontaneously congregated, united by their simmering dissatisfaction, which later erupted into vigorous chants of protest.

This was supposed to be a historic occasion, the first time in eight years that a consolidated reproductive health bill managed to successfully reach the plenary of the House of Representatives, surviving committee discussions and political pressures. The principal authors of the bill, armed with data and backed up by a technical staff, had prepared to give their sponsorship speeches and answer questions during the plenary debate. In a show of massive support, reproductive health advocates almost filled the three levels of the gallery on both sides of the hall, their white shirts, buttons and purple bandanas, lending more boldness to their presence. On the left side of the hall, women in dark blue skirt and blouse uniforms – all members of the Catholic Women’s League – occupied the balcony closest to the floor, a block of regal silence opposite the sea of energetic colors across the vast hall. One level up, where I found myself seated to observe the proceedings, parishioners from the different dioceses of the city, mostly women in their church uniforms, some wearing scapulars, were led by nuns in white habits, priests in civilian clothes and fussing lay officials. These individuals came to show their organized opposition to the bill. Anticipating the opening of debates on the controversial measure, members of the media gathered in the corner right of the Speaker and trained their cameras on the negotiations and antics unfolding on the floor. No speeches nor arguments were heard that afternoon, however; the delaying tactics of the opponents proved effective in blocking any discussion on reproductive health on that momentous day.

LOOKING BACK: THE STORY OF THE REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH BILL

In the past ten years, a number of legislators, with the support of women’s non-governmental organizations (NGOs), have attempted to pass a bill that seeks to institutionalize policies upholding sexual and reproductive health and rights, while ensuring programmatic continuity from one administration to another. The Reproductive Health or RH bill, officially known as House Bill No. 5043,

“An Act Providing for a National Policy on Reproductive Health, Responsible Parenthood and Population

Development, and for Other Purposes”, traces its rough history to a legislative measure filed in 2001

proposing the creation of reproductive health programs and strengthening structures that will institutionalize these programs. The original bill cited the imperative reasons for such a policy: the high maternal and infant mortality rates, the 300,000 to 400,000 cases of illegal abortions a year, the high risk of pregnancy in a developing country, and the unmet need for family planning services among women. The bill called for a reproductive health care framework that recognizes the sexual and reproductive rights of individuals and couples; gender equality, equity and women’s empowerment; and the welfare and the rights of the child.

The House bill being discussed retained the ten elements of reproductive health and upheld the four pillars outlined by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo: responsible parenthood, informed choice, birth spacing, and respect for life. The bill anchors reproductive health in sustainable human development, which “is best assured” with “a manageable population of healthy, educated and productive citizens”. It guarantees universal access to medically-safe, legal, affordable and quality reproductive health services, methods, devices, supplies and information, while prioritizing women’s and children’s needs. Further, it recognizes women’s participation in the formulation and implementation of policy.

A product of collaboration between policymakers and non-government organizations (NGOs), the bill was drafted originally by members of the Reproductive Health Advocacy Network (RHAN). It was eventually sponsored by Representative Bella Flor Angara-Castillo of Aurora Province, a staunch advocate of women’s rights, and co-authored by three other female legislators. This relationship endured in the years that followed, with NGOs providing information and research support to the legislator and those who took over as sponsors after Rep. Angara-Castillo finished her term. NGO involvement in the policymaking process extended to actual revisions to subsequent versions of the bill.

As soon as the bill was filed, the Catholic Church hierarchy wasted no time in mounting an enormous campaign against the measure. Aiming their criticisms towards reproductive health and modern contraceptive methods as a cloak for abortion, the Catholic bishops denounced the proposed law as “anti-life”, “anti-God” and “anti-family”. This framing, at an early juncture, set the “moral parameters” within which the protracted policy battle over reproductive health would be conducted, and along which lines lawmakers, politicians and reproductive health advocates would be pressed to define their positions. Introduced in the same year as the proposed laws on divorce and non- discrimination (protecting lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender people), the RH bill was labeled part of the so-called DEATH bills – for divorce, euthanasia, abortion, total population control and homosexuality. It thus became a platform through which the Catholic Church and affiliated groups pursued moral objectives about gender, sexuality and the family. The controversy that it ignited sharply polarized civic discourse and caused some members of Congress to withdraw support. Recognizing the strong opposition from the Church, legislators felt compelled to invite Church representatives and allies to committee hearings to show that the policymaking process was fair, unbiased and democratic.

Thus, began the cyclical life of the bill. Each congressional term, the sponsors would file the latest revision of the bill; the House committee would hold hearings; supporters and opponents would mobilize and rehash their positions; Catholic bishops would issue denouncements, politicians would vacillate, media would cover the developments until the controversy reaches its height, and then the whole issue would slowly die down, time would run out in Congress, and the bill would be shelved until a new Congress was elected and reconstituted, after which everything would start all over again. Each reconstitution of Congress had spelled either the end of term of principal authors of the bill, the entry of new political forces on both sides of the bill, and even a change in the Presidency. The cyclical life of the bill, in this dynamic context, was far from a process that merely repeated itself. With the 2007 electoral outcomes, for instance, reproductive health advocates and opponents must strategize anew to contend

with the major political realignments in Congress. And while it would seem that the balance of forces heavily favored the Catholic Church, significant shifts in the configurations of state power and popular sentiments, although not enough to get the bill approved, actually allowed the bill to have a life beyond the 11th Congress and continue on to have “nine lives”.

This chapter has three sections. The first section deals with the debate surrounding population, development and environment, and gives a background to the shifts in thinking about these issues at the international arena. This contextualizes the history of the population programs and policies in the

Philippines, which is tackled in the second section. The second section further traces the shift from population control to reproductive health at the country-level and explores how reproductive health and population policy becomes a site for the enactment of the intertwined modernizing and nationalist project of the state. In the last section, I describe the political actors locked in the contestation over reproductive health and discuss the discourses emerging from their respective positions. These discourses center on population and development, health and rights, and religious morality, which respond to the discursive authority of modernity and nationalism. I show how the process of engaging with each other results in a co-construction of positions that reveal more than the immediate issues about the provisions of the bill. The positions espoused by opposing actors essentially ask: How do we define the problems of the nation? What kind of society do we want to build? What kind of people are

Filipinos? What kind of future do we want for the country? How should policy reflect what is best for the nation? Who should matter in policymaking? These questions imply notions of notions of progress and backwardness, and calls into question the role of the state in modernizing the nation, the values of a modern nation, and the qualities of modern national subjects.

FROM MALTHUS TO CAIRO: Debates on population, environment, and development

The debate on population, environment and development has a long history. Thomas Malthus, an English clergyman turned economist, influenced much of our current thinking on the issue when he argued in his 1798 “Essay on the Principle of Population” that population increased geometrically while resources and food grew only arithmetically, causing scarcity and social disorder. His ideas were seized by the ruling elite who feared the effects of the French Revolution on the discontented poor and needed to justify their wealth (in Bandarage, 1997). This tension between resources, population and distribution of wealth has characterized the debate since then. Demographers, environmentalists and governments in the West have argued that overpopulation is the cause of poverty and underdevelopment while feminists and Third World activists have argued that unequal social structures, uneven distribution of wealth, and the history of colonialism are at the root of poverty and deprivation in the developing countries. Underlying this tension was the basic question: what is the path to development?

In the first decennial conference on population held in 1974 in Bucharest, four views on population emerged. Asian and European countries as well as the US took the view that rapid population growth aggravated economic and development problems and was a matter of extreme urgency. India and Indonesia supported family planning but only in the context of development. Latin

American and African countries, on the other hand, asserted that population played no role in development. Another group which included China, Brazil and France argued that population growth was good for several reasons: to defend the country, to stimulate the economy, and to populate vast lands. Yet another view, espoused by the USSR and others, pointed out that it was the world economic system and its inequities that were responsible for social and economic problems (Singh, 1998). Amidst these divisions, “development is the best contraceptive” became the rallying call of many third world countries (Sen, 1994). It was a repudiation of the population paradigm that was seen as being imposed

by the more developed countries. In Bucharest, more development in the form of improvements in health and education and not more population control was viewed as the solution to third world problems.

By the second decennial conference in 1984 in Mexico, the development alternative took a back seat to the politics of abortion rights that spilled over from the internal battles in the United States (Sen,

1994). Attacks from the religious right on family planning and women’s reproductive choice resulted in the decrease of financial support for family planning from the US, which had been the major international source in the past. Moreover, the trend of declining government investment in social services such as education and health, known as Reaganomics, was ushered in during the 1980s and cast aside the development paradigm advanced in Bucharest.

It is important to note at this point that many countries in the South have implemented coercive

– through quotas, incentives and disincentives, and denial of basic rights -- population control programs and have received support – in the form of contraceptive supplies and foreign aid – from more developed countries. Governments in India, Bangladesh, the Philippines were just a few of those who were criticized for their population control programs. It was during this time that feminists and activists, especially in the Third World, began linking population control and the manipulation of women’s bodies into a critique of a development paradigm (based on population control) that willingly sacrificed women’s rights while ignoring the social inequities created by capitalist accumulation.

Also, since Bucharest, the population paradigm had made modifications in its principles. The crude number-counting and exhortation of a population bomb ticking off had made way for a more sophisticated formulation that emphasized the relationship between population, environment and sustainable development. Carrying capacity was the concept that brought these factors together. In this formula, population pressures were deemed to have grave consequences for the environment, causing deforestation, desertification, erosion and other environmental problems (Bandarage, 1997) and thus,

making development unsustainable. Indeed, sustainable development became the aspiration of environmentalists, developmentalists and demographers alike in the 1980s.

In September 1994, the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) was held in Cairo, Egypt. Gathering 180 delegates from UN member states, 1,200 non-government organizations, and hundreds of media representatives, it was a conference that sought a consensus on the contentious issue of population and its role in development. Hailed as a landmark conference, it was for many of the actors involved in the process a step forward from a demographic-oriented target- driven population policy to a rights-based population policy approach (Nadaavukaren, 2000).

Although the lack of demographic targets in Cairo was heralded as a new path for population and development, a closer reading of the ICPD Programme of Action (1994), however, reveals that curbing population growth remains to be the framework and overall goal of the Conference through

“(promoting) appropriate demographic policies” (para. 3.9) and “(facilitating) the demographic transition as soon as possible in countries where there is an imbalance between demographic rates and social, economic and environmental goals, while fully respecting human rights. This process will contribute to the stabilization of the world population…” (para. 6.3) Clearly, from the above, demographic targets, although couched in more developmental language, were not subordinated.

Demographic consciousness was embedded in the entire process of the Cairo Conference. While

Petchesky (2003) would argue that this did not necessarily amount to cooptation of the agenda of the transnational women’s health movement, the population paradigm offered by the consensus in Cairo remained contentious and problematic.

The consensus on reproductive health and rights reached in Cairo and Beijing reflects both the strength and limitation of the United Nations regime. Through an elaborate and exhausting process, it was able to bring together differing and disagreeing ideologies to draw up two common-ground documents that advanced progressive language on reproductive and sexual rights. The consensus,

however, was blunted by the reservations voiced by more than 40 countries which focused on two paragraphs: Para. 96 on sexual rights and Para. 106.k on calls to review abortion laws. The Vatican expectedly expressed reservation on the entire section on health, which contained all the controversial issues at the conference, which included contraception and family planning. Although non-binding, the conference documents are the closest that the international community could come to a cohesive agreement on sexual and reproductive health and rights. Paradoxically, this limitation is also its strength in that member-States attach themselves to the documents to demonstrate their identification with the international community’s norms and sentiments.

SHIFTS IN POLICY: FROM POPULATION CONTROL TO REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH

I want to turn briefly to the historical shifts in reproductive policy that inform the present debates about reproductive health. Reflecting the political preoccupation with the threat that

“population explosion” posed to decolonizing nations, a national population policy was first launched in

1971 under the Commission on Population (PopCom), during the time of President Ferdinand Marcos. It had massive funding support from the United States and twice the budget of the Ministry of Social

Services, its parent agency (Dixon-Mueller, 1993). (This pattern of uneven external development aid would continue until the mid-2000s when USAID support for family planning services and contraceptives remained considerably bigger than the budget of the entire Department of Health). Dr. Conrado Lorenzo

(1976), the first executive director of the PopCom, explained that the institutionalization of the country’s population policy was based on the assumption that a high population growth, especially in a country of scarce resources, had adverse effects on family, community and national welfare. The policy goal of reducing population growth would be achieved through influencing fertility behavior, regulating internal migration and redistributing the population from heavily congested areas to sparsely populated regions. A Population Education Program (PEP) was also set up to integrate population concepts into

the curricula of elementary and secondary schools, a strategy that was clearly an attempt to package the issue of population as a cultural program.

Indeed, as Lorenzo (1976) elaborated, while quoting Ferdinand Marcos, the architect of martial law, the national population program signaled the “arrival of a new consciousness, a new awareness of our conditions, our necessities and our capacities for self-deliverance” (p. 65) towards economic and social development. Martial law as nationalist consciousness, for Lorenzo, enabled policy - in this particular case, the policy on population - to be more responsive to the urgent needs of the people. The nationalist project rested on a vision of a modern family, a nuclear unit of parents and not more than four children, within which the benefits of economic development were to be located. The rational distribution of national resources among the people also relied on a notion of a desirable family size, which keeps in check the fear of scarce resources. This modern family would be established with a new consciousness heralded by the proclamation of martial rule, a political and military system that made radical changes possible, all in the name of national welfare. The national population policy was woven into the narrative of the Filipino nation and its unfolding potentials. This national social imaginary echoed Marcos’ declaration in his second inauguration speech in 1969, “This nation will be great again.”

Through the years, the Philippine government has shifted its policy and stance toward the issue of population. If the Marcos years implemented a coercive population program through family planning incentives and disincentives and a system of quota (Gorospe, 1976), the administration of President

Corazon Aquino halted all family planning services except for the natural family planning component of the program. Aquino’s alliance with the Catholic Church, which was instrumental in the People Power revolution that toppled the Marcos dictatorship and propelled her to the Presidency in 1986, also made it possible to enshrine a provision recognizing “the equal protection of the mother and the unborn child from conception” in the new Constitution. This was a reformulation of the original proposal, “right to life of the fertilized ovum,” which encountered protests from the women’s sector. The victory from reaching

compromise revision, however, “belonged more to the church than to the women” (Fabros et al,

1998:228). It was also at this time that the Catholic Church and its allies worked to get Aquino’s signature on an Executive Order disallowing the use of public funds for the provision of modern methods of contraception. The discovery of this “behind-the-scene” work of the Church and the resulting protests by women’s health groups led to the demise of the order.

From 1992 to 2001, the administrations of Fidel Ramos and Joseph Estrada separated themselves from the authority of the Catholic Church. During their terms, they re-introduced a dynamic population policy which now integrated the language of reproductive health and sustainable development, following its cue from the United Nations International Conference on Population and

Development (ICPD) in 1994 and the Fourth World Conference on Women (FWCW) in 1995 (Jain, et. al.,

2002). It is, however, women’s health advocates and non-government organizations, through critical collaboration with the Department of Health and the PopCom, which have been instrumental in pushing for a more rights-oriented population policy in this period. As evidence of how reproductive health was successfully integrated into health programs, Administrative Order No. 1-A series of 1998 (see

Department of Health, 1999) defined the ten elements of reproductive health that were most appropriate for the Philippine context and guided the work of government health workers in the national and field offices. The ten elements of reproductive health to be prioritized and addressed, which were also adopted in the Reproductive Health Bill of 2008, are:

1) family planning, 2) maternal and child health and nutrition, 3) prevention and management of abortion and its complications, 4) prevention and management of reproductive tract infections, 5) education and counseling on sexuality and sexual health, 6) breast and reproductive tract cancers and other gynecological conditions, 7) men’s reproductive health, 8) adolescent and youth health, 9) violence against women and children, and 10) prevention and treatment of infertility and sexual dysfunction.

The devolution of health services to local governments, however, has meant that unless a national policy is approved, reproductive health services would still be limited and dependent on how much priority local executives place on health, in general, and reproductive health, in particular.

Because of its contentiousness, the availability of reproductive health services becomes subject to the personal religious convictions of local leaders.

The 2008 Reproductive Health Bill filed and debated under the government of Gloria

Macapagal-Arroyo. Macapagal-Arroyo, who, with the legitimizing blessing of the Catholic Church, ascended to the Presidency after People Power 2 ousted Joseph Estrada. Macapagal-Arroyo, exhibited a wily incoherent stance toward the issue, releasing statements meant to keep the support of the Catholic

Church hierarchy while courting the allegiance of the business sector and women’s NGOs. This ambiguous position has threatened to erode the gains made toward a more comprehensive approach to addressing reproductive health.

The latest version of the proposed legislation seeks to adopt an “integrated and comprehensive national policy on responsible parenthood, effective population management and sustainable human development” anchored on the rationale that “development is better assured with a manageable population of healthy, educated and productive citizens”. This time, however, the modern project of population management (as opposed to population control), highlights its internationalist perspective by invoking its conjunction with the consensus reached in the series of UN conferences in the 1990s recognizing individuals’ reproductive rights and right to development. In addition, proponents of the bill have also argued for the relevance of instituting a population policy in achieving the Millenium

Development Goals (MDGs), citing economist Jeffrey Sachs’ statement, “Population management is crucial in reducing poverty by half” (PLCPD, 2005a). The nationalist values of “greatness” and

“potentiality” now combine with a global perspective that proves the progressiveness of instituting a population policy that is in keeping with the ever modernizing and globalizing times.

What is not lost through these historical shifts in policy is the association of the national population policy and its complementary family planning program with the national development of the country. Whether accommodating a reproductive health framework or endorsing a more religious orientation, the population issue as reflected in policy has always engaged with nationalist values and developmentalist concerns. And as a strategy that will modernize Filipino life, the changing policy on population (cum reproductive health) incorporates not only a vision for the nation but also a framework that allows it to be embraced into the civilizing arms of the international community.

POLITICAL ACTORS IN THE POLICY DEBATES

In this section, I introduce the major actors contesting reproductive health in the policy arena and the positions they take regarding contraception, abortion, population, and health rights. These are

Pro-life Philippines and allied groups, and the Reproductive Health Advocacy Network (RHAN), which represent the most assertive voices in the public debates on reproductive health, inside and outside of

Congress.

Pro-life Philippines

According to its publication, Pro-Life Philippines is “a national body coordinating pro-life groups, providing education and documentation of life issues, and raising the consciousness of Filipino people on respect and responsibility for human life” (Pro-life Philippines commemorative issue, 2008). It had its start in the country in 1974 when a young nun, Sister Pilar Verzosa, RGS, attended a seminar with an

American priest, Fr. Paul Marx, OSB, who talked about abortion and the US Supreme Court ruling in Roe v Wade that upheld in the previous year women’s right to abortion under privacy principles. Fr. Marx founded the Human Life Center in 1971, which later became Human Life International, the first and largest international pro-life organization. The seminar, held at the Department of Health in Manila, showed pictures of “aborted babies” which so horrified and moved the young nun that by the end of the

priest’s talk she had managed to ask for information materials, including the film, “Abortion – A

Woman’s Decision”. Armed with the film and a 16 mm film projector that Fr. Marx also gave her, Sister

Pilar, who was trained as a nurse and then worked in the Good Shepherd Home for Single Mothers, began her mission of going around schools, parishes and communities showing the ‘horrors’ of abortion and speaking about the right to life of the unborn. Sister Pilar’s pro-life advocacy overlapped with her identity as an activist nun who fought the Marcos dictatorship; at one point, she was detained by the military for joining a civilian fact-finding mission investigating the killings of farmers in Southern Luzon.

This broad-ranging political engagement also characterizes the way Pro-Life Philippines has approached its mission. As Sister Pilar explains the difference between the Pro-Life in the United States and her group:

…Pro-life in the US (is) anti-abortion mainly. They don’t take other issues except this -- that life begins from the moment of conception, or fertilization. For us, (our issues are) from conception all the way (to) euthanasia and all the other issues that would cover respect and care for human life, even all the environmental issues that would affect human life. And because human life is created, (it also includes issues about) conception, fertilization, fertility, (which) are attached to sexuality, marriage, family…They all come in.”

Indeed, in one political rally denouncing the corruption and lies involving the Philippine president and her family, Pro-Life was in attendance, hinting at how the group saw itself as part of a broader social movement for change.

While tracing its beginnings to the initial ties with the US-based Human Life International, Pro-

Life Philippines nonetheless relied at that stage on “family-oriented Catholic organizations like the

Christian Family Movement of the Philippines, Couples for Christ, Marriage Encounter, Parish Family

Life” for crucial support in organizing meetings and conferences. Today, Pro-Life Philippines counts among its network of organizations the traditional Catholic Church affiliated groups like the Catholic

Women’s League, Knights of Columbus, Daughters of Mary Immaculate, Singles for Christ; pro-life NGOs such as Family Media Advocacy Foundation, A Home for the Angels, Human Life International-

Philippines; Catholic private schools represented by the Catholic Educators Association of the

Philippines; and Buhay (Life) Party, a political party which was elected into the House of Representatives in 2004 by garnering the most number of votes among all party list candidates and getting three seats in the lower House. Buhay Party, whose leadership and staff come from other allied pro-life groups, identifies three core issues in its agenda: promotion of pro-life issues, elimination of government corruption, and provision of social services. These groups, together with the Catholic Bishops

Conference of the Philippines, act in concert and as a collective in campaigning against the reproductive health bill. Contrary to common perception, however, Pro-Life, according to Sister Pilar, is not a Catholic organization, adding humorously, “Your uterus is not Catholic.” While the group could have been given the status of a Church-mandated organization, the founder explained that they opted to be independent from the Catholic Church, enabling it to do its work outside the mandate of the Parish Council or any

Episcopal Commission, in short, outside the hierarchy of the Church. However, the group serves as a resource for the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, providing information and research on issues pertaining to pro-life advocacies. While Sister Pilar asserts that her group is an interfaith group with Muslim and non-Catholic members, a look at its Board of Trustees and Advisers would show names of Catholic bishops acting as its spiritual advisers, hinting at the influence of the Catholic Church at an institutional level. The prominent presence of Pro-Life in mobilizations organized by the Catholic Church as during the mass rally for the 40th anniversary of the Humanae Vitae and the message of support from the latter for Pro-Life’s Silver Jubilee celebration speak to the close relationship between the two.

My first introduction to Pro-Life came when I attended their youth conference on reproductive health and sexuality held in an exclusive girls’ Catholic university. The conference gathered male and female high school and college students from different schools and colleges to listen to speakers’ testimonies on finding true love; the emotional and moral dangers as well as disease risks of premarital sex; how sex is like catsup (that is, when you’re eating hamburger and catsup drips on your shirt, that

catsup is seen as a stain because it is not in its proper place, which is like what happens to sex – it becomes dirty – when done outside marriage, according to the speaker); and the virtue of leaving one’s marital or sexual destiny to God. Through workshops, song and dramatization, the student participants expressed their hopes for an ideal spouse and their vision of family life. An exercise, in particular, asked these young people to imagine their future child, what their dreams for the child were, and how they would prepare themselves right now to be the right parent for that child. This conference, attended by over a hundred students, showcased Pro-Life’s capacity to reach out to young people and get out its message about the “culture of life”, linking it to pure romance, lasting love, a steady family, the certainty of God and a moral life. While these students could be considered a captive audience, coming as they did from Catholic institutions, their readiness to embrace these ideas, however, indicated that Pro-Life was effective at some level in cultivating a new generation of “pro-lifers”. Other activities that the group organized, and which I was able to attend, included seminars on pro-life counseling regarding teenage pregnancy, abortion and related issues; natural family planning; responsible parenting; and post- abortion trauma syndrome. The chief participants were teachers and counselors sent by their Catholic schools, with the last activity co-organized by a Protestant evangelical group.

The alliance between pro-life groups and the Catholic Church is further evident in congressional hearings. To ensure that legislators realize the extent of opposition to the reproductive health bill, Pro-

Life, its affiliate groups and the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines mobilize their constituents – majority of whom are students from Catholic schools and members of parishes -- and present their separate position papers during congressional hearings in the Lower House and the

Senate. Like any conscientious lobbyists, pro-life advocates, priests and, especially, the bishops do their work behind the scenes, making personal phone calls to legislators, meeting and ‘dialoguing’ with authors of the bill, vigilantly monitoring the movement of the measure in Congress, and updating their support base through email, newsletters, and public meetings. The radio station, newspaper, parish

newsletters, pastoral letters and the hundreds of pulpits owned by the Catholic Church collectively serve as a media network for updating its constituents and followers, and for publicly attacking politicians who support the bill. In the congressional archives, boxes of petition papers from dioceses from all over the country and personal letters from individual Catholics demanding that legislators reject the bill attest to the Catholic Church’s capacity to galvanize its parishioners into action.

Reproductive Health Advocacy Network

The Reproductive Health Advocacy Network (RHAN) is a national coalition of more than 25 organizations that came together to advocate the passage of a law on reproductive health. It is composed of family planning and development groups, women’s health NGOs, feminist organizations, community-based youth groups, and NGOs working in various fields such as the media, community organizing, rural development, health service provision, legal reform and policy advocacy. In its brochure, RHAN (n.d.) states its vision:

A Filipino society where every Filipino has access to safe, affordable and quality gender responsive sexual and (reproductive health) services they need in all stages of their life, achieved through the State’s promotion, respect and protection and fulfillment of (sexual and reproductive rights) as an integral part of Human Rights (sic).

While this vision holds the network together, member organizations are well aware of their differences in viewpoints and politics, coming as they do from diverse, even conflicting, political orientations and traditions. From the perspective of individual members, their advocacy of reproductive health had different, and contradictory, origins: some members were involved in the population program of the Marcos regime in the 1970s; some started their work in the primary health care and maternal and child health in past decades; others had long-term commitment to feminist causes; a few saw its connection to their work in the area of family law and human rights; and others saw it as a critical issue in the communities they work in. The unity of these different groups on issues such as

population, abortion, even emergency contraception, were never assumed, and often debated and wrestled over. Members admit that this lends dynamism as well as constraint to the network’s actions.

As a network, RHAN casts a broad net and has drawn other movements and groups into its advocacy.

Among its active supporters are lesbian, gay and transgender groups, HIV and AIDS networks, inter-faith organizations, and the business sector. In particular, the alliance between reproductive health advocates, LGBT groups and HIV and AIDS networks has had a long history as many of these groups and individuals work on the intersecting fields of health, sexuality, reproductive health, and human rights. In addition, given that another bill addressing discrimination against LGBTs is pending in Congress and also being opposed by the Catholic Church, the mutual support and solidarity between reproductive health and LGBT advocates is being solidified by common challenges.

RHAN was instrumental in making reproductive health a major legislative advocacy issue.

Collaborating with policymakers, individual members of RHAN drafted the original bill, which was eventually sponsored by Representative Bella Flor Angara-Castillo of Aurora Province, a staunch advocate of women’s rights, and co-authored by three other female legislators. This relationship endured in the years that followed, with network members providing information and research support to the legislator and to those who took over as sponsors after Rep. Angara-Castillo finished her term.

RHAN’s involvement in the policymaking process extended to actual revisions to subsequent versions of the bill.

At the core of the network are the Philippine Legislators Committee on Population and

Development (PLCPD), an NGO created by legislators to advance issues related to population and development through a policy research arm; Likhaan, a women’s health NGO that provides health services to urban poor communities and uses community organizing to push for reproductive health and rights; and the Democratic Socialist Women of the Philippines, a national organization which serves as the secretariat for the RHAN. While other RHAN members actively participate in the activities, shape

the direction of the network, and contribute resources to the campaign, it is the three organizations that steer the whole network, by virtue of the number of staff they can deploy to focus on the campaign, the funds they can commit, and the consistency with which they have been able to sustain the advocacy, even if participation of other members wane at times.

PLCPD, which holds office within the House of Representatives and has direct daily contact with legislators and their staff, provides a critical link and interface between RHAN’s advocacy work and the tangled legislative process. This role has facilitated the network’s movement within and access to the

Lower House and everything connected to the reproductive health bill. This has also enabled the network to respond to emerging developments regarding the bill. PLCPD has developed its political mapping skills, identifying lawmakers who are prepared to champion the bill, who will support it publicly and who will support it quietly, who will oppose it or have withdrawn their support, and who have remained neutral and uncommitted. Based on this mapping, member organizations divide the task of approaching uncommitted legislators to get their support and maintaining relationship with already committed legislators.

Bolstering PLCPD’s insider position within Congress are its Board members, all of whom are elected Representatives. As a policy group that also provides technical support to legislators, PLCPD staff are able to act on behalf of their legislator-Board members, attending congressional meetings and other activities. Their knowledge of the daily operations at the House of Representatives, in particular, has allowed PLCPD staff to influence the composition of committees tasked to hold hearings on the reproductive health bill. They managed this by informing supportive legislator-allies of the developments in the formation of committees at the beginning of a new legislative session. In particular, anticipating that the Committee on Health and the Committee on Population would be critical, PLCPD staff monitored the membership of these committees and urged allies to volunteer as members, thus

populating the relevant committees with supporters to boost the bill’s chances of being passed at this level.

While PLCPD enjoys privileges because of its congressional affiliation, its presence in the halls of the Lower House, however, has been questioned. It was accused of being a “foreign agent” by the pro- life Deputy Speaker because it received funds from the Packard Foundation, which, according to the legislator, is a US-based “population-control” group. Yet, in a bizarre twist, it was later revealed that the

Deputy Speaker was a founding member of PLCPD.

Likhaan, with its track record in delivering reproductive health services and organizing work in urban poor communities as well as its feminist orientation, is recognized as leading the more radical edge of the RHAN campaign. Because of its open and unhesitating support of emergency contraception and abortion rights, it has been singled out and tagged as “pro-abortion”, with its connotation of

“killer”, in my interviews with Pro-life members. On another front, Likhaan initiated actions that led to the filing of a constitutional petition challenging a local policy “discouraging” the use and distribution of

“artificial” contraceptives in Manila’s public hospitals and clinics. By bringing the fight for reproductive rights to the courts, this initiative has fed into the RHAN campaign, providing yet another vehicle through which member organizations could be involved and intensify their advocacy. Together with

DSWP and another member, WomanHealth, which have direct links with grassroots communities,

Likhaan is relied upon by the network to mobilize hundreds of women – the “warm bodies” -- mostly from the slum areas, for the plenary debates in the House of Representatives. In RHAN assessment meetings right after the plenary sessions, each member would be asked what it could commit – in terms of funds and people – for the next round of plenary sessions, and Likhaan always provided the crucial numbers to reach the goal.

The Democratic Socialist Women of the Philippines (DSWP) is a national federation of 157 community- and sector-based women’s groups that works on issues of economic marginalization,

violence against women, sexual and reproductive health and rights, and women’s political participation.

While most of RHAN’s members have links with groups in places outside Metro Manila, DSWP’s organizational base has a national reach that has proved beneficial as the network recognized the necessity of extending the campaign to the provinces and organizing support at the local level to exert political pressure on local representatives. Beyond its secretariat role, DSWP also focused on and coordinated the multiple activities for the local legislative advocacy.

The Family Planning Organization of the Philippines (FPOP), the oldest family planning institution in the country, and The Forum, a policy advocacy NGO which boasts of a Board composed of prominent figures like former President Fidel Ramos, are able to attract individuals and groups that would otherwise not be reached by the network. Together with other network members, they organized a gathering of members of the economic, political and cultural elite to cultivate and cement the latter’s support for reproductive health.

ADVOCATING REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH

There are three starting points that reproductive health advocates take when arguing for the passage of the Reproductive Health Bill. The first deals with the urgency of stemming the country’s increasing population and providing for its needs, and the task of pushing the national development agenda on the right track. The second introduces a conversation about the rights of individuals, especially women, to a full range of services and information that will enable them to make decisions about their bodies and sexualities, and family lives. The third highlights the high numbers of maternal deaths, a neglected health emergency, and calls for action to save women’s lives. While all three points get articulated by advocates, which argument gets emphasized depends on who is speaking and the perspective to which the speaker is oriented.

Population divides

A recognized “fault-line” among advocates is the negotiated equality between the population and development perspective, on one hand, and the rights framework, on the other hand. With strong adherents on both sides, these two arguments have earned a place in the discussions. Yet, a few advocates are of the view that it is easier to explain to government officials and the public the issue of population and development than to convince them about reproductive and sexual rights. Senator

Rodolfo Biazon, a proponent of the Senate version of the bill, insists that reproductive health should be presented as a problem of population and poverty because explaining it within “a rights-framework” will not be understood by ordinary people. This was echoed by an advocate, a former official in the Marcos and Ramos administrations who now heads a policy NGO, who said, “Filipinos won’t appreciate the rights-based approach.”

A Marine General who was credited for defending President Corazon Aquino’s government from one of the most serious coup d’etats in the 1980s, Senator Biazon talks about the poor circumstances under which his family lived during the Second World War, and how losing his father at an early age meant taking on various jobs -- washing clothes for other people, selling cigarettes, and collecting empty bottles to help his mother and support his three younger sisters. It also meant that only he and another sister could continue their education, while their two other sisters had to stop after grade school. From his story, it was a painful, but otherwise rational, decision that his mother made to maximize the little resources that they had. The Senator saw the same kind of poverty among the farmers that he interacted with as a soldier, many of whom had large families surviving on a small plot of land. He asserted:

The population growth is a major factor in poverty, and unfortunately, if you look around, it is the middle class that only have 2 or 3 children but those who suffer under the grinding poverty have many children.

Speaking in a strong voice, and yet with just a trace of pain and pity, he mentioned during our conversation that he continued to support his sisters who did not get the same opportunities as he did.

Aware of the elite backgrounds of Filipino Senators, many of whom were either born into well-off families or established political clans, and the few who were born poor but have now become wealthy, I was nevertheless struck by how first-hand Senator Biazon’s experience of poverty shaped his support of the bill.

Underlying the Senator’s sentiments is the idea that ordinary Filipinos – like the farmers that he encountered -- understand well enough the accepted wisdom that a larger population translates into more poverty for people and the nation. For advocates like him, the poor are too preoccupied with gut issues, such as hunger and deprivation, to comprehend the abstract notion of rights and link this to reproductive health.

The national demographic survey released during the debates placed the Philippines’ population at 88.7 million, a number that, according to Rep. Edcel Lagman, the bill’s main proponent, has “galloped” from the 60.7 million of seventeen years ago, and is expected to “balloon to an alarming

160 million in 2038”. Reproductive health advocates assert that for a country constrained by poor resources and a huge foreign debt, the Philippines cannot simply support this large population and the complex social services that it needs. With 45 out of 100 Filipinos living in poverty and subsistence

(NSCB, 2008), this picture of poverty can only be exacerbated by a population growth rate that is the third highest in Southeast Asia (WHO, 2010). The argument goes on to say that the pace at which the economy is growing cannot catch up with the much faster growth in population. This is one of the reasons why the country, which ranked second to Japan in terms of economic development in the

1960s, now lags dismally behind newly industrializing Asian countries such as Taiwan and South Korea

(See Angeles 1992) and its neighbors Thailand and Indonesia. Citing a 2002 UNFPA Report which states that “lower birth rates and slower population growth over the last three decades have contributed to

faster economic progress in a number of developing countries,” Rep. Lagman provides evidence for the role of population in influencing the country’s future development (see Explanatory Note, House Bill 17).

Advocates of the bill take further note of the official government statistics. According to the

National Health and Demographic Survey (2003), the desired fertility of Filipino women is 2.5 children, yet the prevailing fertility rate of 3.5 reveals that women are having one more child than they plan for mainly due to lack of reproductive and sexuality information and services. It is the high number of unintended pregnancies – more than half of all pregnancies (Guttmacher 2009) – which drives the country’s high population growth rate. What makes this all the more worrying for advocates is that

57.3% of families with “many children” (sic) are poor compared to only 15.7% of those with only two children” (Family Income and Expenditures Survey, from 1985-2000, cited in HB 17), which makes a strong case for the link between large family size and poverty. Further, it is pointed out that large family size is associated with poor school participation, as well as poor health and survival rates among children (Orbeta, 2003), which gives a compelling reason for the persistence of poverty in families and its cyclical transmission from one generation to the next.

In a statement released by 26 economists that included former Chiefs of Economic Planning and a Secretary of Budget, they underscore the fact that almost half (or 44 percent) of pregnancies among the poorest 10 percent of women of reproductive age are unintended. While there is evidence that poor women want to limit their number of children, they are unable to do so. Unintended pregnancy, they add, has an unintended social cost (or negative externalities, as economists say). For while the well-off who are having more children will probably bear on their own the cost of raising and educating their children, the poor, on the other hand, are more likely to rely on government for health services and the public education of their children.

Advocates see the situation as thus: A resource-limited country whose government cannot provide adequate and much needed social services such as education, employment, healthcare, and

housing for its population, majority of whom do not have the capacity to access the services on their own because of poverty, has to find ways to alleviate poverty and address the rapid population growth that puts pressure on scarce resources. Providing reproductive health and family planning information and services addresses the need of women and couples to limit family size as well as the goal of the government to slow down population. Moreover, it will be a means by which government can mitigate the impact of poverty on families. As the 26 economists from the University of the Philippines concluded:

In a situation where government is already hard pressed in financing even the most basic terms of public spending, having no national population policy is tantamount to burying one’s head in the sand.

The economic and development arguments have attracted support from local government officials who view reproductive health as a poverty reduction scheme that will lift not only families, but also entire districts that they govern. Given that local elected officials must deal with the long lines of people who go to their offices every day asking for financial assistance – to buy medicines, pay for hospital bills, defray burial expenses, fix roofs destroyed by typhoons, pay for bus fare to return to the province – it is not surprising that they see reproductive health, and specifically family planning, as a pragmatic and economical answer to what is viewed as an interlinked problem of population and poverty. Thus, several local governments have already adopted ordinances that promote and institutionalize reproductive health programs (e.g. Aurora Province, Baguio City, Davao City) while other devote substantial amounts for contraceptives in their local health budget, even in the absence of local ordinances.

Where governance is defined primarily as the management and allocation of scarce resources, framing reproductive health as a means to manage populations, achieve development and reduce poverty makes it a governance issue and well within the mandate of public officials.

Reproductive and Sexual Rights

Other advocates, particularly those from women’s and feminist groups, have expressed uneasiness with the emphasis placed on the argument about population growth as “demographics… blurs the importance of (reproductive and sexual) rights”3. Coming from the experience of population control under the Marcos regime, and being rooted in Marxist class politics, the progressive women’s movement criticized the development framework that identified overpopulation as the cause of poverty and underdevelopment of the country. The movement asserted that the crisis of Philippine development was brought about by unequal social structures which also have their sources in historical relations. They also criticized this development framework as patriarchal in its designation of women’s bodies and sexualities as both the source of and instrument for solving the population problem. While women were given participation in development, it was only as mothers, potential child-bearers, in short, only in their reproductive roles. In this regard, the women’s movement positions the respect for reproductive and sexual rights as a key element to be included in an alternative development paradigm

(Estrada-Claudio 1992).

But while the women’s health movement pushed for reproductive and sexual rights and self- determination, they were careful to point out that the exercise of these rights was only possible and meaningful within conditions of social justice and equality. This means that enabling conditions such as gender equality, economic empowerment, and social justice are crucial for women to exercise their reproductive rights. Contextualizing reproductive rights within broader frame also meant that the women’s movement believed in addressing issues such as the government neglect of basic social

3 Interview with Atty.ElizabethPangalangan, 2008.

services, the foreign debt and structural adjustment programs, migration and violence, militarization, and others (Petchesky, 2003).

