Defending my Faith

There were lots of things I wanted to blog about but I decided to blog about my faith, my religion. Yes, I am a Catholic.

When I started this blog, I intented this to be about RH advocacy vis-a-vis my religion. I wanted to use this medium to shed light on misinformation and misconception primarily about reproductive health, in particular family planning, adolescent reproductive health and HIV/AIDS prevention.

Yesterday, the results of the PULSE ASIA SURVEY on family planning was published. It says, 9 out of 10 Filipinos are in fact favoring birth control. In a nutshell, the article stressed that majority of Pinoys give importance to family planning and expressed the need for the government to provide budget allocations to safe modern methods of FP. Likewise it stated that candidates who include RH/FP in their platform of government should be supported. (read the full article in the Philmade blog).

With the Catholic Church's Ten (10) commandments in voting this May 2007 elections, I felt the need to blog my thoughts about it. The "battle" between the RH advocates and the pro-life groups as backed by the Church has been in existence way way back. At some point, the catholics have abandoned their religion because of their RH advocacy. Seemingly, these two things are mutually exclusive. But they are not.

I don't want to discuss lengthily as to why but the bottomline is that we have our freewill, and that is the greatest gift we received from God. In voting, exercise this freewill based on your own analysis of things, and in consideration of the socioeconomic state of the country. Reproductive Health care and services is an essential need of our people, and candidates who have a clear platform to address this issue must be supported. It only means they truly understand and seek to address the root causes of poverty in the country.

If it would mean greater chances for preventing unwanted pregnancies, and infants being cared for completely by their mothers, women having more time for herself and her family, couples enjoying their sex life together, and families being more stable and manageable, then I don't think God will object.

My religion and my faith in God Almighty will never hinder me to grow and be the best person I can be, for myself and for others.