Throughout his tenure as President Duterte has had plenty to say to and about the Catholic Church. None of it good. Many of his remarks have irked the faithful as well as the faithless due to the obscene nature of his comments. But it seems everyone was wrong. Everyone underestimated what Duterte was actually doing and saying. All of his remarks against the church have been part of one long sustained intellectual discourse against the unreasonableness of the dogmas of Roman Catholicism and Papal dominion within the hearts and minds of the Filipino people.
Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said Duterte’s harsh words against the country’s largest religion were only meant to question the validity of some of the Church’s teachings.
“I would not call that abusive,” Panelo said in an interview with ABS-CBN News Channel, referring to the President’s attacks on the Catholic Church.
“I call that intellectual discourse questioning the validity of certain doctrines of your religion,” he added.
Let us then make a brief attempt at ferrying out this discourse and see if we can put it together. I shall have to start from the beginning in June 2016 and follow the threads of the discourse as he weaves it into one beautiful tapestry. The focus will be on the most salient theological pronouncements he has made and they will be presented in chronological order.
June 27, 2016
“I believe in one God Allah. Period,” he said during his last flag ceremony as Davao City mayor. Allah is the name of the God worshipped by Muslims.
Duterte said he has been at odds with the Catholic Church because of its opposition to artificial family planning methods. He noted that in Davao City, pills, ligation and other birth control methods are accessible to couples.
“I go against the Church because its position is not realistic,” the tough-talking leader said.
Duterte, however, went beyond Catholic doctrines and questioned the relevance of the scriptures themselves.
“Those were written 3,000 years ago. Ano ba pakialam natin sa kanilang sinulat?” he said.
July 25, 2016
"Let me assure that while I'm a stickler for the principle of separation between the Church and State, I believe quite strongly that there should never be a separation between God and State," he added.
September 7, 2016
“What I don’t like really is ‘yun bang takutin ka. Pagka maliit pa tayo, magpunta tayo ng impiyerno, magpunta tayo ng impiyerno, kung ano man sunugin ng impiyerno na,” said Duterte, who himself uses colorful threats against criminals and terrorists.
(What I don’t like really is how it makes you fearful. When we are small, we are told we will go to hell, whatever, we will burn in hell.)
The “Iglesia ni Duterte,” meanwhile, will not be as strict and will condone vices otherwise frowned upon by the religious.
“Walang bawal. Inom, sige inom. Babae, ay, sige hanggang patayin ka ng asawa mo. Madali man na magpatay ng asawa, ‘yung husband ninyo, ‘yung 'legal,'” said the President.
(Nothing is prohibited. You can drink and drink. You can have as many women as you want until your spouse kills you. It’s easy to kill a spouse, your husband, in a "legal" way.)
Duterte then suggested a way to kill one’s philandering spouse slowly but surely. “Lagyan mo ng extra two spoonfuls ‘yang kanyang ulam, ibigay mo. Two years' time, papalpak ang kidney niyan. ‘Wag mo na i-dialysis, sabihin mo, ‘yan na sigurong suwerte mo,’” he said.
(Put two extra spoonfuls in their food, have them eat it. In two years' time, their kidney will fail. Don’t let them go through dialysis, say, "That’s just your luck.")
January 24, 2017
“I challenge you now. I challenge the Catholic Church. You are full of shit. You all smell bad, corruption and all,” Mr. Duterte said on Tuesday.
February 3, 2017
“Do not believe that you will go to hell... There is no such thing as heaven and hell. You know it would need a very stupid God if he creates me as a human being and at the end of my earthly life he would just send me to hell,” Duterte said in his latest rantings against the Catholic Church in the country during a convention of the Philippine Association of Water Districts in Davao City.
“God is alpha and omega, the beginning and end. He sees everything. You have free will but just the same, God knows that you’re going to hell so why the heck create me if you let me suffer?” he added.
“If you’re the creator of life, then create another one but not me. You know (this is my) universal identity so you can’t tell me to change. ‘Mayor, do not say bad words, be courteous to visitors.’”
“In the meantime, we try to survive in this planet and we can only pray to the true God. Their God, with all the pageantry, look at their gold cross,” he said.
“I thought Christ was crucified on a wooden cross?”
Duterte, a baptized Catholic who claims to believe in God but not in religion, has been badmouthing the Catholic Church, some of whose bishops have criticized alleged extrajudicial killings in his war on drugs.
June 22, 2018
"Kinain ni Adam (Adam ate it) then malice was born. Who is this stupid God? Istupido talaga itong putangina kung ganoon (That son of a bitch is stupid if that's the case)," said Duterte during a summit in Davao City.
"You created something perfect and then you think of an event that would tempt and destroy the quality of your work," he continued.
"Tsuk tsak lang 'yun ng nanay pati tatay mo wala ka pang kasali tapos ngayon may original sin ka. Tanginang klase – anong klaseng relihiyon 'yan? 'Yan ang hindi ko matanggap. What a stupid proposition," said an incensed Duterte.
(That was your mother and father's deed, you weren't born yet, but now you have original sin. What kind of religion is that? I can't accept it.)