Their critique of the population framework, the growth-focused development paradigm, and even of reproductive rights (and human rights, in general) positioned this women’s movement in opposition to the project of modernity. Yet, as Petchesky (2003) reminds us, this opposition does not necessarily place the women’s movement/s in an innocent, pure position, for while these movements contested these different aspects of modernity, they nevertheless participated in the elaboration of population and development policies as well as human rights instruments. Their participation in the

International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), along with other movements around the world, for example, contributed to the emergence of a global consensus on reproductive health and rights, which reflected in part their own notions of rights. This, however, has given rise to a critique of participation in time-consuming UN processes as a potential cooptation of the transnational women’s movements agenda by developmentalist and demographic interests.

In the domestic arena, women’s health activists in the Philippines have formed an alliance with family planning groups and legislator-proponents of the reproductive health bill. Their support for the bill was based on the need to institutionalize a reproductive health policy that will be impervious to the personal religious beliefs of whoever is in power. However, provisions on strengthening rights-based reproductive health care co-existed with a provision encouraging couples to limit their children to two, rendering the issue of growth rates and fertility reduction central to the debate around the bill (Padilla,

2004). This recalls the character of the Programme of Action of the International Conference on

Population and Development in which reproductive health and rights were given prominence without the population control consciousness being dislodged from its central place.

Even with the modification of this provision on the “ideal family size” -- removing the incentives of scholarships and other benefits -- this provision remained a source of debate within a network that

needed to be unified against the institutional capacity of the Catholic Church. For while some groups were willing to accept this compromise, there were others who questioned the extent to which the population perspective was framing the policy and would impact the provision of family planning services. While Rep. Lagman stressed that the provision was merely “recommendatory,” several women’s health groups feared that those who would implement the policy would interpret it as the institution of a clear demographic target. The situation is problematic as support for a two-child policy has gained support from the business sector and other groups, which see the urgency of extricating the country from poverty through economic growth rates and fertility declines.

The pressure from the Catholic Church, on the other hand, has continued to push the women’s health movement to tightly defend reproductive health. This has produced a few ironic twists to the debate on the reproductive health bill. In response to the Catholic Bishops Conference of the

Philippines’ assertion that the population growth rate of the country had in fact slowed down to 1.9 percent, the coalition of legislators and women’s groups behind the bill insisted that the rate was higher at 2.36 percent (PLCPD, 2005b). Depending on where one was sitting, the country could be heading toward a demographic winter or a population-economic meltdown, but either way spelled crisis for everybody. In one Senate committee hearing, this subject became so contentious that even data from the government statistical board meant to enlighten the stakeholders could not have the force to rise above the politics and convince protagonists of the demographic picture from the experts’ view. This seemingly technical issue of population growth rates echoes the tension between the triumphant belief in progress and the acute awareness of crisis and doom found in modern social life. Further, this shows how women’s health activists and feminists become part of the dynamic of the debate and are compelled to participate in the iteration and reinforcement of ideas that they themselves seek to overturn. The counterpoint offered by the reproductive and sexual rights perspective does not exist outside of, but gets inserted into, the discourse of population. “As long as coercion is not used (in the

implementation of the policy),” was how a key feminist leader rationalized the unspoken compromise that had been forged with the population argument.

Saving Women’s Lives

If some of the leaders are reluctant to use the language of rights in the reproductive health campaign, it is not only to emphasize the centrality of the population problem; rather, out of necessity, it is to dodge the accusations from the Catholic Church and pro-life groups that the bill is an underhanded way of legalizing abortion. While the series of UN conferences in the 1990s achieved a global consensus on reproductive health as a critical area for women’s empowerment, it has generated a backlash in the counter-discourse of the Vatican and other conservative religious groups that has reduced reproductive rights and health to simply mean abortion. This counter-discourse has found a foothold in the arguments revolving around morality and the limits of acceptable human action. With abortion being illegal in the country, it has also anchored itself in the law.

During the first hearing for the original version of the bill, Rep. Angara-Castillo and reproductive health advocates were perplexed at the charge of Catholic representatives that the proposed measure was sneaking in provisions on abortion. An advocate recounted that they had reviewed the document many times but could not find the provision being referred to. They would discover later that the passage in question was not in the bill itself but in the explanatory note. The explanatory note discussed the need to re-examine the illegal status of abortion in the Philippines, particularly in cases where the woman’s life is at risk. Potentially controversial as the statement was, it had escaped the eyes of the advocates and the bill’s principal author, and had put them on the defensive. Denouncing the advocates as part of a “neo-ultrafeminist movement”, pro-life activists charged that the bill came in “sheep’s clothing … wrapped in beautiful statements as human rights…” but its “explanatory notes (sic) and reference documents present its true intentions” (Imbong, CBCP position paper, 2008). At this time, the tension between ideological positioning and political strategy emerged as even feminists within the

network saw the futility and the potential backlash of including abortion services on the agenda. The feminist lawyer who drafted the bill, however, saw the imperative of meeting the “abortion scare” head- on. The resulting fall-out from this debacle was the addition of passages in subsequent versions of the bill underscoring the fact that “abortion is a crime under the Revised Penal Code” and that “the bill does not promote abortion as a method of family planning”. Designed to counter the aggressive misinformation by the bill’s opponents and to assure potential supporters that the bill never aimed to legalize abortion, these statements presented a dilemma for women’s health advocates and feminists:

While advancing reproductive health in the policy arena, they foreclose the possibility of having a thorough and democratic debate about abortion, health and reproductive rights in the public sphere.

It is worth noting that the authors of the bill as well as a significant number of RHAN members have either rejected abortion based on personal sentiment or were unwilling to take a clear position on it. Bringing abortion to the discussion table, however, could impact the carefully-built trust among advocates. A feminist advocate explained that to turn the internal discussion into a contest over which group could take the most radical position on the issue would be an unproductive exercise, and to push legislator-proponents to take pro-abortion positions publicly would be asking their allies to commit political suicide.

What the legislators and diverse advocates’ groups clearly agreed on was the need to address the high rates of maternal mortality and save mothers’ lives by “providing hospital-based family planning, establishing obstetric care facilities, ensuring that births are attended by skilled health practitioners, encouraging proper birth spacing and preventing abortion.” Citing a UNFPA report, a

Likhaan position paper noted that that the Philippine maternal mortality rate of 162 per 10,000 live births represents a lifetime risk that is 23 times more than what is found in developed countries. RHAN also emphasizes Department of Health statistics showing that 75% of all maternal deaths happen among

15-19 year old women. The critical link between maternal deaths and newborn deaths is further noted

as “motherless newborns are between 3-10 times more likely to die than newborns whose mothers survive” (Likhaan statement, 2008). As part of the advocacy, a touring photo documentary on child mothers from urban slums was mounted by WomanHealth. The key message was “Ang nagbibigay ng buhay di dapat mawalan ng buhay!” (Who gives life must not lose her life.)

REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH AND THE MORAL DISCOURSE OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

Accusing individuals of immorality and being anti-Church has been the customary response of the Catholic Church hierarchy to actions and pronouncements of public figures revealing a more liberal view of sexuality and reproduction. That the Church has thousands of pulpits, owns radio and television stations and runs a network of private schools across the country has provided priests, nuns and religious groups with effective mechanisms through which they could air their vilifications. That the

Catholic Church is a major player in Philippine society has made it a sought-after voice by the mainstream media as well. Thus, when the Catholic Church charges the proponents of the Reproductive

Health bill of being “anti-life,” “anti-family,” and “anti-poor” and “anti-Filipino” (PLCPD media statement, 2005c), this has force that reverberates throughout the country. It is also the kind of rhetorical distortion that only the Church could employ without facing legal sanctions.

Defending the “culture of life”

The Catholic Church’s opposition to the reproductive health bill rests on what it claims its responsibility to defend the sanctity of life and the “culture of life”. The former is based on the belief that human life from the moment of conception is sacred, and therefore, must be protected and allowed to thrive. The culture of life starts with the recognition of the value and dignity of human beings, who are created in the image of God. It also refers to the notion of “openness to life and the channels to life”. This openness to life is linked to human sexuality which has a two-fold purpose: the unitive, or the love and embrace between married couples, and the procreative, or the reproduction of

children. Marriage and the family constitute the foundation of and the location for the fulfillment of human sexuality.

The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) acknowledges that the reproductive health bill “makes a number of good points” but asserts that it contains “fatal flaws” that make it unacceptable. It maintains that the proposed policy, with its provision making available the full range of contraceptive methods, including “artificial” methods and devices, is contrary to the “culture of life”.

“Artificial” contraceptives, such as hormonal pills, injectables and implants, according to the Church and its allied groups, are abortifacient and pose an impediment to conception that would have taken place otherwise. Bishop Bacani, an ally of progressive groups on many political issues, demonstrates his knowledge and describes the abortifacient action of these contraceptives:

They not only prevent the fertilization of the ovum by the sperm but they prevent the implantation of the fertilized ovum…The IUD…the pills make the (lining of the uterus) inhospitable to the fertilized ovum.

A translation of this explanation was further provided by Atty. Jo Imbong, the legal adviser of the CBCP:

They destroy the feeding environment of the embryos. Before (the embryo) can reach it, the womb has already been destroyed. It cannot anymore support the embryo. The environment has already been destroyed…What do you call that, when you deprive a person of basic nourishment? Isn’t it murder, killing?

At the core of this rejection of contraceptives is the question of when life begins. While the

Catholic Church teaches that human life begins at the “moment” of conception or fertilization, those who promote “artificial” contraceptives have “transferred (this) to implantation,” according to an official of Human Life International Philippines. The difference, she insists, is that “conception happens once the sperm and the egg unite, and it happens in the outer third of the fallopian tube. Implantation happens

3-7 days later.” The process of fertilization acquires for the embryo the status of an “alive human being that is journeying towards implantation,” its 36 chromosomes an evidence of its full humanity. Medical doctors who support the Catholic Church position provide perspectives that align science with Christian

moral theology. Dr. Edna Monzon, a bio-ethicist from the University of Sto. Tomas, the oldest and considered the pontifical Catholic university in the country, explains:

All of us, without exception, started from an embryo…when the egg and the sperm united. The egg coming from the mother, the sperm from the father, they unite and they develop. If they come from human sources then they must be human. And if they develop, multiply, divide, then there must be life. There must be human life.

She then rhetorically asks,

What do we call the embryo from fertilization to implantation? Can we call it a lizard or a worm? We can’t, because it is a human being.

Another doctor who heads the ethics committee of an elite hospital and represents an allied group of the Church in congressional hearings supports this:

The genetic code is already there, and anything that moves and grows by itself, and propels itself without being prodded, must have the principle of life. Therefore, it must have a soul.

She notes that locating the beginning of pregnancy in the implantation stage occurred only after the

1974 decision on the Roe v Wade allowing abortion based on privacy rights. This, she says, was a move made for political reasons rather than on the basis of scientific evidence.

For the Catholic Church, the RH bill’s endorsement of all methods of contraceptives points to its failure to “define clearly when the protection of life begins” and poses a “serious threat to the life of infants in the womb”. Moreover, the Church hierarchy asserts that this creates a “contraceptive mentality towards a culture of death,” with the failure rates of artificial contraceptives acting as a

“precursor to the adoption of abortion”. When contraceptives fail, individuals are encouraged to take the next option, which is abortion, thereby “trivializ(ing) the whole concept of having sex,” according to

Representative Zialcita, a leader of the pro-life block in the Lower House. For Church allies then, this state of affairs debunks studies cited by reproductive health advocates that link the reduction of abortion cases to the increased use of contraceptives by individuals.

Although the authors of the bill have consistently denied it, the Catholic Church insists that the proposed measure endorses abortion and will eventually pave the way for its legalization. This, pro-life advocates emphasize, is the real agenda of the RH bill. Their assertion stems from the claim that the term “reproductive health” as used in the ICPD explicitly includes abortion and represents the double- speak employed by the supporters of the bill. In addition, pro-life advocates only see deception in the move by the authors to include in the bill statements that reiterate the illegal status of abortion in the country. This suspicion is based on the argument that reproductive health has universal meaning and application, and therefore, the Philippine policy cannot be an exception. As Ligaya Acosta, spokesperson of Human Life International-Philippines, argues:

Abortion is part and parcel of reproductive health. It’s all there in the documents… So they tell us, not in the Philippines. You would tell us that we have a different meaning for it? No, we cannot (do that), because it is a universal term.

Ironically, in making this argument, pro-life advocates deny the legitimacy of the reservations to statements regarding abortion made and won by the Vatican and its allies at the ICPD. Furthermore, they declare that reproductive health is a marketing term invented in the 1980s by “abortionists”, which include “killer agencies” such as the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and USAID.

For some pro-life advocates, maternal deaths are an overblown issue. Insisting that more people die from cancer, hypertension and heart disease, they downplay the deaths from pregnancy-related complications. In addition, they take issue with the safe motherhood program of the Department of

Health that aims to make people aware that every pregnancy is a risk for women. To them this is about

“eliminating pregnancy as it is a disease” and pushing women to take contraceptives. Abortion to save the mother’s life is an “abuse” of the idea of protecting women’s lives. In this, stories of women who took the risk and died giving birth to their children are cited as “heroic“, and even “saintly”4.

4 Interview with Dr. Angie Aguirre, 2008.

Valuing human dignity and women’s rights

Apart from having abortifacient effects that violate the right to life of the unborn from the moment of conception, artificial or modern contraceptives also violate women’s right to health, according to the Church position. Citing studies, including those by the WHO, pro-life groups raise the risk of acquiring cancers and other diseases from the use of contraceptives. These adverse effects, they lament, are not fully discussed by health providers, which compromises women’s informed decision. In response to the argument that the risk of getting cancer is low and that the health benefits of contraceptives outweigh their risks, pro-life doctors concede that all medicines have side effects. They maintain, however, that artificial contraceptives are not like other medicines in that they are not used for the treatment of disease. Pregnancy after all is a natural process, not a disease. For this reason, full disclosure of every single adverse effect of contraceptives, including their so-called abortifacient effects, should be observed to make women realize that their health rights are being violated. To support this argument, the work of feminist and women’s health activist Barbara Seaman which exposed the risks of oral contraceptives, is regularly invoked. What is not mentioned by pro-life advocates, however, is that

Seaman’s exposés were written in the 1960s at a time when high-dose pills were being manufactured and were critical in forcing the pharmaceutical industry to develop the safer low-dose oral contraceptives that are used today.

While pro-life advocates stress that their position on contraceptives is based on scientific evidence and that for them reproductive health is not a religious issue, their arguments, however, inevitably lead to a discussion of Catholic moral teachings. Tubal ligation and vasectomy, for example, are contraceptive procedures thought to be forms of self-mutilation that desecrate the integrity of the human body and the value of human dignity. By treating pregnancy as a disease that has to be controlled by harmful contraceptives, reproductive health undermines health. Here the medical ethical

principle of totality is used to anchor a religious belief. As Dr. Angie Aguirre, a medical doctor in one of the exclusive hospitals in Metro Manila, stated:

Under the principle of totality, we know that our body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and we have the responsibility to take care of it. And so you cannot euthanize your body, kill yourself or remove your body parts unless there is a problem in it or there is a disease and you (have) to save yourself. But you see, in tubal ligation and vasectomy, the tubes are healthy. In other words you are mutilating a part of your body that is not diseased.

As Atty. Imbong further asserts:

Women’s and men’s bodies are precious. You don’t destroy what God has created…That destroys the integrity of the human body and you are no longer complete as a human person, the way you are supposed to be made.

For pro-life advocates, the implications of contraceptive use on Catholic moral principles must be discussed by health providers in order to enable individuals’ informed decision, which is expected to ultimately result in the rejection of these contraceptives. When pressed on what she would do if a woman patient still wanted to get contraceptives despite their side effects, Dr. Aguirre replied that the patient is free to go to another doctor but without her referral. In this instance, the “freedom of conscience” that pro-life groups seek to protect from the inadequate disclosure of medical information by health providers becomes a sinful act and loses their support.

The opposition to the RH bill is also made in defense of women’s rights and empowerment.

However, women’s rights are placed within the context of marriage and family. Because the use of contraceptives de-links sexuality from procreation, it is considered to promote promiscuity in men and, as a consequence, the abuse of women. This “modernistic approach to sexuality” devalues marriage and human sexuality (CBCP, 2003). The rise in the number of single mothers attests that “the dignity of womanhood” has been placed “at great risk”. Further, gender equality is undermined when women are left to take the main burden for and the risks associated with the use of artificial contraception. By making contraceptives accessible to unmarried couples and providing sexuality education to

adolescents, the RH bill, according to the Church, erodes family life and values and is therefore a “source of danger for the stability of the family” (CBCP, 2003) .

“Population is not the problem”

Lastly, the Church argues that the bill erroneously assumes that population growth is the cause of poverty and, therefore, makes a position against the poor. It cites the unequal distribution of resources and graft and corruption as reasons for the widespread poverty in the country. It asserts that population is a resource, and people are a primary economic force and are agents of growth. Atty. Jo

Imbong, legal adviser of the CBCP, describes the role of the family in spurring a nation’s development:

Growth starts with the family, a typical four person family, with two or three children and the mother and father working. The parents send their children to school, the children are able to get jobs to support themselves, and they raise their own families.

This domestic economy based on family expenditures fuels the economic life of the country. At its heart is the ideal and moral nuclear family in whose womb the birth of every child must be welcomed. As

Ligaya Acosta, HLI spokesperson, explains, a child has two hands and two feet that will later be able to work and help the family. This child will be productive and may even be the child that will be instrumental in removing the family from poverty. In promoting contraceptives, she says:

We always undermine the poor. This is all about control, so they can control the lives of these people. People have many children because they want many children. It is not because they don’t have access to contraceptives. I was there, I tell you, I was a frontline health worker, more than 40 years of the program. During all those 40 years, all our rural health units were flooded with pills, with IUDs, with contraceptives. But there were no takers. People were not taking the pills because they knew there were many side effects. People got the pills, but they used them as fertilizers for their orchids. The condoms, they used as toy balloons. Then, the (workers) won’t remove the IUDs because they had to meet targets, and people were complaining to us. I talked to USAID, they came to the Philippines to investigate, because my speech appeared in the Inquirer, my first speech appeared in full-page in the Inquirer.

Thus, according to Dr. Acosta, it is wrong to assume that poor couples who have many children lacked options to plan their families. The bill will “not uplift the poor” as “the increase or decrease of population growth does not by itself spell development or underdevelopment.”

Pro-life advocates see in the graying population of European countries the manifestations of demographic winter, a consequence of falling birth rates which is the result of “population control” and the prevalent use of contraceptive technology. This is the reason these countries are now in need of migrant labor and caregivers. Pity is expressed toward the plight of the elderly in these settings who are said to have resorted to “child-for-hire” services in order to have someone to talk to. Comparing the

Philippines to these countries, pro-life advocates point to the advantage of having a young population that leave the country as overseas labor, send back remittances and keep the economy afloat. While they criticize the “population control” agenda as one that aims to “eradicate poverty by eliminating the poor,” they laud pro-natalist policies, such as that of Singapore, as an exemplar of “economic leadership”. Atty. Imbong explains why these pro-natalist policies are not population control policies:

No, it is more now a remedial measure because they have seen that what they were doing on population control was not good for the economy, so they have to do something about it. That is not population control, it is economic leadership, if you may call it that way. If the country is having an economic crisis because of the wrong policy, then it is the duty of the government to put it back on track. But of course since the population control mentality has already been ingrained for so long in Singapore, there are no takers. Women still do not want to get married. It’s not popular anymore. It’s hard to reverse the population control mentality; it will takes generations to do that. So it’s very frightening because here it’s been ingrained in the thoughts of our young population and we don’t know if they are aware that it is difficult to reserve and we can make the same mistake.

In the public debates about the impact of an increasing population growth rate on already limited social services meant for poor families, the Catholic Church hierarchy concedes that the country has a population problem which exacerbates the poverty situation. However, this position of the Church is drowned by the rest of its allied groups which argue that there are enough resources for everyone and that the population can be distributed in the different islands of the country. A priest I interviewed,

critical of the overzealousness of some of these groups, criticizes the Church hierarchy for encouraging this extremist position. He suggests that the Church is keeping quiet because it needs these groups to lead the attack against the reproductive health bill. Bishop Bacani, however, defends the Church stance by stating that the population issue is not part of the Catholic Church teachings, and therefore, it cannot prevent groups from voicing their position on this.

Responsible parenthood is offered as a counterpoint to population control. While for reproductive health advocates this means planning one’s family by spacing and/or limiting the number of children using any safe contraceptive methods that work most effectively for the couple, for pro-life groups responsible parenthood means openness to new life and understanding that part of the married couple’s responsibility is to beget children. Spacing or limiting the number of children is accepted as an element of family planning, but this must be accomplished “in accordance with the moral law of God”.

Natural family planning, according to the Catholic Church, is the only morally acceptable method that will uphold responsible parenthood. As explained by Marita Wasan, Executive Director of Pro-life

Philippines: “Responsible parenting is loving your children and supporting your children, not by means of contraceptives.”

While the aggressive and carefully orchestrated protests of the Catholic Church against the reproductive health bill and ongoing family planning program of the government would logically indicate its non-participation in population efforts, in reality the Church has had a history of involvement in the government’s family planning programs as far back as the Marcos administration. The Church was represented on the Board of the Commission on Population (PopCom) when it was first established. The

Marcos government, on the other hand, endorsed responsible parenthood and natural family planning as part of the range of choices in the so-called “cafeteria approach” to the family planning program.

Additionally, and perhaps attesting to the clout of the Catholic Church, the government included the responsible parenthood program of the Church in the budget allocation of the PopCom. For the Church

then, as now, the only acceptable contraceptive was the natural family planning method and the

“cafeteria approach” was criticized. In 1975, to bridge the growing chasm between Church and state relations, the Catholic Church and President Marcos agreed to draft a set of policies on family planning.

It was clear from this that the Church believed in the urgency of addressing population growth and the need for a family planning program.

The family planning program of the Arroyo government had also made similar accommodations to the Church. Amidst protests from women’s groups and other health sectors, the Department of

Health awarded a 50 million Peso contract to the Couples for Christ (CFC), a massive base group of the

Catholic Church found at the local level, to promote natural family planning. It is worth noting that the strategy of Catholic Church leaders of mounting an organized opposition to the reproductive health bill through sustained lobbying, on one hand, and acquiring financial support from the government for its own population program, on the other hand, represents the ability of the institution to work on all fronts without undermining its resources and mobilizing power.

What I want to illustrate here is the capacity of the Catholic Church to engage the modern state and maximize state structures to negotiate and advance its own population agenda. Its moral discourse on population, reproduction and sexuality, although viewed as backward-looking, does not pose limits to its ability to engage in the public arena normally acceded to the state. One needs only to look back at the historic People Power 1, which deposed the dictator Marcos in 1986, and People Power 2, which toppled a corrupt Estrada in 2001, and the role that the Catholic Church played in these national events to recognize the immense authority that it holds in the public sphere. As for its explanation of its strategy of tapping government resources, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) said that its position was a movement from previous critical non-collaboration to principled collaboration.

The Church’s support for responsible parenthood and natural family planning implies that it believes in addressing the modern problem of population. However, by sticking to this position, it argues that there is a way to be modern and moral at the same time. Thus, the CBCP states in their pastoral letter:

Christian parents must exercise responsible parenthood . . . they should strive to beget only those children whom they can raise up in a truly human and Christian way. Towards this end, the need to plan their families according to the moral norms taught by the Church” (CBCP, 2002).

For the Church, morality does not negate modernity.

Further, in the Church’s affirmation of the need to respond to the population problem, hence, a need for family planning, we can find a notion of progress. This progress is based on a Catholic/Christian improvement of society and one which God has ordained. Far from throwing the Philippines back into medieval times, the Catholic Church by participating in and shaping the public sphere, is making claims on modernity. This claim for a place in modern society is evident in the CBCP’s (2002) pastoral letter on the promotion of natural family planning and using government resources:

Aside from tapping the resources of government to promote natural family planning, a collaborative effort would enable the Church to share her value orientation with government workers, many of whom are Catholics of good will. Would this not be a way too for the Church to enter into a dialogue on family life in the marketplace itself?” (p.5) (emphasis mine).

What we see here is a glimpse of the process of co-construction of modernity and religion, where religion shapes the discourse of population and development while at the same time appropriating the discourse of the free market (as a value marked by modernity) to legitimize its moral-and-modern position on population.

The Church, even as it collaborates with different state institutions, competes with the state, that modern social form, in defining and cultivating the national culture, emphasizing the moral dimensions of national life. In talking about the reproductive health bill as an anti-poor measure and, therefore, contrary to the principle of sustainable human development, the Church appropriates the

nationalist discourse of the modernist project. The anti-Filipino argument, on the other hand, is an opposition to what the Church groups saw as a liberalization of values that would turn the country into a westernized, hedonistic, sexually permissive society (House Committee on Health, April 2003). Beyond this sweeping statement, however, the anti-Filipino argument rests on the understanding of the

Constitution by the Catholic Church, which protects the life of the mother and the life of the unborn from the moment of conception. A proposed law construed to promote abortion is therefore, according to the CBCP, a “defiant call for public officers and citizens to violate our Constitution.” Indeed, such a move would be against the nation’s values.

By raising the issue of the right to life, the right of parents to regulate their children’s sexuality, and women’s rights to health and gender equality, the Church uses the language of rights recognized by the international community for whom rights are universal and inherent. For an institution accused of traditionalism, the Catholic Church has mastered negotiating the international and domestic political arena, demonstrating the modern ways in which it wields institutional prowess much in the same way as a nation-state would.

GROWING SUPPORT, BLEAK PROSPECTS

During the early years, whatever discussion that passed for a debate about reproductive health was limited between the Catholic Church and a small core of reproductive health advocates, with the former on the offensive and getting most of the media attention, and the latter unable to parry the blows from a mighty opponent. However, in recent years, more voices and independent actors -- from the media, academic community, and business sector -- have come out to defend the bill and argue for the necessity of providing women and families with reproductive health services. Owing to the persistence of the authors and advocates in re-filing the bill in the past Congresses, despite bleak prospects, it became possible to sustain, albeit in an uneven fashion, the discussion about the issue, until public awareness steadily grew. The cyclical death and resurrection of the bill, with its attendant

controversy, ironically set the conditions for a national public debate to take place. As the Catholic bishops stepped up their attacks, threatening to deny communion to and excommunicate politicians who support reproductive health, even ordinary Catholics who would have kept silent, bristled at this vindictive stance. By 2008, with more and louder voices from a broader movement challenging the

Catholic Church’s authority to define what constitutes sexual and reproductive morality for individual

Filipinos, it became the Church and allied groups’ turn to feel embattled. Even as the plenary deliberations on the bill did not prosper, blocked by a queue of 22 pro-life legislators, each of whom had readied to ask questions until the congressional term ended, the issue refused to die and remained on the national agenda. In the months leading to the May 2010 presidential elections, the debate had intensified as candidates were being pressed to declare their position on reproductive health, both by the Catholic Church-led pro-life movement and by family planning and women’s health groups. That reproductive health had become a critical issue that defined the approach to and ethics of governance of the next leader of the country cannot be overestimated.

Indeed, underlying the contentious positions coming from different fronts are fundamental questions about the direction of the nation, its goals and aspirations, the roles of institutions, and their relationship to the people. Linked to this are questions that reflect a nation’s grappling with its history, national identity and religious identity. As well, implicated is the transformation of gender, sexual, and reproductive practices of Filipinos. Thus, I try to answer the following questions in the next chapters:

What is the role of religion in our society and in people’s lives? Who should define what is moral and what constitutes morality? How should we govern our sexual and reproductive lives? In what ways do sexual and reproductive practices shape moral lives? What are the values that shape Filipinos?

Many of these questions have been the subject of contestation for decades and are not new.

Many of the political actors that figured in the past are still the same actors that are engaged actively in the current debates. Many would argue that not much has changed in the situation of the Philippines: It

remains underdeveloped and the social conditions under which people live have not improved; therefore, the context within which earlier contestations have taken place is unchanged. But, in the intervening years between the first national population policy in the 1970s and current attempts to institute a reproductive health care policy, the country experienced political upheavals in the transition between governments. This reconfigured the relationship between traditional political actors, as well as the character of the engagement between the state, the Catholic Church, and civil society. It is these political dynamics that are at play in the conflict over the reproductive health policy.

I have also tried to show in this chapter how reproductive health and population as a modernist project have been contested by different political actors – the State, the Catholic Church and the women’s health movement in the Philippines. Each of these actors makes claims on modernity by advancing their own vision of what makes a modern nation, what constitutes modern values, and what the modern future should look. But while they attempt to shape the discourse on reproductive health and population, specifically, and modernity or development, generally, they are in turn subjected to the molding, influencing, constructing force of modernity. The state, the Catholic Church and the women’s health movement as actors engaging each other all do so within the discursive field of modernity, where power enables each one to formulate and reformulate its own position while still holding these contending positions within its defining constraint. An effect of this engagement is the containment of reproductive health that strips it of the elements that would broaden women’s rights. The move of the

Catholic Church and its supporters to ground women’s health as family health invokes women’s rights while confining the same within the private domestic sphere. At the same time, the move by reproductive health advocates to repeatedly state the illegal status of abortion forecloses the possibility of a more democratic discussion of the issue.

CHAPTER THREE

REPRODUCING THE MORAL NATION: Catholicism and the Politics of Reproduction

“I’m sure that there (will be) some pressure from the Catholic population. Those who are very devout Catholics, who know the teachings of the Church, will try to persuade their own representatives in Congress… to look at the issue from the point of view of religious or moral principles. That is the responsibility of the citizenry. I imagine that is also the duty of our legislators to listen to their own people. If not, surely we will remember you in the next elections. That is natural.”

-- Archbishop Quevedo, quoted in IPPF, 2002

Why, in heaven’s name, Mr. Speaker, are the principal authors and sponsors insisting on legislating the promotion of artificial methods of contraception against the vehement objection of the majority of our people? We, Catholics…comprise no less than 80% of our population… artificial method of contraception is a direct assault and violation of our religious belief and in contravention with the provisions of the Constitution…(T)he bill therefore, in sum, in substance, is an advocacy of an extremely divisive policy.

The bill (goes) against the fundamental Catholic doctrines, the strong beliefs of the majority of Filipinos born and raised in a Catholic environment, a majority that must be reckoned with, whether we like it or not (sic). This is where the problem lies. It will not simply be a case of an ordinary disagreement… We cannot quibble or trifle with matters of faith. We may be looking at a possible conflagration… There is not cause for worry though in so far as the Church and its followers are concerned because violence and destabilization is (sic) not part of our teaching or advocacy.

But there are others, many others who may take advantage of the situation so that the gathering of signatures, the street rallies in different places, the spontaneous unplanned mobilizations in schools and colleges, the endless vigils and prayer rallies of millions of Catholics, which may be taken as a sign of massive unrest, may result in a divisiveness that may undermine the national peace and unity we are seeking to achieve.

-- Rep. del Mar, House plenary on the reproductive health bill 23 September 2008

In 2002, Archbishop Orlando Quevedo warned politicians about the doom waiting for them at the polls should they support the reproductive health bill filed in the House of Representatives. Six years later, Deputy Speaker Raul del Mar warns of a conflagration that can tear the country apart should fellow lawmakers approve the bill, which has been the subject of a contentious national debate for almost a decade. Both cast the issue of reproductive health within religious terms, framing the impending passage of the bill as an enormous conflict about faith, an affront to the Catholic majority, and finally a veiled declaration of war. Their language shifts from a sense of injury to a seeming readiness to use threats, from affirming peace and order to prophesying massive unrest. The leader of the Catholic Church and the legislator both claimed to speak for the Catholic majority, linked religious beliefs with citizenship, and demanded a prominent space in the policy arena for religious morality.

Embedded in these statements is a hegemonic narrative of a Catholic moral order providing cohesion for a God-fearing nation.

The role played by the Catholic Church in the legislative and public debates on reproductive health illustrates its peculiar position in Philippine politics and society. At once lauded and criticized for intervening in political events and issues, the Catholic Church nonetheless remains an institution to be reckoned with by groups, movements and parties wanting legitimacy. This is attested to by national surveys that identify the Catholic Church as the most trusted institution by Filipinos. This credibility is due largely to recent history and the part it played in struggling against a dictatorship and a repressive state, while siding with peasants, workers and the poor in the fight for social justice and democracy. At a time when all other political organizations suffered repression, it was the only institution left standing to support the broad movement for change. Those who support reproductive health confront an institution with a durable power that was able to face down a brutal state.

While the Catholic Church insists that its power only comes from the word of God, doctrinal persuasion has not been as effective as institutional might in convincing policymakers to withdraw their

support for the bill, or in pressuring current and former presidents to drop the bill from their priority legislative agendas. Its ability to pressure politicians speaks of the Church’s real power in the world of policymaking and politics. Its success in blocking the passage of the reproductive health bill for the last ten years is also proof. Yet, this success has also raised questions about the place of religion in the political life of the nation and the extent to which the Catholic Church should intervene in politics. As a result, calls for the strict observation of the separation of church and state have emerged from different sectors, including the media, academe and NGOs.

The social conflicts surfaced by the contentious debates on reproductive health reveal the myth of a unified moral nation under the Catholic Church. The battle at the policy level has also opened the field for the contestation over Catholic identity and its meaning. Moreover, threads counter to the

Catholic narrative of the nation begin to provide an alternative vision and practice of politics and citizenship.

In this section, I attempt to map out the domains where the Catholic Church wields influence, focusing on the entanglements between Catholicism and the nation, and how this has produced a discourse of religio-nationalism that impacts national consciousness as well as politics, policymaking and governing in the Philippines. The chapter has two parts. The first traces the historical roots of the power of the Catholic Church and how it exercises this power politically and culturally. I also discuss the challenges to the Church’s influence in the arena of reproductive health policymaking and the strategies the Church employs to marshall secular nationalist arguments to re-establish a religious moral ground.

The second part focuses on the status of Catholicism as a ‘natural’ part of Filipino culture and identity. I also discuss the efforts by reproductive health advocates to argue from within their faith, open questions about what makes a good Catholic, and assert a new flexible Catholic identity. Reproductive revisionism counters the Church’s strategic secularism (attempts to move away from religiously-based

arguments about reproductive health). These moves from the two opposing sides, I argue, reshape both what it means to be secular and what it means to be Catholic.

HEGEMONY AND THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

Religion, according to Rhys H. Williams (1996), is a political resource that operates as “culture” and as “ideology”. In many studies of religion and political struggles, however, the categories of culture and ideology are either conflated or taken as mutually exclusive. In these studies, religion, as culture, influences political relationships in that it provides mechanisms for the creation of symbolic worlds. It works as an implicit worldview that is absorbed and taken for granted, shaping meanings and forming identities. As Williams states, “Religion is less about [doctrinal] beliefs, per se, than about meaning in the world” (p. 370). Religion functions as a force that naturalizes the social order. However, religion as ideology has been taken as an idea system that disguises and mystifies power relations. As such, it functions in much the same way as culture in that religion legitimizes the existing political order and naturalizes domination. Williams uses Gramsci to analytically link and distinguish each other.

Gramsci introduces the concept of hegemony as a function which the dominant group exercises throughout society while direct domination is the function of the state (Hoare and Smith, eds.,

Selections from the Prison Notebooks (SPN), 2003). According to Gramsci, hegemony is dispersed in multiple sites of power which are not only located in the political domain but also in the private domain.

For Gramsci, the private domain refers to sites such as the educational system, the family, religion or the

Church, etc., which also correspond to civil society, or the other face of the state. However, Gramsci also suggests that hegemony is both force and consent acting together as elements of power relations, with the coercive elements of the State, in many ways, giving way to the regulation of civil society. As

Williams (1996) succinctly puts it, “(P)olitical control requires both coercion and consent” (p. 373).

Consent plays a large part in Gramsci’s notion of hegemony. The hegemonic process involves the formation of unity of groups and the elicitation of consent from both allied groups (which the dominant group leads) and from opposing groups (which it dominates). Hegemony in civil society is crucial because this is how even opposing groups can be brought under the influence of the dominant class. Cultural production and religious instruction, as well as influence in schools and in the family, are the ways the dominant group carry out their hegemonic activities. In this way, consent is already developed and established even before consent to political alliances happens. Here, the actions of the

Catholic Church in the Philippines serve as an example of how consent is harnessed, organized and mobilized in moments of political upheavals.

What is important, however, in thinking about hegemony is that it marks ever-shifting dynamic power relations which assume different forms within different contexts (Crehan, 2002). Thus, the balance of power becomes crucial in any given historical juncture. The Catholic Church in the

Philippines, as a site of power, illustrates this constant shifting of power configurations. In different historical moments, the Church, as an institution that shapes and influences people’s sentiments about morality, the family and the government, has shown itself also being strengthened or weakened by the state, or challenged by its own constituency, and especially by the poor. The elements within the

Church, both the progressive clergy and the traditional hierarchy, are also in constant engagement with each other, legitimizing or challenging the Church’s stance toward particular moral issues and groups of people, embodying the shifts of power inside and outside this institution.

PART ONE

CHURCH AND NATION THE COLONIAL PERIOD

The specific historical convergence of religion, colonization, and creation of a national identity gave Catholicism its profound impact on the life of the country. Prior to Spanish colonization, the

islands that came to be known as the Philippines did not have a collective identity. Spain, and more concretely the Catholic Church infrastructure, that brought these islands under the control of the monarchy (and God). The Christianization of the Philippines, as the main strategy in the colonizing process, created the nation and shaped its national identity.

The Catholic Church occupied prominent roles in colonialization and anti-colonial resistance. The

Church’s presence in Philippine politics began in the 16th century during the Spanish colonization5. The missionizing friars took on the colonial task and it was in this way that Christianization became integral to Spanish colonization (Deats, 1967). Through the establishment of the patronato real, the system which gave the Spanish crown the power to appoint the clergy in exchange for supporting the expenses of the Catholic Church, the history of the state and the Church became intertwined (Pertierra, 1988).

Friars took charge of maintaining the colonial government in the islands by performing baptismal rites that converted the population to Catholicism, implementing the encomienda system, collecting taxes for the monarchy and a range of other functions that made the friars both religious leaders and government administrators (Youngblood, 1990) for several centuries. The 1896 Revolution against Spain was instigated by a deep-seated anti-clericalism, spawned by the abuses and oppression by Spanish priests, and gave birth to Filipino nationalism. Religion has been enmeshed in the assertion of a Filipino national identity, at once serving the interests of colonial powers and providing an impetus for the natives’ fight against colonialism.

The American Commonwealth period brought the experience of the American Revolution and its theories of political governance and democracy to the Philippines. The “wall of separation” of Church and state was instituted in the 1935 Constitution and the Catholic Church was officially “disestablished”

5 The Philippines was under Spanish control for more than 300 years, under the American Commonwealth from 1898 to 1946, and briefly under the flag of Japan in the early 1940s during World War II.

(Bernas, 2003). Stripped of its direct access to secular power, the Catholic Church focused on its task of evangelization, and prepared to regain its public role through social action programs.

