Money laundering

JAIME CARDINAL Sin was once quoted as saying he would accept money from the devil himself and use it in the pursuit of good. It is not an exact quote but the idea or the spirit is there.
The dearly lamented Sin was responding to a mediaman’s query on the morality of accepting donations from gambling. The “moralists” of course were quick to take the cardinal to task for adhering to Machiavelli’s dictum of the end justifying the means.
The successor to the House of Sin made a similar pronouncement yesterday. That so long as the money goes to the poor, there is nothing morally wrong for the Church to accept donations from government agencies such as the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office. Maybe, even the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp.
It is charity that they dispense, so what is wrong with accepting it? So long as it is funneled to the poor.
“If the donations go into private pockets, then that would be evil, even if the donor is a saint. But if the donation ultimately ends up with the poor, there is no evil.” So went Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales’ exorcism of the money from government.
Come to think of it, ain’t that one novel, and very noble, form of money laundering?
Government donations to the Church were (mis)construed in some political and media circles as the determining factor in the pastoral statement of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines that did not demand the resignation of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
But even staunch Arroyo critic, Bishop Deogracias Iniguez of Caloocan, did not see any wrong in the Church accepting donations.
“There’s no problem there, it’s good that the PCSO is helping with the people’s needs.” So was Iniguez quoted as saying, and he admitted that his diocese also received PCSO donations.
Some weeks back, Bayombong (Nueva Vizcaya) Bishop Ramon B. Vilena admitted receiving P1.6 million from the PCSO for the construction of a hospital for indigenous people.
Indeed, what’s wrong with accepting government donations? It is “clean money.” The receiver knows where it’s coming from. It is not given under surreptitious situations. It has a defined end – to help the poor.
Now, where it given under the same condition as that of the P500,000 that the Reverend Governor Eddie T. Panlilio received, then that would be a totally different case. (What happened na nga pala to that money? Still in the keeping of the Panlilio’s putative administrator?)
Indeed, what’s wrong with accepting donations from gambling? If these are meant to uplift the poor?
A few years back, the CBCP said “the form of gambling that is organized, widespread and systematic, whether legal or illegal, is not desirable.”
Clear there. Not desirable. But neither forbidden.
I remember a Tagalog essay on jueteng that I wrote in May 2005 t the time Senator Aquilino Pimentel called Pampanga as the “Vatican of jueteng.”
It started: Ang sino mang walang bahid ni katiting na dungis ng jueteng ang maunang maghagis ng tambiolo, pitsa’t papelitos.
It went on to discuss the pervasiveness of jueteng in the province to wit: Nagsusumigaw ang katotohanan sa Pampanga, ang jueteng ay higit pa sa bisyo o sugal. Ito ay relihiyon.
All sectors of society involved and benefiting from jueteng were touched, the Church not excluded, thus:
Ang simbahan. Ah, ang simbahan.
Sa nayon kong irog, retablo sa altar presyong abot milyon, kay Ngongo donasyon. Ilan pang kapilya’t mga simbahansa ating lalawigan nabuo’t natayo, pinagmimisahan, panginoon ng jueteng ang pinasasalamatan. Pagawa’t donasyon pa rin nitong panginoon ang maraming altar, upuan, luhuran, pati kumpisalan. Ano ang masama dito? Ano ang imoral? Ang tumulong sa simbahan? Ang bigyan ng kalinga ang maraming naghihirap nating kababayan?
Dirty money is laundered clean with the detergent of goodness. To the poor. As theirs is the kingdom of heaven, so even Belzeebub’s money gets holy when used for their end.
Amen.