"I believe there is a universal mind. But [to] what extent is the influence of the – I cannot picture him as a human being…But I really believe, i have this faith and abiding thing about – but don't believe in religion," he said.
July 10, 2018
"Ang Diyos ko forgiving, ang Diyos ko hindi bastos, ang Diyos ko hindi nagmumura. As a matter of fact, ang Diyos ko walang sinasabi except the 10 commandments," he said.
(My God is forgiving, my God is not rude, my God does not curse. As a matter of fact, my God does not say anything except for the 10 commandments.)
"...[A]nd then when you use God to tell that I'll go to hell. You know, my God never created hell because if he created hell he must be stupid God. My God is not stupid to create man just to burn him in hell."
"I do not believe in Heaven because if I do, only a fraction of you in this crowd will ever enter Heaven. All of us, makita ko lalo na 'yung mga 2 asawa dito mga playboy, lahat man tayo sa impyerno magkita (especially those who have 2 wives, who are playboys, we will see each other in Hell). That is fiction," he said.
"Sabi ko nga, give me a religious guy na nakapunta (As I said, give me a religious) anywhere, you take a picture of Mother Earth from above... saan 'yang Diyos na yan (where is that God)?"
November 26, 2018
“How people from 3,000 years ago predict or project what is happening today? You build a chapel on your own house and pray there, you don’t have to go to church to pray for these idiots,” Duterte said in his speech during the groundbreaking of the Davao City Bulk Water Supply Project.
December 29, 2019
“Magdasal ka na sa isang Diyos, magdasal ka pa dito sa santong yawa. Isa lang ang Diyos. (You’re already praying at one God, then you’re going to pray at these cursed saints. There’s only one God.) There’s only one God, period. You cannot divide God into 3, that’s silly,” said the President.
Before attacking the Holy Trinity doctrine, Duterte said Jesus Christ is “unimpressive” because he had allowed himself to be nailed on the cross.
“‘Yong Diyos mo, pinako sa krus. Tangina. Nakakawala ng bilib. Ako ang Diyos, tapos ipako mo ako? Putangina. Sabihin ko, ‘Lightning, ubusin mo ito. Sunugin mo lahat ng mga erehes,'” said Duterte.
(Your God was nailed on the cross. Fuck. How unimpressive. I’m God and you will crucify me? Motherfucker. I’d tell them, ‘Lightning, finish all of them. Burn all the non-believers.')
The passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ is among the central doctrines of Christian faith, with Christians believing that Jesus sacrificed himself to save the world from sin.
The President likewise belittled the belief in saints, whom he previously called as “fools” and “drunkards.”
“‘Yong iba, ‘yong mga Santa Catalina, Santa Ana, Santo Tomas, San Sebastian, Santo Rodrigo, wala iyan… ‘Di ko nga kilala ‘yan. Look, those documents were written – if at all – 3,000 years ago. Anong pakialam nila sa buhay natin?” asked Duterte.
(Saint Catalina, Saint Anne, Saint Thomas, Saint Sebastian, Saint Rodrigo, they’re nothing… I don’t know them. Look, those documents were written – if at all – 3,000 years ago. Why would they care about our lives now?)
“Sino sumulat? Sino ‘yong si Santo Tomas? ’Di nga natin alam kung sino ‘yon. Baka pangalan ng baka o kamel ‘yan noon,” he added.
(Who wrote about them? Who’s Saint Thomas? We don’t know who they are. That might even be a name for a cow or camel then.)
How does all this fit together?
First off Duterte announces he believes in only one God and his name is Allah. Ostensibly that would make Duterte a Muslim. This would explain his anti-trinitarianism. Islam does not believe in a God that is one in substance and three in person. But many of his other statements don't jibe with Islam either.
For instance he invites people to join the Church of Duterte where anything goes. More like Pleasure Island than a church. Islam has strict moral rules which Duterte's ideal church flaunts. No drinking for one. Islam also has its own version of the afterlife but Duterte does not believe in hell or heaven.
Duterte calls the creation story stupid but the creation story in Islam is not all that different from what is found in Genesis. God creates the world and Adam is tempted by Satan to eat the forbidden fruit. Islam finds great influence from the Bible considering Noah, Abraham, and Moses to be prophets yet Duterte says the Bible is irrelevant as it was written 3,000 years ago. He calls Jesus unimpressive but Islam also reveres him as a prophet.
How can any of that be tied into an intellectual discourse? Duterte's doctrines do not make any sense. He is all over the place saying whatever comes to his head. I belive in Allah, the church is full of shit, the trinity is silly, the bible is irrelevant, the last Monday of the month of January will be a special working holiday called National Bible Day.
Wait. What?
"As a predominantly Christian nation and the largest Christian nation in the Asia Pacific, this Act recognizes the value of the Holy Bible as the core of Christian faith," it said.
I give up. If anyone else can make hay out of these theological statements of Duterte then have at it. As it stands Duterte is simply saying the most offensive things he can against the Catholic Church with the sole purpose of offending and not because he has any real philosophical or theological objections to their doctrines. His arguments reflect a childish hedonism rather than any systematic thinking through the issues.
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