Scholars and theologians have described Filipinos as nominal Catholics who are given to public displays of religiosity but privately disregard the teachings of the Church (Bulatao, 1966). This “split-level

Christianity”, according to Father Jaime Bulatao (1966), allows for the private commission of religious transgressions while enabling the maintenance of moral status in the community. The centuries-long monopoly of the Catholic Church over the religious market, alongside with its political involvement and the consequent neglect by the clergy of its evangelical role, is one of the reasons cited for this state of affairs. Another explanation is the way religious indoctrination was implemented in an authoritarian style during the colonial period. As Spanish was the language of the colonial elite and the friars refused to teach this to the natives, the translation and interpretation of the Scripture was strictly controlled by the clergy. This ensured the monopoly of priests on doctrinal knowledge. The natives learned to be

Catholic by obeying and respecting the authority of the friars as the sole interpreter of God’s word. Up until the nineteenth century, the Bible was never translated into a vernacular language and owning one was punishable by law. Rote learning and reverence for religious leaders characterized religious indoctrination. This rigid hierarchical relationship between priests and their communities persists until today. This also partly supports the argument for the view that Catholicism did not fully take root in the archipelago, as it never succeeded in dislodging pre-Christian beliefs and practices (Kessler and Ruland,

2008).

BASIC CHRISTIAN COMMUNITIES: FROM SOCIAL ACTION TO REVOLUTION

In the 1950s, the Catholic Church had seen its public influence wane when it was viewed primarily as the Church of the elite, with whom the performance of religious public rituals were/are mostly associated (Pertierra, 1988), and which prompted the creation of Basic Christian Communities

(BCCs) as a strategy to regain its relationship with the masses (Fabros, 1988). It was this more

progressive stream within the Church that spoke against oppression, worked on social justice issues and became the moral voice against the dictatorship from the 1970s until the mid-1980s.

Inspired by the opening offered by Vatican II and in response to the question of how to define

Church involvement in socio-political matters, the Catholic Church in the Philippines set up economic and self-help programs in 1965 as part of its social action strategy (Youngblood, 1990; Hechanova,

2002). By 1966, Church-state relations were defined by the collaboration between the Church and the

Marcos government on social action initiatives, with the regime emphasizing the inevitable overlap of the material and the spiritual spheres and the necessity of cooperation between the two (Hechanova,

2002). But the social action paradigm’s weaknesses became evident in the face of human rights violations and social injustice during the Martial Law years and its inability to confront the unequal power relations in Philippine society, especially in the rural and agrarian sectors (Youngblood, 1990). It was through social action programs, however, that priests, nuns and laypersons began their integration with the poor communities and their exposure to broader social issues, which would serve as a catalyst for their deeper involvement in the anti-dictatorship and social transformation movements (San Juan,

1986).

By the early 1970s, the Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines (AMRSP) took up cudgels for the oppressed and raised a strong voice against the dictatorship. The liberation theology in Latin America served as an influence on the AMRSP, which represented 2,500 priests and 7,000 nuns from different orders. In 1972, the Christians for National Liberation (CNL), was formed. Composed of priests, nuns and lay workers, the CNL would later join the underground Communist Party of the

Philippines/National Democratic Front and wage an armed struggle. The Church hierarchy would spend much of its energy protecting priests and nuns from raids, arrests, and detentions by the military. The

Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) would eventually, although belatedly, openly criticize the Marcos regime, ending the critical collaboration with government that it had cultivated in

the earlier years (San Juan, 1986; Youngblood, 1990; Hechanova, 2002). A “theology of struggle” (dela

Torre, 1986) was espoused by radical priests, who argued that the Church is a Church of this world and therefore, could not be insulated from the injustices it sees. Oppositional ideologies of Marxism, liberal reformism and anti-communism all had strongholds in the Catholic establishment and debates about the proper role of the Church in politics persisted within the institution. What bound these perspectives together was their common opposition to the Marcos regime.

Although this period of political ferment introduced radicalism into the Church, progressive voices were found mostly among the ranks of priests and nuns who worked directly with communities.

While the Church hierarchy protected its rank and file from state retaliation, and became a champion of civil and political rights, it nevertheless remained conservative in its views on gender, reproduction, sexuality and the family. Moreover, where the Catholic Church’s own authority is concerned, the rigid hierarchical relationship between the Church and lay persons remained, notwithstanding its work with grassroots communities and discourse on democracy. This rigid hierarchy also held the Church and its affiliated groups together, as dissenting voices from within were contained. In the course of the debates on reproductive health, individual priests and nuns who supported the bill maintained that they could not speak publicly about their own views as it would go against the official position of the Church. Thus, while there are diverse voices and perspectives within the Church, these existed in the margins and were subsumed (and suppressed) within the institution’s authoritarian hierarchical tradition. In this,

Church leaders succeeded in presenting to the public a united Church, with one voice.

MIRACULOUS UPRISING

With the crackdown on the press, the muzzling of the judiciary and the tight control on the legislature during the Martial Law period, the Catholic Church, as the oldest institution of the nation, was the only pillar left standing to oppose Marcos. Its network of parishes, schools and grassroots organizations provided the support for the democratization movement. By the time of the People Power

revolution in 1986, its radio station, Radio Veritas, which until then broadcast only religious programs had become a virtual dissident underground station giving people instructions where to go, what to bring, what to prepare for, and praying for moral triumph during the five days that it took to topple

Marcos (Hechanova, 2002). The Church served as the tolling carillon agitating people to defend democracy. The pouring out of millions of Filipinos into the streets in response to the call of the

Archbishop Jaime Sin for people to go and fill EDSA Avenue to protect rebel soldiers from being attacked by the Marcos military was testimony to the power of the Church to unite Filipinos.

During those five days that overthrew Marcos and installed Cory Aquino as President, the symbolic power of the Church was brought out in full force. Rosaries, crucifixes, flowers, candles, prayers, kneeling nuns, priests in white, and above all, statues of the Virgin Mary, were the artillery unleashed by People Power (Tadiar, 2004), sidelining the slogans of the Left and progressive movements,. The Church would later claim that it was this devotion to God that thawed the hearts of the military forces, stopped the tanks on the Marcos side, and prevented what could have been certain bloodshed. Before long, Cardinal Sin would be beside Supreme Court Justice Teehankee during Cory

Aquino’s oath-taking, giving his blessings to the first woman President of the Republic.

To memorialize the miraculous uprising and “evoke the reality of Our Lady's presence at EDSA during the People Power Revolution,” a shrine was built by the Catholic Church on the major intersection of EDSA and Ortigas Avenue, with the towering bronze sculpture of Our Lady of Queen of

Peace forming the “apex of the structure” as she looked over the city’s chaotic life6. The EDSA Shrine was inaugurated on December 8, 1989, a day after Cory Aquino’s government survived the most dangerous of the many coup attempts against it, and has since been the site for the yearly People Power celebrations and other important religious events (http://www.edsashrine.com/edsa/the-edsa-

6 According to the EDSA Shrine website, the prime corner lot on which the Shrine was built was donated by two families of the economic elite, the Ortigas and Gokongwei families, the former known for its real estate business and the latter for its chain of malls. Prominent artists, including the National Artist, Architect Leandro Locsin, were involved in developing the design for the Shrine.

shrine.html). It also serves as a reminder of the crucial role that the Church played in that historic moment.

WHICH PEOPLE, WHAT NATION, WHOSE CHURCH?

Through different Philippine historical periods, the nation and state seem to occupy different and separate spaces in the imagination of the Filipino people. In the colonial era, the state was established even before there was a nation in the sense of a collective Filipino identity. The contemporary state is a product of colonialism imposed on the different and disparate groups on the islands. Moreover, the colonial state merged with the Catholic Church and the Christianizing mission.

The emergence of a Filipino national consciousness and national identity was a counterpoint to colonialism. Thus, in this context, the state and the nation were ideas and forces working in opposition.

The nation, as embodied in the desire of Filipinos for independence and freedom from Spain and subsequently from the United States and Japan, had to fight the state to fulfill its “nationhood.” The identification of the Church with the state created obstacles to the fulfillment of this nationhood. And

“the people”, with their collective experience of colonial oppression, became the antithesis of the abusive Catholic Church.

The dichotomy of the state/Church, on one hand, and nation/the people, on the other, was reconfigured in the latter years of martial law as the Catholic Church shifted from its traditional allegiance to the state and crossed the power line to be with “the people” in their collective fight against the US-propped dictatorship. For many Filipinos, the Catholic Church in that historical moment became the Church of and for the people.

There are two things worth keeping in mind about this reconfiguration of forces. The Church’s institutional might and influence, while used to support people’s desire for democracy, was also employed to appropriate the discourse of democracy and freedom. Its ability to define this historical moment as an act and will of God (Tadiar, 2004) diverted the 1986 People Power movement from its

radical promise to reinstitute social order and harmony. With the visibility of the Church hierarchy, in the person of Archbishop Cardinal Sin and the other bishops, and the marginalization of radical voices, the call of People Power was transformed from social justice and equality to political reconciliation and magnanimous victory.

It is imperative that we interrogate the meaning of “the people in the shifting politics of People

Power, and what it refers or has come to refer to. In the beginning, the People Power event was a container for different movements and political factions with the common cause of defeating the

Marcos regime. The people from diverse sectors who participated in it were homogenized into a nation for democracy and took Cory Aquino as their unifying center. With the victory and presidency of Cory

Aquino, with whom the people identified, a state/nation/people configuration became possible. But the people Cory Aquino7 represented in this struggle for national liberation were the elite, the same extractive exploitative hacenderos and capitalists disenfranchised by Marcos and against whom priests and nuns in the theology of struggle together with peasants and workers had collided. People Power became a platform on which this elite faction launched their brand of nationalist aspirations, purporting to espouse social change, national progress and honest government, but refusing to accommodate social equality and served to privilege only the few.

The Church hierarchy’s proximity to Aquino, whose personal piety and obedience to Catholic doctrines complied with religious morality, and her elite circle, was seen as a sign of the Church’s approval of an elite-defined nationalist agenda. For the elite who ran the affairs of the state, their show of public piety became a marker for their supposed nationalism, and the Catholic Church once again enjoyed the company of the (new) state, which by virtue of People Power now purportedly represented the true sentiments of “the people.”

7 Cory Aquino comes from the Cojuangco clan, which owns the sugar plantation, Hacienda Luisita. Her family also owned the monopolistic telephone company, PLDT.

THE CONSTITUTION AND THE MORAL ORDER

Following the 1986 People Power revolution that brought Corazon Cojuangco Aquino, the widow of slain Senator Benigno Aquino, to the presidency, a Constitutional Commission was created to draft the fundamental law of the land to replace the Marcos-instituted 1973 Constitution. The ConCom, as it was called, included in its ranks a priest, a bishop, a nun, and at least thirty nine “Catholic

Commissioners” (Bolasco, 1994). In the context of a revolutionary government8, the ConCom proceeded to formulate one of the most progressive bills of rights in the region, reflecting the ideals of the post- dictatorship period and strengthening democratic space in the country. However, the very same

Constitution that expands political rights restricts rights for women. The intertwining of the discourses of family, reproduction and sexuality with that of democracy signaled a new female maternal citizenship

(Canning, 1996). The strong presence of Church representatives in this political process signaled yet again the merging of Catholicism with the rebirth of the nation. As Corazon Aquino’s address to the

Manila clergy on May 1986 revealed, she entrusted to priests two tasks: the renewal of morals and morale of the people as “their most important contribution to nation building” and the constructive critical collaboration of the Church officialdom with the new government (Bolasco, 1994).

It was at this juncture that the Catholic representatives in the ConCom successfully enshrined a provision in the Constitution protecting the life of the unborn. Section 12 of the Declaration of Principles and State Policies states: “The State recognizes the sanctity of family life and shall protect and strengthen the family as a basic autonomous social institution. The State shall equally protect the life of the mother and the life of the unborn from conception” (Constitutional Commission, 1986) During the debates on the floor, Commissioner Bernardo Villegas, the sponsor of the provision and a prominent ally of the Catholic Church, explained that the intention of the Section was to prevent abortion from ever

8 When Corazon Aquino ascended to power, abrogating the 1971 Martial Law Constitution was one of her first acts. Without a Constitutional framework within which to exist, her government was declared a revolutionary government in its first year, during which a Constitutional Commission was formed to formulate a new Constitution.

being legalized in the country. Noting that Philippine law follows closely US jurisprudence, he wanted to put in place constitutional guarantees that would prevent the legislature from enacting a law based on the “infamous” Roe v Wade decision. While several commissioners intervened and argued that the provision “preempts the possibility of a thorough, scholastic and academic discussion on the debates on human life,” a matter still being debated by science, medicine, and other disciplines, the sentiment that it would be better to err on the side of caution and protect life (cells) from the moment of fertilization prevailed (Constitutional Commission, 1986: (4) 705). The triumph of Catholic universalist principles over the particular realities of women’s lives, such as rape and poverty, is captured by Commissioner Villegas’ argument: “I can just repeat the transcendental reasons that a wrong cannot be righted by another wrong; a very good end never, never justifies an immoral means” (Constitutional Commission, 1986:

(4)709). It was the constitutionalization of “the absolutist claims on morality in the name of human life,” as Commissioner Felicitas Aquino pointed out (Constitutional Commission, 1986: (4) 705). (See also

Commissioner Abubakar’s argument about the nation p. 710.]

Whatever semblance of separation of Church and state there was gave way to the moral authority of the Catholic Church in the political life of the nation. At the same time, only a few

(Constantino, 1991) dared to criticize the Church hierarchy for its penchant for taking front stage in political issues. Politicians, even before the People Power era, had already been accustomed to asking approval from the Church and now feared losing their status as God-fearing individuals, a status which symbolically conferred on them a moral right to govern the people.

PEOPLE POWER 2: “MORALITY IS FROM GOD”

The moral course of the nation as defined by the Catholic Church hierarchy would, however, be derailed by the emergence and victory of Joseph Estrada in the presidential elections of 1998. Estrada, a popular and former actor, has had a long political career, serving as Mayor of San Juan City for several terms before being elected as a Senator in the 1980s and later as Vice-President in 1992. By 2000, the

exposé about Estrada’s use of local government structures to facilitate, protect and, ultimately, profit from illegal gambling operations propelled the daily massive indignation rallies calling for his resignation. The EDSA Shrine became the natural site for these protests. While political and civic groups, NGOs, the business community, various sectors and unaffiliated individuals participated in these protests, the crisis gave the Catholic Church yet another opportunity to flex its moral-political muscle.

Even before the investigation and impeachment proceedings started, Cardinal Sin together had already issued a pastoral letter urging Estrada to step down out of “delicadeza9,” asserting that given the scandals the president had lost the moral ascendancy to govern. While some priests and bishops balked at what looked then as a presumptive call, they would later hail Cardinal Sin’s act as part of the

“prophetic” task of the Church. As Msgr. Villegas explained (Sioson San Juan 2001),

A prophet is a spokesman of God. The prophet waits for the word of God and proclaims it, once known, even if he is alone, even when faced with threats of being persecuted and killed. The prophet does not consult surveys. He does not wait for the voice of the majority. He only waits for the inspiration from God, reads the signs of the times, studies them, then goes to proclaim the truth (p. 199).

And the “truth” was the holy ground on which the archbishop and his priests stood when they declared to the faithful that Estrada must step down. For the Church the issue was “morality in public office” and the “morality of the highest political leader of the nation” (Sioson San Juan, 2001), which also pointed to the scandal around Estrada’s extravagant lifestyle and the titillating stories about his many mistresses and children.

If People Power 1 was about freedom and democracy, People Power 2 revolved around competent and clean governance, which is achieved only through the gift of morality from God. When eleven senators from Estrada’s camp outvoted the rest of the senator-judges to prevent the opening of the infamous envelope bearing the President’s alleged criminal misdeed, Cardinal Sin intoned, “Morality

9 This roughly translates to both “decency” and “shame” combined.

is not a matter of numbers. Morality is from God. God does not sleep. God will judge. God will punish all those who prevent the truth from being known” (Sioson San Juan, 2001, p. 200). And for Msgr. Villegas,

Cardinal Sin was “the prophet of hope, the prophet of wrath against immorality” (p. 200). It became apparent at this point that People Power 2 lacked the trepidation of its predecessor to be merely called a miraculous revolt. In People Power 2 was the ripening of a triumphalist nationalist moralism, bursting with confidence and certainty, justifying a “holy war”.

The call of Cardinal Sin and the Church during People Power 1 was vastly different from the

Church’s pronouncement justifying the overthrow of the leader of the nation. In 1986, in the wake of massive cheating by Marcos in the snap elections, the Church declared that he had lost the “moral basis” for governing. The Church bishops then did not say that because of his corruption and lack of morals Marcos had lost his moral ascendancy and moral right to rule (Zulueta, 2001).

The Church notes with confidence the rolethat it played in installing through People Power the governments of Corazon Aquino and Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. It was with the same power -- to make and unmake presidents and political careers -- that the Catholic Church would threaten politicians who dared to go against the teachings of the Church.

It is no surprise then that politicians, who distrust each other, regularly trekked to Cardinal Sin’s villa (which the Archbishop jokingly referred to as “the House of Sin”) to seek his “guidance” and

“blessing.” The events leading to People Power 2, and, in particular, the exposé by Ilocos Governor

Chavit Singson on jueteng10, had the stamp of approval from Sin. This authority to designate right from wrong, moral from immoral, would come into full force when, at the height of negotiations between

People Power 2 groups and the Estrada camp, then Vice-President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo went to the

Cardinal to ask for his recommendations to the Cabinet and to report that she had acceded to the

10 The illegal numbers game popular in local communities and from which Estrada and his cronies of politicians profited.

request of the generals who had crossed over to their side to give Estrada four days to leave the Palace.

The Archbishop of Manila, the astute politician and soldier of God, was known to have thundered,

Gloria, you are now the president…If you begin your presidency by doing what the generals want, you will do that for the rest of your term…Let the generals obey you and follow you. Please, take your oath. The people are waiting for you. (Villegas, 2001, p. 201).

On January 20, 2001, the day of Estrada’s fall from grace, the military leadership abandoned their Commander-in-Chief and switched loyalty to the People Power 2 faction. In front of the EDSA

Shrine, about a million people witnessed the triumvirate of Cardinal Sin, General Angelo Reyes and soon-to-be President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo join hands and forces, to officiate the anticipated

“renewal” of the nation and the conclusion of a morality play. The scene was reminiscent of the lay-out of the Spanish colonial town center: the Church cathedral in the middle, flanked by the municipal hall, on one side, and by the guardia civil barracks, on the other hand, while the plaza where the townspeople congregate lay before them, for better monitoring and surveillance by the three pillars of power. Then, as now, there was acknowledgment that one’s social status derived from the distance between one’s house and the Church: the closer you live to the cathedral, the closer you are to power, and that means you yourself are powerful.

RELIGIO-NATIONALISM

The merging and conflation of Catholic identity and morality, on one hand, with nationalism, on the other hand, speaks to powerful sentiments and myths - about religion and nation - that feed into, form and work in tension with each other. I refer to this process of co-construction between Catholic identity and national identity as religio-nationalism. This fusion of religion with the nation and the survival of the nation forms the critical lens which can help us for understanding and locating the political dynamics involved in the debate on the reproductive health bill.

Undoubtedly, the People Power events have left an indelible mark on the political imagination of Filipinos. They constituted proud moments in history during which various sectors of the population identified with each other’s struggles, renewing people’s faith in social change and collective political action. These events also reclaimed a historical legacy: that of a people whose ancestors mounted the first successful anti-colonial revolution in Asia, and who now had the power to once again change and determine the future direction of the nation. Each People Power victory heralded a promise of a new beginning that would finally spell growth and progress long aspired for by Filipinos. In these historic moments, there was a sense that the unification of the nation was being undertaken not only in the name of democracy and modernity, but even more so in the name of God and the Church. The nation struggled to break the yoke of oppression; in so doing, it fulfilled the will of God. The nation was cleansed and purified, but, ultimately, it was God and religion that emerged as victors.

Catholicism has insinuated into, and (re)taken the center stage in, the political imagination of the post-colonial nation. Whereas the abuses of, and hatred for, the Catholic friars ignited the revolution against the Spanish colonial state more than a century ago, in the post-colonial era, the political power of the Catholic Church has been re-embraced by Filipinos as a weapon against the authoritarian and patrimonial state. The weight of historical legacy and the exigencies of continuing political crises have combined to fashion the Catholic Church as a defender of freedom and democracy, of the exploited and down trodden, of the helpless and the weak, against the abuses of the system. Thus, nationalist and democratic ideals became intertwined with Catholic ethics and identity. At the same time, politics and nationalism have become imbued with religious language and discourse, framing political affairs into contests of “good versus evil” and giving rise to calls for a “national moral recovery”.

People Power movement aspired to build a democratic society, one based on the principle of uniting diverse groups of people while recognizing their differences, and guaranteeing equal rights to all.

Yet, these democratic ideals collide with the politics of the nation, which rest on the principle of defining

uniqueness and drawing boundaries (Rhadakrishnan, 1992). Here, the re-born nation, which already claims uniqueness based on its being the only Christian country in Asia, defines its fundamental identity and aspirations in terms of Catholic moral and political values. The pluralism that a democratic society supposedly upholds dissolves in the re-drawing of religio-political boundaries as Catholicism sweeps aside other religious identities, ethical perspectives and political alternatives. Moreover, pluralism becomes defined as pluralism and unity only of the majority religion. As bishops and their allies never fail to remind their adversaries, Catholics make up more than 80 percent of Filipinos and, if their religious moral sentiments are not respected or accommodated, they can rise up against the state as a single mass. In this regard, the parameters of national belonging are circumscribed by Catholic identity and loyalty to the Church. Challenging this relation between the nation and the Catholic Church constitutes an act that will divide the nation.

PART TWO

HIDDEN INJURIES

Up until now, the narrative of a Catholic Church of and for all, one with the nation’s aspirations, dominates the discourse of the nation and the people’s struggle for democracy. As in any balance of power, this narrative privileges the actions and voices of certain groups while excluding others.

The national unity displayed at EDSA by People Power 2 was shattered by the spontaneous outpouring of grief and rage that Estrada’s urban poor constituency unleashed three months later. In late April 2001, masses of slum dwellers, who were responsible for his overwhelming electoral victory, decided to stage their own revolt to re-install the populist Estrada. Moved by the appearance on national television of a defeated humiliated Estrada, now treated like a common criminal, the “great unwashed” took the former president’s injury as their own, because it was “sobra na, kawawa naman si

Erap” (This is too much already. Erap [Estrada]is already beaten.) It was the first time in decades that hundreds of thousands of slum-dwelling Filipinos spontaneously poured into the streets without any organizational support from progressive groups.

They trooped to EDSA Avenue, Metro Manila’s main highway, and like the crowd during the second People Power kept vigil for days at the Shrine of Our Lady of Peace. But the crowd in the so- called Poor People Power event, which did not have any organization or structure, was nothing like the

“perfumed crowd”11 of People Power 2. Their brand of political pornography – sexual jokes, rude songs, lewd slogans mixed with political dissent – confirmed for the educated middle class the slum dwellers’

“uncouth,” “uncivilized” underclass culture. When they refused to evacuate the grounds of the EDSA

Shrine, the Archbishop of Manila, Cardinal Sin, threatened that they had no permit to use the site, warning that the Shrine was “private property”.

11 The visible elite and upper class crowd, members of whom always wore white and some of whom brought their maids to the demonstrations and rallies, was tagged by the Philippine press as the “perfumed crowd.” The tag was also in reference to observations that this crowd seemed to never sweat or smell under the scorching sun.

In the early morning of May 1st, Labor Day, about 50,00012 slum dwellers at EDSA, , moved to attack Malacañan in Mendiola13, their indignation further increased by the speeches of politician- agitators from the Estrada camp who saw a political opportunity in the spontaneous mobilization of urban poor. What Filipinos witnessed on television that day was a bloody, violent riot that lasted for more than twelve hours. With rage as their only weapon, the slum dwellers, the so-called “masa,” took on the police, the media, and anybody who stood in their way. The rampage resulted in the death of several individuals and in the injury of countless others, as well as in the destruction of property worth millions of pesos. It shattered Filipinos’ view of themselves as a “peaceful” people and revealed the

“dark side” of People Power. Later, rebellion charges would be filed against the leaders of the uprising.

But while the violent Mendiola scene continuously flashed onscreen, another scene at the EDSA

Shrine unfolded that morning. After the masa had moved to Mendiola, prominent figures and middle class people who supported People Power 2 reappeared at EDSA, and armed with brooms, rags, soap and water, vigorously cleaned up the marble walls and stone steps of the Shrine. The Catholic hierarchy deplored the “immorality” of the People Power 3 “mob” for trashing the place and mouthing obscenities before the imposing presence of the Virgin Mary. Cardinal Sin, together with People Power 2 personalities, accused the “mob” of desecrating “holy ground” (Tenorio, 2001). This prompted members of the urban poor to accuse the Church of being elitist.

The violent riot spoke of the pain and resentment that the poor had long endured against an unjust system and could no longer bear, thus their fury at being once again ignored. To them, Erap was not just their defender; he was one of their own. His ascension to power was because the poor put him there; his victory was therefore also theirs. They wanted Estrada back, arguing that the aborted impeachment trial failed to prove Estrada’s guilt and that he deserved a fair trial. When asked, however,

12 At its peak, People Power 3 was estimated varyingly from 300,000 to a million. 13 The main street leading to the gates of Malacanang.

to explain why they liked Erap, they fell back on firm but incoherent beliefs, “Basta, basta” (Because, because) (dela Torre, 2001).

At this point, it is easy to dismiss the assertion of these thousands of squatters as fanaticism.

However, at their rallies, mixed in with the lewd jokes, the millenarian atmosphere and the emotional slogans to bring back Estrada, were calls to respect the Philippine Constitution. It was a curious call coming from the uneducated classes which many suspected were planted by Estrada’s allies. As some people cynically and insultingly asked, “When did the masa become Constitutional experts?” Yet, as dela

Torre (2001) explained, the masses may have no place in society but when it came to politics and elections, their vote mattered a lot to them. Politicians may buy their vote, but it still remains their own, something that they control. For the poor then, the vote is the only power available to them and it is through that power that they can express their sentiments. When Estrada was removed from his position before he could finish his term, the poor saw it as changing the rules -- rules, which society told them to follow, and yet, when they did so to their advantage, were once again changed to benefit others.

It is clear that the issue of respecting the Constitution was not an abstract idea for Estrada’s supporters. The slum dwellers’ insistence on following constitutional procedures rested on the norms of liberal democracy, i.e., individual rights and electoral processes, which they claimed as their own as members of the national citizenry. These norms meant that they had achieved their own electoral victory through Estrada’s election into office. The numerical dominance that the poor marshaled during the elections was supposedly the realization of a representative and inclusive political process. Yet, their majority soon was forced to give way to People Power 2, which disqualified their electoral victory. Here,

Crehan’s (2002) elaboration of Gramsci’s concept of hegemony becomes instructive. Crehan explains that an aspect of hegemony in practice is “the power to determine the structuring rules within which

struggles are to be fought out” (p. 204). Given a shifting power dynamic, the slum dwellers sought to use yet again the rules of the elite and middle classes by staging their own uprising.

But not having harnessed their own political tools, they sought to mimic People Power 2, borrowing its form, symbols and rhetoric that political observers judged pathetic and farcical (David,

2001; Severino, 2001). Unseating Gloria was the answer to the ouster of Erap, in what could have been a movie plot about the comeback of a beaten hero. For the masses, who chanted “Nandyan na kami!

Maghanda na kayo!” (We are coming! Get ready!) (Rafael, 2001, p. 423), the time for revenge had come and they, along with Erap, were the heroes who would rise from the dust and defeat the real enemy.

This “apocalyptic agency” (Rafael, 2001) also echoed of the resurrection of Christ with whose sufferings the masses had culturally identified.

SUBALTERN CONSCIOUSNESS

I want to return to the inability of the urban poor to articulate their reasons for supporting

Estrada and for staging People Power 3. Gramsci characterizes subaltern consciousness as fragmentary and contradictory, precisely because it is subaltern and does not have enough of coherence to view and comprehend the world. It contains contradictory elements because it has imbibed the hegemonic worldview of the dominant group clashes with the particular subaltern reality that it deals with. Herein lies also the potential instability of the hegemonic formation or structure. And this is what hegemonic classes want to hold off and prevent from developing into a crisis. But Gramsci concedes to the

(necessary) limit of the subaltern consciousness to form spontaneously into transformative movements that can challenge dominant classes.

As Crehan (2002) elaborates on Gramsci, a key dimension of inequality is the inability of subaltern people “to produce coherent accounts of the world they live in that have the potential to challenge the existing hegemonic accounts (which by definition see the world from the perspective of the dominant) in any effective way” (p. 104). In People Power 3, the urban poor who came out in droves

understood injustice, inequality and the unfairness of changing the rules in the middle of the game, so to speak. They also understood that they had always been marginalized by the system. In their slogan,

“Poor is Power,” they tried to pose an idea counter to the kind of legal power wielded by the upper and middle classes. But “Poor is Power” worked only at the level of making a virtue out of being poor, remaining an unsystematic consciousness and ideology about class politics. As both dela Torre (2001) and Fortaleza (2001) observed when they attempted to join the People Power vigil at EDSA, the slogans and ideas circulating in the crowd were “hilaw” (raw, or not well-thought out, or lacking in analytical force). As veteran members of the socialist movement/s in the country, both dela Torre and Fortaleza, however, admitted that at EDSA, they were the spectators whose ideas had to take second priority to the spontaneous expression of sentiments by the urban poor. The contradictory elements of this subaltern consciousness reveal themselves in the simultaneous rejection of the norms and symbols of the wealthy educated class and the passionate support for Estrada, who remains upper class after all.

RESPECT AND RECOGNITION

The nation watched in horror the crude behavior of the tsinelas (rubber flip flops) crowd (Rafael,

2001), who was depicted as “hakot,” trucked in and paid by Estrada’s supporters, supplied with shabu

(known as “poor man’s cocaine”), always high and intoxicated, and some of whom literally brought their laundry to wash outside; the poor forced the elite and middle classes, the Church and the country’s leaders to see the nation’s social wound. The political rage of People Power 3 was, however, easily domesticated -- explained by the middle class media and by the government as a product of the political manipulation by the Estrada camp of an ignorant, hungry, deprived, victimized section of the population (Fortaleza, 2001; Tenorio, 2001; Rafael, 2001; Doronila, 2001b). Cardinal Sin, in the aftermath of the violent riot on May 1, emphasized that “the poor will have to be the priority” (Sison,

2001).

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Chatterjee (2004), in his discussion of the emergence of mass democracies in the West, points to the distinction between citizens and populations. He argues that unlike the concept of citizen which connotes “participation in the sovereignty of the state,” the concept of population enables government to reach large sections of inhabitants as “the targets of their ‘policies’” (p. 34). In the aftermath of

People Power 3, prioritizing the poor by way of poverty alleviation and education schemes was the proposal to solve mass discontent. For the government and the middle and upper classes, the lack of education of the poor and their vulnerability to manipulation became the main culprit in the shameful

May 1st uprising. Given this framing of the events, it was easier to think of the poor as beneficiaries of socio-economic programs than to confer on them the full rationality of citizenship. Moreover, the moral assumptions about being a citizen in Philippine society, exposed during People Power 2 and 3, made the urban poor ineligible for citizenship. Their lack of respect for private property, their seemingly incoherent and rude language, their inability to distinguish between public and private space, and the violent manner by which they conducted themselves all demonstrate that the squatters were too

“uncivilized” to fully take part in civil society. To take Mamdani’s (1996) argument in his discussion of the African colonial state, civil society post-People Power 1 and 2 “was presumed to be civilized society, from whose ranks the uncivilized were excluded” (p. 16).

Activists who decided to support People Power 3 (and separate from the majority of progressive and Left groups which supported People Power 2) defended the urban poor, asserting that although other politicians rode on the potential gain from the poor’s uprising, it could not be denied that many of those who participated came out into the streets of their own choice. Ed dela Torre (2001), a former priest who was in the underground movement during the Marcos years and served in the anti-poverty commission under Estrada, adds a nuanced perspective by explaining that poverty alone was not the reason for the violent riot. To him, had it been poverty alone, the country would have had many Poor

People Power events a long time ago. Rather, it was the combined “exclusion and contempt” for the

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“maliliit” (the small) that the poor felt from the elite, from the government, and from the Church that caused the social eruption. The provocation then was not just structural but cultural and deeply personal. As a participant in People Power 3 bewailed, “They insult us by saying we were paid to go to

EDSA. They see us as scum and scavengers because we are poor. This is a matter of life and death”

(Sison, 2001).

The discourse of social justice, according to Nancy Fraser (1996), “once centered on distribution, is now increasingly divided between claims of redistribution, on the one hand, and claims for recognition, on the other” (pp. 3-4). Redistribution claims speak to the need for a more just distribution of resources and goods while recognition claims speak to a politics of respect that rests on difference rather than assimilation to the dominant norms. While there is a tendency among social movements to treat redistribution and recognition as antithetical claims, Fraser argues that neither of the two alone is sufficient thus, the need for both to be integrated in a single social justice framework.

The tension between the two claims, however, emerges in the politics of People Power 3. Whereas government and civil society groups stressed the urgency to address the economic needs of the urban poor, urban poor communities, on the other hand, had demands that went beyond access to government services and goods for their members. What they emphasized was the desire to be treated with respect and dignity. This brings us back to their assertion of “Poor is Power.” Here, poverty is not rejected but is instead turned into a potentiality. What is implied in the slogan is the possibility of redemption in being poor; it is, however, the contempt for the poor that is being repudiated.

Believing in the infallibility of its morality, the Church, the government and the People Power 2 groups claimed to speak for the whole nation and the Filipinos. Thinking that what it valued – good governance, moral leadership, honest government institutions, religious obedience – was universal, it failed to recognize that for the poor, whose desperate lives have seen no improvement from one

President to another, these things made no difference. From the perspective of the poor masses, the

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system has never worked for them and having a Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo benefited only the elite and the educated. Abandoned even by the Catholic Church, they felt all the more their social exclusion.

Estrada, on the other hand, an imperfect leader though he may be, never looked down on them and truly enjoyed their company.

In the context of People Power 3, the outpouring of the poor masses into the streets with their own ideas of governance, leadership, justice and God, cannot but be interpreted as an assertion of an authentic morality, in defiance of what has been defined by the elite and the Catholic Church.

As contrasting events, People Power 2 and 3 surfaced social divisions masked by the idea of a unified moral nation triumphing over corruption, injustice and exploitation. As an exercise in participatory democracy, People Power 2 and 3 revealed a politics of citizenship and the kinds of legitimate political claims that can be accommodated by the state. Moreover, these events brought to the fore the class politics mediating the principles and practice of citizenship, which allow for certain forms of exclusion and domination that conflict with universalist notions of democracy, equality and morality – ideals assumed to be at the heart of People Power as guided by the Catholic Church. Here, who are “the people” referred to in People Power, who can make claims on the state and religion, what makes a claim moral, and by whose authoritative imprimatur can a claim be judged legitimate and moral. Moreover, underlying this morality is an identification with a Church and a God who suffer with them, look kindly on them, and will open the doors of heaven for them.

PART THREE

MAKING AND UNMAKING POLITICAL CAREERS

Two years prior to the 2010 national elections, as politicians started to intensify their campaigns, Ozamiz Archbishop Jesus Dosado issued a pastoral letter stating that lawmakers who supported “pro-abortion bills” would be denied the Holy Communion because they were “in a situation of sin”. But the Archbishop clarified that refusing to give the Eucharist to pro-reproductive health

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legislators was not a sanction or penalty, rather, it was “a reaction to a person’s public unworthiness to receive the Holy Communion” (Cebu Daily News 2008). Although the Catholic Bishops Conference of the

Philippines (CBCP) did not adopt this as its official position, several bishops followed Archbishop

Dosado’s lead and released their own pastoral warnings.

How the denial of the sacrament could not be interpreted as a form of punishment, especially in the context of stern disapproval of the legislators’ continued support for the bill, was a subtlety lost on the public. If the public were to take the denial of Holy Communion as an act of non-punishment, as the bishops would have them believe, then the threat by the bishops can only be seen as unnecessary and irrelevant. It was clear, however, that Church leaders made the clarification so as not to be accused of intimidating legislators and their constituents and to avert public criticism. During our interview, the spokesperson for the CBCP, Atty. Jo Imbong, defended the bishops’ position, “The Church does not intimidate. It is a good mother to her children.” While the Catholic hierarchy realized the importance of managing the public response to its action, its main target remained the legislators who would be voting on the measure. In this, it achieved results as a number of legislators, after getting calls and visits from the bishops, announced they were withdrawing support for the reproductive health bill.

National surveys consistently show that majority of Filipinos want the government to provide family planning and reproductive health services. That they express a need for these services indicates that Filipinos do not see their Catholicism as a barrier to practicing contraception. The same surveys also reveal that Filipinos would vote for politicians who support reproductive health. Voting patterns also debunk the notion of a Catholic vote. While Filipinos consider themselves religious, this religiosity does not translate into votes meant solely to affirm the Catholic Church’s official position on a specific issue.

Voting patterns, in fact, reveal that Filipinos do not vote based on a single issue.

However, even with this evidence, politicians admit to feeling intimidated by the Catholic

Church’s brand of pressure politics. In 2008, during the 13th Congress, a number of legislators who

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support the bill decided not to sign as co-authors, opting instead to wait for the plenary vote to make their views public . Revealing their hand too early in the game, they explain, only invites regular visits and calls from the bishops. The method of keeping their position seemingly neutral or undecided protects them from becoming the subject of the latter’s sermons and enables them to dodge political arrows from the pulpit. Representative Janette Garin, one of the authors of the bill and a medical doctor, felt the power of the Church during the 2007 elections, when the priests and bishops in her district regularly targeted her in their homilies and made her into a “pro-abortion” politician. The legislator declared that the bishops, like politicians, can also play “dirty politics” (ABS-CBN News, 2008).

Politicians know too well that elections are a politics of addition and they cannot afford to lose a single vote. With the high stakes involved, it is too risky for politicians to fall into disfavor with the

Church. Although the Church’s doctrinal teachings may have lost some of their direct hold on the masses, its institutional influence remains strong. Given its wide social reach and its capacity to distort information, the Church is capable of mounting a formidable, sustained and long drawn-out opposition campaign. Bishop Teodoro Bacani, writing in 1992, illustrates this in his book, “Church in Politics”:

The Church has at its disposal its many institutions, foremost of which is the parish. Through the parishes, the Church hierarchy can speedily and with effect transmit its pastoral letters and statements to the people. Then there are the Catholic schools as well as the social action centers and Catholic organizations whose members number millions. Finally, there is the growing number of basic ecclesial communities which are composed mostly of people in the grassroots…The mass media are also available to the Church. It has an unmatched network of radio stations, and has access and influence on TV as well. There are also diocesan newspapers in circulation. And Church people write credibly in several national newspapers. Though the Church has not been using media militantly for its political involvement, it could easily do so. (p. 37)

With Church leaders clearly aware of their clout and how to employ the vast resources of the Church politically, the potential electoral repercussions are real for politicians who dare to diverge from

Catholic-mandated reproductive and sexual morality.

