MALAYBALAY CITY (18 May) – Sorsogon bishop Arturo Bastes said the Catholic Church does not intend to make Sarangani Rep. Manny Pacquiao its poster boy in the campaign against the controversial Reproductive Health Bill. But the boxing champion’s audience with the bishops suggests that they wish to capitalize on Pacquiao’s popularity. His popularity as a boxer, however, is no guarantee that the anti-RH advocates would be able to turn the tide against the Bill.

For one, Pacquiao, as Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago implied in her reaction to the congressman’s anti-RH pronouncements, faces a credibility problem.

Santiago twitted Pacquiao’s position vis-à-vis reports early this year that his wife, Jinkee, had admitted using pills.

The bishops’ newest pet lawmaker has sounded inconsistent in relation to Jinkee’s usage of contraceptives. In an earlier interview, he professed that he and his wife had resorted to abstinence in spacing their children. But when Jinkee’s usage of birth control pills resurfaced he casually retorted that she has stopped doing so but did not specifically say when. Jinkee said she was taking pills after giving birth to their fourth and youngest child.

Funny that Pacquiao, fresh from a lopsided victory against Sugar Shane Mosley, got his anti-RH Bill posturing knocked down (not out yet) by a blow that came from the same media that has followed his every move. What makes it sweeter to the pro-RH camp is that Jinkee’s own words in the past, preserved in the boundless vaults of cyberspace, dealt the knockout punch. Talk about winning battles without firing a single shot. Sun Tzu lives.

Lying down on the canvass laid by Jinkee, Pacquiao could only mutter: “Iyun na nga yung ibang tao gumagamit ng contraceptives, nagpi-pills, nagku-condom, kahit wala pang RH bill so bakit pa natin ipapasa ‘yan?[]