January 28, 1997

To all Priests and Lay Leaders in the Archdiocese of Manila:

May the Lord’s Peace be with you and may you experience abundant life in this year dedicated to Jesus Christ! I wish to encourage everyone to participate his or her small way in. Rev. Fr. Remy Tuason conducting the recollection in the celebration of Pro-Life Week from February 8 to 15, 1997. The theme for this year is:

UPHOLD THE DIGNITY OF LIFE — STOP THE KILLING!

Pro-Life work spans the whole spectrum of human life: from conception to natural death. Conception and natural death are indeed important reference points or “parentheses” by which we can easily understand the Creator’s design and purpose for creating us. But we to whom God has granted the gift of Faith know that the issues of human existence extend long before conception and long after death. The real boundaries of human existence are locked in the eternity of God’s own Life, a mystery that must be discerned and approached with reverence and respect.

Today, amidst the violence that marks our own earthly drama, the world around us appears to be falling apart — what with rape, incest, abortion, murders, and other violent crimes. In this valley of tears, it should be clear to us that the root of violence is the lack of God’s Life in the human heart. That is precisely Jesus came to plant in each one of us; and He expects that Life to grow and bear fruit (Cf. Jn 15:16). This is what I wish to exhort you to reflect upon during Pro-Life Week and during Lent on this first year of preparation for the Jubilee Year 2000.

Heinous crimes abound and even appear to be on the increase. Naturally, we overflow with compassion for the victims, and very often we rile with righteous anger against the criminals. But if we knew Jesus more intimately, we would realize that in His eyes, everyone is a victim — including the perpetrators of heinous crimes. Both offenders and offended are wounded. Everyone — in the family and the whole of society — is somehow adversely affected by any sin, and this is why everyone without exception is in need of God’s healing love. This shows just how much each one of us is worth in God’s eyes: every person is worth all the blood that Christ shed for all!

The perpetrator is the first victim in the sequence of events which comprises a heinous crime. The criminal is a person who should have had a well-formed conscience, a right mind and goodness of will; but because of a series of unfortunate circumstances and wrong decisions, such offenders had been severely experientially deprived, distorted in their thinking, orally handicapped and spiritually malnourished. By some oversight or trauma, they did not learn the fundamental virtues and the right values from their family, nor from friends, nor from school, nor from media, nor from government; and perhaps they even failed to hear it from the Church. It is also possible that they somehow unlearned right conduct and respects for human rights. It is precisely these who are in most need of God’s mercy. “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means: I desire mercy and not sacrifice” (Mt 9:12-13). And it can happen to anyone — including you and me, since we all have a tendency to sin.

But the healing love of Jesus Christ takes on various forms and appearances, and it always passes through and is inseparable from His Justice. It is precisely in the pursuit of justice that human laws and God’s mercy are designed to interlink. In this pursuit, it is important that human laws be promulgated and enforced in support of the Almighty’s merciful intention: the rehabilitation of the criminal instead of his or her death.

God’s mercy in his justice are bound inseparably in His Love. This is why when we speak of God’s Justice, we mean the application of the necessary “punishments” and “purifications” aimed at developing, rectifying, or restoring the balance of mind, heart, and soul of an offender (Cf. Is 3:18; Ps 119:156). God’s love in this case is “tough love,” but it is love nonetheless. Healing is always a painful process which, for the offender, begins with repentance, then moves on to correction. The offender must zealously be led through this therapeutic process (assisted by the enforcement of penal laws) — even if it takes a lifetime — so that at the moment that God in His wisdom deems fit, He may take back the life He Himself gave to the offender.

Meanwhile, we must hasten to aid and console those who have been offended, who are hurt both physically and spiritually. Their afflictions will not end by physical therapy alone, but rather only after an assiduous rehabilitation of mind and heart. The heinous deed cannot be undone, not even by revenge (Cf. Mt 5:38). No less painful as for the offender, and difficult as it may seem, it is forgiveness that will set the offended on the road to recovery. They must learn gradually to love their offender — with “tough love,” of course, but with love nonetheless.

My dear friends, if we do not sow love, compassion, and forgiveness, we will doubtlessly reap more crime. If we foster vengeance, we do not need others to violate or kill us, for we are suffocating ourselves with bitterness already. The solution to evil and hate is not egoism and more hate, but more love — a love that endures temporal suffering with a view to eternal joy. He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it (Mt 10:39). As Pro-Lifers next to the Heart of Christ, we must all strive to assimilate His Love and compassion for all victims — offended and offending; we must encourage, help, and even compel human justice to align itself with God’s Justice, inseparable from His Mercy, enveloped in His Love.

I wish to congratulate and thank Pro-Life Philippines and all the NGOs who have responded heroically to the Holy Father’s call to build a Civilization of Life as we move into the Third Millennium. Mabuhay kayo sa tinapay na nagbibigay-buhay! Mary, the Mother of Life is especially close to you. I keep you in my heart and in my prayers; please keep me in yours.

Devotedly in Christ,

(Sgd.) + JAIME L. CARDINAL SIN, D.D.

Archbishop of Manila