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Further, with the personalistic nature of Philippine elections -- where candidates are selected based on their individual qualifications and character, rather than their party representation and platform -- politicians must protect their moral standing in the community at all cost. For those who have a shaky hold on their political base, having the Catholic Church actively campaigning against their candidacy can mean the end of their political careers. In this sense, the Catholic Church is an astute political actor that understands how to manipulate the rules of personality-based politics to its advantage. By using pressure and fear tactics to impose its position on voters and politicians, religious leaders employ strategies “as bad as buying (their) votes” and which reinforce traditional politics

(Bernas, 2009). Not surprisingly, abstract surveys about public opinion do not give politicians enough comfort or protection in the face of a relentless attack from the Church.

The ascendancy of the Church in the political arena, an outcome of its crucial role in the democratization movement, gave it the power to bestow, or deny, legitimacy to political leaders, their governments and policies. As the Catholic hierarchy invokes its part in the People Power revolution 25 years ago, it asserts, “(I)n 1986 we Catholic Bishops made a prophetic moral judgment on political leadership. With this prophetic declaration we believe that we somehow significantly helped open the door for EDSA I and a window of political integrity” (CBCP, 2011).

Sitting presidents are likewise not immune to pressures from the Catholic Church. There is a public acknowledgement that the Catholic Church can make and unmake presidents. Since the filing of the original reproductive health bill in 2001, the country has had three national leaders. The first, Joseph

Estrada, a former actor and a populist leader who implemented family planning and population programs, was deposed by the business elite and middle class forces, with support from the Catholic

Church, due to charges of massive corruption in what has been called People Power 2. From the beginning, the Church had been uneasy with Estrada, who was elected by the poor majority and, therefore, did not rely on the Church for legitimacy. He was willing to risk the bishops’ disapproval,

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strongly pushing a comprehensive family planning program, even appearing in television advertisements to personally promote it. His sexual indiscretions and other excesses, however, made him an easy target for his elite opponents, the politicized middle class and his Catholic critics. As in People Power 1, the

Catholic Church provided the moral voice and leadership for the ouster of Estrada and the mobilization of People Power 2, showcasing yet again its massive influence in shaping the outcome of political upheavals. Installed in Estrada’s place was Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who later usurped power by extending her term, and was considered the most corrupt and unpopular president since Marcos. But her readiness to veto the reproductive health bill and her government’s implementation of a natural family planning-only program bought the silence of the Church hierarchy, effectively preventing the majority of the bishops from joining the growing and sustained public clamor for Macapagal-Arroyo to step down. For the activists and feminists who struggled side by side with the Church for democracy and accountable governance, and who were now simultaneously campaigning for a reproductive health policy and questioning Macapagal-Arroyo’s legitimacy, the Church’s political stance showed how the preservation of its interests came first before the national interest. In order to sustain the legitimacy of its moral authority in the public sphere, the Catholic Church is prepared to coerce as much as it is willing to be coopted by political leaders and regimes.

Nine years later, Benigno Aquino III, the son of Cory Aquino, replaced Macapagal-Arroyo, having been elected into office on a surge of nostalgic sentiment that followed his mother’s death less than a year before the 2010 presidential elections. Although he espoused his mother’s political principles and considered himself a devout Catholic, he veered away from Cory’s pious obedience to declare his support for the reproductive health bill as early as the electoral campaign period. As expected, the bishops invoked the memory of the saintly Cory Aquino and People Power 1 to get Noynoy, as Benigno

III is popularly known, to tow the Church line. However, the historical, political and sentimental ties between the Catholic Church and the current president’s family have resulted in a never-ending

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dialogue between the bishops and the executive office in an effort to placate the religious leaders.

Although nothing has changed in either side’s positions, and Aquino III has been firm, this circular conversation sends the message that the Catholic Church comes to the table not as a mere participant; rather, it is there as an authority, who authorizes a decision before it can move forward. As such, it has to be pleased and satisfied in order for things to proceed, or it would discontinue the dialogue and rally its constituents, if the conversation does not follow its expected direction. Indeed, if there is anything that the Church has achieved in the last 10 years, it is not the outright defeat of the reproductive health bill based on its perceived flaws, but the effective stalling and blocking of the proceedings as an effect of its refusal to authorize this political act. And this authority comes out as a triumphalist power, as

Manila archbishop Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales announced the eventual victory of the Church in the battle over the reproductive health bill, “Ang simbahan walang talo yan. Maniwala kayo, maski ano gawin nila. (The Church never loses. Believe me, whatever they do).The (Church) of Christ always wins”

(Philippine Daily Inquirer 2011).

With the decline of doctrinal authority among the Catholic population, clerical persuasion has taken an overt political form, and its targets are political decision-makers. Because moral authority is not enough to compel opinion and behavior, the Catholic Church must appropriate state power and strongly pressure state actors to enforce religious conformity beyond the Church’s adherents. Engagement with the state and its policymaking apparatus then is the Church’s attempt to ensure the longevity of its moral position and secure wider political and secular legitimacy for its religious authority.

OPPOSITIONAL IDENTITY, ALTERNATIVE FORCE

As the Catholic Church basks in its political power, it also denies this power at the same time. As its spokesperson, Atty. Jo Imbong, asserts,

“We don’t interfere (with) the legislative function. What we can only do is make our voice heard… (The Church) doesn’t have enough people to talk about all these things. It doesn’t have guns. It doesn’t have funds to do all these…Why

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are they saying powerful? Its only power comes from the spiritual.”

In attempting to disavow its own power, the Church is actually establishing an oppositional identity to two forces, namely, the so-called international population control movement, and capitalist or market agendas. For the Church, both represent powerful forces that sacrifice women’s health and human dignity to imperialist and profit interests. These interests include pharmaceutical companies that sell supposedly harmful contraceptives to unsuspecting women, western nations that sell their political agendas to a weaker nation, and corrupt politicians who sell out their country to both. By positioning itself against imperialism and capitalism, the Church is able to align itself with the anti-poverty, anti- colonial and anti-globalization sentiments of Filipinos. It is also able to tap into Filipinos’ deep distrust and lack of confidence in government, declaring that “there is a greater form of corruption, namely, moral corruption which is really the root of all corruption” (CBCP pastoral letter, 2011). In so doing, the

Church offers an oppositional identity that resonates with people’s desire for social justice and their rejection of exploitative relationships. This is the same oppositional identity around which the Church was able to galvanize Filipinos into action during the 1986 People Power and during the second one two decades later.

Moreover, in a political culture where competing political parties are mere vehicles for traditional political ambition, the Catholic Church has supplanted the role of parties in providing a credible set of alternative ideals and principles to the people (Doronila, 2001). The political vacuum created by the failure of political institutions to deliver the most basic of services and to protect people’s rights is a void that the Catholic Church, as an oppositional force, has been able to fill. Viewed as an institution that acts based on spiritual principles, it is trusted to care for the whole flock without prejudice to anyone. Progressive groups and social movements, including those in the Left and the women’s movement, actively seek the Church’s support and alliance for issues such as agrarian reform, illegitimate foreign debt, indigenous people’s rights and domestic violence. Ordinary people seek its

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many charity organizations for services that government cannot fulfill, especially, health care; most citizens would rather donate to the Church than to government welfare agencies because they believe that funds will not be mishandled. According to its directory, in 2001 alone, the Church ran 147 hospitals and clinics, 236 orphanages, and 69 homes for the elderly (Kessler and Ruland, 2008). The Church also inspires the spirit of volunteerism, activism and citizenship, when it organizes thousands of Filipinos, especially the youth, into nationwide parish-based cells that guard the ballot and monitor the counting during elections. Given the political violence and massive fraud that characterize Philippine elections, an independent election watchdog that commands the respect of the state and civil society provides the citizenry with an instrument to ensure clean, honest and peaceful elections, a step toward reforming the country’s political system.

What makes the role of the Church all the more significant is that it meshes the material, the political, and the symbolic, thereby endowing the Church with an even grander persona: the defender of all humanity (the tortured and the free, the dead and the living, and the elderly and the fetus). In turn, its enormous political capital finds extension in the power to determine who or what is worthy of being defended and must be protected. Many Filipinos therefore see no contradiction in the Church’s insistence that the “helpless fetus” must take precedence over women’s lives, as it appears to be consistent with the moral scheme that values humanity, especially, those who are considered weak and defenseless. For many, even those in the progressive movements, the Church’s opposition to reproductive health and family planning must be weighed against the many other advocacies that the

Church has waged together with the people and its invaluable efforts to make the country a better place for Filipinos. Hence, the question that inevitably arises is, “How could the Church be wrong?” More importantly, “Is it worth it to break with a powerful group that is normally an ally on most issues?”

The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines’ (CBCP) rhetorical distancing from its political power also sets up an opposition between the spiritual power of the Church and oppressive worldly

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forces, much like the epic biblical battle between David and Goliath. It speaks to Filipinos’ disposition to support the underdog. The CBCP states in its pastoral letter of January 30, 2011:

(The RH Bill) is the product of the spirit of this world, a secularist, materialistic spirit that considers morality as a set of teachings from which one can choose, according to the spirit of the age. Some it accepts, others it does not accept. Unfortunately, we see the subtle spread of this post-modern spirit in our own Filipino society.

This post-modern spirit includes the “misguided” notion that “women have power over their own bodies without the dictation of any religion”. Against this “new truth”, the Church presents its doctrinal position as a higher – and absolute – truth that embodies the “authentic human values” and “Filipino cultural values” cherished “since time immemorial”.

Several points are worth highlighting in the pastoral letter. First, the bishops hone in on the spirit of the age, or worldly values, and imply a sinister motive to its “subtle spread”. Filipino society, which until now has remained true to the Church’s teachings (ergo, to itself), is no longer safe from this threat. As it succumbs to this worldly spirit, Filipino society faces the erosion of its authentic cultural values upon which it was founded. Here, the Church employs the unquestioned status of cultural values as a determinant of a society’s character (Joseph, 1998) to elevate religiousness and Catholicness as the essence of the Filipino nation. The conception of cultural values, and by extension, of Catholic values, as an integrative aspect of society enables the Church to rally the people against the reproductive health bill which threatens to fragment the nation and its national character.

Second, the bishops attack what in the past it has called moral relativism. For the Church, actions may have a context, but morality has no gray areas. This means there is only one accepted way of living one’s life, and Church doctrine represents the only set of rules on which actions can be judged moral. Last, and related to the second point, in aiming at the “secularist” spirit of the times, the bishops assert the authority of religion and, specifically, of Catholicism, as the only sources of morality and moral

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praxis. More importantly, they attempt to preempt the space for non-religious, non-Catholic and opposed voices as to prevent these voices from carving out legitimate discourses in the public sphere.

The Catholic Church’s oppositional identity operates on two axes: as an alternative force to traditional politics and as a traditional defense against moral and cultural degradation. The first acts as a force for change, the other as a fortress against it. While there may be a tension between the two, the

Catholic Church maneuvers around these two axes firmly, but fluidly. This allows the Church to pivot and slide between the two ends of the political-cultural pole, capturing a wide range of sentiments regarding the family, marriage, children, gender relations, personhood and the social good. Because of this fluidity, this identity is able to attract, and attach itself to, other symbols and forces, while mobilizing diverse groups of people, who may contradict one another’s interests but find unity with the

Church’s oppositional cause. Given the symbolic connections, cultural resources and organizational capacity that it is able to deploy, the Catholic Church is able to move through, and between, different discursive spaces. This means that the legitimate public role of the Catholic Church remains relevant for many Filipinos.

BETWEEN RELIGIOUS SENTIMENTS AND SECULAR ARGUMENTS

Strategic secularism is the term used by the Argentine sociologist Juan Vaggione to describe the ways in which the Catholic Church deploys utterances, acts and instruments associated with secular agendas and institutions to legitimize its moral doctrine and public role. While political crises have shown that the state, in the post-colonial Philippine context, needed the Catholic Church to legitimize its existence, the reproductive health controversy has also revealed that the Church must now rely on the state to secure its own legitimacy. By providing the secular anchor to the Church’s agenda, the state maintains Catholicism’s relevance in people’s everyday life. Moreover, the Church is not merely appropriating secular tools and assumptions to advance its religious objectives. Rather, in strategically

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employing secular logics and instrumentalities, the Church is actively redefining what it means to be secular and what is circumscribed by the space called the secular in Philippine society today.

Sensing the decline of its power of doctrinal persuasion and the backlash against theological damnation, the Catholic Church has gradually moved away from religion-based arguments and relied on recognizable secular markers to bolster its opposition to the bill. In recent months, the Catholic Church has disavowed religion as the sole ground on which it appeals to Filipinos to reject the reproductive health bill. In the same pastoral letter above, the bishops claim to speak “on the basis of the fundamental ideals and aspirations of the Filipino people and not on the basis of specifically Catholic religious teachings”. Following this cue, a public statement against the reproductive health bill soon circulated online a month later. Posted by a group of faculty and students from the University of the

Philippines (a place viewed as a breeding ground of radicals, Marxists and atheists), the statement echoed the position of the Church, but curiously emphasized in its introduction the “secular background” of the university and the use of “reason” for its argumentation. After some investigation, it was later found that the statement was initiated by Opus Dei leaders and their supporters in the university. Understandably, the Catholic Church uses all possible and available methods, strategies, and connections to enforce its hegemonic authority, whether by invoking spiritual tools of dogma, using political intimidation, marshalling its constituency, or appealing to the power of the religious emotion.

This shift away from religion is accompanied by a move towards the Philippine Constitution as the source of moral authority. Having ensured that its dogma has been incorporated into the law of the land more than twenty years ago, when it successfully inserted a provision on the protection of the unborn from conception and maintained those on marriage and family, the embrace by the Church and its allies of a more “secular” approach to the reproductive health debate is not surprising. Viewed as a political document that embodies the national values, the Constitution legitimizes the Church’s moral code as a core value held by all Filipinos, regardless of religion. By wrapping the secular status of the

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Constitution around its doctrinal thinking, the Church can claim allegiance to the law as the premise of its position. In this shift, to go against the principles of the Constitution (and the Church doctrine embedded in it) would mean being un-Filipino, not being un-Catholic.

At the same time, invoking the secular and the power of reason seems to be a strategy to penetrate a public that is tired of dogmatic invocations and clerical arrogance. The use of science, and specifically, the selective interpretation of scientific studies to align with the Church’s arguments against reproductive health, is meant to target those who do not consider religion pertinent to the reproductive health debate or in their decision regarding contraception. That even health advocates are left confused by the scientific evidence produced by Church allies speaks to both the power of science to mediate secular society and the failure of the scientific community to engage publicly with religious authorities.

Writing about the history of secularism in the West, Smith (2008) describes how the secular is commonly understood. First, being secular is often conceived in terms of the decline in the institutional and political power of the Church and the attendant erosion of the public authority of Church leaders.

Second, being secular means the treatment of religion as a matter of private belief, not public truth, and the acceptance of secular assumptions as the basis of interaction in the public sphere. Last, being secular is often associated with a critique of the West that is bundled with criticisms of liberalism, individualism, materialism and moral degeneration. Notwithstanding the various critiques of these theories of secularism (Asad et al 2009; Asad 2003), it is clear that the Catholic Church in the Philippines is battling secularism on all three counts. However, in order for it to be intelligible to the non-religious and non-Catholic, the Church has had to use the very language of the secular and present its case on a secular platform.

But what is the secular and what is secular space? Commonly designated as that formation or space not occupied or governed by religion, the secular nevertheless cannot be imagined without religion (Asad, 2003). I understand the secular as a set of historically produced processes and

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interactions that shape the relationship between religion, the state and the public. Bound up with the idea of the secular and secularism are the notions of modernity and liberal democracy (Cannell, 2010).

A subset of the secular is the relationship that defines the freedoms and limits that rule the separation of Church and state, with each entity protected from being taken over, and prevented from taking over, the affairs of the other. In the reproductive health controversy, the Catholic Church and the government give differential stress to the two principles of this separation: the Church leaders assert the freedom to practice religion while political leaders invoke the limits to Church involvement in policymaking. Both, however, seek to uphold the Church-state separation as a marker of a modern democratic nation.

In the Philippines, the discourse of Church-state separation has its own hold on the nation’s historical imagination. While the revolution against Spain ousted the friars from power in 1896, the formal disestablishment of the Catholic Church came years later when this principle was enshrined in the so-called Jones Law, a precondition set by the imperial United States as part of the process of preparing Filipinos for self-government (Gowing, 1967; Ortiz, 1971). Disestablishment also involved the crucial purchase of the vast friar lands by the US, and their sale and redistribution to Filipino lay citizens, which paved the way for the transfer of these land resources to the cacique class that mediated between the Spanish colonial government and the natives, and now had the means to purchase the lands, in the process creating the oligarchic elite that exercised a monopoly over the country’s agricultural resources until the present (Schumacher, 1981; Connolly 1992). A new regime of power displaced colonial religion as the axis of government. The nation’s law and jurisprudence and political system followed closely those of the United States. Anti-clericalism characterized nationalism (Kessler and Ruland, 2008). In as much as Catholicism became embedded in the formation of the nation-state, so did liberal ideals of government and society. It is no accident that history books taught Filipinos that religion was Spain’s heritage to the country, while democracy was the legacy of the United States. The ascendancy of the United States beginning in the nineteenth century as a world power cemented its

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lasting political, economic and cultural influence on the Philippines, serving as the Philippines’ model of a dynamic progressive nation and the country’s link to the modern West. Hewing to the liberal ideals of governance and democracy, not to mention the values of the market, the Philippines took pride in behaving as a modern/izing nation-state.

Yet, while the Catholic Church has been formally disestablished, politics have shown the imprint of Catholicism in the practice of policymaking and the conduct of elections. Civic space, where individuals are supposed to interact as equal participants, has also disclosed the sway of religion over other voices, muffling oppositions and conflicts. In the Philippine case, the idealistic legal discourse of

Church-state separation is maintained even as the secular is being oriented towards religion, with the substance of the (reproductive) law being aligned with religious doctrine. When the Church declares that its position is rooted in the fundamental ideals of the nation and not in religion, it aims to narrow the distance between the religious and the secular, with the Church giving the impression that it is willing to be subsumed within the nation-state. Filipinos’ historical memory of a Church colonizing the islands recedes and gives way to the idea of a secular nation simply returning to its religious roots, without the violence that had accompanied the colonial religious conversion. In a sense, the secular that emerges is a space and a set of dynamic social processes that is officially stripped of religious markers but is deemed really religious underneath (not governed by religion but whose essence is deemed religious). Thus, when the bishops declare that they speak not on the basis of religious teachings, this utterance is possible only because the nation had already been defined in terms of religion. But the logics and mechanisms of the secular dictate that this truth can only be confirmed and conferred by the state, not by religious authorities, a kind of role reversal that demonstrates how the

Catholic Church also needs the state to legitimize its authority. Yet, with the entangled dynamic of this relationship, this harmonization between religion and the secular is also experienced by the nation as an intensification of the conflict between the two.

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The engagement between the Church, the state and social movements indicates that Filipinos recognize that there is a role for the Catholic Church in the public sphere. In fact, Filipinos value its voice and intervention in political issues that confront the abuses and failings of the state and of the market, invoking the social justice and democratic streams within the Church. At the same time, however, it is in challenging a coercive state power that the authoritarian tradition of the Church comes in as an effective counterforce. It is in private matters related to sexuality, reproduction, gender, marriage, family, and morality that many Filipinos reject the dictates of the Catholic leaders. Ironically, personal morality is the area over which the Church claims to preside and have jurisdiction, and from which, therefore, the state must stay away.

PART FOUR

RAISING NATURAL CATHOLICS

Catholicism’s near-unquestioned status as a natural part of their way of life influences how

Filipinos understand and conduct themselves as social and ethical beings. A lasting legacy of 300 years of

Spanish colonization, Catholicism is viewed as an essential element of Filipino national identity and moral subjectivity. With an overwhelming majority of its population identifying as Catholics, the

Philippines prides itself in being one of only two Christian countries in Asia. But this premise of a purely

Catholic nation no longer holds true as religious pluralism has expanded. With the growth of Islam, the various Protestant denominations, and evangelical groups, as well as independent Filipino Christian churches, the Catholic Church faces challenges to its dominance. Yet, as an authoritative discourse

(Asad, 1979), Catholicism regards other systems of meaning according to its imposed concepts. In this case, Catholic doctrine remains the frame of reference against which other religions must define and orient themselves. As an ideological formation, Catholicism maintains and reproduces its authoritativeness because of its embeddedness in socio-political structures.

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Despite the arguably diminished influence of Catholic teachings on the sexual and reproductive morality of Filipinos, Catholicism continues to permeate Philippine society. This is evident in the rituals and practices that people perform in daily life. With Church dogma relegated to a minimal role, however, it is the symbolic and social aspects of Catholic practice that Filipinos have embraced and have become embedded in everyday life. Images of the Virgin Mary, the Santo Niño, Christ and the saints are found everywhere -- in homes, parks, schools, government offices, even inside jeepneys and on random street corners. Mass attendance and devotion to the Virgin Mary and the saints are consistently high, as people flock to the churches, especially in times of economic crises. Domesticating these religious symbols – dressing up the child Jesus statue in a LA Lakers jersey, turning Pasyon chanting into a rap music session, transferring Sunday mass services to the malls – has become part of the religious scene.

Important family and community events are almost always related to religious occasions, such as baptisms, weddings, funerals, house blessings and town fiestas. But instead of being marked solely as religious events, they become occasions when clans reconnect, friends become family, men and women court, and people enjoy feasts and weave collective stories. Apart from being religious duties, these events are practiced as social obligations meant to strengthen family ties and community solidarity.

Owing to their regularity and frequency, Filipinos have relied on these socio-religious activities to serve as organizing vehicles for establishing, sustaining and structuring their social relationships. More than formal religious instruction, these social habits are equated with being Catholic.

Lent illustrates how Catholicism is observed and expressed in a social – and very public -- way by

Filipinos. Every year, during the Holy Week, the country stops for a whole week to remember the death and resurrection of Christ. When I was a child, my parents would bring me and my siblings to seven churches, the required number to complete our visita iglesia which we observed as part of our Lenten tradition. Crowds of families trekked to the churches, making the same pilgrimage. Some people would walk barefoot as they made their way to the churches, unmindful of the hot pavement, keen only on

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making good their panata (devotion). On a couple of occasions, we chanced upon flagellants, men who covered their faces with their shirts and beat their bare backs with a clump of small bamboo squares individually attached to a thick rope. The skin cracked and the blood dried on the men’s backs. While the sight could be traumatic for a child, it also seemed a natural part of the religious scene, which lessened the fear that I felt. The reenactment of the Stations of the Cross through the neighborhood streets, with a cast of costumed biblical characters led by a Christ carrying a wooden cross, was a feature of the

Lenten occasion. For the entire week, we would also watch old Cecil B De Mille ‘religious’ movies, such as The Ten Commandments and Samson and Delilah, as television stations showed only ‘religious’ programs for the whole week.

When time and energy permitted, my parents would host a pabasa, a non-stop reading- chanting of the Pasyon, a book that chronicles the life and death of Christ in more than 200 pages of verse. My father would create an altar, with the crucifix, the bust of Mater Dolorosa, and other religious images, while my mother would bring out our stacks of Pasyon. Tita Puring, a relative who was trained in this chanting tradition, led the pabasa which usually lasted for almost two days. It was an open house, with friends and neighbors coming and going, taking turns in chanting (and sleeping), while my family

(and extended clan) made sure there was enough food to keep everyone going. The same scene would be happening in other houses on our street, and most everyone participates in these community gatherings. At three o’clock on Black Friday, the exact time of Christ’s death, we made sure we were quiet to observe the moment. By evening, my family and the rest of the community either watched or participated in the street procession of the Dead Christ, the Sorrowful Blessed Mother, and all the magnificent rebultos in the Church’s vast collection. With the priest and sacristans in their regalia and the lay leaders saying the repetitive rhythm of the Holy Rosary, the procession inspired a combination of awe and solemnity, and pomp and pageantry, among spectators and participants alike. By Easter

Sunday, we would wake up early to take part in the dawn procession; the female members of the family

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joining the carroza (float) of the Sorrowful Blessed Mother and the males joining with the float of the

Risen Christ. On two separate years, my younger sisters were the angels who lifted the black veil from the grieving figure of Mother Mary to declare the resurrection of her Son. I, on the other hand, never saw myself as an angel and was only too happy to be singing Regina Coeli in the children’s choir.

These rituals made powerful impressions on the minds of both children and adults. Catholicism provided the community with drama and spectacle, pathos and excitement. It energized, moved and gathered large numbers of people. Performance of, and participation in, these very public rituals signified to people that they belonged to the Church. Looking back, I realize that my immersion in the religion involved Church tradition and teachings, folk beliefs and practices, and even local and

Hollywood pop culture. While all these rituals told me that I came from a family of observant Catholics, it was my private Catholic education that somehow gave me a sense that I was being consciously molded as a knowledgeable Catholic.

Catholicism as lived practice shapes subjectivities. Catholic formation starts during childhood.

From the moment a child is born, she is already being prepared for and socialized into the Catholic tradition. She can see and join the outside world only after being baptized. As early as possible, her family introduces and inculcates in her the rituals of the religion. As forms of discipline, regular mass attendance, the confessional, the Holy Communion and saying prayers provide the child with a structure that will guide her spiritual and moral development. A Catholic education, which systematically introduces the doctrine, ensures the rigorous compliance with tradition and ritual, not to mention the reverence for religious authority. Although rote learning and routinary observance as methods of cultivating piety has been criticized by the religious and non-religious alike, these instill in individuals a sense of being Catholic and afford them the right to claim this identity. As religious techniques that get repeated over and over and transferred from one generation to another, they become cultural habits associated with, and create, the moral person. More critically, Catholics believe that this whole

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disciplinary regime has application outside of its religious context and can determine a child’s future success as a productive citizen. This is grudgingly conceded even by staunch reproductive health advocates who face a dilemma regarding their children’s education. For those who can afford it, Catholic schools are still preferred by parents who want their children to receive quality education, acquire

“values formation” and grow up with a “structure”. Testimony to this immense credibility is the number of Catholic schools operating in the country. As of 2001, the Catholic Church was running 965 high schools and 275 colleges, as well as hundreds of primary and kindergarten schools, molding and educating the minds of about two million young students (Kessler and Ruland, 2008) and producing the middle class educated elite and leaders of the future. In a social environment that consistently reinforces and reproduces its dominance in the culture, Catholicism becomes the default worldview through which many Filipinos comprehend social facts. As someone who was immersed in this environment for all her young life, I can say that children grow up thinking that the whole world is

Catholic and other religious groups are an aberrant, if at times incomprehensible, populations.

Class and gender also structure the patterns of Catholic religiosity and subjectivities. While the middle and upper classes, through Catholic education, receive formal religious instruction, the lower classes rely on their families and popular culture as the main forms of religious transmission. As Catholic schools come to be more associated with the elite and fewer lower class families can afford access to these institutions, Catholic education has become a guaranteed marker of social status and respectability. It is among the upper classes that religious patronage circulates as they serve as benefactors to Church programs and projects, as well as recipients of Church, even Vatican, recognition and privileges. A few of those campaigning against the reproductive health bill, for example, were prominent lay individuals who held significant government offices and coveted Vatican-designated positions in the Church. As their social status and power are interwoven with the operations of the

Catholic hierarchy, and having imbibed its dogma and rules more systematically, the elite are more

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invested in maintaining the moral and public authority of the Church. Moreover, moral virtues and political principles, as publicly espoused and observed by the elite, and linked to religiosity, respectability, charitable works, economic freedom and liberal democracy, become the dominant standards by which the rest of society must conduct itself.

National surveys on religiosity show that Filipino women, more than men, are the more religious gender in terms of Church attendance. Church attendance and participation in religious organizations and activities are higher among women. While men, led by the bishops and priests, make up the Church hierarchy, it is the women who maintain and run the activities of the parish, schools and foundations on a daily basis. More critically, it is traditionally the mothers who introduce and socialize their children into the religion, and are responsible for the family’s moral and religious upbringing. It is safe to say that women comprise the majority of Catholic communities. The Church relies both on their religious loyalty and caring labor to maintain the institution and reproduce the next generation of Catholics. At the same time, the Church exercises doctrinal influence on Filipino women, their social and moral views, and their reproductive practices and decisions. Not surprisingly, it is the nuns and the women’s groups, such as the Catholic Women’s League, that are easily mobilized by the Church for its campaign against the reproductive health bill. More telling is the participation of Catholic schools in congressional hearings: while students from exclusive girls’ schools run by the religious sisters are visible in these Church actions, there is not the same participation from the counterpart boys’ schools run by the priests.

BAD CATHOLICS

Protagonists in the reproductive health debate contest the questions: What makes a good

Catholic? How should a Filipino express her Catholic religiosity and identity? And who can claim Catholic identity? This contest is as much about the substance of Catholicness as it is about the process of achieving this identity.

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Obeying religious teachings constitutes moral goodness for many Catholics. For those who oppose the reproductive health bill, however, this general principle, usually left for individuals to deal with privately, now requires a public show of allegiance to the Church. More specifically, complying with the papal edict, Humanae Vitae, and declaring war against the bill are a must to qualify as a good

Catholic and to prove one’s Catholic identity. For the bishops, Catholics who support the proposed bill fail in this test and therefore lose the right to call themselves as such. Considering the many Filipinos who do not follow religious doctrines, it was pointed out that this rigid requirement could mean for the

Catholic Church losing a significant number of its members. But to this possibility, a prominent pro-life doctor and medical ethicist invokes purification of the Church:

As the Holy Father says, when you prune the Church, that is the time it will grow. That is in fact his message to the Catholic schools: better quality than quantity. That is how the Catholic Church started. They used to burn the Catholics, the Christians. But they stuck to their faith, and they met their fate (in) the catacombs. We’re not here to hide ourselves just because we are afraid to be unpopular. They laugh at us, they ridicule us, they call us medieval thinkers. But I’m sorry, if you use these (sex education) modules, we not only go back to the dark ages, we will go back to pagan times.

The autonomous person exists only in relation to the possibilities sanctioned by the Church. This is echoed in the statement of the bishops questioning “(women’s) power over their bodies without the dictation of any religion”. As for Catholics who are firm believers and yet who are for reproductive health, according to a bishop I interviewed, “many of them don’t know how these contraceptives operate; but if you explain (it) to them, I think they are more convinced.” Although the Catholic hierarchy makes a point of stating its respect for the individual’s conscience, there is for the Church “an informed and right conscience”, which is “enlightened and guided” by the “teachings of one’s faith”

(CBCP pastoral letter, 2011). This conscience must conform to God’s will, as interpreted by the priests.

Yet, theologians also recognize a “hidden” tradition within the Church – not publicly spoken about by the bishops – which allows more freedom to the individual’s conscience and its contextual digression from Church doctrine as part of the person’s spiritual development. This acknowledges the

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competence of lay Catholics to reflect on, interpret and apply the moral laws of the Church in their lives.

Moreover, this implies that clergy may have limited competence in certain moral matters, “given the limits of natural law itself”, and may have to rely on laity “as providers of secular knowledge” to Church authorities (Bernas, 1991). As legal expert and constitutionalist, Father Joaquin Bernas (1991), asserts,

“(T)here is theological foundation to the possibility that a very much married Secretary of Health might know more about conjugal morality, and immorality, than some celibate monsignori (p. 14).”

However, the formation of an independent conscience, if it encourages independence from religious authorities, destabilizes Catholic identity. That is, at least from the point of view of the Church hierarchy. And, this is exactly what has happened with the emergence of an organized movement of

Catholics that supports reproductive health. Using their faith as the platform for their position, members of the Catholics for RH Movement (C4RH) assert their right to exercise their free will according to

“(Church) teachings of equity, social justice, love, and compassion”. As a counterpoint to the Catholic

Church’s move away from religious argument and its embrace of secular language, this reverse move by advocates pushes the contestation over religious identity to the forefront of the debate. What results is a shift in the political struggle: whereas the Church has designated reproductive health as the battleground, advocates have now taken religion and Catholic identity as the terrain for contestation.

Content in the past to rely on the strength of human rights arguments, advocates now not only feel the need to uphold reproductive health; but more so, they see the imperative to reclaim their faith as they understand it.

FRIAR MEMORIES

The gentleman, dressed as Jose Rizal, the Filipino national hero, found himself near the altar and couldn’t resist the temptation. It was a special Mass, but he wasn’t aware of it. All he knew was that he had a message for the bishops, and so he walked to the front and lifted his placard on which was emblazoned the name, “Damaso!” While at it, he shouted at their eminences to get out of politics. The

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congregation heard, and so did Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales, archbishop of Manila, and Alfredo Lim, mayor of Manila. Soon after, the gentleman was escorted out of the Manila Cathedral and arrested by the Manila police, based on a suit filed by the Catholic Church. The official charge: offending religious feelings. It was a criminal statute that went a long way back in history, way, way back, in fact, that no one had heard of it until that February afternoon. The news touched a nerve among the public and exploded on Facebook and Twitter universe, with outraged citizens casting their support for the offender and offering funds to bail him out.

The gentleman was Carlos Celdran, an artist and a much-sought out tour guide, who was popular for making art performances of his historical tours of old Manila. Of the old Spanish elite, his exposure to the city’s slums convinced him that people needed help in planning their families. He was already distributing condoms in Manila’s poor areas long before reproductive health advocates approached him to be part of their campaign. Ironically, his work as a guide depended on the cooperation of the Catholic Church, as the latter controlled the major sites in Intramuros, the old walled city that served as the spiritual and political center during the Spanish period, and which was Celdran’s platform for his performances. San Agustin, the country’s oldest church and a premier stop in Celdran’s introduction to Philippine history, is one such site. The cobbled streets of Intramuros also lead to the

Manila Cathedral, the seat of the Manila archdiocese, and to the offices of the Catholic Bishops

Conference of the Philippines, as well as some of the oldest Catholic universities. And, of course, there was Fort Santiago, the military fortress the Spaniards built in the 16th century, and where the national hero, Jose Rizal, was imprisoned before his execution in 1896.

In writing the subversive novels, Noli Me Tangere (Touch Me Not) and El Filibusterismo (The

Filibuster), Rizal, who believed in freedom, self-governance and reforms through peaceful means, inspired both the reformist dissent and armed revolution against Spain. Depicting the ills of Philippine society and the centuries of oppression of Filipinos under the colonial regime, his novels captured the

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corruption and abuses of the friars, and the seething rage the natives felt toward the prayles (friars). The petty and hateful Dominican, Padre Damaso, was the villain of the piece. Embodying the vindictiveness and moral corruption of the prayles (friars), Damaso had the hero, Ibarra, excommunicated for daring to stand up to him. He was later revealed as the real father of the tragic heroine, Maria Clara, whose betrothal to Ibarra never came to be because of his machinations. Banned by the Spanish government because of their incendiary content, the novels continued to haunt the Catholic Church into post- independence Philippines as the clergy in 1956 sought to ban its teaching in public and private schools, claiming Rizal’s works violated Catholic canon law.

With the arrest of Celdran, in his Rizal persona, the deep historical memories of friar abuse erupted to the surface and drew a parallel link with the Church’s political intimidation in relation to the reproductive health bill. The call for compassion resonated with many as online discussion threads showed comments from ordinary Filipinos questioning the bishops’ lack of sympathy for those whose poverty simply cannot sustain their large families and for whom Church teachings offer no solution to their everyday problems. Opening the question of what it means to be Catholic, these ordinary Filipinos challenge the Church hierarchy’s own sense of ethics, charging bishops of being un-Catholic, being unfeeling, and being hypocritical. Expectedly, the sexual conduct of priests, many of whom have gotten women pregnant and are hiding their own children, has not escaped criticism. Celdran eventually posted bail, with the help of family and friends, and was made to apologize to the Catholic Church. But his act of had already had its desired impact. “Damaso”, that one word, gave a name to the intransigent and abusive power of the bishops who sought to get their way and block the bill, no matter what.

DEFENDING THEIR FAITH

Defending Catholicism has taken on two approaches, one negative and the other productive.

While the first involves exposing the hypocrisy and attacking the morality of the Catholic Church, as demonstrated by the surge of protests during the Celdran incident, the second involves the affirmation

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and deepening of commitment to Catholicism. The Catholics for RH Movement aims to make fellow

Catholics realize that “there is no dissonance with their being Catholic and simultaneously believing in the advocacy and goals of reproductive health and rights” (Catholics for RH, n.d.). But in order to reclaim their faith, advocates recognize they must learn more about their religion and study the teachings of the Church more thoroughly. This has inspired members to go back and read the Scripture, and hold forums that engage with progressive clergy and moral theologians. Advocates think this process will enable them to deepen their faith and argue for reproductive health within religion while holding steadfast to their Catholic beliefs. A reading of their manifestos reveals a movement that is still figuring out how to position itself within the framework of Catholic doctrine. While it insists on “Catholic manifestations” of social justice and compassion, the movement nevertheless only repeats the rhetoric that couples, and, especially, women, should have the right to determine the circumstances within which to raise their families, and to have the freedom to make decisions based on their conscience and their capacities and limitations. Defining reconciliation as the apostolic mission of Catholics, the movement calls for compassion for those “in need and in distress”, stressing that the goals of saving women’s lives and raising healthy families should serve to unite Catholics. Even as it pronounces that living a “healthy, happy, and dignified life” is a “Christian right” (Catholics for RH letter, 2011), the movement has yet to reframe the reproductive health issue within a specifically doctrinal Catholic position.

What the movement has accomplished, however, is to claim legitimate public space for the

Catholic voices not sanctioned by the Church. Here, going public and being visible are the critical strategies of the movement. Going against the tendency of many adherents to keep their opposing sentiments to themselves, Catholic supporters of reproductive health send the message that it is time to speak out and show that the Church hierarchy does not speak for them. Disagreements with the Church,

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however, should not mean turning away from one’s faith. Explains Edelina dela Paz, national coordinator of Catholics for Reproductive Health (Jimenez-David, Philippine Daily Inquirer, Oct 6, 2010):

You don’t stop being a Filipino just because you are disappointed or angry at our leaders. The same goes for our love and faithfulness to the Catholic Church. We remain very strong and faithful to the Catholic Church, but we strongly disagree with the bishops’ stance on family planning and reproductive health.

Although the possibility of being disowned by the Church is real, these advocates are prepared to fight for their right to belong in the Catholic Church. As a defiant Rina Jimenez-David (Philippine Daily

Inquirer, Oct 6, 2010), a prominent journalist and reproductive health advocate, writes in her column:

But if Church authorities wanted me out of the Catholic Church, I said, then they would have to drag me out kicking and screaming. I wasn’t giving up my membership in the Church on just anyone’s say-so.

By mounting an organized challenge to the Church and its notion of a conforming believer, the movement begins to fashion a new Catholic identity that allows a person’s conscience to be independent from official teaching, and in a way that may reformulate Catholic laity’s relationship with religious authority. In evolving this flexible Catholic subject, the movement asserts the validity of using life experiences as the basis for reflecting and reinterpreting religious teachings, instead of forcing life choices to conform to dogma.

