PHILIPPINES
Bangkok Post
MYLENE CORPUZ
A Manila bishop’s alleged sexual harassment of a woman assistant and a second bishop’s scandalous fathering of a child by a woman parishioner has plunged the Philippines’ dominant religion into its worst crisis in a generation.
A combination of shock, outrage, weeping and gnashing of teeth have swept through parishes, as the faithful learned more of the allegations and confessions of the two senior officials.
One of them, Bishop Crisostomo Yalung, has resigned from the priesthood with the young mother of his daughter, while the other, Bishop Teodoro Bacani, has gone on an extended long vacation in the United States as the Vatican launched an investigation into his alleged moral transgression.
Priests in the Catholic Church, which is also among the world’s pre-eminent religions, are bound by strict vows of celibacy.