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CHAPTER FOUR

THE MORAL ECONOMY OF REPRODUCTIVE SURVIVAL: WOMEN’S NARRATIVES AND REALITIES

The contentious debates around reproductive health, population, and development have placed poor women – their image, status, and condition -- in the center of the national policy battle contested by women and health groups, the state, and the Catholic Church. Citing studies showing that a majority of families that have many children are poor, Rep. Edcel lagman, the main proponent of the reproductive health bill asserts that the aim of the policy is “to improve the quality of life of the people…” (Explanatory Note, House Bill 17, 2008). Reproductive health advocates support this statement and have come out with ads with dramatic images of sad mothers juxtaposed with statistics on poverty and maternal mortality. The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, on the other hand, has called on the “faithful” to defeat the measure because it “…militate(s) against the aspirations of the poor, the integral development of our people, the integrity of creation, moral values in the family, the welfare of women, children and the young…” (CBCP Pastoral Statement, 2000, cited in CBCP

Monitor, 2008). Thus, to the Church’s list of charges against the RH bill could be added, “anti-women,” and ultimately, “anti-poor”.

While the welfare of the poor has been part of the language and rhetoric of social movements, policymakers, and the Catholic Church for a long time, this “hailing” of the poor to identify, and be identified, with the agenda of the different political actors at this political juncture comes from a recognition of the volcanic consequences of the deepening alienation of the masa from Philippine society. This disaffection with society was evident during the violent uprising by the masses of urban poor and slum dwellers in 2001 to protest the ouster of populist President Joseph Estrada by the elite and middle classes, the Catholic hierarchy and the military. If prior to this mainstream society had been able to ignore existing class cleavages, this event finally convinced the public, and with such impact, that

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there existed a layer of society that lived on the margins and whose needs were being denied. What it further exposed was the potential power of the marginalized, given their sheer numbers, to disrupt and overturn the political system. With this came the recognition that, in order to prevent another uprising, government has to respond to the conditions that were at the root of the alienation of the poor.

Cardinal Sin, in the aftermath of the violent riot on May 1, emphasized that “the poor will have to be the priority” (Sison, 2001). (See also Editorial, Philippines: Mirror Images, Asia Times Online, 3 May 2001;

Maritess Sison, Filipinos jolted as 'people power' bites back, Asia Times Online, 4 May 2001; Walden

Bello, The May 1st Riot: Birth of Peronism Philippine-style? Focus on the Philippines, 7 May 2001.) In terms of traditional politics, aligning with, and showing the same sensibilities as the poor reinforced it as the expedient way of conducting politics.

In professing to speak for the poor, the main protagonists in the debate recognize the potential impact of a reproductive health policy on poor women. Yet, as Mary Racelis, a prominent sociologist, pointed out in an opinion piece, the voices of those most affected – the women -- were “eerily missing” in the debate. She further asked: “Even if they courageously break the culture of silence and speak out from their own vantage point, who among the powerful will listen?” (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 2008).

Indeed, as then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo explained her support of the Catholic Church’s position, there was “not enough pressure to make (her) change (her) policy”. This implies that women, most of whom struggle everyday to support their families, must match the institutional resources of the

Catholic Church in order to be given a hearing by those in power. Policymaking, in this regard, penalizes the poor for being poor and the powerless for being powerless.

In this chapter, I present the voices of women who come from a slum community in Metro

Manila. In looking at the lives of these urban poor women, I explore how they interpret, follow and resist Catholic Church doctrines and practices as these relate to sexuality, reproduction and citizenship.

Further, I examine how social class, gender and religion work in tension with one another in women’s

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everyday decisions, and how the constraints and opportunities that poor women encounter in their everyday lives are enabled by the state and its institutions. Moreover, I examine how social exclusion shapes the moral economy by which women negotiate reproduction and sexuality. In doing so, I attempt to look at the footprints of power in women’s relationship with authority, whether that of the state or religion, as this relates to their experience and practice of reproduction.

A PLACE BEYOND THE CIRCLE

I have passed Sangandaan14 a countless times in the past. As a college student, I took the daily commute from Sta. Mesa to Quezon City, and on the way back, my jeepney would go around the rotunda where it would make several stops in front of government buildings to let off and pick up passengers. I had heard that behind these buildings and their perimeter walls were hundreds of families living in shanties and makeshift dwellings. When friends working on urban poor issues confirmed this to me some years ago, I found it incredible that these squatter communities, as they are commonly called, had existed there, not completely hidden yet almost invisible to the rest of the passing world. But the women, men and children who lived in these communities were not trying to hide themselves, and their invisibility was not of their own making. The wall was there for a reason, but I, for one, had never bothered to look.

A colleague, a community organizer who is herself from the ranks of the urban poor, showed me the visible side of Sangandaan and taught me how to get there easily. To access Sangandaan, one has to get off the highway, right after it curves away from the rotunda, and there one sees a line of low dwellings, made up of scrap materials – wood, tin, tarpaulin, plastic, hollow blocks, rocks, rubber tires - cobbled together, hugging one side of the highway. A few small sari-sari (variety) stores and cramped eateries are interspersed between the houses. Water, coming from the laundry washing, the canal, and

14 Name of community has been changed.

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other household sewage, flows on the sidewalk. The color of this scene is mostly gray and ash, of something old, put together. It has a settled-in look, despite its makeshift appearance.

The dirt road that leads to the interior is wide enough for a jeepney to pass through, but is too narrow to accommodate two vehicles side by side. This does not matter, anyway, since this road does not go beyond 50 meters, after which point, it funnels into a tiny street, which splits into narrow confusing arteries that twist and turn, and somehow divide and organize the community into four sections: A, B, C and D. Once one has reached section D, one has to retrace her steps in order to leave the place. The street that once served as the backdoor for the residents had been closed by the government agency located on the other end of the community. A few of my respondents had suggested that this made it easier for the police to flush out criminals, who may or may not be from

Sangandaan, and who would retreat and use the community as a haven. Of course, in desperate situations, the walls are there to be scaled.

Sangandaan is a dense community on a small block of government land, teeming with people, ever-growing, but with very limited space for expansion. The fragile houses, box-like and usually no more than 8 square foot wide and 6 feet high, sit on top of, and lean and groan against each other. They are often dark, lacking proper ventilation, and sometimes had only the dusty ground for floors. Their walls and roofs may protect inhabitants from the direct sun, but are too flimsy and haphazardly assembled to fend off the rain and strong winds that the typhoon season brings. When it rains, dampness hangs in the air and the cold settles on the ground inside, making one feel dry and drenched both at the same time. Often carrying two or more families, these houses get further subdivided or extended upwards when a son or daughter decides to bring their partners and children to live with their original families. To go to the second level of a house, one has to climb very steep stairs or a vertical wooden ladder leading to a trap door that has been cut out from the ceiling. Pushing up the trap door

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will lead one to a small room which either serves as the bedroom into which everybody must squeeze or a separate room for a second or third family.

On a typical day, playing children crowd the tiny streets and adults are found in front of their houses relaxing and chatting with neighbors. Because their homes offer little room for movement, residents spill out into the streets to beat the heat, stretch, gamble, cook, wash the dishes, do the laundry, take a bath, have a drinking session, hold parties, and sing karaoke. The merging of private and public space is further highlighted by the way secrets and intimacies inadvertently, and at times unavoidably, get spread in the community. With only thin plywood usually separating the houses, family conversations and quarrels, as well as couples’ intimate moments, carry through walls. Cora15 recounted the night she refused her husband’s sexual attentions: When she felt her husband beside her, she hollered, “Ba’t mo ba hinuhubad and panty ko?!” (Why are you removing my “panty”?!), and not unexpectedly, they received a lot of teasing comments and knowing smiles from neighbors the morning after. It was a case of dense and porous space acting as an effective transmitter of sensations and emotions, transforming personal information into public knowledge. (This state of affairs has influenced the way the women respondents viewed their private lives. In one of my early getting-to- know-you group conversations with them, they dismissed my suggestion that they could choose not to answer any question that they might not be comfortable with. The notion of privacy was something they seemed to dismiss, reassuring me that their lives were open and there was not much to hide from each other.)

As an established squatters’ community, Sangandaan gets legal water and electricity. One of the country’s two major water monopolies supplies water to Sangandaan, setting up a main source at the entrance of the major road. But many households remain without their own source of water as families are made to bear the cost of the pipeline that will connect to the main source. The women I interviewed

15 Names of all community respondents have been changed.

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had to buy water by the bucket from neighbors who had their own pipelines. At 2.50 pesos per bucket, one family of four buys six buckets every day to be used for bathing, cooking, washing dishes, and flushing the toilet; if there was laundry to be washed, six buckets were added. This family ends up spending more than 400 pesos (about $ 9.50) a month on water, an exorbitant amount to pay for what can only be described as trickles of water and which represents a significant share of the family’s meager income . (For comparison, I checked this amount against my own family’s monthly water bill. For an unlimited water supply that supports the needs of a busy household, we pay about 700 pesos.) How precious water is to these families was highlighted for me one afternoon as I was chatting with Mila, one of the mothers I interviewed. Having noticed that many children sit on the ground and run around regularly with their bottoms naked, I asked, “Why are they not wearing any underpants?” After expressing annoyance with the “neglectful” mothers of these children, Mila added that the children must have gone through all their underpants already, but their mothers were probably still collecting enough laundry before using a bucket or two of water for the washing. To solve this problem, sometimes the mothers would just hang the soiled underpants to dry the urine without washing them.

Given the problem of sanitation and garbage disposal – garbage trucks cannot pass through the narrow streets to collect garbage - the implications for disease and illness cannot be overlooked. Skin disease, for example, is common among both children and adults.

A similar arrangement exists for the electricity needs of the community. Residents are required to organize into clusters of five households, which are linked to a single electricity meter and a main power source. The monthly bill is divided among the families, one of whom is assigned to collect the payments. This, however, has caused fights between neighbors as the assigned collectors sometimes use the money for their own household and emergency needs. As in their water situation, the electricity use of these families is limited. Most households remain in darkness for most of the day and do not turn their lights on until early evening; many also turn in early in the evening as they do not have any

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television to keep them awake. With the country plagued by a power crisis, the rising cost of electricity has affected all segments of society. But poor families, compared to their middle class counterparts, end up spending relatively more on public utilities while having very limited access to the same. Moreover, although these families have legal access to public utilities, the illegal status and improvised nature of their communities condition the manner by which services are delivered – in stop gap fashion.

Reflecting the “underground” character of the community, most of its residents make a living at the bottom rung of the labor market or as part of the “informal” sector -- as sidewalk vendors, street sweepers, janitors, jeepney drivers, domestic help, laundry women, dishwashers, ditch diggers, garbage collectors, construction workers, tee girls, caddies, beggars – earning a petty wage, and most of the time, irregularly. All of these activities are conducted in the fringes of the formal economy, keeping alive a whole community that’s at the edge of survival. As proof that low wages have left homeless and marginalized even the regularly employed, public school teachers, government clerks and members of the police force count themselves as among the denizens of this squatters’ area.

Against its fringe identity, however, the significance of communities like Sangandaan, with its large population of potential voters, has not been lost on politicians. Promising to build basketball courts or community halls, and distributing rice and other goods to residents, politicians, on one hand, secure the loyalty of residents for the duration of the election campaign. Taking advantage of the windfall that elections bring, residents, on the other hand, approach candidates to ask for favors. At the time of my fieldwork, local elections had been called and the large numbers of unemployed in the community provided politicians with a pool of aides and the seemingly indispensable crowd to boost candidates’ entourage while on the campaign trail. In return, the residents were fed for the day, possibly given a small compensation and the privilege of orbiting around political power. Family occasions were not spared from the necessity of creating mutual support in this context --not a few residents had their birthday celebrations, complete with drinking sessions, sponsored by politicians, while grieving families

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benefited from the generous charity of political candidates who visited during funeral wakes. Juliet, one of the younger women I interviewed who had worked for a politician in a previous election, shared that one of her tasks then was to identify for the duration of the campaign all the individuals who were celebrating their birthdays, having a child baptized, getting married, or had a death in the family and to provide this information to political leaders. This information-gathering is crucial in facilitating the flow of dole-outs and secure the electoral benefits of patronage politics. Vote-rich slum communities like

Sangandaan become key sites during elections and can significantly influence electoral outcomes (See, for example, Phillip Tubeza, NGOs fight vote buying, Philippine Daily Inquirer, 11 May 2009; Urban poor vote, Cebu Daily News, 29 April 2010.)

Lourdes, who is 53 years old, remembers Sangandaan as a vast cogon field decades ago. As a first generation settler, she had helped clear the field to make way for her family’s makeshift house, and eventually a small community. She shares that the Sangandaan of today is already a third generation settlement, after previous settlements had been burned to the ground by the government and residents relocated to sites outside of Metro Manila. However, the efforts to demolish these communities proved successful only in the short-term as some of the old residents had gone back to rebuild and new settlers had also staked their claim on the land. Still, the threat of demolition is a hovering presence in the community, taking on an identity of its own as residents must be constantly alert to developments on local housing and land policy. Talks of an impending demolition were alive during the early part of my fieldwork as plans to sell government land to private corporations and convert the land into commercial centers floated. Later on, the talks calmed down as the election period drew near, protecting the community from the threat as incumbent politicians sought the support of voters. The tension underlying the relations between the community and local government also surfaces in how residents perceive and interpret government projects as a double-edged development. This was evident when the concreting of the community’s main road was started sometime in 2008. While this was welcomed as a

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project designed to improve the community (and earn votes for the politicians), a few of my interviewees commented that the new road was meant to prepare the land for conversion into commercial property and facilitate the eventual take-over by businesses. Apart from considering their moves in relation to government actions, residents also learn to define their identities and realities in terms of their engagement with the state. They view themselves as illegal occupants of the land and are resigned to the idea that they will eventually be relocated outside of the city. They seem to be always entreating politicians and signing petition papers to stop demolition threats while at the same time registering their names on government lists to secure a slot in their relocation site. In this context, the reciprocity of patronage relations exists hand in hand with the antagonistic engagement between communities and the state as the two entities struggle over housing and land rights while trying to maintain the existing political order. This complicated relationship between the urban poor and the state manifest in women’s statements that alternate between gratitude for politicians’ help, cynicism about government’s programs for the poor, acceptance of their illegality, and demands for government to respond to their needs.

COMMUNITY WOMEN

For the women I interviewed, the critical events that shaped the trajectory of their sexual and reproductive lives were heavily framed by their family and socioeconomic background, and the conditions of poverty and deprivation, particularly. The many exclusions experienced by these women served to define the social, cultural and moral spaces made available to them for exercising their life options. The generational impact of these deprivations and exclusions was sadly evident in the reproduction of experiences in the lives of their children. Moreover, for a sector of women that has been viewed as having rampant sexuality and uncontrolled fertility, their decisions and actions regarding sexual relations, marriage, pregnancy and raising children were in many ways characterized by the pursuit of sexual conventions and gender expectations. Their aspirations of being good women and

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mothers are, however, thwarted by the exclusionary constraints of economics, while their underclass position already marks these women as “dangerous”, “polluting”, and incapable of moral authority

(Skeggs, 1997). This negotiation between class position, gender norms and sexual values, with its contradictions, dilemmas and limited possibilities, informs the subjectivities and moral worlds of these women.

Ranging from ages 18 to 53 years old, most of the twenty women I interviewed had experienced hardships early in life and learned to survive by working at an age when playing was still supposed to be their main preoccupation. Working as domestic help for middle-class families, in particular, was the option open to many of these women. The lack of education is evident in the group as 16 of them did not finish high school, and of this number, almost half did not even complete grade school. Most of the women are married, although many did so only after getting pregnant or having borne several children with their partners. For the few who remained unmarried, the quest for a man who would marry and support them has resulted in serial relationships which have produced children whose fathers have abandoned or refused to recognize them, assuring the women’s “bad” reputation in the community.

Interestingly, when I asked the women how they ended up with their partners, a significant number of them replied that they themselves did not know how things came to be and that they had not imagined it. The perplexity with which they admitted to this seeming belated realization was intriguing. I would learn that for a number of the mothers, their experience of reproduction began with a disgrasya, or accident. Disgrasya, as a result of sexual explorations with their partners, or of male maneuverings or coercion that leave the women with little choice but to accept sexual relations with these men, precludes the idea of planning one’s pregnancy and stresses the unpreparedness of the women for motherhood at the time. In many cases, this unpreparedness on the part of the women was countered and soothed by the readiness of the men to take responsibility (pananagutan) for the pregnancy and offer marriage (or some domestic arrangement) that would manage the women’s public shame. Yet,

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while marriage or living together has managed the women’s sexual reputation, it also spelled for the women the start of a long reproductive career.

Half of the women I interviewed had their first pregnancy in their teenage years, between the ages 16 and 19; about a third, when they were between 20 and 23 years old; and about a fifth, when they were 24 years old and above. These women have between one and 12 children, with the average number of children at about 4. The women in their 40s and 50s have an average of five children; those in their 20s and 30s, almost four children; and those in their teens, almost two children. If we take the older women’s fertility rates as the general pattern for the community women, it would not be unreasonable to assume that the younger women in the group have just begun their long reproductive careers and can expect more children into their late 30s or early 40s. It is worth noting that the average number of children that these women have is higher than the national average of 3.3 children per woman. More significantly, it is much higher than the average of 2.8 children for urban women (National

Demographic and Health Survey, 2008.) But what these figures do not reflect is the actual number of pregnancies that these women have had or the miscarriages and abortions they have experienced.

Neither do these numbers speak of the early deaths of their young children, in some cases. A significant number of the mothers have also had to give up their children to the care of other relatives or their former partners. One gave up her newborn child to a “wealthy person” she did not know but who could provide her child a better future.

EARLY PATHS

Lourdes grew up in a poor rural community in the Visayas. Her parents separated when she was very young and her mother ended up with another man as a result of gapang, or the act of crawling, which in this case connotes a stealth sexual act and is a euphemism that the older generation uses to reduce the stigma of rape or sexual assault. Her stepfather, a farm hand, did not earn enough to provide for the family. To help feed her siblings, Lourdes learned to dig for sweet potatoes, cassava and

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other root crops. As a young girl, she would cross two mountains to reach her school, often, with an empty stomach. For as long as she could, she insisted on going to school even when there was pressure for her to help feed the family. Her mother once demanded, “Are you going to put your desire to study first before your family’s need to eat?” Before she could even finish third grade, however, she left school and traveled to Manila to work as a maid for a family.

I washed clothes, cleaned the house, took care of their children. Often, my (wards) would get sick, and I was the one who looked after them in the hospital…Very early (in life), my body learned about hardship…I was taking care of four kids. I was the only one. My God, that couple was too much… I was nine years old. The oldest child hit me with a broom. I had a glass thrown at me…I was there for a year, but never saw my earnings.

After leaving this family, Lourdes worked as a domestic help for other families, and with her small income, supported her mother and sent her younger siblings to grade school. It was her way of living her dream of getting an education. Later, she would meet her future husband, a security guard, who took her on a date one day and didn’t let her go home that night. Speaking in subtle terms, Lourdes described what happened, “He wouldn’t allow it that nothing would have happened (between us).”

When I pressed if she was forced, she replied, “It was like you couldn’t get out of it.” She admitted that while she did not want the sexual attention at first, she also got carried along with it. And because staying with a man for a night was considered either an elopement or compromising a woman’s virtue, or both, whether or not it was with the woman’s consent, Lourdes explained, “During those years, when something like that happens to you, you really have to get married.” She went back to her employer’s house the following day with Ric, who asked for the latter’s blessings to marry Lourdes. Lourdes, who had a boyfriend at the time, ended up marrying Ric. The two would have eight children, all of whom are now grown up, and whom they supported on Ric’s earnings as a jeepney driver.

Raissa, 19, had a similar, if a bit more traumatic, childhood. She was born and raised in a province in Mindanao, where she worked in a corn field as early as age 7. Her parents had a troubled marriage which drove her mother and her older sister to escape to Manila. Her father eventually

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convinced her mother to take him back and send for him and their other children, leaving Raissa behind.

When asked who took care of her, her answer was made in a dead-serious tone.

No one. I was by myself. I wandered around and went everywhere. I couldn’t stay in our house because I was all alone there and the nearest neighbor was on the other side of the mountain. I would go to the houses of the older people I knew. I would sleep and eat in different people’s houses. My grandmother never gave me food. They showed no interest in my well-being… But I would go to my aunt’s house to baby sit her children and she’d give me money.

“Throw-away” was how Raissa described herself. After almost two years, when she was 9 years old, her father finally asked her to join the rest of the family in Manila. In Sangandaan, she tried to resume her studies but eventually quit, never finishing her third grade. Raissa explained to me that she

“married” young because she was looking for someone who would love her. Yet, the circumstances of her “marriage” were far from what she had envisioned or planned. She and her boyfriend were part of a group of teenagers who regularly met for drinking sessions and soon the two started a sexual relationship. Suspecting her to be pregnant, her boyfriend told her father that she was carrying his child, and, upon learning this, the latter proceeded to beat her up in front of their neighbors. The suspected pregnancy, however, turned out to be a false alarm. But having been shamed publicly, Raissa felt that the only way to salvage her honor was to become a wife to her now common law-husband, a young man whose past arrests for theft had further reduced his chances of gaining legal employment and supporting their growing family.

Marriage and raising a family came to most of these women unplanned, and even unwelcome

(at least, in the beginning), in some cases. Yet the very unplanned-ness of this disguises the sad reality that, with little education, even fewer prospects of steady employment or opportunities to realize their aspirations, marriage and family are the only route left for many of these women. As Lourdes shared, she envied a friend, who had remained single and worked as a domestic worker in Hong Kong. Had an opportunity opened to her when she was younger, she said she would have gone to Singapore, Malaysia

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or Japan, and stayed unmarried herself. This reference to other countries speaks to the diasporic dreams of millions of Filipinos who desire to leave the country in search of a better life and acknowledges the impact of labor migration in transforming the ambitions and imagination of many

Filipinos (See, for example, Cruz, 1989; Constable, 1997; Parreñas, 2001; Parreñas, 2005; Faier, 2009.) As the top Asian destinations for Filipino migrant workers, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia hire Filipino women as domestic workers, while Japan accepts Filipinas mainly as entertainers in its sex industry (See

POEA statistics, OFW Deployment by Occupation, Country, and Sex, Full Year 2010.) As it becomes more competitive and knowledge-based, labor migration will remain a tantalizing fantasy for those living in the margins. For Raissa, who expressed a desire to work but had no skills, knowledge or any sort of productive connection, there is nothing that would bridge between her immediate world of the slums and the world of gainful employment outside, whether within or outside the country. Lacking real options, what is left for these women to do? This marginalization, which signifies a gaping disconnect between women’s ambitions of self-development and economic prosperity, on one hand, and what they can realistically achieve given the painfully limited resources that are available to them, on the other hand, serves as a funnel that tracks women into the single direction of marriage and raising a family. In this instance, the women need only to rely on their “natural” nurturing abilities and reproductive capacity as their main resources to qualify for this path of marriage and family. But beyond this, for

Lourdes, Raissa and the other mothers, their marriages and families also mark their existence and significance, offering a progressive movement from a prior social location to a new status, even as they remain within the same field of power, indicating that they have achieved something in life.

Motherhood, especially, affirmed their place and brought them gender status in the social world.

MOTHERHOOD ACHIEVED AND UNDERMINED

For me, being a mother gives me joy… Even though our life is like this, we are able to show our child at a young age that this is the kind of life we have. When the time comes, when he can already understand, he

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will think, ‘This is the kind of life that my mother had, but my life shouldn’t have to be like this. I should help my parents’.

In this passage, Juliet echoes the sentiments of the women about motherhood. Motherhood is a source of happiness for all these women, and seeing their children happy is how they best describe that happiness. But inextricably meshed with this experience is the everyday challenge of providing for their children and family. The women talk about not only the challenge to make ends meet; rather, they emphasize the constant struggle to search for the very means to survive on a daily basis. Juliet, 27, who, together with her husband and 4-year old son, lives in a household of more than 20 members, counting her parents, 11 siblings, their partners, as well as her nieces and nephews, knows how it is to scramble for and fight over the little resources of the family. Because her husband works irregularly as an unskilled laborer, she is forced to depend on her mother, Hilda, who is also one of my respondents, for their daily subsistence. She is ashamed of this dependence but she couldn’t do anything about it. To help out, she wakes up at dawn to go with her mother when the latter searches the garbage cans in neighboring areas to collect recyclable cans and bottles. Hilda, 50, on the other hand, more than her husband, provides the steady center for this family. She supports her family by working as a street sweeper and doing odd jobs for the village council. She told me that her neighbors had expressed amazement at how she was able to support such a large brood. She explained,

We, my children and I, in the past, experienced collecting garbage at night, even if it was raining. We were there collecting (garbage) so that they would have their school money the following day. We just waited for their father to fall asleep because he would get angry. But I said, ‘Where will we get the children’s money? They will be going to school tomorrow.’ How many were they then? And one after another …Then, one of them…this made me cry… when one of my daughters came, and said, ‘Mama, here, this is for our rice.’ Then, my son, he would fetch water (for the neighbors). For a drum of water, 25 pesos.

With their husbands or partners often without work or earning barely enough, the responsibility for stretching resources or filling all the gaps fall heavily on the mothers. The search for food, or finding ways to feed their family, in particular, takes much of the women’s energy on a daily basis, exhausting

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their resourcefulness with varied results. Maita, a mother of three, starts the day feeding her three young children sweet porridge, which she buys for 5 pesos a bowl from a neighbor’s food stand. With the rest of her 100 pesos budget, she buys ¾ kilo of rice, a pack of instant noodles and a can of sardines.

“As long as it has broth or sauce,” which she can mix with the rice, Maita can make the food last until the evening. To ensure that the food is equally shared, she sits her children around her at meal times and, in turns, spoon feeds each one of them. A staple for Filipinos, rice is the reliable food choice of many families and is usually paired with a viand or two. For many mothers in Sangandaan, however, rice has become a stand-alone meal, mixing it with soy sauce, salt or used cooking oil to give it a bit of flavor, and counting on its heavy carbohydrates to provide fullness that lasts for hours. For this reason, Maita proudly declares, her children are not skinny. On other days, there is no budget to speak of and the mothers must literally roam the streets looking for small jobs, asking neighbors if they need help with the laundry, fetching water, or other tasks. At times, the first meal of the day has to wait until the evening, after the women have had an opportunity to diskarte (creative or resourceful hustling) and earned some money for the day. This was what Lorena was doing when I saw her wandering the main street one afternoon. When she saw me, her face immediately cleared as she knew I would have canned goods and a modest compensation for her after our interview session. This made me feel a bit uneasy, and I wondered how the prospect of receiving money, even a small amount, influenced the dynamic of our interview sessions. I had to recognize, however, that given the deprived conditions under which these women live, the smallest of amounts represented a much-needed resource that could decide whether their families would have food on the table or go hungry for another day. In this regard, the relationship between myself, as the researcher, and my respondents was inherently unequal. In order to establish a more equal relationship, I focused on the quality of our conversations, emphasizing that I was a grateful recipient of their good will. (When one of the women, who I suspected was not in the mood to be interviewed at that time, hid from me one afternoon, I took it as a sign that I succeeded in

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two things: setting a compensation that was not too lucrative and establishing a dynamic that allowed the women to assert themselves, even in an indirect way.)

Since the women, more than the men, are relied on to diskarte for the family, many of them have taken to borrowing money from relatives or neighbors, offering laundry and other odd services, selling street food, joining TV contests, betting on illegal numbers games, or even organizing these gambling sessions themselves. Hilda used her diskarte skills when she filched gravel and cement from the road construction site outside and, working fast with her bare hands, built a floor for her house one night. Sometimes, the diskarte is a losing proposition from the start. This is what happened when Lorena bought on installment a set of underpants for 500 pesos from an Indian salesman, who roves around the community selling items for a huge interest, and re-sold it to a neighbor for only 300 pesos. In the end, she got her cash for the day, but still had incurred a debt of 500 pesos, while subsidizing the cost of her neighbor’s underwear! Disappointment with their husbands or domestic partners also surfaced in the course of talking about the burden of searching for means to support their families. Raissa felt abandoned by her husband during these times: Sometimes, when we don’t have anything to eat, he just lies there, (even if) the kids are hungry. He expects me to be the one to find (food). One time, we couldn’t borrow from anyone…it was raining, I was looking for food while he was just lying on his back. But I just let him be. Maybe, he’ll still change.

It is no surprise that the women describe their life as “isang kahig, isang tuka” (one scratch, one peck), referring to the way a chicken scratches the ground first before pecking at a grain. Hunger is all too common, with families rarely getting three meals a day, and none at all once or twice a week.

Drinking water to fend off the hunger is a coping strategy that Cora takes, while keeping her children inside the house is how Raissa prevents them from getting enticed by the treats at the store. Both retreat into their homes, willing their minds away from the pangs of empty stomachs. Asked what they do during these times, they replied: “Tahimik lang” (We’re just quiet.) While the answer was matter of fact, there was a sadness in their eyes that betrayed their suffering. In those two words, “tahimik lang,” the women speak of a silence that isolates them from society and is a condition of their existence. It

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goes beyond the physical boundaries that separate them from those who have more in life, for it is a deeply felt marginalization that gets experienced, confirmed and reinforced with each lack, constraint and deprivation that is encountered every day. It is a suffering whose depths is expressed, and retreats, in silence. Poverty and deprivation, as material consequences of structural violence (Farmer, 1996), render the women’s suffering voiceless and invisible.

At times, however, the resistance to this structural violence erupts in the body and gets embodied as an affliction (Kleinman, 1997). This is evident in the headaches that left Fe seemingly detached from our conversations. I asked her one day why it always took her so long to answer my questions. She explained that she had a constant head pain, and I didn’t doubt her. I had seen how she struggled to feed her eight children by collecting her neighbors’ trash, her thin arms pushing hard her wooden cart in the mud and across the highway, earning a measly peso from each household. With a husband who physically abuses her and refuses to support the family, Fe looks much older than her age of 39. Poverty exacts its toll in other ways, claiming not only the body but also the mind. It began, a few years ago, with Juliet’s hospitalization, which was both a medical and a financial crisis for her family.

With financial worries and a newborn son to take care of, she started drifting into her own thoughts, foremost of which was where to get the money to pay off the bills. Soon, her family could not reach her.

“I lost my mind,” Juliet described the episode.

Surviving then becomes the experience that defines motherhood for many of these women. But surviving brings to mind not only the challenges that they face; rather, it invokes the qualities of strength, resourcefulness, resilience, perseverance, responsibility, duty and love. All these qualities are deployed to perform a sacrifice for their children. Indeed, part of being a good mother is the ability to constantly struggle, take on adversities and do everything for the survival of the family. At the same time, motherhood itself is a resource (Kawash, 2011) that the women can command to bolster their actions and decisions while shielding or justifying their willingness to endure the everyday humiliation of

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deprivations. In this regard, the main achievement for motherhood is its affirmation as a virtue. As gender identity, motherhood, in its virtuous mold, confers social, if feminine, status on women.

Class position, however, has a way of undermining this status. Although sacrifice may make a virtue out of motherhood, it is a quality that must be enacted and fulfilled with regularity, as demanded by the particularly impoverished socio-economic context within which the women raise their children.

Providing for the needs of the family is still a requirement, a minimum that, even with their sacrifices, they are often unable to meet. As a result, the attainment of the model of motherhood aspired for is compromised and bound to fail. For these women, there is nothing more painful than the helplessness of not being able to provide for their children. When this happens, they fall short of being the good mothers they endeavor to be.

CONCEIVING POVERTY

For all the women who participated in the research, every child is a blessing from God, a belief that concurs with Catholic teachings. Many also believe that the number of children that one has is determined and has been planned by God. Yet, when asked how they felt when they learned they were pregnant with the second, third, or fourth child, many of the women admitted to feeling concerned about how they would manage an addition to the family. The joy, which once accompanied a pregnancy, is slowly eroded by the prospect of having yet another mouth to feed. Some confessed to thoughts of aborting the fetus while a few others admitted to actual attempts at terminating their pregnancies. This is far from the picture of an idealized motherhood that the Church paints regarding reproduction.

Lorena expresses these contradictory feelings about pregnancy and the conflict it creates in the family:

I still feel the same (about each pregnancy). I was happy to get pregnant but, of course, I worry that I would now have more children. If there are only a few (of them), I could help my husband. But how would I be able to help him? I am always getting pregnant. My mother-in-law scolds me because I’m always getting pregnant, instead of helping my husband. I tell her, ‘Then talk to your son’. But she says, why her, when I should be the one to tell my husband to control himself. I did control myself, but

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still got pregnant. I had to stop taking pills because it triggered my asthma.

In talking about their pregnancies, the women would inevitably recall their experiences of giving birth, their stories painting a picture that go against the sentiments of feminine fulfillment. Instead, they revealed experiences that represented low points in their lives. Remy talked about how she and her newborn child had to stay in the hospital for weeks because they did not have enough money to pay for the hospital bill:

We thought of escaping (from the hospital). When we got the bill, it was more than 21,000 pesos…Where are we going to get the money to pay for this? We only had 3,000. My husband went to the secretary downstairs and tried to negotiate. He told the doctor, ‘If you want, I can take my wife home, then we can leave our child here. We’ll go back for him once we have the money.’ But the doctor would not agree as there had been many who left their babies and the mothers never returned. My husband said to them, ‘But you won’t let me work for you. When my wife recovers, she can also work here, even if it’s washing dishes at the canteen. Still, you won’t agree.’ Then, my husband got our dilapidated electric fan, (offered it) as collateral, but they won’t take it. He talked to the head and begged, ‘Have pity… Please, we can sign a promissory note…’

The birth of a child, while welcomed as a blessing, is also a period of crisis that destabilizes the family. Further, there is an uncertain element to the blessing when keeping the child becomes a question mark, as when Remy, contemplating leaving her son in the hospital, thought she might not see him again and that, perhaps, he wasn’t meant for them. For many of the women, giving birth to a child is accompanied by the real possibility of giving up that child as a way of resolving the crisis. It is worth noting that adoption, as an alternative to contraception or abortion, is a similar solution offered by the

Catholic bishops. What is left out in the discussion, however, is that preventing a pregnancy does not carry the same moral dilemma for the women as giving up a child, whether in the form of legal adoption or abandonment.

Without a single exception, the women expressed a desire to limit the number of children they wanted to have. Their attempts at using contraception, however, have been inconsistent and foiled by

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financial constraints and health considerations. At the time of our second interview, Teresa’s injectable had lapsed and she was worrying how she would pay for the next one. Before she could get inserted with an injectable, she would have to buy a pregnancy test kit to determine that she was not pregnant; if the result of the test was negative, this would allow her to get an injectable, but only after shelling out a hundred pesos for it. Fear, urgency and resignation undoubtedly showed in Teresa’s words. My response to her at the time, unfortunately, reflected a logic that assumed that health services were in place and functioning properly.

Teresa (T): “Now, I’m scared. Because I stopped getting injected.”

Dulce (D): Ah, you mean, your injectable?

T: Yes. (Money’s) too tight for us. You have to pay for it. That’s why I’m scared that I might get pregnant again. I have to go back to the (health) center but I have no money. It costs a hundred, Ate.

D: Isn’t it given for free? I know it’s free.

T: If they (the center) don’t have any in their stock, we have to buy it.

D: Maybe, you can go back. They might have it already.

T: No, they really wanted us to pay. I already went, and they were making me pay a hundred. But, (things) are really tight. What can I do? I don’t have the money for it. I really want to get an injectable. I really want to. I’m thinking, as soon as I get the money, I’d get injected. I don’t want to (get pregnant again), but you can’t tell the man that you don’t want to have sex with him.”

Here, Teresa pointed to three factors that prevented her from actualizing her reproductive decision-making: lack of financial resources, inadequate health services and male sexual privilege.

Because women’s contraceptive needs clearly competed with the other urgent needs of the family, their contraceptive intentions were easily set aside, and the practice discontinued. In addition, the rationality upon which family planning, as a technological fix, rests does not work in this context. Even the use of relatively long-acting methods such as injectables suffers from the inconsistencies of the women’s unsteady lives. However, it is common for health providers to attribute this lack of rationality neither to the precarious balancing act that the women must perform nor to the inadequacies of the health care

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delivery system. Rather, it is blamed on the perceived inability of the women to prioritize family planning and to know what would be good for them. But, even when women prioritize, and, yes, beg, for contraceptives, the health care system, saddled by financial problems and political constraints, cannot respond to their reproductive health needs. Contrary to the judgment of outsiders, the necessity of family planning is not lost even on young mothers. In another part of Sangandaan, Emily, who became a mother at 17, had been breastfeeding her son for almost a year and was determined not to get pregnant again:

I see other people and their life. I see my life in them. When you have many children, you can’t do anything else. Even with just one child, it’s difficult to move around. You can’t even wash the dishes, especially if there’s no one to help you.

But like Teresa, without any means to access contraceptives, Emily lived with her fears.

In arguing against the Catholic teaching that ‘artificial’ contraceptives are abortifacients that “kill life”, and are, therefore, sinful and immoral, the women said that using contraceptives eases the burden of poverty and allows them to better care for their families. They also questioned the idea of “killing life”, and asked, “How can that be a sin? Nothing has been formed yet.” For them, it would be more sinful to have more children than they could support and jeopardize further the survival of their other children. Responsible parenthood, then, is more than just choosing which family planning method to use or deciding which one is more moral. It is interpreted by the women as taking into account not only the life of a potential child but the impact it will have on the future of their other living children. It is on this issue that a clear articulation of a right was made by the women: the right to decide and determine what’s good for their families. This right is linked to the assertion that they must follow their “own conscience”, and that the Catholic Church, when it came to matters about raising a family, should not impose its thinking on women. In declaring that not everything that the priests say must be followed, the women exhibited their autonomy from Catholic doctrines.

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Church proscriptions then seem to play no role in women’s decision not to use ‘artificial’ contraceptives or undergo sterilization. Apart from the lack of financial resources, one of the main reasons that prevented women from using contraceptives was the fear of side effects, such as getting cancers, especially, losing their menstruation, and thus, the ability to flush out the ‘dirty’ blood from their bodies. More critically, they feared losing their ability to work and perform physical tasks, which was needed in caring for their kids and home. Women were consistent in explaining that they decided against ligation because they believed once the procedure had been performed, it would mean they could no longer carry heavy loads, fetch water or wash heavy clothes. In this regard, women’s decision to use contraceptives or not is always weighed in relation to the performance of, and adherence to, their maternal duties. Clearly, the matter of ‘artificial’ contraceptives and family planning has been defined by the women as primarily about family survival and the mother’s health; it has ceased to be a religious moral issue that must be wrestled with.

BLOOD AND LIFE

In our conversations, the urban poor women said they considered abortion a sin because it was

“killing” a tao, a human being. But unlike the Catholic Church which believes life begins from the moment of conception or fertilization, women give between 2-4 weeks before declaring that there is a human being growing inside them. During the first few weeks, the women believe that what is in their wombs is only “dugo” or blood, which could be made to flow again by taking bitter herbs, a spoonful of raw coffee, or even gin. This can also be accomplished by hitting their hips, pelvis, or back against a wall, pressing the edge of a plate on the stomach or, on purpose, falling down the stairs.

However, there remains an ambiguity about this period of pregnancy. While women assert that it is “only blood”, they will nevertheless talk to their “child” when they attempt to abort it – to ask for forgiveness, or to say, “My child, if you really want to live, then cling hard”. If the first or second attempt fails, and the fetus continues to grow, the woman stops trying and accepts that her “baby” wants to live.

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This negotiation between the woman and her “baby” is mediated by God’s wishes; whether the “blood flow” is restored or not, the women see the result as one of fate: the child is either meant to live or not, according to God’s plan. As Nanette said:

If it gets aborted, then it gets aborted. But if it’s really meant for you, if God really gave it to you, then I know… it’s not going to get aborted.

At the same time, in referring to the potential life inside their wombs as tao, a human being or person, and not buhay, or life, the women hinted that they were relating to something concrete and recognizable. As they elaborated, it already has an ulo (head) or kamay (hands), which is more than just a shape or form that they can relate to. When they did use the word buhay, they employed its verb form, instead of the noun form, stressing the second syllable instead of the first. A distinction was thus made between the two states, “alive” and “life”. This seems to suggest that women were taking recognizability of form (head, hands, feet), temporality and viability as the relevant signs or markers of being human and being alive. Without access to ultrasound technology, however, women make this assessment based on a combination of folk knowledge, the emotional connection to their bodies, spirituality and pragmatism. Ultimately, because it is more concrete and sensible, the act of recognizing the tao that is alive has more significance for the women than the act of deciding when life has begun.

In these examples on contraception and abortion, women, far from taking religion as irrelevant in their reproductive decision-making, re-interpret religious teachings and seek to reconcile these with what is attainable morally within the constraints of their situation. While the idea of “sin” persists in the stories of the women, it is given a vernacular meaning when women defend their decision to use pills or injectables. On the other hand, in the case of abortion, “sin” loses its rigid definition (i.e. as Church officials would say, “abortion at any time is killing”) and is subject to many conditions: the number of weeks the woman has been pregnant, the real fate of the fetus over which only God has control, and the willingness of the woman to accept this fate. The act of appropriating religious teachings then to fit one’s circumstances is akin to the tugging and pulling at a stretchable cloth until there is enough

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material to cover a given object. Women constantly adjust and re-adjust until they reach a certain moral equilibrium, or a reasonable social order, that they believe incorporates simultaneously commonly held religious beliefs and their own reality. Religion, therefore, does not lose its relevance in women’s lives; rather, it is made pliable in the process of women’s re-interpreting of religious teachings. It is important to note, however, that, although they identified as Catholics, the women did not count themselves as religious, which for them meant strictly observing Catholic practices and teachings. The women rarely go to mass, cannot recite in full the Church-mandated prayers, and are unfamiliar with specific religious doctrines of the Church on reproduction and sexuality. Yet, not being religious did not mean for the women not being close to God. When I would ask the questions, “Do you feel close to God?” or “How important is God to you?”, this would trigger a welling of tears in the women, and a strong quiet emotion would overcome them for a few moments. This would be followed by a narrative that describes their relationship with God. As the mothers shared:

Brenda: First of all, when I have a big problem and then I pray, it lightens (what I feel in) my head…then my chest (also). When I pray and ask the Lord, I feel lighter…as if the Lord is not far from me. The Lord is kind to me (short pause, voice cracking). (The Lord) does not forsake me (long pause, voice crying). That’s what I’m thankful for the Lord, even if I don’t have my relatives with me, when I pray to the Lord… it’s as if my parents are beside me…

Juliet: (When I pray), I ask for help from God, I beg [nagmamakaawa] God to forgive me…I cry out my problems to (Him)…I just cry… (and after, I feel) happy.

Gemma: (God) is important to me, really important to me because S/he is the only one I need, the only one I call. There is no one else that I can call any time but Her, because ... (God) is the only one who gives all the tests… To God I give my trust, my whole heart trusts that S/he makes everything possible in my life. (Voice emotional.)

Two things then can be gleaned from these narratives. First, the concept of religiosity (or spirituality) for women is predicated on an experiential relationship with God based on suffering and not on religious obedience which the hegemonic Church requires of its constituents. Second, social class is constitutive of this religiosity, that is, poor women’s experience of God is inextricably linked to their

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experience of poverty and lack, and they construct religious morality through this worldview. In these narratives, God is a source of hope for the women in times of hardship and need, and provides the comfort and understanding that lighten their burden. Part of the language that the women use is awa, which in Filipino means “to beg”, “to take pity” or “to have mercy”, and thus, their oft-repeated utterance, “May awa ang Diyos” (God will take pity on me). Underlying this is a sense of suffering which comes out in their stories of poverty, deprivation and survival from childhood up to the present. It is also a suffering that only God, who had suffered for the redemption of humanity, could feel with them.

Feeling abandoned by society, they articulate their issues in religious terms, the idiom of religion giving them a sense of worthiness because there is a God who suffers with them (Ileto, 1979).

To return to the subject of women’s reproductive decision-making, years after having an abortion, some of the women feel that they are still being punished for their “sin”. Their punishment?

They can’t get a steady source of income and they experience a lot of hardship in life. For the women who gave a child up for adoption, there is also a sense of guilt and shame that remain, belying the facile position of the Church that, if the woman does not want to bear a child, there is always adoption to consider.

The tension between institutional religion and ‘lived’ religion is highlighted in the way Filipinos conscientiously follow religious public rituals but listen to their ‘conscience’ when it comes to private matters. Yet following one’s conscience does not necessarily mean a guiltless, shameless or sinless life.

As one of my informants during my preliminary research said, the role of the Church in moral matters is

“to protect you and redeem you. Guilt is the mechanism by which that protection and redemption work.” Sometimes we think of moral subjects as acting subjects; we focus on their concrete actions but forget what happens inside the person. For the women in this research, the capacity to feel suffering, guilt and shame seems to be a necessary ingredient in the constitution of moral subjectivity. But the contradictory nature of this moral subjectivity is revealed in the way that women are able to re-imagine

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religious morality and make room for their own reproductive decision-making, on one hand, and yet still inhabit the very same religious moral values that they resist. It is important to remember, however, that even as women define their relationship with God as primary, it is their relationship with their children and families that demand their urgent attention, energy and care. The guilt or shame arising from their reproductive decisions and actions then becomes a cross that they willingly bear if it means their family’s survival and, therefore, ultimately, their redemption.

RESISTANCE AND SUBMISSION

But what makes women’s experience of family planning (‘artificial’ contraception) different from that of abortion? Is it enough to say that women’s moral subjectivities allow for both the subversion of and compliance to the Catholicism? In looking at their relationship to Catholic teachings on reproduction and sexuality, I also attempt to examine the relationship of poor women to power and authority. What I have found is that, in defending their right to practice family planning and contraception, women are able to pose a direct challenge to the teachings of the Church, questioning the institution’s assumptions as well as articulating an alternative perspective based on their realities and a certain grasp of their rights. This is different from their equivocations when it comes to the issue of abortion, wherein instead of a direct assertion, women alternate between justification of their actions, guilt, rationalization, and, finally, submission to doctrinal damnation. Their initial resistance to religious authority can only find anchor in appeals to the benevolence of the same authority as the women search for a language that will express the truth about their experience.

In as much as it has legitimized family planning and contraception, the existence of a counter- public discourse, such as the population, development and poverty alleviation framework, has provided a space within which women can articulate and ground their reproductive decisions, actions, and so- called transgressions. Family planning, which has been part of the country’s population and development strategy since the 1960s, has already gained legitimacy and support from various sectors

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of society. Although it suffered setbacks in the 1980s during Corazon Aquino’s term, its promotion as a government program has been well-established. The proliferation of advertisements and public service announcements on the benefits of family planning has also cultivated the public’s support, and with this, a national consciousness that aligned the family’s aspirations with that of the country’s goal of attaining development. It is thus not surprising that, when asked why they supported family planning efforts, the women readily pointed to the “ballooning population”, which, if not addressed, would likely plunge the country into deeper poverty. With the country’s future at stake, women’s decision to use contraception as a means of family survival becomes a stand in for the nation’s preservation.

While state discourse props up the position of the women on contraception and family planning, the same cannot be said in the case of abortion. With the provision in the Constitution mandating the state to “protect the life of the mother and the unborn” strengthening the Catholic Church prohibition against abortion, government discourse has largely been about the illegality of the act. Attempts by the

Department of Health to introduce the discussion of post-abortion complications as a public health issue have been thwarted by moral and legal restrictions. Women, in this case, have found no legitimizing discourse within which to articulate their experience of abortion and enable them to speak back to power. With its capacity to wield the law and summon the full force of its penal power, the legal secular discourse of the state, moreover, is proving to be more restrictive. Ironically, it is the religious discourse that provides women with a little space within which to find moral salvation from their actions. The merging of the Church and state position against abortion, however, has ensured that women do not have instruments to support their moral claims, and their voices remain marginalized and illegitimate.

As a result, the alliance between the Church and state has foreclosed the open discussion of the issue and stifled the emergence of other possible perspectives upon which women could anchor their experience.

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Women’s ideas and practices of contraception point to their achievement of autonomy from religious doctrine. Their decision to undergo abortion, and the patterns of their abortion experiences, defy the Catholic Church’s grave prohibition. This speaks of a resistance to Church authority that rests on notions of mortal sin, infallibility and religious morality. Yet, without the protective mechanisms of class status and the structural support of the state, women are unable to sustain their resistance and exercise their moral decisions.

MORE OF THE SAME

For some of the women, there is shame in getting pregnant too often and having many children.

They admitted to cringing, and one or two said they did not leave their house for a while, when neighbors and relatives commented, “You’re pregnant again?!” These comments were almost always followed by the question, “Don’t you feel pity for yourself?” and the admonition that wives were responsible for controlling their husbands’ sexuality. While women would angrily respond with, “Why, are you the ones who feed my children?” they also expressed helplessness and a wish to change their situation.

This helplessness and inability to have control over their life situation was further impressed on me by the end of my fieldwork. After a few weeks of absence from Sangandaan, I returned to the community for one of my last visits to say goodbye to the mothers. At this time, I learned that Teresa,

Lorena, Emily, Fe, and Celina were pregnant, while Remy had given birth to her third child. All of them had been insistent about not wanting to get pregnant again and expressed a desire to use contraception.

Being poor and pregnant makes women more vulnerable to the stigma of having untamed sexuality and rampant fertility, not to mention the tag of being irresponsible parents and citizens.

Giving economics as the main reason, the women in the study agreed with the common thinking that the poor do not have the right to have many kids. When asked why the poor have many kids, their most

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common answer was that people “had nothing else to do” and needed something to “occupy their time” because most of them do not have jobs to be busy with. This reflects the automatic equation of sex with reproduction and the role of economics in mediating, moderating sexuality, and again the reinforcement of the perception that the poor have “undisciplined” sexuality. The Catholic Church’s position on

‘artificial’ contraceptives and on sexuality for procreation, by encouraging women to bear children while at the same time limiting women’s reproductive options, makes poor women more vulnerable to stigmatization.

But this stigmatization should also be viewed in relation to state policies and actions. In particular, the proposed responsible parenthood and population management law, while aiming to institutionalize much needed reproductive health programs and service, also professes to produce

“healthy, educated and productive citizens”. As citizens, women become individuals who are not merely

“acceptors” of contraceptives; rather, as citizens, they are individuals invested with rights and responsibilities, particularly, the responsibility to appreciate and plan a smaller family. Indeed, the proposed bill has a section specifying two children as the ideal family size. Moreover, embedded in the idea of a healthy, educated and productive citizen is the notion of a woman whose subjectivity lies in self-control and discipline in the arena of fertility and reproduction. At the same time, however, recognizing the Church’s strong opposition to reproductive health and ‘artificial contraception’, the government is now implementing a “responsible parenthood” program that provides natural family planning only services, which urban poor women find hard to sustain given their circumstances.

In this context where being a ‘good Catholic’ means not using artificial contraceptives and accepting each pregnancy regardless of its impact on families, and being a responsible citizen means planning your children and appreciating a smaller family even as government fails to provide services to comply with such ideals, it is hard for poor women to achieve both without being stigmatized and discriminated against either way. ‘Responsible parenthood,’ moreover, becomes yet another moral

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principle that the women fail to embrace. Indeed, poor women cannot win in this situation. While the welfare of the poor has been part of their language and rhetoric, the actions of the Church and the state in relation to reproduction and sexuality have deepened the exclusion and alienation of poor women from society.

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CHAPTER FIVE

GO NATURAL, START LOCAL: POLICY MOVES THROUGH GOVERNMENT

Shore and Wright (1997) argue that “policies can be read as cultural texts, as classificatory devices […], as narratives that serve to justify or condemn the present, or as rhetorical devices that function to empower some people and silence others” (p. 7). They further write that the structures, discourses and agencies through which policy operates can offer us insights into the workings of power.

In this chapter, I present three case studies that show how policies offer implicit and explicit models of social order. These policy case studies attempt to affect social norms by enforcing existing norms and codifying new ones.

This chapter also illustrates how reproductive health policy has traveled through the various structures and levels of government, despite organized attempts to obstruct its movement. Although the stalled discussions in Congress have blocked the reproductive health bill, this has only provoked local governments and national agencies to come up with various policy responses in order to define their own approaches to the issue. The failure of the legislature to resolve the policy debate has pushed key actors to summon the powers of other governmental bodies, such as the appellate courts and international human rights committees. Whether supporting or impeding reproductive health, these responses from the different levels of government demonstrate how policymaking gets displaced, rerouted and accommodated in other governmental mechanisms. In this case, policy statements, national and local health programs, judicial petitions, as well as leaders’ personal convictions, take the place of national legislation, producing disjunctions and contradictions in the way government operates and meets its responsibilities.

Looking at three policy cases, one national and two local, this section examines conflicting government responses brought about by the unresolved national legislative debates regarding

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reproductive health. The first case looks at the national government’s natural family planning-only program implemented in 2001 and continued up until 2010. The program highlights how a discourse of equal opportunity has been developed to justify the radical shift away from a more comprehensive family planning program to one that solely focuses on natural family planning. It also shows how policy, in the form of presidential and administrative directives, gets translated by its implementers into a full- blown program with a philosophy, a schedule of tasks, and a set of targets, in order to accommodate the

Catholic Church’s position within the rationalizing technologies of governance. Religious ideas and natural family planning techniques embedded in the program work to fashion husbands and wives into morally responsible parents who maintain both sexual discipline and reproductive openness. What gets understood, practiced, articulated and circulated by intended beneficiaries are ideas about the family and responsible parenting that emphasize a harmonious moral-social order based on faith and religion.

This process reveals how the public reworks the ideological positions and policy discourses that the state propagates, oftentimes taking these in directions not intended by official discourse (Greenhalgh and

Winckler 2005).

The language of policy, according to Apthorpe (1997), is both a form and a source of power.

Policy language uses different ‘styles’ of expression that may be characterized as clear, plain or vague in order to attract, please and/or persuade. What is clear derives from the omission of something; what is plain emanates from the refusal to elaborate; what is vague is rendered clear by context. Moreover, policy language, even if vague, already sets the conditions that may reinforce the status quo, limit the changes that can be achieved, or introduce radical changes into the system. While policy is not always successful, the language that it uses always has an effect – on the people it targets, on those charged to carry it out, and on the environment within which it is implemented.

The second case reviews Executive Order 003 enacted by Manila City in 2001, which effectively banned modern artificial contraceptives in public hospitals and health centers. EO 003 illustrates how

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seemingly vague and plain language creates its own linguistic interpretation aided by the public recognition of the personal statements and actions of its author-executor. By its vagueness, the policy already oriented the rules - official and perceived - for its implementation and practice, while its language provided cover for its real intention. At the same time, even as EO 003’s objective was masked by vague language, the linguistic cues about the policy’s moral orientation was clear. Its invocation of universal “pro-life” values works as linguistic and ideological devices that are recognizable – and therefore interpretable - by the public and meant to persuade Manila constituents of the worthiness of the policy. The last case looks at Quezon City which approved in 2008 Ordinance No. 1829, establishing reproductive health programs and mandating adolescent health education in public schools. In contrast to Manila’s Executive Order, Quezon City’s Ordinance employs a language of efficiency and rationality associated with economic and social development goals. For the wealthiest city in the country, this developmental discourse exerts a powerful influence on the debates, overcoming opposition from the

Catholic Church.

These three cases reveal that, as the contestations over reproductive health policy are played out at the local levels and on the ground, the lines that define the actors on opposing sides of the debate gets more blurred. Those who implement the natural family planning-only program find ways to justify talking about modern family planning methods in communities. Advocates of natural family planning undermine each other as they debate over which NFP methods are more moral and legitimate.

And political allies of the Catholic Church shed their allegiance to the Church position as they confront their religious leaders and criticize the latter’s actions. What may appear as a clear cut demarcation between contending parties at the national level are revealed as tangled threads of conflicts and alliances between and among protagonists at the local political scene.

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CASE 1: THE GOVERNMENT SEARCH

Coming from the different cities of Metro Manila, they had gathered to recognize the best.

Officials of the Commission on Population and the Department of Health called the regional conference to mark the first two years of the government’s Responsible Parenthood and Natural Family

Planning (RP-NFP) program, inviting married couples who had actively participated in the campaign to be part of the ceremonies. Representing the model couples from the national capital, the husband-and- wife teams were selected based on their regular attendance of responsible parenting classes, consistent practice of natural family planning for at least three months, and declared satisfaction with the natural method. They must also be of reproductive age and already have children. The award for the Best RP

Couple goes to the partners who have absorbed the knowledge, attitude and practice of responsible parenting; use natural family planning properly; and intend to motivate and recruit other married couples to the program. As judges for the competition, population and health officials weighed these criteria 40, 30 and 30 points, respectively.

It was a festive occasion, pop music blaring during the breaks, the programmed proceedings enhancing the Christmas spirit that was in the air on that December day. The program started with a spiritual message and a prayer by a bishop, followed by the singing of the national anthem, after which came the inspirational speeches from top government officials, and the midterm report on the accomplishments of the Responsible Parenthood and Natural Family Planning program. Sitting at designated round tables, local health and family planning workers, in their color-coded t-shirt uniforms, together with their nominated couples, made up the majority of the audience, lending a grassroots atmosphere to an otherwise ceremonial event. The program’s highlight was the award of the title Best

RP Couple and the first and second runners-up; the winning couples each receiving a glass plaque and a basket of goodies, as well as an opportunity to be photographed and featured in official government publications.

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Bearing the theme, “Sa tamang agwat ng panganganak, pamilya’y aangat” (“With proper birth spacing, your family will be better”), the conference reaffirmed the four pillars of President Gloria

Macapagal-Arroyo’s population policy: responsible parenthood, respect for life, birth spacing, and informed choice. Through the showcased posters and infomercials, the program highlighted natural family planning as a symbol of responsible parenting and a way of improving the conditions and fortunes of families. The event formalized the Responsible Parenthood Movement (RPM), envisioned as a nationwide grassroots organization that would promote natural family planning and convince Filipino couples of its health, social and moral benefits. As a culmination, the elected officers of the Responsible

Parenthood Movement in Metro Manila took their oath and were sworn in by population officials.

A few days prior to the regional conference, a National Population Congress had brought together in Manila the local executives, health representatives, non-government organizations (NGOs) and Catholic Church-affiliated groups from the other regions in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. The mayors of Naga, Marikina and Tanay - local governments recognized as having the most successful natural family planning programs in the country - presented their “best practices” to their counterparts from other cities and provinces. From the non-government side, a nun representing the Parish of Ipil in

Cagayan de Oro, talked about the archdiocese’s pastoral experience in running a natural family planning program since the 1970s, which was the precursor of the Philippine Federation for Natural Family

Planning. The presence of local elected officials and health workers in these meetings demonstrated that the RP-NFP program had found support from local government units (LGUs). Moreover, the participation of NGOs, and, especially, of Church-affiliated groups, gave the much-needed approval to the government’s NFP-only population policy. These groups came with their information and education materials -- comics, calendars, posters, brochures, stickers, manuals, t-shirts -- and exhibited their knowledge of the various natural family planning methods. Also gracing the occasion was a movie

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celebrity, who has a second career as a respected family and child development specialist and was tapped to be the endorser of the government’s natural family planning program.

The search for the Best RP Couple, the organization of a Responsible Parenthood Movement

(RPM), the mobilization of local governments, and the enlistment of Catholic Church support, were elements that articulated the natural family planning-only program of the Arroyo government. The RPM conferences in late 2008, the same time that the debates on the Reproductive Health bill finally reached the plenary of the House of Representatives, served as a culminating stage in the institutionalization of this program. Initiated in 2001, the natural family planning-only program was then President Gloria

Macapagal-Arroyo’s response to the political conflict and the pressure from the Catholic Church that resulted from the introduction of the RH bill. Arroyo’s directive on natural family planning marked a radical shift in the direction of the country’s family planning program, which until then took a “cafeteria approach” of making available all methods of legal and safe contraception. For the first time since the

1970s, the government’s family planning program was officially aligned with the Catholic Church position.

HISTORY OF NFP SERVICES

Government documents depict the institutionalization of the NFP-only program as a logical evolution of the national family planning program and population policy. The NFP Handbook

(Department of Health, 2003) traces the origin of natural family planning services to the programs started by the Catholic Church in the 1970s, which were later taken on by NGOs and integrated into health, community organizing and organization-building activities. On the government side, NFP was part of the range of family planning methods (or, method-mix, in bureaucratese) promoted in the earlier years, giving LAM (breastfeeding), and the rhythm method a place alongside oral contraceptives, condoms, IUD, injectibles, and sterilization. In 1994, the Philippine Family Planning Program started to distinguish between “traditional NFP” and “modern scientific NFP” methods, with the latter being

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recognized as equally effective as the “artificial” methods of contraception, such as the pill. Modern scientific NFP endorsed by the government by this time included LAM, and the cervical mucus, basal temperature, sympto-thermal, standard days, and the two-days wet and dry methods. These were distinguished from the traditional NFP methods, withdrawal and rhythm or calendar, which were deemed ineffective; the latter was officially removed from the program, while the former was never recognized as a method. However, an evaluation of staff competencies in the Department of Health found that its personnel lacked the skills and training to deliver NFP information and services. This led to a partnership with the Philippine Federation for Natural Family Planning and, subsequently, with the

Institute of Reproductive Health at Georgetown University, Washington DC, which aimed to develop the

Department’s capability in NFP training and service provision. By 1996, then President Fidel Ramos directed local governments to include NFP in their family planning services. The DOH further refined the implementation guidelines and improved the standards of NFP services in the following years.

While these developments aimed to strengthen natural family planning services, government viewed NFP as part of a range of family planning services that it should provide. There was no intention to make NFP the only method endorsed by the government. It is important to remember that the 1990s was also the period that the government started to take a population management approach and integrated reproductive health and rights into the population and development framework. The closest that the government came to introducing a NFP-only program was in the late 1980s during President

Corazon Aquino’s administration, when the Catholic Church and its supporters attempted to get Aquino to sign secretly an Executive Order that would have prevented government from using public funds for artificial or modern contraceptives. When this was discovered, women’s groups protested and the EO was never signed. However, the family planning program during this period was effectively halted as

Mita Pardo de Tavera, then Secretary of the Department of Social Welfare and Development, then the agency responsible for running the government’s family planning program, stopped distributing

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contraceptives. A big howl was raised when stocks of donated contraceptives were later found in the government warehouse, expired and undelivered. As a result, a reorganization of agency functions followed, and the implementation and provision of family planning services were transferred to the

Department of Health, whose responsibility it remains. The experience of having a family planning program whose implementation (or non-implementation) depended on the personal or religious biases of the administrator currently in power was one of the major reasons reproductive health and family planning advocates saw the need for a reproductive health law. If programs were to be effective, their continuity from one administration to the next was imperative.

LEVELING THE PLAYING FIELD

The language of Administrative Order 125 s. 2002 (Department of Health [DOH] 2002), which details the National NFP Strategic Plan Year 2002-2006, describes the government’s new approach as

“mainstreaming natural family planning”. A DOH brochure states that this means “putting NFP into the center, into focus, in a dominant discourse in the Philippine Family Planning Program (PFPP) where political will, policies and support systems including budget for information and services are in place”

(DOH NFP brochure, n.d.; DOH NFP Handbook, 2003). In our interview, Director Marcelino further explained that the history of the Philippine Family Planning Program is a history of providing information and services on “artificial” methods. This time, she says, the government of President Macapagal-Arroyo wanted to “level the playing field” and give “equal treatment” to natural family planning. To put this into action, under the mandate of the administrative order, Congress allocated a budget of 50 million pesos to fund the information and education activities on NFP. The President’s policy directive instructed the Department of Health to collaborate with the Couples for Christ, a Catholic group, in implementing NFP. In fulfilling this, the DOH awarded the 50 million pesos contract to the Catholic religious group in 2004 to enable the latter to undertake NFP-related activities nationwide. It was considered a controversial transaction as no official bidding had occurred, but defended by the DOH in a

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press statement as “beneficial because CFC is not charging for its services. The P50 million is allotted for operational costs of their activities. No salaries or honoraria will be drawn from the said money” (DOH press statement, 2004). As of 2008, no assessment of this collaboration had been conducted.

In addition to allocating funds for NFP, “leveling the playing field”, more significantly, also meant that no national government resources would be used to purchase or promote artificial or modern contraceptives. This came at a time when USAID, the country’s main donor of modern contraceptives, announced that it would stop supplying these commodities by 2006. Former DOH Secretary Manuel

Dayrit, in a Letter to the Editor (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 2004), responding to criticisms from a women’s health advocate, further shed light on the government’s position.

First of all, it has never, at any time been my job or the job of the Department of Health to buy contraceptives. It would be recalled that all contraceptive supplies that, in the past, were distributed free-of-charge through the government healthcare system were donated to the Philippines by foreign governments or organizations. After many years of this, it became the tendency of many Filipinos to equate government’s role in attending to maternal and child health and responsible parenthood with the distribution of contraceptives. The use of contraceptives is, in fact, only one of the available approaches employed in only one of the many essential elements of maternal and child health and responsible parenthood. It does not spell out the totality of the DOH’s work in this area.

Asked by media who the government expected to fill the gap in services and provide modern contraceptives, President Macapagal-Arroyo replied, “The NGOs” (Sison, 2003). Equal treatment, in this case, did not mean increasing support for NFP while maintaining the existing support level for modern contraceptives; rather, it meant ending services prioritized in the past, but which are now politically unacceptable, in favor of the Church-endorsed natural family planning. Moreover, as family planning services get fragmented, the government shifts its responsibility to provide comprehensive services to the private sector.

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In arguing for “ensuring adequate and honest information on the various modalities or approaches families can choose to ensure their health and well-being,” then Secretary Dayrit also stated:

While we have all become accustomed to the longstanding situation in which donated contraceptives were widely distributed free-of-charge, this may not necessarily have been the best approach for the nation to take in addressing the needs of the people. Statistics will show that the prevalence of contraceptive use has long since leveled off, and there is really no massive clamor among the Filipino people to have more and more free contraceptives. The observation that hormonal preparations were used for gardening, and that stocks of unwanted contraceptives just took up space in storerooms - are not just urban legends, but facts. Thus, financial resources allotted by foreign donors to assist the Philippine Government’s programs could actually be better spent in other pursuits than purchasing contraceptives.

The former Health Secretary was right in saying that the contraceptive use prevalence had tapered off in past years. According to the National Demographic Health Survey (2008), the modern contraceptive prevalence for all women in the Philippines has increased from three percent in 1968 to thirty four percent in 2008. However, women’s use of modern contraceptives increased by only five percent between 1998 and 2003, and by only one percent between 2003 and 2008. But far from what Secretary

Dayrit had implied, the leveling off of the modern contraceptive prevalence cannot be interpreted as a decrease in demand for modern contraceptives. In this, the NDHS provides a more complete picture.

Reporting on the proportion of women who want to stop childbearing or who want to space their children, it states that twenty two percent of married women have an unmet need for family planning.

This statistic, however, could be an underestimation as it represents only those who are married and does not include single women who are sexually active and want to avoid pregnancy. The NDHS further reports that the level of unmet need has increased by more than one-third since 2003. It suggests that this increase could be a result of USAID’s withdrawal in 2006 of its large-scale contraceptives supply to the national family planning program, a funding support that lasted 30 years.

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Secretary Dayrit does not also mention that the natural family planning-only program was a result of political pressure from and negotiation with the Catholic Church and its allies who had gained key positions within government agencies. The former Secretary of Health during the first years of the

Arroyo administration was a member of the Opus Dei, a Catholic organization known for its religious orthodoxy and whose members mostly come from the elite; it was during his term that the Department of Health declared IUD an abortifacient and banned emergency contraceptives from the market. At the

Commission on Population, two prominent members of the Opus Dei were appointed Board

Commissioners, filling two of the three positions allotted for NGO representatives. A population program official gave this perspective during our interview:

To be frank with you, it is the President who appointed the two Commissioners. The appointment did not go through the regular process. (We) nominated two others from the NGOs. You can just imagine the discussion in the Board (about the RH bill). All the GOs (government organizations) and the (Chair) are for the RH bill, except for the two Commissioners. The Board cannot make a common stand. Individual members and agencies can have their own position, but as a collegial body, the PopCom Board does not have one. Secretary Cabral (of Social Welfare) gave her own personal position supporting the bill. Secretary Duque (of Health) said let Congress debate on the issue and let them decide. It’s hard for us in PopCom. At the same time, we are the beneficiary (of the funds for NFP)… Our Secretary (PopCom) advised us not to join the fray. Our hands are tied. We have no choice but to be silent.

President Macapagal-Arroyo’s personal position on the issue was the critical factor in the change in policy. A hard-nosed economist, who used to head the Department of Trade and Industry in the mid-

1990s, Macapagal-Arroyo is also a devout Catholic. Elected Vice President in 1998, she was installed as

President with the blessing of the Catholic Church, when Joseph Estrada was ousted in January 2001.

Given her own religious beliefs and acknowledgment of the Church’s political influence, she was prepared to follow the Church position on the reproductive health bill and natural family planning to keep the support of some bishops and hold on to power after the 2004 elections. Giving credence to this quid pro quo was the discovery in 2011 that Macapagal-Arroyo had granted seven bishops their personal requests for donations of expensive sports utility vehicles. The bitter irony, however, as some

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legislators pointed out, is that Macapagal-Arroyo admitted in an interview that she used oral contraceptives when she was a young mother (Sison, PCIJ 2003). A legislator was reported to have remarked, “I guess at the back of our mind we were all thinking, ‘if you did it yourself, then why are you depriving women from having the same choices that you had?’” (Sison, PCIJ 2003).

The pressure from within government, together with the President’s support for the Catholic

Church position, shifted radically the focus of the PopCom, and the agency drew widespread criticism from both NGOs and lawmakers. For PopCom personnel who believed that the agency’s mandate was to set population policy within the broader economic goals of the country and who affirmed the principles of reproductive and sexual health and rights during the UN conferences in the 1990s, the conflict between the new official policy and their previous mandate was something they had to struggle with. As the PopCom program official admitted, changing their own mindset was a challenge, “It was very hard to internalize. It was difficult for us in the first years because it was a sudden shift.” The shift was obviously a big turnabout, brought home by the fact that Secretary Osias, who had previously criticized natural family planning as ineffective, was now traveling the country to extol the benefits of the method. Osias, a well-known reproductive health advocate, gained the disapproval of former colleagues in the NGO community, who perceived him to be too willing to tow the government line. This became apparent during a congressional hearing, when he was grilled and shamed by a pro-RH legislator who thundered that he didn’t deserve the salary that taxpayers were paying him; his former colleagues, while feeling sorry for the treatment that he got, also felt that it was a direct result of his political decision to submit to the President’s implement.

Aware of the criticisms from women’s health and family planning groups, with whom they worked during the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) and the Fourth

World Conference on Women, the program official explained that the PopCom had not abandoned reproductive health. The way PopCom had managed to avoid stating explicitly that it opposed the

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reproductive health bill was telling, especially during congressional hearings where government agencies such as the Department of Health, Department of Social Welfare and Development,

Commission on Women were always invited to present expert opinion. It was a diplomatic way of following the marching orders from the President while ensuring the agency did not publicly oppose the bill. In addition, while the agency’s resources were concentrated on promoting natural family planning at the national level, PopCom still talks, if quietly, about modern family methods at the local level. The

PopCom program official points to the flexibility at the local government level, where cities and provinces are free to determine the health services that will be made available to their constituents.

However, if a local government wants resources from the national government for its family planning program, it has to be for activities that will promote natural family planning specifically; otherwise, local officials must look for or use their own funds to make modern or artificial contraceptives available in public clinics and hospitals. The problem with this arrangement is that not all local governments are first class municipalities or cities, or have adequate resources to run social services and programs. Struggling local governments, if they want to provide any reproductive health services at all, are left with no choice but to implement natural family planning programs in order to offer some form of service to their communities.

A NATURAL PLAN

In his speech during the regional conference, Tomas Osias, Executive Director of the Commission on Population (PopCom), proudly reported that, in its first two years, from January 2007 to December

2008, the government’s NFP program had reached 153,000 couples in 8,000 of 42,000 barangays nationwide. The National Capital Region (NCR), or Metro Manila, he added, contributed 30,000 couples to the 4.2 million total number of couples targeted, and ranked third overall among all the regions. To frame this accomplishment within the country’s broader population and health goals, Secretary Osias

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talked about natural family planning and its potential impact on development. As Secretary Osias elaborated,

What is the relationship between responsible parenting and accelerated (development)? There is a close relationship between birth spacing and development. When husband and wife space their children for 3-5 years in between, this means that they will be able to give their child quality time and are better able to attend to his/her health. This also means that the couple will be able to pay attention to their marriage; the woman can attend to the husband and their intimate relationship. This will prevent conflicts between them. This also means that the woman will have quality time for herself, not just to make herself beautiful, but to study and be productive and help the family. Birth spacing then is not just for limiting the number of children. It builds and improves family life, and prevents family troubles… When husband and wife help each other, this will prevent hunger and poverty. We envision responsible parenting as a way of life for Filipinos. Couples will not have children they cannot afford to feed and clothe… Responsible parenting is a way of empowering families. Progress starts with the family, the basic unit of society. When we build strong families, we build a strong nation.

Also evident from this statement is how the impact of NFP is seen in terms of creating a harmonious family life. Natural family planning, as the articulation of responsible parenting, supports the desires and aspirations of the heterosexual married couple and, in so doing, empowers the family upon which the nation is built. In envisioning responsible parenting-cum-natural family planning as a way of life for

Filipinos, health and population officials seek to elevate it above the category of a health or social service program. Linking it with the creation of a Responsible Parenthood Movement that will mobilize men and women to spread the good news about natural family planning adds a cultural weight to the campaign.

During our conversation, however, PopCom regional director Marcelino revealed that, despite the positive tone of the conference, the program’s accomplishments fell short of government targets.

PopCom had expected to saturate the country’s 42,000 barangays by 2010; in NCR alone, the government needed to cover more than 1,600 barangays to reach the target figures. To achieve this objective, 10 RP classes for 10 couples in each barangay had to be conducted. The ultimate goal by the end of the four years was to reach 4.2 million couples, and to convert 17 percent of this population (or,

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714,000 couples) into NFP users. Since the 1970s, the Philippine Family Planning Program had offered a broad range of methods but it was geared toward modern methods, which until 2002 were viewed by health officials as more effective. The new strategy now required the (re)training of frontline health and population workers in responsible parenting and natural family planning methods to enable them to conduct the classes. Director Marcelino admitted that her agency had not yet undertaken any documentation of NFP use among the couples who had attended the responsible parenting classes.

Thus, at the time of the interview, the PopCom did not have any data on how many couples had actually been converted to the NFP method under the new strategy. She hinted that even with two years still left in the program, it would take a massive deployment of health and volunteer workers to reach the targets that the government had set.

Another program official talked on the lack of assessment, suggesting how PopCom had been given a difficult task:

At the regional level, no appraisal or assessment of the program has been done yet. But if you want to know how it is faring, you look at the SWS (Social Weather Stations) surveys. They indicate how NFP is accepted on the ground. It’s so hard to promote. It’s a difficult method, because it needs discipline. But we’re giving it a try and we plan to evaluate. We plan to target poor couples. At the end of the day, this is not just about reaching couples, but how many couples are using the method. But before you can produce one NFP user, you need three months to work on it. Even then, you are not sure (if you’ll be able to convert).

In the same breath, however, the program official also clarified that the government does not view natural family planning as a method of contraception, rather, “it is an educational process, a discipline, a lifestyle and a practice,” echoing Secretary Osias’s statement. Administrative Order 125 s. 2002 defines

NFP as “a technique for determining the fertile period” which relies on fertility awareness to prevent or achieve pregnancy. As the path that leads to a harmonious married life, NFP “promotes close involvement of the man and shared responsibility of the couple for planning their family, enhances communication and cooperation and respect for each other within the family”(Administrative Order

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125, DOH). In the language of the government, natural family planning has become synonymous with, and is the key to, responsible parenting and marriage.

But even as officials insist on presenting NFP as a way of life, the pressure to meet the target of more than four million couples and convincing hundreds of thousands to become NFP users within four years creates tension between vision and strategy. Any educational process needs time to be implemented, but given the public demand for government to produce results within a short time frame, coupled with government’s own rush to prove that Filipinos do prefer NFP - even without the evidence to show that it is effective and economical - the touted program of NFP is undermined. A deeper contradiction, however, is that population officials and personnel themselves seem to be undergoing the same educational process and trying to convince themselves that the NFP-only mandate was an effective strategy. During informal conversations with PopCom personnel, it was common for them to express frustration over the direction of their work, at times even offering half-articulated apologies for it, yet they would diplomatically speak about the merits of the program in official venues.

This kind of political accommodation characterized the actions of population and health officials.

Speaking at a national conference in March 2011, the new DOH Secretary under President Benigno

Aquino Jr’s administration acknowledged the same political accommodation by national leaders

(http://portal.doh.gov.ph/node/3036/pdf):

The advocacy for reproductive health in the government especially during the previous administration was characterized by “accommodation” and a policy of vacillation. By their own reasons, previous national leaders have chosen or were forced not to take the less traveled road of reproductive health apparently because of political accommodations. But we do not dare to question their decisions as leaders, what we should do is to face the challenge that is thrown to us who are now given the opportunity to improve the lives of the Filipino people.

The dissatisfaction and frustration over the strategy that makes natural family planning the only method offered by the National Family Planning Program have not been limited to government population and health personnel. Disagreements among NFP advocates and practitioners have also

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surfaced, over which NFP methods are legitimate and moral, and how NFP should be treated in relation to modern contraceptives. Esper Dowling, Executive Director of the Philippine Federation for Natural

Family Planning, was predictably happy that the government has provided more support for NFP.

However, she insisted that the government should not limit the choice to only natural family planning and the decision on which methods to use should be left to the couples themselves. From her experience of running NFP programs for more than 30 years, from the time she worked with the

Catholic Church until the present, Esper had learned that the emphasis should be on fertility awareness and this should be the foundation of any family planning training. This, she says, can be applied by individuals to their reproductive lives, regardless of the method they would eventually decide to use.

She adds that fertility awareness is crucial because surveys have shown that Filipinos practice contraceptive pluralism and do not stick to any single contraceptive method.

Dr. Ligaya Acosta, President of Human Life International Philippines, on the other hand, has taken exception to the inclusion of the Standard Days Method (SDM) in the program, which she says encourages the use of artificial method (condoms) as a back-up method. Developed by the Institute of

Reproductive Health (IRH) at Georgetown University, Washington DC, SDM was introduced in the country in the 1990s when the government collaborated with the Institute in giving NFP training to health personnel. In the intervening years, a local IRH was formed and has established itself as a player in the reproductive health field, working with NGOs, government and the Catholic Church groups. In a two-day Pro-Life workshop I attended in 2008, Mitos Rivera, head of IRH Philippines, was a speaker. But while Sister Pilar, founder of Pro-Life Philippines, enjoys a working relationship with IRH, Ligaya Acosta rejects IRH and SDM.

The Standard Days Method (SDM) is a calendar-based method which identifies the fertile period to be between days 8 and 19 of the menstrual cycle for women whose cycles are between 26 and 32 days. This theoretical fertile window was established based on computer-modeled data from the World

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Health Organization (WHO) study on the Billings method, which tracked 7,400 actual menstrual cycles.

In order to practice SDM, couples are given necklaces made of 32 colored beads to monitor the woman’s fertile and infertile days. Brown beads correspond to infertile days, or spouse days, and white beads to fertile days, or baby days (Rivera, n.d.). A small rubber band around the necklace serves as a marker, which the woman moves from one bead to the next to mark the daily progress of her cycle.

Communication about the woman’s fertility status and sexual negotiation are supposedly facilitated by showing the necklace, and the advancement of the rubber band, to the husband or partner.

Dr. Acosta, a former DOH Information Officer and IEC Manager for the HIV/STI Program, insists that the formulation of the 12-day fertility period, being computer-generated, is flawed and bound to fail. In her briefing paper to the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, she states that this flawed premise only encourages the use of artificial contraceptives (i.e. condoms) as a back-up method.

She says, “…In my days at DOH, SDM is normally taught with the use of condoms during fertile days”.

The inclusion of condom use in SDM trainings, she adds, occurs “particularly when there are no participants from the Catholic Church” (Acosta, 2007: 3). The use of the WHO concept of reproductive health in the SDM Training Manual is another reason why SDM has been deemed an objectionable method. For Human Life International-Philippines, reproductive health is another term for abortion, its use “an example of verbal social engineering” (Acosta, 2007: 7). Moreover, Church allies think the collaboration between Georgetown University, IRH and USAID in the development and promotion of the method represents an “un-Holy Trinity” – as all three forces, and especially USAID, promote abortion and population control (Bullecer, n.d.). Dr. Acosta and HLI have thus called on the bishops to exclude

SDM from the natural family planning methods authorized by the Catholic Church.

In defense of SDM, Mitos Rivera, the first NFP National Coordinator for the Catholic Church’s

Episcopal Commission on Family Life and a Principal Teacher for a WHO Project on the testing of the fertility learning package, wrote the piece, “Lighting the Candle of Truth” (n.d.). She argues that the

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method is intended only for women whose cycles are within 26-32 days. This cycle length, according to the study, characterizes 75% of women’s cycles. The method, she adds, does not pretend to work for women whose cycles do not fall within this range or for those who have irregular cycles. She also defends the method’s efficacy rate of 95.25%, calculated based on scientific standards and protocols, peer-reviewed and validated by the WHO. As for the possibility of couples using a back-up method during the fertile period, Rivera explains that, although difficult at first, many couples eventually manage the 12-day abstinence period. In cases where abstinence is difficult, the SDM training instructs couples to use another NFP method. Rivera adds, “SDM is not in competition with any other method” (p. 2).

While conceding that SDM literature used in other countries carry the phrase, “abstain from unprotected sex,” which suggests the possibility of protected sex and condom use, she clarifies that some faith-based SDM programs, of which IRH Philippines is one, espouse an abstinence-only approach to NFP. Moreover, reproductive health as used in training manuals references the definition employed in papal documents, which “the Holy See considers…in a more general concept of health. (The term) embrace(s)… the person in the entirety of his or her personality, mind and body…The Holy See rejects the act of abortion or access to abortion as a dimension of these terms” (p. 3). Rivera concludes, “There is so much to do, and we will not waste our time and effort arguing about the merits of one method and demerits of another” (p.4).

SPREADING THE WORD

The institutionalization of the Responsible Parenthood Movement was crucial to the national strategy on natural family planning. The membership of the movement would be drawn from all those who participated in the RPM classes conducted by PopCom. The strategy is as follows: Ten RPM classes, each with 10 couples participating, will be conducted in each barangay. At the end of each class, the formation of a Responsible Parenthood Movement will be discussed, the participants will be given their

IDs, and then are expected to elect their representative to the RPM barangay federation. The barangay

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representatives will then come together and elect their representative to the municipal or city federation. Then all municipal and city representatives will elect their representative to the regional level, which will then form the national level federation. Leaders of the RPM federation are expected to conduct and sustain the RPM classes, while collaborating with each other. They also have the responsibility of linking up with barangay, municipal, city, provincial and national officials and advocating for policies in support of responsible parenthood. A look at the NFP brochure developed by the Parish of Ipil reveals that the RPM federation is structured similarly to the way the Parish had organized its NFP services at the parish, diocese and archdiocese levels.

A RPM class takes about eight hours to complete, either given as a one-day session or broken into two half-day sessions. To support the conduct of RPM classes and formation of the RPM federation,

PopCom developed several information and education materials. These are the Responsible Parenting and Natural Family Planning Facilitator’s Guide (for the trainers), Responsible Parenting Handbook (for the participants), and the Operations Manual for the Responsible Parenting Movement (for PopCom, trainers, RPM leaders) [Commission on Population 2007]. These documents indicate that the classes tackle five main thematic areas:

1) Responsible parenting. This covers the meaning of parenthood, parenting and responsible parenting; core elements of responsible parenthood; essence of children; children’s rights; family formation.

2) Family relationship. This covers the topics of marriage, the “real meaning” of marriage and making marriage work; parent-child relationship; and relationship with relatives and in-laws.

3) Home management. This includes topics such as activities and time management, budgeting and maintaining a safe and happy home.

4) Fertility awareness. This discusses the difference between male and female fertility. Its link to responsible parenting is established as “the natural starting point since it is fertility that determines whether a couple will have children or not”.

5) Natural family planning. This describes the five modern scientific natural family planning methods endorsed by the government, namely, LAM, billings method, basal body temperature, symptom-thermal method, standard days method, and the two-days method.

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These are perplexing documents in that they combine eclectic references to develop the philosophy, rules, and techniques that will cultivate responsible parenting among (low income) Filipino couples. The bibliography for the Responsible Parenting Handbook, for example, includes policy documents, government population and health manuals, an academic book, magazine articles, the

Humanae Vitae, the Philippine Constitution, the Child and Youth Welfare Code, a few items on responsible parenthood by NGO advocates, and an obscure reference written by Ellen Gould White, a

Mormon who wrote about family life in the early 20th century. The RP Handbook, for example, moves from one section to the next without any transition, thus the enumeration of the rights of children, including: “Children have the right to be born well once they are conceived” and “Children have a right to a wholesome family”, is immediately followed by tips on proper hygiene, such as: “Keep your fingernails and toenails clean and trimmed” and “Move your bowels daily and urinate regularly”. In examining the documents, one gets a sense that one is reading a mash-up of a legal rights primer, a moral values paper, a home and lifestyle magazine, and pop psychology. In the section on family relationship, the Handbook gives some rules on making marriage work. For example:

Mutual love and respect. Why would two people get married who did not love and respect each other? The fact is, as time passes and life becomes increasingly complicated, the marriage often suffers as a result. It is all too easy for spouses to lose touch with each other and neglect the love and romance that once came so easily. It is important that husbands and wives continue to develop love and respect for each other throughout their lives. If they do so, it is highly likely that their relationships will remain happy and satisfying.

The Handbook gives several definitions of responsible parenting derived from the Philippine Population

Management Plan, a DOH training manual on pre-marriage counseling, and the Humanae Vitae, without providing a critical explanation for each and treating each equally. The Handbook explains that the government’s responsible parenthood program is “based on several social and economic development and cultural and religious views” (Department of Health, 2003:1). Thus, responsible parenthood refers to the shared ability, decision-making and responsibility of parents to determine the desired number,

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spacing, timing of their children according to their life situation (Population Plan); and “it is exercised by the deliberate and generous decision to raise a numerous family or by the decision made for grave motives and with due respect for the moral law, to avoid for the time being, or even for an indeterminate period, a new birth”(Humanae Vitae). Finally, the Handbook presents the various methods of natural family planning from which couples can choose and which will enable them to fulfill responsible parenthood. This establishes the use of natural family planning as a hallmark of responsible parenting.

BEST COUPLE

The winners of the Best RPM Couple were Elmer, 38 years old, and Gina Antonio16, 42 years old, from

Marikina City, who have three children, ages 12, 6, and 1. They were introduced to the Standard Days

Method (SDM) in 2007 and had been practicing it for about year at the time of their award. Gina had just given birth to their third child when she heard about the RPM classes being conducted by their barangay and asked Edgar to attend. Trained as a midwife (although she had stopped practicing), Girlie admitted being naturally interested in self-improvement courses and thus did not need much convincing to get involved in the program. She puts to good use the knowledge she gets from attending free workshops as she shares them with her younger relatives and neighbors. Because of her readiness to impart to others what she knows, Gina has become an adviser of sorts to the other women who consult her on many issues regarding health and family life. She jokes that she should start charging her friends a consultation fee. Likewise, her husband Edgar, a Born-again preacher, shares Gina’s inclinations and interest in learning, and needed no prodding to participate in the classes. Articulate and confident,

Edgar hosts a regular radio program that tackles faith, family and community life. He also makes a living using his talent in drawing, making signage and hand-painted shirts and bags. This ability to

16 Not their real names.

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communicate and the credibility of their family story made Gina and Elmer perfect candidates as a model couple for and leaders of the fledgling Responsible Parenthood Movement.

Married for 13 years, the couple from the start wanted to limit the number of their children and had been practicing family planning even before turning to the Standard Days Method. Growing up in poor families, both Gina and Elmer experienced fending for themselves because their parents could not afford to support all their children. The hardship, says Elmer, influenced their thinking on how to raise their own family and made them determined not to reproduce the poverty that they have experienced.

However, while they originally wanted only one child, a second child followed their first born after five years. And because both children were boys, Elmer convinced Gina to try for a third pregnancy, which finally gave them their much-hoped for baby girl. Although they ended up with more children than had been planned, Gina was satisfied with the birth spacing that they were able to achieve and thankful for their children “because it is what God gave us”.

Before shifting to natural family planning, condom and withdrawal were the couple’s choice of contraceptive methods. While these methods proved effective in spacing their children, Elmer says that these did not remove their anxiety, especially when they would fail to use condom or withdrawal for one reason or another. For him, the fertility awareness that they learned as part of the natural family planning method was what made the difference. This made the practice of SDM more comfortable for the couple.

Sometimes, not often, we failed to use the rhythm (and condom). Why? It was at the height of our sexual desire. We were newly married, especially in my case, I am younger than she is. Whenever that happened, I’d feel guilty. I would really pray, please, not yet. But I realized God was guiding us. I saw how He acts… With natural family planning, it’s good. It’s natural and proven (effective). With the cycle beads, we become aware of the period when she’s fertile. We don’t have to use a condom, and it depends on the cycle of the woman. What is the value added of SDM? It’s so much easier. Not like before, it was really hard on my part. During that time, we didn’t know, we had to always watch. With SDM there is no problem, because we know when we’re fertile. Our sex life is even better.

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For Elmer then, knowing when his wife’s fertile period occurs during the month means sexual relations can follow a schedule that ensures no pregnancy will result from sexual intercourse. The regularity of this cycle provides Elmer and Gina with a predictable schedule that they can work with and thus ease their anxieties. What appears then as the element that would discourage couples from practicing natural family planning is actually the very reason that draws Edgar and Girlie to rely on the method.

The discipline of following a schedule provides a logic that the couple is able to control. Making sex follow this cycle is a small sacrifice to pay for the peace of mind that the couple gets from feeling “safe”.

Although the effectiveness of SDM remains to be seen – as the couple achieved the spacing and limiting of the number of their children by using condoms – Elmer and Gina have embraced NFP as suitable for their lifestyle.

NFP AS A WAY OF LIFE

Elmer stands on the platform in front of the big hall, beside him is a wooden easel, a beige canvass bag, stretched and flattened, pinned on it. He is introduced as the better half of the Best Couple and the President of the Responsible Parenthood Movement-National Capital Region. The emcee builds up the excitement for Elmer’s special presentation: a hand painting demonstration-lecture on responsible parenthood and natural family planning. The audience - about a hundred barangay officials, health workers, Best Couple nominees and their children - is expectant. They give their full attention to the diminutive man whose self-assurance, communication skills and gentle demeanor inspire confidence in those that he encounters. Population and health officials beam, looking proud of their discovered talent.

Elmer, artist, Born-again preacher, NFP educator, directly looks at his fellow Best Couple nominees and government officials, and begins to speak, “I think it is safe to say that we all believe that we’re created by God. I think all of us will not allow the belief that we’re descended from apes.”

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As if to make sure that everyone is listening, he pauses to ask, “Are we all in agreement about this?” and answers the question himself, “I don’t think anybody will question me about this.”

Prepping his audience, he continues: “I believe that we’re all God’s creatures -- because everything has been ordered by God. Here in the center, God placed human beings. So God saw a human being but He did not see anything that was suitable for this human being. So God put the human to sleep and gave him a woman, from the human’s own rib. It is clear that the woman was taken from the man’s rib, not from the rib of a cow. The rib is close to him, to his heart, that’s why the woman is loved.”

He turns to the easel, a tube of paint in his hand, and with a skilled flick leaves a dot of color on the canvass, “This is Nanay.” And, another dot, “This is Tatay.” And then, another dot, until there are five dots of color paint forming a circle on the fabric.

“Here is Ate, here is Kuya, and here is Bunso,” he introduces the rest of the family members to the assembly as he points to each of the last three symbolic dots.

He continues his story, “This is Mother. This is Father. God said, go forth and multiply. So, here is older sister, older brother, and the youngest one.”

“I teach hand painting,” Elmer shifts gears, “and in hand painting, spacing is important. Then pointing to how the dots are arranged and evenly spaced, he instructs, “If you don’t put space in between, you’ll squeeze out the rest of the design. This is basic in design.”

Then he extends his hook, “This is also basic in raising a family.”

“Why is this important?” he asks.

He expounds, “First, the eldest son’s needs are different from the needs of the next child. (With spacing), we will be able to take care of (the different needs of the children).”

His right hand moves across the canvass, quick and precise. “We can use family planning. One of the methods is SDM. It’s very good, affordable, no side effects. There are other alternatives, especially, among natural methods. So, we need to space.” Wavy lines appear.

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Taking a dot as his starting point, Elmer’s hand glides up, then down, his lines form a bulb shape that begin and end on the dot. As each bulb forms, he names them, “The eldest daughter. The eldest brother. The youngest.”

The shapes begin to take definition, all five dots get their bulbs. A flower emerges. The artist declares, “This is very perfect. This is a beautiful concept of a perfect family. A flower -- it’s perfect -- when it has only five petals.”

The audience gets more curious. Elmer shades the petals, a shade of pink here, an orange there, turning quiet for a few moments as his hands get busy. He begins to speak again, “Each family member has a function, a role. Tatay is the pillar. Nanay is the light.”

Elmer becomes more animated, reaching more and more to the audience, “But sometimes, the light disappears, and father gets crazy. Mother leaves – because life is hard, she goes away to work overseas. So, if mother leaves, if father leaves, then the family has a problem.”

Then he leaves the problem, fills each petal with color, and goes back to his main point, “So, here Kuya, Ate, Bunso. Each has a function. This creates a design. A good example of this is that each member works toward a common goal. Whatever you do, together we have just one goal. Mother and father have to instill in their children that they have a goal for the family.”

Elmer continues to work. This time he focuses on the space in the center of the flower. He says,

“This circle, this holds together every member of the family. This is God - the center of the family. We have to have God inside the family, not to make God our enemy. When God is inside the family, we’ll receive blessings.”

“This is a good example of a good family. This is a responsible family. When there are many responsible families in a community, let’s see what is created? The audience listens and watches intently.

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Then he continues, “Why three children? Three, because it will make it difficult for couples to separate. With two, you can say, you can have the boy, I will take care of the youngest. Then what happens to the middle child? But with three, you have some protection. They will think hard. But if you want to have two, that’s also okay.” A few people in the hall nod, some laugh quietly, seemingly in agreement.

He offers, “Also, if there is a second Nanay, the flower becomes ugly. It loses the symmetry, the balance. So, there should only be one mother.”

Moving to another section of the canvass, the artist adds more dots, more petals, more color covering the space. “When we bring all these families together, what can be created? Each family has their role, each one brought together by love, by one goal. If the lines of communication are open between them, they have a good relationship. If there’s an emergency in one family, community… it’s easy to find a solution, if there is good rapport (among members). The outcome is good. Like a flower, with a fragrant scent. This is the benefit.”

Elmer goes deeper into his lecture and into his painting. On the top right of the canvass, a new shape appears, bolder, more colorful. The canvass becomes more alive. He further explains, “When other communities see this, the couple, they see an example. Ay, we can now have a pattern. We can attract the youth. What can possibly happen to them? They won’t lose their way anymore. They have someone to look up to and idolize. This will produce a new and beautiful generation.”

He shows off his new creations, “Like butterflies. What attracts butterflies? - Beautiful flowers.”

A garden of flowers and butterflies is revealed on the canvass. The painting looks pretty and charming and happy.

Elmer proceeds, “There are two reasons why families break up. In performing our role, sometimes, we encounter problems. We commit mistakes. A classic example: Tatay wonders why the budget that’s supposed to last until the next month, after only a week, it’s already spent. Because Nanay

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made a decision to buy something on installment, but did not tell Tatay. So, there is conflict. Tatay then accuses Nanay of so many things.”

He adds that the influence of friends is another reason why families break up, and, with a tube of paint, Elmer smears a flower with black, intones, “… A flower gets destroyed.” Seeing the colors on the canvass ruined, the audience lets out a collective sad “huuuuuh”.

As his audience waits for what will come next, Elmer takes a pause. He offers positive thoughts,

“What is the process of restoration? Of course, acceptance. Admit that you bought something on installment. When there’s honesty, there’s trust in the relationship. So, restoration starts with acceptance…”

“What is good is, in confessing, there is forgiveness. Our wounds get healed, not in time, but because of love. If your spouse doesn’t forgive you, it’s because he/she wants you to separate, because he/she might also be doing something. But the truth is, when you say sorry, the forgiveness is already there.” He takes white paint, covers the black with it, and cleans up the messy part. The audience watches closely, not wanting to miss anything.

“Asking for forgiveness is hard, but once you do it, there are benefits. Affection. A more colorful relationship,” the artist-lecturer earnestly speaks to the crowd.

Using his fingers, Elmer expertly mixes the colors, intent on erasing the black, transforming the dark into vivid colors. He presses his point, “The process of restoration, we use our hand, not foot. To fix the problem, we use our hands. When we do it, gradually blessings grow. Let’s see how it works.” He works some more, his fingers now covered in paint. “By using our hands, we can add color – orange, then yellow.” Slowly, the painting changes colors. “This is the fruit. See.”

He continues, “The process of healing asks that we use our hands, our touch, love, care. We won’t be able to restore our family if we use our fist. The result, we realize that the bad that happened in

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our life, when we get it fixed, we come to a realization. Ah, we fought, it’s because my wife really wanted to have another child!”

More flowers appear, red, green, yellow, pink. Blue skies. Butterflies. The painting is restored.

The audience looks admiringly at the artwork.

Elmer concludes, “Yes, we have lapses, but we have to focus on what is the goal of the family.

The family, that’s from God. If we realize this, we won’t hesitate, we won’t allow it to be destroyed.”

People give Elmer a vigorous applause in appreciation of what they’ve seen and heard. A small crowd gathers around the easel, examining and admiring the work. They congratulate Elmer for his creative presentation and for showing that lectures on health and family planning need not be boring.

Edgar asks who should get the hand-painted bag and everyone agrees it should go to one of the population regional directors. Population officials happily close the conference.

Elmer’s lecture-demonstration presents an exceptional, if ironic, moment in the government’s family planning program. Since the 1960s the government had sought women’s participation and leadership in the implementation of family planning program in communities. But for once, a man is seen as an important part of how the government needs to think its way through reproductive health issues. Further, his lecture highlights how men’s involvement in the program can potentially be harnessed to achieve program success, since a man who can talk about fertility awareness and family planning can be more effective in reaching out to other men. A troubling aspect, however, is how men tapped as spokespersons and leaders for community-based family planning and reproductive health programs may focus on giving rules rather than on listening to and articulating women’s reproductive health needs. Given men’s dominant position within their families and communities, there is a real possibility that lectures by men may end up silencing women’s voices and perspectives, or attributing the source of family planning problems to women, which is hinted at in Elmer’s presentation. In this sense, the “Best Couple” becomes yet another policy mechanism by which male authority is (re)asserted

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over women’s reproductive lives and gender inequality reinforced. The credibility and legitimacy that men’s participation contribute to community-based programs, while invaluable, may also be an extension of the authority roles already traditionally held by men. Thus, grassroots women, who have been playing key roles in community programs and movements, may be reduced to secondary or background roles to accommodate the men, who are accustomed to taking leadership positions. For this reason, developing comprehensive reproductive health education for both men and women leaders and trainers, as well as building equal partnership in movements, are critical. In the case of this natural family planning presentation, however, the opportunity to educate based on an informed and inclusive understanding of health, sexuality and reproduction was sacrificed; instead it relied on the sway of religious language and the charisma of a male leader to deliver messages about family planning. In this instance, even the much-vaunted “scientific” methods of NFP get undermined when those who promote

NFP advance ideas that refute scientific principles (e.g. the denial of evolution). Even more troubling, however, was how population and health officials, who were keen to show that sound science underlies

NFP, were willing to let these distorted ideas about science become part of a supposedly evidence- based program.

CASE 2: WHAT HAPPENED IN MANILA

The seeds for the national government’s natural family planning were planted in 2000, two years before the conception of the NFP Strategic Plan. It came in the form of a local executive order signed in 2000 by then Mayor of Manila, Lito Atienza. At the time, the presidency was still held by

Joseph Estrada, who had managed to sustain the family planning program despite attacks from the

Catholic Church. Atienza, who was previously the Vice Mayor for several terms, is a Board member of

Pro-Life Philippines and has always been open about his anti-abortion position. Part of his vision as

Mayor was to restore the old glory of Manila by rehabilitating its historical and colonial landmarks and ridding the city of pesky illegal street vendors. A few years into his term, the change in the city’s

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appearance was marked. Concrete sidewalks have been turned into bricked walkways, their edges lined with those old-style cylindrical barriers. Graceful lamp posts adorned and lighted corner streets and main highways. Manila Bay became an attraction again, its romantic view of the setting sun, wide thoroughfares and musical events pulling in locals and tourists alike. The entire length of Rizal Avenue

(simply called Avenida by locals) was rid of vehicular traffic and turned into a promenade, reminiscent of the colonial era.

Another project was the preservation of the old Quiapo Church, through which hundreds of devotees who come from all over Metro Manila stream during the day and whose patron, the Black

Nazarene, attracts more than a million devotees when its image is paraded through the streets every year on January 9. Alas, the Mayor’s idea of preserving Quiapo Church was to paint the roof of the

Church beige. The historical society was aghast, to say the least. Beside the Church is another historical landmark, Plaza Miranda, the site of the fateful bombing of the Liberal Party election rally in 1971 and the excuse for the declaration of martial law. Activists and radicals have used the plaza for small rallies and as an assembly point for big political demonstrations. As a plaza, it looked nothing like one; it was simply this busy asphalted square of a space beside the Church that has a recognizable name but no recognizably special features, and yet all the streets radiate from and lead to it. But under Mayor

Atienza, the plaza was transformed: its asphalt replaced by granite-looking surface, its perimeter surrounded by columns and arches, its open space now enclosed and tighter. With these features, the place now did not only have a recognizable name but also a set of noteworthy features. It became a plaza. But a plaza needs a central figure, a monument, a hero. In the transformation, a Shrine to the

Unborn has been erected, occupying a prominent space just before the main entrance of the Church.

The stone sculpture features an infant being presented by two giant hands, presumably the hands of the resurrected Christ; the extended palm of the left hand holds the infant, while the right hand, its palm

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showing a wound in the center and fingers in a loose peace sign, gives a gesture of blessing to the child.

For Mayor Atienza, the Shrine showed that the city of Manila was pro-life.

In its introductory passages, Executive Order 003, Declaring Total Commitment and Support to the Responsible Parenthood Movement in the City of Manila and Enunciating Policy Declarations in

Pursuit Thereof, states that Manila “takes an affirmative stand on pro-life issues and responsible parenthood” and “condemns criminal abortion, euthanasia, divorce and same-sex intermarriages as amoral and deplorable practices”. It also states its position on contraceptive methods:

…(T)he City promotes responsible parenthood and upholds natural family planning not just as a method but as a way of self-awareness in promoting the culture of life while discouraging the use of artificial methods of contraception like condoms, pills, intrauterine device, surgical sterilization, and other.

To fulfill these principles, the EO lays down several policy actions. These include gearing health and social services to promote responsible parenthood; advocating citizen participation and involving NGOs, religious and civic organizations; and establishing natural family planning programs in major hospitals.

These activities, the EO further states, will be “geared on moral rejuvenation” and “equip its people against amoral influences brought about by the excesses of modernization”.

Even though the EO was signed in 2000, its existence was not realized and news spread only in

2004. But residents and NGO practitioners had already been observing that contraceptives had started to disappear and become unavailable in government health centers as early as 1998. During the press conference on the court petition to declare the EO unconstitutional, Fe Nicodemus, a resident of Manila and an NGO worker who distributes contraceptives in communities, recalled,

I learned about it only from the women, because they were complaining. In Tondo, barangay officials were telling me, ‘That’s not allowed, Mayor said.’ But these officials didn’t know yet about the EO, either. And have not even read it. So, in network meetings, I would just share with other women’s health groups – ‘In our place we don’t get family planning’.

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Fe recounted how difficult it was to secure an official copy of the EO. A supposedly straightforward request for a copy of the document invited suspicion from City Hall employees, and she had to parry questions from clerks who asked why she needed a copy and for what purpose it would be used.

In the ensuing controversy over the Executive Order, Mayor Atienza asserted that he never banned modern contraceptives and that the policy only discouraged their use. However, this semantic distinction made no difference in how the policy was carried out. While the letter of the law specified

“discouraging”, its spirit was interpreted to mean “banning”. The NGO Likhaan, which runs clinics in the slum communities of Manila, together with the New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR), conducted a study on the impact of the policy on poor women and on health service delivery in the city.

In their widely-cited report, Imposing Misery, Likhaan and CRR discuss the “chilling effects” of the policy on the provision of reproductive health services. Although the vague language produced some unevenness in the way the policy was viewed by local executives and health personnel, its overall impact was to effectively prohibit artificial contraceptives in government hospitals and health centers.

Without a clear policy guideline from City Hall, but well aware of the Mayor’s personal position on artificial contraceptives, local health personnel refused to provide contraceptives and even referrals to their women clients for fear of incurring the ire of their chief executive. At the same time, pharmacies had also stopped making available some artificial contraceptives, such as injectables, in an apparent response to the Mayor’s personal calls regarding the sale of these products in his territorial jurisdiction.

Barangay officials also became cautious about working with health NGOs, a few of which had been running women’s health and family planning programs in these communities for years. These NGOs reported being harassed and intimidated by local officials and had to discontinue their services after City

Hall refused to renew their permits. Even with the change of leadership in Manila after the 2007 elections, Fe still had fears about her position, explaining, “I’m already marked. If my group needs assistance from City Hall, it would be difficult for us to approach officials.” With many of Atienza’s allies

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still in position, defending and protecting the projects he had championed, Fe’s sentiment was understandable.

Even with these findings, Mayor Atienza’s office argued that the EO did not constitute a ban because artificial contraceptives were still available in pharmacies, private clinics and DOH-run hospitals, which were not directly under the control of the city government. The market approach solution, however, does not work for a large segment of Manila’s population. For poor women who relied on government for their health care and did not have the means to pay for private health fees, this meant effectively losing access to family planning services. The other option for these women was to go to adjacent Malabon City, where the public health centers offer these services for free or at reduced prices.

But the inconvenience of distance, the additional transportation cost, and the potential loss of women’s daily income due to hours lost to traveling remained significant barriers to women’s access to health care. Sheryl, a 25-year old mother of three, whose family lives in a dumpsite, calculated that her jeepney fare to and from Malabon was around 50 pesos ($ 1.20) - a prohibitive amount for a family that earns only 150 pesos a day. To address this obstacle, Lina Bacalando, a community organizer, and her group,

MOTHERS, started to organize a regular jeepney pool that would take batches of women to Likhaan’s

Malabon clinic to get the family planning services they needed. But how to make this a sustainable arrangement remained an issue for the women of Manila.

Moreover, the natural family planning program that was supposed to be in place was reportedly limited, even token, in its implementation. In place of family planning services, Mayor Atienza was known to visit slum communities and give cash rewards to mothers who have many children. The

Likhaan-CRR report quotes DOH-Manila health officers:

When Atienza attends medical missions…he calls out to all of these moms…how many of you have seven and above children? When they raise their hands, he rewards them, sometimes with cash –1,000 pesos each. … He goes to Baseco – we have so many depressed areas – and sometimes during community assemblies, [he does this]. “You don’t really need any FP methods” – this is condoned and rewarded by the mayor himself. If you have seven children, you

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get all these benefits, money. This now proves that the mayor isn’t having any NFP methods, any FP at all. (p. 27)

“It was a breakdown of services,” described Elizabeth Pangalangan, a reproductive health advocate and one of the lawyers who filed the court petition on behalf of the 20 women and several

NGOs. And it had grave consequences for the women. Junice Melgar, Executive Director of Likhaan, summed up the large scale impact of EO 003:

It made the problem of grinding poverty more glaring. In addition, the families’ overall health is poorer. Children have poor health, their mothers are also in poor health. And if the mother is not healthy, it goes without saying the family’s health is also affected, because she’s the one who takes care of everybody. Moreover, the couple’s relationship gets strained. When the husband asks for sex and the wife is reluctant, because she fears another pregnancy, this creates conflict in the relationship. The quality of child-rearing also gets affected, when parents have to care for too many children. The policy has real social implications.

The discontinuation of family planning services also has serious consequences for the health care system. During a public meeting to present the findings of the study, Imposing Misery, Dr. Michael

Tan, a medical anthropologist based at the University of the Philippines, pointed out that the decade-old

EO had effectively de-skilled Manila’s public health workers, who had lost the skills and capacity to implement a (modern) family planning program. He lamented it would take years to undo the damage to the public health care system created by the EO:

We saw how one man, how one man’s personal beliefs can be imposed on the whole city, paralyzing the entire health care system, penalizing thousands of women, especially the poor. We must never forget it’s the poor who suffered. The middle class still had their options. It’s scary to think what happened here in Manila. We know the damage will take years to unravel. It’s a long period…We will have to retrain our health personnel – they’re now far behind in their knowledge of contraception, the quality of care needed, the issues around reproductive health. I worry, too, about what anthropologists call habitus. For almost 10 years, you did not think about family planning and reproductive health. It’s not going to be easy to start providing those services again. Many have to be convinced again… We need to jumpstart this. Different agencies have to work together, give workshops and trainings, to make up for this.

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DILEMMAS

What happened in Manila raises political questions regarding the extent to which political power and policy can be used to impose an elected leader’s religious convictions. It also opens contentious legal questions regarding the autonomy of local governments and to what extent this can be invoked in the formulation of policy which may have implications on existing national laws or international commitments. Implicated in these questions is the Local Government Code that devolved power and functions to local governments and councils. Hailed as revolutionary, the Code was enacted in 1991 to rectify a highly centralized government that gave the President and the national government vast powers over provincial and city decision-making. The Code enabled the formation of local councils, the participation of people’s organizations in these councils, and the formulation of ordinances that will govern territorial jurisdictions, as part of the democratization process after martial law. Functions, such as the provision of health care and the development of socio-economic programs, were also transferred from the national government local executives (Gatmaytan, 2006). With the promise of political autonomy and democratization, a new set of governance issues emerged. Political dynasties found security in autonomous territorial jurisdictions (Gutierrez, 1994). Development projects depended on local leaders’ personal priorities. Budgetary constraints hampered social services. Health services suffered the most, and the continuity of programs such as family planning became subject to many political conditions.

Legislation at the local level proved to be both promising and constraining. It became a critical mechanism for setting political and social agenda independent of the priority issues being defined at the national level. The passage of landmark ordinances on domestic violence, the establishment of gender and development budgets, as well as the creation of local gender and development councils, was carried out and replicated in different cities and municipalities. Policymaking on gender and women’s issues found support from local legislative councils (Gatmaytan 2006). When it became evident that local

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legislation was a critical arena for advancing social reforms, a new battleground on which reproductive and sexual rights would be fought emerged. With this development, the relationship between local and national policies has become a point of contention.

Although the 2007 elections ushered in a new administration in Manila, as predicted this did not bring immediate change to the state of family planning and reproductive health services. Mayor Alfredo

Lim, a police general who had been the mayor for several terms before relinquishing his position in 1998 to run for President, did not see any reason to repeal the Executive Order. Even as he declared he was for informed choice and didn’t think government should dictate couples’ reproductive decisions, Lim, as well as the City Health Office, believed the language of the EO did not specify a ban on artificial contraceptives and therefore did not require repeal. Moreover, while the new mayor had instructed health workers to give information and referrals on artificial contraceptives, he had publicly announced that the City would not use any funds to purchase these supplies, claiming that the local government inherited a one billion peso budget deficit from the previous administration. When asked if he would restore services once the City has gained more resources, his reply was: “We’ll see. I am giving free college education…My government is focused on providing education, health, peace and order, and housing.” Health, in this case, seems to exclude family planning. One also has to question the convenient lack of funds, for the mayor appeared on the University of Santo Tomas grounds during the

40th anniversary of the Humanae Vitae, and, in front of the bishops and a 10,000 strong crowd, declared that Manila’s funds won’t be used for artificial contraceptives. On this occasion, the Mayor made no mention of the budget deficit and gave no reason for his decision not to fund family planning.

The return of NGOs and the private sector that run family planning and reproductive health services improved the situation. The Reproductive Health Advocacy Network Network (RHAN) collaborated with the City Health Office and the Department of Health in organizing reproductive health fairs in different communities and giving free services to women and men. Individual members have also

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assisted the local government in raising funds for reproductive health programs by approaching donors like the UNFPA. But poor women still report being turned away from public health centers and hospitals and being refused modern contraceptives. Without any official revocation of the policy, and given the mayor’s equivocal pronouncements on family planning, health personnel were still reluctant to go against the policy status quo.

Independent of negotiations with Mayor Lim, reproductive health advocates led by Likhaan and

ReproCen lodged a petition with the Court of Appeals to declare EO 003 null and void. Twenty women and a few NGOs were the official petitioners. Raul Pangalangan, a lawyer for the petitioners, explained why it was necessary to seek a judicial ruling on the EO:

It has to be a legal claim, not just a political claim. What is at stake? This is about the rights of individuals. Why should the individual’s reproductive decision be defined by the Mayor? But we should be on firm legal footing to make a claim. We want to raise the claim to a higher level. So the effects are not localized and the effects can be felt across the board. And send the message that similar executive orders are unconstitutional.

Advocates pressed their appeals beyond local executive and national judicial institutions.

Philippine commitments to international human rights conventions are now not only invoked; the mechanisms that enforce these commitments have also become a venue for direct advocacy to summon international community support. Engender, a feminist legal organization, together with Manila-based

NGOs, has filed an urgent action request to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination

Against Women (CEDAW) to make the Philippine government accountable for failing to fulfill its human rights obligation and urge the latter to repeal the Executive Order 003.

CASE 3: QUEZON CITY, COUNTERPOINT

Manila was not the only city facing a battle over reproductive health. As the national debate over the Reproductive Health bill raged and stalled in Congress, the issues had spilled in many parts of the country, prompting local councils to adopt their own policies. These moves were taken either as a

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way of making a stand on the issue or as a way of addressing health and poverty conditions in their communities. In either case, local leaders recognized the reality that the resolution of the legislative impasse may actually lie at the local government level, not at the national political arena. In Metro

Manila, another city decided to take action.

In February 2008, the Quezon City Council approved unanimously on third reading Ordinance

No. 1829, An Ordinance Establishing a Quezon City Population and Reproductive Health Management

Policy. The policy is anchored on the framework of sustainable development, which seeks to manage the city’s growing population and the resources required to support the needs of this population. To this end, the local government “guarantees access to safe, affordable and quality reproductive health care services, methods and relevant information as it gives priority to the needs of women and their children”. Further, the City “shall promote natural and artificial methods of family planning that are deemed safe and effective” and make reproductive health information accessible to “parents and couples, including unmarried individuals”. Under the ordinance, adolescent health education will be taught in public schools by trained teachers starting from first year to fourth year high school. While the policy emphasizes the illegality of abortion, it nonetheless makes provision for the treatment and counseling of women who seek care for post-abortion complications. To prepare the City for the undertaking, the policy provides for the mandatory and regular training of all local health workers and barangay officials in the delivery and provision of reproductive health services. A multimedia campaign to raise public awareness about reproductive health is also identified. A budget of twelve million pesos was allocated to implement the policy.

The initiative emanated from the City Government’s Anti-Poverty Integration Task Force, composed of twelve key departments, including the City Health Department, the Social Services

Department, the Urban Poor Affairs Office, among others. Created by Mayor Feliciano Belmonte in

2006, the Task Force was assigned to recommend poverty alleviation policies as well as coordinate and

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assess all anti-poverty programs of the local government. Quezon City is the wealthiest city in the country. With a population of about 2.5 million, it also hosts the largest urban poor and migrant communities in Metro Manila. Mayor Belmonte, whose three terms lasted from 2001 to 2010, has been credited for rationalizing the City’s fiscal and budget policies, improving the taxation system, and successfully turning Quezon City into a competitive city. During his term, he supported the establishment of the Gender and Development (GAD) Council and its activities, as well as collaborations with women’s NGOs working on domestic violence, health and other issues. Both the GAD Council and the Anti-Poverty Task Force are headed by well-known women’s rights advocates who had transitioned to government from their NGO involvement. Although he was from the same political party as then

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Mayor Belmonte took an independent position and pursued a different policy direction on reproductive health.

In order for the proposed measure to be taken up officially by the City Council, Mayor Belmonte needed one of the councilors to sponsor the ordinance. After talking to several councilors, all of whom supported the measure, he found one who was prepared to be the principal author. Joseph Juico,

Councilor of Quezon City’s first district, was in his second term when he introduced Ordinance No. 1829.

Although relatively new in politics, Joseph grew up in a political family, having parents who directly participated in elite politics and occupied key government positions in the post-EDSA period. His father,

Phillip Juico, gained political prominence as Cory Aquino’s Secretary of Agrarian Reform in the 1980s, while his mother, Margarita, moved in political circles as Aquino’s Executive Secretary and confidante.

Both parents are devout Catholics and, like Aquino, were close to Archbishop Cardinal Sin when the latter was still alive. Young, idealistic and sincere, Joseph didn’t realize at the time that his decision to sponsor the ordinance would threaten his political career and his chance of being reelected for a third and last term.

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Unlike the secret issuance of EO 003 in Manila, the process of passing Ordinance No. 1829 was public. This made for a transparent but arduous process, and left Councilor Joseph Juico vulnerable to the campaign by the Catholic Church. The Quezon City Council started public discussions on the proposed measure in 2007. In his privilege speech explaining why the City needed a population management and reproductive health policy, Councilor Juico recounted his mother’s story:

There is a woman, who was once advised by her doctor in New York that given the risk to her life and the child in her womb, it was his medical opinion that she should undergo an abortion…(S)he was faced with a dilemma no mother should ever suffer – to save her own life or to bring her child into this world…Guided by her religious beliefs and a strong moral foundation, she decided to continue with the pregnancy…She eventually gave birth to a strong and healthy baby boy. Ladies and gentlemen, had my mother decided differently, I would not be here today before you.

My mother’s dilemma 30 years ago is the same with married and unmarried women everywhere. However, she is college-educated and together with my father, has sufficient means and resources to raise a family – to provide for food, clothing, ensure their health and give them an education…Other families face entirely different realities…Immersion in depressed areas in my district has opened my eyes to some disturbing truths. Mired in poverty, I talk to these growing families losing hope for every day that they struggle to survive. I see malnourished children roaming the streets, deprived of three square meals a day, opportunities for their future – such as education, and when they grow up, the cycle will begin again…Couples ask me to help them because they cannot provide for their children and at the same time their family is just getting bigger.

Mirroring what was happening in Congress, the hearings about the ordinance mobilized opposing groups and individuals, many of whom were also involved in the debates in the House of

Representatives and the Senate. Member organizations of the Reproductive Health Advocacy Network

(RHAN), several of which are based in Quezon City, prepared for all the hearings with their experts and community speakers, position papers and information materials. The Catholic Church and its allies mobilized students, parishioners and prominent figures. The prelate of Cubao, Bishop Ongtioco, in particular, was a heavy presence. He introduced speakers on their side in one hearing, and in another, he made a spectacular entrance: Trailed by an entourage of priests and sacristans in white, he entered

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the main hall in a Bishop’s ceremonial robe, cape and miter. The gallery hushed and hissed, as a mix of awe and indignation spread through the audience.

The Catholic Church’s arguments against the reproductive health ordinance echoed the criticisms leveled by the Catholic Church against the Reproductive Health bill in the national legislature.

Church representatives and allies raised the abortifacient effects of artificial contraceptives, immorality of abortion, and freedom of religion. The issue of sexuality education in public schools - muted in the

Congressional hearings because of the attention to the issue of contraception – was a major debate in

Quezon City as parents and educators made their voices heard. Supporters of the Catholic Church contended that the responsibility for children’s sexuality education lies primarily with the parents and that the ordinance undermined the parents’ role. Sony Sison, a social psychologist and a member of the

Catholic Church panel, talked about the eight stages of psychosexual development and the dangers of giving sexuality education starting from Grade 5 to 4th year High School:

So, what are the effects on our youth? Youth will be taught reproductive health and secular sex education. Based on the long term study of sex education in the United States, from 1960 to 1991, the following trends were established. I think, the sex education course that you are going to teach is more or less similar to this. That’s why I’m quoting this data. Abortions have increased 800%. The illegitimate births have increased to 457%. Child abuse has increased more than 500%...The divorce rate has increased 133%. The percentage of single parent families has increased to 114%, living together has increased to 179%. The incident of venereal disease has increased to 145%. The teen suicide rate has increased to 114%. You can see now there are more teenage suicides – the juvenile violent crime rate has increased to 195%. This similar statute is definitely the outcome of secular sex education without moral values. What will happen to our children, to your children and to our youth? What will happen to future marriages, families and to the societies? What will happen in Quezon City, the capital of the Philippines, known for its wellness and the richest treasury?

In another hearing, however, Dr. Cristina Montiel, a psychologist from the Ateneo de Manila University and a reproductive health advocate, offered a constructive position and identified three areas as a common ground on which the two sides could work together. First is the desire of both sides to look at the studies that examine the effects of sex education on adolescent sexual behavior. Even as the two

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camps were looking at different sets of literature -- one showing sex education is correlated with increasing pregnancy rates among youth, and the other, the evidence for lower rates of risky sexual behavior – both groups can conduct a comprehensive review of these studies. The second common ground is the recognition by both groups of the need for a school-based program that addresses their respective concerns about adolescent sexuality. While one side refers to this as chastity education and the other side speaks of sexuality education, recognizing the particular concerns related to adolescents’ psychosexual and social development is an opening worth pursuing. The last point of agreement is the need to determine the appropriate and acceptable content of this school-based education.

Cracks in the alliance between the Catholic Church and its supporters also surfaced. As a compromise position was reached providing adolescent health education starting from first year high school instead of the original proposal of starting at Grade 5, the Catholic Church denied that it had authorized any group to speak or negotiate on its behalf. It turned out that Pro-Life representatives, in a meeting with Councilor Juico, made several suggestions pertaining to this provision, which was interpreted by City Hall as the group’s openness to the revisions. For this, Pro-Life earned the displeasure of the Bishop of Cubao, who, according to Sister Pilar, thought her group approved the amendments and proceeded to isolate them. “They were blaming us. They say that’s why the ordinance passed,” the nun lamented. Even as Pro-Life views itself as an NGO autonomous from the Church, it became apparent in this instance that its positions are subject to Church approval.

The role of government in providing social services and which services should be supported by people’s taxes also preoccupied the hearings. Supporters of the Catholic Church invoked their status as tax payers who “collaborate with the Quezon City Government in its intentions to promote the common good … (and) will claim our right to actively oppose any effort to undermine our belief of the common good”. Echoing the discussion in Manila about the local budget, Fenny Tatad, Executive Director of the

Bishops-Legislators Caucus of the Philippines, pushed the Quezon City government to spend instead on

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“the labor requirements of the future and prepare the population and city for inimitable growth”. Citing the City’s successful revenue collection, robust economic activities and responsive basic services, she argues that this contradicts the idea that the City has limited resources for its population and debunks the need for a family planning program.

BETWEEN A BISHOP AND A MOTHER

Outside the City Hall hearings, Bishop Ongtioco issued several directives addressed to “all parish priests, school directors, religious men and women, lay organizations, and transparochial communities” and naming Councilor Juico as the one who introduced the “deadly ordinance”. The bishop wrote:

We need to be vigilant now as Catholics, firmly and faithfully believing in the truth handed down to us from the Lord Jesus Christ through the Catholic Church. We need to defend millions of lives at stake who will be killed because of the cancerous effects of the Pill, the abortifacients (sic) effects of the IUD and the lie about condom as a deterrent to AIDS.

To our brother priests, include this mission in your homilies everyday as soon as possible especially on Saturday and Sunday. (Emphasis mine.) We strongly oppose this Reproductive Health and Population Management proposed ordinance for Quezon City because it kills the unborn children, cause deadly cancers, destroys the Catholic educational formation of our youth and take away from us our intrinsic inalienable right to the free exercise of a correct conscience and our right to freedom of worship in the Catholic faith.

Let us be ready to hold prayer rallies if and when so needed to prevent the passage of this deadly ordinance.

Although Joseph’s father, Phillip, confessed to his son, “my heart is with you but my mind is not sure” (See Rina Jimenez-David, 2008), his mother chose to defend him by directly confronting the Bishop of Cubao. In response to the public attacks from the Catholic Church, Margarita Juico, wrote a letter to

Bishop Ongtioco, in which she expresses her hurt for the way the Church leaders had treated her son and questions the Church’s means of engaging in the debate:

Dear Bishop Ongtioco,

I am writing to you as the mother of Joseph “Sep” Juico, who has been mentioned adversely from the pulpit and in yesterday’s (yellow) directive written by yourself.

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I am hurting, to say the least, as I am deeply disappointed at how the Church seems to be using strong arm tactics in killing such an ordinance on Reproductive Health and Population Management. The same persons who represent the Lord in Quezon City seem to be treating these young legislators, such as my son, not with love as Jesus would have it, but with threats of being refused the Holy Eucharist during Mass or with defamation or vilification of character through media or propaganda. I have never seen the Church so vicious in its attacks that, in the process, it loses the virtues it should stand for.

I had expected, from the QC Church Leaders to the QC Legislators, some encouragement for the councilors to do that they think is right, instead of being discouraged by threats of being deprived the sacraments, being pilloried in public to ensure loss in the next elections.

I am proud to say that my son has been a practicing Catholic and has done more than he should for the ‘least of His brethren’. In fact, if there is anything I can say my children have, which their parents somehow contributed, it is their sense of social consciousness. Now if having that has moved my son to do what you despise, I pray that you and your representatives take an active role in the crafting of this bill instead of crucifying my son who believes in his heart that this is the right thing to do. He claims the ordinance is ‘not written in stone’ and can certainly stand its share of amendments. In fact, he insisted on a public hearing to make this possible. I believe the treatment from the men in robes that he has been getting is not fair and just. Not for anyone and definitely, not from the Church where we belong.

I end my letter by asking, ‘If Jesus were around, would He react in the same way toward His own’? (sic)

Sincerely, Margarita P. Juico

CONCLUDING NOTES

Both Manila City and Quezon City cite limited resources as the reason for enacting and continuing their respective policies on reproductive health and family planning. While Manila opted to de-prioritize family planning services as a way of cutting spending and saving funds, Quezon City has chosen to view these services as a long-term investment in the City’s socio-economic development.

These indicate contrasting strategies of addressing poverty and differing views of reproductive health and rights. As ways of managing populations, Manila’s and Quezon City’s approaches are based on contrasting ethical perspectives: The former stresses the management of moralities to protect the city’s

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pro-life values, while the latter focuses on managing health performance to achieve the city’s socio- economic performance. The national government’s natural family planning-only program attempts to reconcile both by locating religious values within a health and development framework, an act that serves to accommodate the influential Catholic Church. These contrasting approaches create disjunctions in policy at the local and national levels that, while expanding health services in one city and limiting access in another, leave the overall status of reproductive health and rights under question.

More to the point, the contradictory policies on family planning and reproductive health do not serve to encourage poor women, who have an acute sense of disempowerment, to demand from the government the services to which they are entitled.

These case studies also show the promise of local policymaking to affirm reproductive health and rights, and establish the conditions that will support the same. Two factors critical to the passage of

Quezon City’s reproductive health ordinance are worth noting: First is the open and public process and second is the leadership’s political will. The transparent process gave advocates and constituents an opportunity to study the proposed ordinance and subject it to critique, allowing key actors on both sides to equally participate in the public hearings. More importantly, it enabled the dissemination of information to the wider community, who followed the debates and formed their own opinions based on the discussions. The very openness of the proceedings protected the City Council from charges of political manipulation and helped to build mass support for the policy. This contrasts greatly with the approach in Manila, which relied on secrecy to successfully issue the policy ban on modern contraceptives while evading the potential opposition from various sectors. Interestingly, the same secrecy was at work decades earlier, when the Catholic bishops attempted to get former President

Corazon Aquino to sign a similar executive order until the move was discovered and eventually blocked, and more recently, when the Alabang Barangay Council issued in 2011 an ordinance prohibiting the sale of contraceptive pills in pharmacies within its jurisdiction, triggering protests from its wealthy residents

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when the policy became public. That this secret approach to policymaking fails to secure the crucial support of the broader community has yet to be recognized by those who have employed this strategy time and time again. Although the Catholic Church and its allies believe in the moral ascendancy of their position, their actions suggest that the only way their proposals can gain legal ascendancy is to subvert the democratic mechanisms of the policy process.

The leadership’s political will is decisive in the outcome of the policy process. Regardless of whether the policy puts in place reproductive health programs or limits family planning services, the case studies show how local and national executives can actually push for and enact controversial policies, despite potential public criticism, resistance and backlash. However, political will implies the recognition of the “will of the people” and does not only mean the willfulness of leaders to insist on their positions and overcome opposition. To the extent that this political will expresses the desires and aspirations of the many, how responsive a policy is to these needs becomes the measure by which to regard a leader’s sense of political will. For, while local and national leaders may succeed in passing, even imposing, laws that address the concerns of the influential few and disregard the conditions of the poor majority, responsiveness remains to be essential to the maintenance of political and democratic legitimacy (Wurfel, 1988). Further, what these case studies highlight is that, regardless of pressures from the Catholic Church and other sectors, policy decisions and actions remain in the hands of political leaders – legislators, mayors, the President. Ultimately, the accountability lies with the state and the leaders who govern.

The state may formulate policy but individuals engage with it in complex ways. Manila’s ban on modern contraceptives and the national government’s NFP-only program, having been implemented for about ten years, show how individuals have reinterpreted the state discourses on natural family planning and modern contraceptives, revealing ways by which discourses get grounded in policy. Unlike

Manila’s Executive Order which imposed deprivations without offering a clear alternative, however, the

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NFP-only program illustrates how policy serves as a technology of self-management and self- governance, and gets incorporated as part of the individual.

Beyond this, however, the cases show that there is no clear demarcation between those who are known to be pro-life and pro-natalist and those known to be pro-choice and anti-natalist. The complexity of the reproductive health issue shows up in how relationships between presumed allies as well as presumed enemies get tangled and overturned in the process of engaging with each other. This suggests that attempts to fix the moral and political meanings of these categories – pro-life and pro- choice - will be thwarted by the complex conditions and dynamic relationships that are involved in the policy battle.

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CHAPTER SIX

CONCLUSION

The policy battle over reproductive health has preoccupied Philippine politics for a decade. The issues that frame this public debate have troubled the nation and Filipinos for a much longer time, however. They emerged not directly in relation to reproduction and sexuality; rather, they arose out of other social and political questions. As a decolonizing nation in the 1940s-1960s, the country struggled to plot its economic development while confronting persisting and emerging problems. International aid agencies presented the question of population as an impending crisis and as an alternative explanation for the unequal social conditions under which Filipinos lived. This explanation muted, if not elided, the ravages of more than four hundred years of colonialism and war, under Spain, the United States and

Japan. The state of the population became a fundamental determinant of the country’s development and progress. But the population control policies that arose from this thinking did not go uncontested.

As the nation struggled to define itself and its future, the task of analyzing Philippine society and its problems became critical, and different groups waged ideological battles. The radical political movements were at the forefront of the profound questioning of the roots of Philippine dependency and backwardness. Population control and the issue of population encountered nationalist resistance as political movements identified these with imperialist motives and neocolonial objectives. Nationalist ideals, however, were not a pure position as these got entangled with the state’s population control policy and were appropriated by the dictatorship’s desire to achieve progress and greatness, and to finally break away from the third world mold.

Interwoven in the dynamic between population policy, nationalism and the modernizing project is the relationship between the Catholic Church and the state. Since the 1960s the Catholic Church has opposed population control, invoking both papal encyclicals and nationalist values to explain its decision

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to end its critical collaboration with the government and its population program. The military state was more than enough reason to oppose any government initiative. But Church and state relations have been contentious since the Spanish colonial period; the embeddedness of the Church in the nation’s affairs served to support and oppose the state at different historical junctions. During the negotiations for independence with the American colonial regime, how to define the role of the Catholic Church in

Philippine society and how it should exercise its power vis-à-vis the state was the subject of constitutional debate. Following its critical role in the People Power events of 1986 and 2001, the question of to what extent should the Catholic Church be involved in political affairs without overstepping its religious role was both a matter of political and legal significance. Although the

Constitution had set the rules governing the relationship between the Church and state, the historical legacy of colonialism and the exigencies of political crises have also set in place complex socio-political dynamics that challenge Church and state separation. Policymaking on reproductive health is caught up in this historical and socio-political dynamic as both Church and political leaders attempt to redraw the boundaries of Church and state relations as they fiercely battle about the reproductive health bill.

The conflation of religious identity with national identity has been the dominant narrative of the nation, one that’s invoked by the Catholic Church to mobilize its constituents and persuade policymakers about the bill. With Catholics making up the overwhelming majority of Filipinos, the assumption of a Catholic morality that guides the nation has been part of the public and the state’s discourse. There have been few instances when this was politically challenged. In many cases, these challenges were a direct response to the Catholic Church’s attempts to dictate the substance of social policy and restrict what can be accommodated and embraced by (what is considered) Catholic identity and morality. The policy debate in the 1930s on requiring religious instruction in public schools was one; another was the controversy in the 1960s around the ban by Catholic universities on the teaching of

Jose Rizal’s novels that described the abuses of Catholic friars, the catalyst for the revolution against

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Spain. The decades-long war in Mindanao waged by Muslim Filipinos and growing religious pluralism undermine the Catholic claim on the identity of the whole nation.

THE NATION AND MORAL ORDER

The polarized debate on reproductive health has foregrounded these political undercurrents and exposed the deep social cleavages brought about by poverty, social inequality and class structures.

Beyond this, the contestation over reproductive health has illuminated the politics of progress and nationalism, Church and state relations, national identity and religious identity, questions about gender, sexuality, reproduction, morality and lived religion. It has also brought into the arena diverse political actors, including national and local governments, Congress and the courts, the Catholic Church and its allied groups, reproductive health networks and family planning groups, educators, academics, parents, economists, health providers, the media, students, youth and community women. Reproductive policy, as the frame through which the politics of the nation, religion and the state get filtered and played out, has forced social actors to broaden the scope of what is considered political and national. In this sense, the politics of the personal and private become implicated in macro-political processes. Reproduction, as the entry point and axis for these intersecting frames, has sharpened the debate about what it means to be a Filipino, a Catholic and a moral person; what constitutes moral actions and ethical behavior, at the level of the individual, institutions, and nation; and whose voices and realities really matter in state programs and policy.

Religious fundamentalism is the standard frame used by reproductive health advocates and political commentators to explain the Church’s opposition to the proposed reproductive health policy

(Ruiz-Austria, 2004). Catholic fundamentalism, in particular, takes Vatican authority as universal and absolute and seeks legal enforcement of Church dogma, especially on sexuality and reproduction. This fundamentalism, it is explained, emerges from a world view that rejects modernity and Enlightenment values (Ruiz-Austria, 2004). The defense and imposition of traditional religious values that no longer

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resonate with or apply to contemporary Filipino society are identified as main tension points. In the

Philippine political context, the religious right has succeeded in dominating the state in regard to policies on reproductive health and rights by virtue of the Catholic Church’s influence on conservative government leaders. Within this frame, the reproductive health debate is cast as a battle between secular and fundamentalist viewpoints and forces, with reproductive health advocates representing the former and the Catholic Church, the latter. This study shows, however, that this is a limited way of framing the intersecting assumptions, critiques, tendencies, and agendas that drive the conflict about reproductive health. Further, the use of “religious fundamentalism” fails to capture the historical and peculiar relationship of the state, the Catholic Church and social movements in the Philippines. This is a case of properly identifying the actors and elements involved in the reproductive health controversy but giving the aggregated parts an improper collective name. While the debate has elements that mimic other policy battles waged on fundamentalist terrain, such as the abortion issue in the United States, the nature of the Philippine conflict rests on a different set of positions, motivations and relationships.

Underlying the concept of religious fundamentalism is the discourse on modernity which assumes the dichotomy between the nation-state and religion, and the secular character of nationalism

(van der Veer, 1999). The history of anti-colonial and anti-dictatorship politics in the Philippines has shown how religion has been recruited and harnessed to the cause of the nation (Ileto 1979; Deats

1967; Pertierra 1989). In more recent decades, People Power politics have also gained legitimacy and mass support through the mobilization of the institutional power and religious symbols of the Catholic

Church. Religion, and Catholicism, in particular, served as a source of national unity and rallying point for nationalism. In the process, nationalist and democratic ideals became intertwined with Catholic ethics and identity, at once feeding into, forming, and working in tension with each other. This fusion of religious sentiments and nationalist imagination, or what I refer to as religio-nationalism, I argue, forms

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the critical lens which can help us understand and locate the political dynamics involved in the debate on reproductive health.

This study argues that the tensions between nationalism and modernity are played out in the contestation over reproductive health and resonate in the policy debates, state responses at the local and national levels, and Catholic Church and social movement discourses. Moreover, this tension manifests in urban poor women’s understanding and re-articulation of reproductive health policy, and in their reproductive practices and religious experience. As they engage in the debate, the key political actors offer overlapping and competing visions of nationalism and modernity, the desire for development serving as the bridge between these nationalist and modernizing sentiments. As the unquestioned category, development is the path that the nation must take toward modernity, and for a former colony, it is also a precondition for overcoming dependency and achieving full sovereignty. With its links to poverty alleviation and population management, a reproductive health policy promises to be an effective means of reaching these development goals. But as the Catholic Church asserts, Catholicism bounds the nation and defines its identity. A reproductive health policy that goes against the doctrinal teachings of the Church constitutes a threat to the Catholic nation and its moral order. Since Catholic religious morality guides the path of the nation and its citizens, adherence and obedience to Catholic core values must not be compromised. In the entangled contestation over reproductive health then, two perspectives on nationalism emerge: The first takes the nationalist vision of progress that rests on a rational socio-economic development model to achieve the ideal of national modernity; and the second takes nationalism as including Catholic virtues that make up an essential part of the nation and of being

Filipino. In the first sense, nationalism as the drive toward progress and greatness strips the idea of a distinctive set of specific ideational characteristics. In the other sense, being Filipino (in a Catholic way) becomes the main value, even (and maybe, especially) if this means repudiating standard global practices and agreements, such as those related to reproductive health and rights. In other words, in the

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first instance, it becomes less important that Filipinos become Filipino (and Catholic) than that they do what is necessary to achieve progress; in the second, being Catholic is held as the measure by which

Filipinos can keep the integrity of their national identity.

The assertion of a Filipino nation within a Catholic moral order was for the most part an accepted truth that the Church, state and public helped weave into the political imagination of the nation. It wasn’t until the insistence of the Catholic Church to govern the intimate lives of individual

Filipinos according to a fixed meaning of religious and national morality that cracks in the unity between nation and religion began to show. Sexual intimacy outside of marriage, reproductive self- determination, family planning and birth control are part of the modern project of self-regulation, personal conscience and self-governance. Individual choice and personal freedoms associated with self- governance are supposed to be supported and protected by the modern state, not to mention encouraged by the capitalist market. At the same time that the state can claim jurisdiction over this intimate sphere, the Catholic Church asserts its position as the rightful overseer of the space of personal morality, which it thinks properly covers the sexual and reproductive lives of Filipinos. Changing attitudes regarding sexuality and reproduction as well as the need to improve family conditions have increased the resistance to the Catholic Church’s strict restrictions and interventions into the intimacies of social life. Whereas past social conflicts involving the Church had resulted in the questioning of its role in the political arena, the policy battle on reproductive health has led to the challenging of the Church’s authority over both political and personal matters. More importantly, it has opened the field for the contestation over Catholic identity and its meaning.

In all this, the state must answer to the tensions and contradictions between nationalist and religious sentiments. At the same time, it must provide the administrative, political and policy framework for the nation, which rests on secular notions of nation-building, Church and state separation, and individual human rights. This modernizing impulse of the state, however, must take into

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consideration the historical role religion has played in legitimizing and propping up the state through the harnessing of nationalism in the post-colonial era. To what extent it should accommodate the Catholic

Church and not risk its own legitimacy in the nationalist and modernizing terms is a question the state must confront.

The social conflicts surfaced by the contentious debates on reproductive health reveal the myth of a unified moral nation under the Catholic Church. Discourses counter to the Catholic narrative of the nation provide an alternative vision and practice of politics and religion. The possibility of passing a reproductive health policy destabilizes long-held truths about the Catholic moral order and the national character of Filipinos. Moreover, it potentially shifts the power configurations between the state, the

Catholic Church and civil society that could change the national political fabric. Further, it points to a potential reorganization of the relationship between Catholicism and a significant majority of Catholics, who do not see a conflict between reproductive health and their religious beliefs. At stake is the authority of the Church in relation to the state to shape and define the moral good, either for the nation or individual Filipinos. Also at stake is the right of individuals, especially, women, to govern their sexual and reproductive lives, and determine the conditions of their lives. And as the state is expected to resolve these social tensions, at stake is the state’s ability to support the materialization of modernization without losing a powerful ally in the building and formation of the nation.

DISCOURSES ON REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH

The state, the Catholic Church and reproductive health movement advance competing discourses that explain and support their stand on reproductive health. These discourses revolve around population and development, women’s health and rights, and religion and morality. But even as they compete and seek to undermine the other’s validity, they also overlap and find common ground with one another. At the same time, as the protagonists in this battle constantly react to each other, ready to disprove the other, they end up defining the ground on which they make their claims according to the

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terms of their antagonists. Alliances also carry contradictions within them, as conflicting views by members threaten the group’s unified stance. In the engagement between the state, the Catholic

Church, and the reproductive health movement, the result is a mutual co-construction that simultaneously locks the actors into their respective arguments and reinforces their adversaries’ discourses.

This co-construction is reflected in how these different actors view contraception and abortion, the most controversial issues in the reproductive health bill. For reproductive health advocates, easing the burden of poor families, saving women’s lives, and upholding women’s reproductive self- determination are the major reasons why it is imperative that government give women access to the full range of contraceptive methods. They argue that access to safe and affordable contraceptives is essential in addressing women’s need to space or limit the number of their children and have control over their bodies and reproduction. By preventing pregnancies that are too early, too many, and too frequent, the provision of contraceptives can help reduce maternal deaths, especially among poor women. For the poor, who are the most affected by having large families that they cannot support, family planning services are not only a means to achieve their desired family size; it is a matter of family survival.

As a public health and poverty alleviation measure, family planning services find strong proponents among economists, population planners, demographers, family planning groups, and the business sector, who bring a macro-economic perspective to the links between women’s contraceptive behavior and fertility rates, on one hand, and the state of the country’s population, poverty and development, on the other hand. While reproductive health advocates are careful to point out the complex and indirect link between population and poverty, demographic thinking that promotes notions of an ideal family size and zero population growth, and views women as targets of population policy still lingers in the movement. The emergence of a more nuanced understanding of population as a factor in

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socio-economic development, however, has not dislodged population control from its niche in development policy and in the public’s mind. This undermines what women’s health activists and feminists have fought for a long time: the perspective that access to contraceptive methods must be taken from the point of view of women’s basic needs and rights. Yet, regardless of their starting frameworks, contraception is one issue on which reproductive health advocates are in full agreement.

On the other side of the debate, the Catholic Church supports the fight against poverty, but stresses that the cause of the problem is the pervasive corruption in government which undermines the provision of basic social services. But for the Church, social services do not include family planning programs, especially those that promote modern or artificial contraceptives, such as the pill, IUD and injectables, which are deemed abortifacients and go against the culture of life and the teachings of the

Church. Within this doctrinal framework, individuals and couples who use modern contraceptives are committing a grave immoral act. The Catholic Church also brings women’s health and rights into its moral position, arguing for the need to protect women’s health from the harmful effects of artificial contraceptives and to rescue women’s dignity from sexual objectification. The state, therefore, if it approves the proposed bill, will be propagating a culture of death and endangering women’s health, while violating people’s religious beliefs.

The unity within the reproductive health movement on the issue of contraception and family planning does not extend to abortion, with segments of the movement taking differing views on the issue. While the movement espouses women’s reproductive self-determination as a general principle, only a small section would unhesitatingly include in this a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy.

Members’ personal moral positions, reflecting the prevalent prohibitive view, do not allow the expansion of the discussion of abortion beyond recognizing the urgency of reducing maternal deaths.

Even the agreement about the necessity of providing women with services for post-abortion complications has not overcome the fundamental divisions among advocates arising from their own

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differing moral convictions. The charge that the reproductive health bill is intended to pave the way for the legalization of abortion has only been met with denials from advocates. Given the sway of moral proscriptions and legal prohibition against the practice, advocates, in an echo of the Catholic Church and government positions, end up affirming the criminal status of abortion. With its defensive stance on the issue, not only has the reproductive health movement posed no real challenge to the Church position, it has also found itself unintentionally reinforcing the discourse of immorality and illegality regarding abortion.

WOMEN’S REPRODUCTIVE AND SEXUAL MORALITY

Missing in these competing discourses are the voices of poor women. Although the situation and image of poor women have been summoned in the debates, to prop up arguments and justify claims, their involvement in the public discussions has been muted. While they are mobilized for rallies and hearings, they are not directly involved in shaping the debate, identifying the relevant issues, or directing the campaigns. The conditions under which women live in the urban poor community,

Sangandaan, give us clues as to why it is difficult for these women to engage in the issues that directly affect them. Grinding poverty forces women to focus on ensuring their family’s survival on a daily basis.

Because their lives are organized around searching for ways to survive, this leaves them with no time and resources to organize themselves or sustain any collective political action. A makeshift life that relies on improvised solutions - at times, on opportunistic actions – also creates a consciousness that is focused on the short term. Because of the absence of any wherewithal to realize or accomplish long- term goals, these women cannot plan or project beyond the immediate present.

Powerlessness and patronage define women’s relationship to the state and other agents of power. This imposes constraints on the way women confront and engage power. Women’s marginal status and lack of political resources prevent them from learning how to engage policymakers and the policy process. Where a simple act of trying to enter the halls of Congress becomes an occasion for the

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system to reject the presence of poor women and their children, it drives home the point that the poor face formidable obstacles in order to be heard. In addition, poverty has positioned these women as recipients of politicians’ patronage and largesse, in exchange for their electoral votes. Lacking in knowledge, economic resources and political status, these women simply have to rely on more influential intermediaries to speak on their behalf, trusting that their interests would be faithfully represented and advanced.

Despite their invocation of women’s health and rights, the discourses of both reproductive health and pro-life advocates represent poor women’s sexual and reproductive capacities as problematic. Whether reflected in the language of fertility rates, desired family size, contraceptive prevalence rates, anxieties about a growing population and its implications on national development are accompanied by discussions of the role of poor women in this growth. Moral proscriptions regarding sexuality and reproduction also seem to apply only to poor women, as they become the target of natural family planning programs. Also absent in the public discussions are the sexual and reproductive health concerns of middle and upper class women, and of men, who appear to not have contraceptive needs or any sexual and reproductive dilemmas.

The importance of giving due attention to the situation of poor women and prioritizing their reproductive health needs cannot be overestimated. But the sole focus on poor women results in a

“stratified reproduction” (Shelley Cohen, in Ginsburg and Rapp, 1995), where the problematization of their sexual and reproductive capacities becomes the basis for addressing reproductive health issues of all other women. The value placed on poor women and their reproductive health is predicated on their representation as the desperate other. Furthermore, as discussions on reproductive health come to revolve around the objective of lifting women out of poverty, the language of pity and charity enters the discourse as a mechanism for gaining public support for either side’s position. There is a risk that, rather

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than the rationale of human rights, charity and welfare, already manipulated in patronage politics, become the ethos to justify the necessity for a reproductive health policy.

Religious authority and doctrinal teachings have little influence on how women negotiate their reproductive lives. The narratives of the women of Sangandaan show that the demands of family survival and the desire for a better life are the critical factors that determine their reproductive decisions and practices. Reproduction, for these women, goes beyond the biological process of bearing and giving birth to life; it is the capacity and the right to determine the conditions of their family life. The challenge of overcoming poverty and deprivation, rather than obedience to the teachings of the Catholic

Church, constitutes the moral and ethical basis for their reproductive actions. They, therefore, reject the view that contraception and the use of modern contraceptives is a sinful act, asserting that it would be more unjust for their children to be raised in an environment of want. Women’s ability to challenge the

Catholic Church on the morality of modern contraceptives does not only rest on the strength of their reproductive experience. The existence of a legitimate public counter-discourse on population, development and poverty has provided a space within which women can articulate and anchor their reproductive decisions and practices and so-called transgressions. Moreover, this counter-discourse has created a public consciousness that aligns women’s desire to limit the number of their children and family size with that of the country’s goal of arresting a “ballooning population”, eradicating poverty and achieving development. In this sense, women’s decision to use contraception as a means of family survival becomes a stand in for the nation’s preservation, and is thus legitimized by this counter- discourse. Women’s views and handling of abortion, however, show that religion maintains its relevance in the lives of Sangandaan women. Unlike their defense of contraception and modern contraceptives, the women’s equivocations about abortion reveal a negotiation with religion and a reinterpretation of religious teachings to fit their circumstances and reconcile with their realities.

Religion is made pliant in order to regain a moral equilibrium or reach a reasonable social order. Yet, in

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the process of adjusting and re-adjusting this moral order, women alternate between justification of their actions, admission of guilt, and, finally, submission to doctrinal authority. In contrast to their direct challenge of the Church’s position on contraception, women’s stance on abortion reflects a more tentative resistance to the dominant religious moral view. Given the illegal status of abortion, women have no legitimizing discourse within which to articulate and justify their experiences of abortion. The merging of the state and the Catholic Church prohibitions against abortion has ensured that women’s moral claims on this issue remain marginalized and illegitimate. While their ideas and practices of contraception and abortion reflect autonomy from religious doctrine and authority, without the protection of class status and state legitimacy, women are unable to sustain their resistance to religious prohibitions and proscriptions. Further, the lack of reproductive health services undermines their reproductive autonomy.

A big gap exists between institutional religion and women’s everyday religion. Women construct a religious ethic based on their experiential and emotional relationship with God, not on religious obedience that the hegemonic Church requires from its members. In their narratives, women speak of faith as a source of hope and comfort, a sense of suffering underlying their language of a benevolent, understanding God who shared their own suffering. Poor women’s experience of God is inextricably linked to their experience of poverty and deprivation; religion provides them with the idiom with which to express their concerns. In this sense, social class is constitutive of this religiosity and forms the worldview through which women construct their religious morality. In the same manner, moral views about reproduction and sexuality are shaped by the conditions of poverty and lack, not so much by the doctrinal teachings of the Church.

POLICYMAKING

The stalled discussions in Congress have not prevented the issue of reproductive health from finding its way through the various structures and levels of government. The lack of resolution at the

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national legislative level has provoked contradictory responses at the local levels, and the three case studies discussed in chapter 5 reveal the disjunctures in the policy environment. They highlight how policymaking gets accommodated, rerouted and displaced at other levels of government – local and international, executive and judicial. Moreover, they show how discourses get grounded in policy, either as a program, ordinance or public statements issued by political leaders, while being reinterpreted by individuals in complex ways. As the three case studies demonstrate, these contradictions and disjunctions in policy produce multiple channels through which power and resistance flow.

As evident in the contrast between Manila and Quezon City, local governments have become a focal point for the policy battles. As the discussions in Congress continued to drag on, advocates and opponents of reproductive health shifted their campaigns to city and provincial councils. This is illustrated by policy developments in Manila and Quezon City, the country’s two most prominent cities.

While Manila issued Executive Order 003 effectively banning modern contraceptives from public health facilities, Quezon City successfully passed Ordinance No. 1829, enacting a population management and reproductive health policy. The outcomes of the debates in Manila and Quezon City have pushed other local governments, pressured by contending groups, to enact their own policies. Media and local politicians monitored especially how the Quezon City Council would manage to keep its position in the face of attacks from the Catholic Church. Davao, Baguio City and Aurora Province are only three local governments that have approved reproductive health policies, the last province implementing its program even ahead of Quezon City. Meanwhile, a barangay in Alabang, a wealthy residential village, approved in 2011 an ordinance prohibiting the sale of modern contraceptives in local pharmacies. In

Batangas and Tarlac provinces, whose Councils lean toward the Catholic position, there is now a stronger momentum to pass ordinances that would uphold pro-life values. These policy moves are not only responses to the absence of national law to guide local governments; rather, they are also counter-

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offensives to prevent the forward movement of either opposing side’s policy agenda in other parts of the country.

Contradictory local policies, however, mean that other government structures are summoned to address unresolved issues in diverse and localized ways. In Quezon City, the Catholic Church and allies assert that the reproductive health ordinance violates freedom of religion and promise to appeal the

Supreme Court. In Manila, reproductive health advocates have petitioned the court to declare unconstitutional the ban on modern contraceptives and other similar local policy. Further, advocates have also submitted a petition with the UN Commission on the Elimination of Discrimination Against

Women (CEDAW) to make the Philippine government accountable for the violations against women’s human rights resulting from the contraceptive ban. These developments signal that many avenues are still available to ensure that reproductive health stays on the policy agenda and have not been foreclosed by Congress’ failure to enact a policy. Yet, this also illustrates that, although these alternative governmental mechanisms have become an arena where reproductive health and rights can be secured, instituting a national policy that will apply to everyone, regardless of class, gender and religion, remains imperative.

These cases highlight the decisive role of political will in the outcome of the policy. The approval of the reproductive health ordinance in Quezon City especially shows how political leaders can ensure a transparent process and successfully enact a controversial policy, despite heavy pressure from the

Catholic bishops and the potential backlash from the influential few. While those governing Manila may argue that their decision to prohibit modern contraceptives constitutes an act of political will, the question of responsiveness, however, marks the difference between a policy that makes a wide range of family planning methods available to individuals and couples and one that limits services to what is acceptable to the Catholic Church. This responsiveness is critical in policymaking and governance as it is essential to the maintenance of political and democratic legitimacy. Further, what these case studies

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highlight is that, regardless of pressures from the Catholic Church and other sectors, policy decisions and actions remain in the hands of political leaders – legislators, mayors, the President. Ultimately, the accountability lies with the state and the leaders who govern.

LOOKING FORWARD

It is hard to predict when the policy impasse over reproductive health will end and whether an acceptable compromise is even possible without any major political fallout for the key actors involved.

But even with many questions still unresolved by the debate (or perhaps, more so because of it), reproductive health advocates may have to keep thinking about the direction a reproductive health policy should take as it moves forward, noting other concerns and processes that still need to be addressed. In reflecting on the future direction of reproductive health policy in the Philippines, I would like to point to some issues that emerged in this study and identify possible openings for engaging in policy.

How to ensure that poor women are able to truly participate and become major actors in the policy discussions is a challenge for the immediate and long-term future. At the same time, a sole focus on poor women leaves out upper and middle class women as well as men from the equation. It also makes reproductive health appear a charitable concern rather than a right to which everyone is entitled.

For this reason, a dialogue across classes may assist in recognizing common grounds and connections regarding experiences related to reproduction, contraception and abortion, as well as accessing and utilizing reproductive health services. A goal of this process is to help build solidarity across classes that can be a stronger vehicle for advancing reproductive health. It is, however, crucial that poor women and men and their communities are strategically positioned and able to participate effectively within this dialogue. Sustained organizing and education work among these communities may be needed in order to build their capacities for political engagement, place them on a more equal footing with other sectors and have a real voice in shaping policy.

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In terms of expanding the reproductive health policy agenda, putting men’s concerns in the picture is important. While male involvement has been identified as part of the ten elements of reproductive health, ‘male involvement’ has been interpreted as getting men’s support for women’s reproductive choices, without recognizing that men have real concerns about raising their families and managing their own reproductive lives. As some women in this study attest, in some instances it was their husbands or partners who initiated the couples’ decision to use family planning.

For the policy discussion to move forward, policymakers must be willing to leave open the divisive question of when life begins and the framing of abortion as killing. Getting beyond this life/death question presents a very challenging task. However, one direction is to move this discussion outside of the policy arena and into the larger public sphere where more voices and perspectives can be heard. But this entails talking about abortion based on moral, social and medical grounds, and real life circumstances – a daunting task given the illegal status of abortion. This may also be an opportunity to have a broader discussion about faith (and non-faith), taking a closer look at the ways religion influence and impinge on people’s lives. Ethnographic studies that examine women’s abortion experiences and the impact of religion on personal lives could be a step towards opening this discussion.

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