(May 5) From Shattered vows: Musings of a married priest by Rev. Tax B. Rosaldo:

In my 12 years as a clergyman, the Church’s power structure, “honeycombed with sexual secrecy,” gradually shaped me to fit into it.

The bishop’s advice to me is still very vivid: “You can take a woman, but no civil marriage, live in another place where no one knows your identity, but on Fridays or Saturdays, return to your parish for Sunday Masses.”

Another bishop whose clergyman fell in love with and impregnated a woman advised her parents to take her to the a convent in Baguio until she delivered the baby, and then to leave the baby in the convent after delivery.

Many bishops have become very shrewd in maintaining this culture of secrecy and hypocrisy. These institutional virtues are to be kept intact at all costs.

In his “Shattered Vows,” David Rice wrote that “by a conservative estimate, 50 percent of the clergy in the Archdiocese of Manila have relations with women, and Jaime Cardinal Sin is silent about it.”

Some bishops who discover that their clergymen have had carnal relationships with women or with men, whether with or without consent, send them to other dioceses or abroad to escape suspicion and hide the scandal.

(May 7) How Filipino priests are shielded from scandal:

A charity institution in Malabon is known to take in women impregnated by Catholic priests to prevent them from aborting the child in their wombs and provide them with natal care, spiritual healing and counseling.

It also shields priests, who have broken their vows of celibacy, from scandal. This was disclosed to the Inquirer by a priest who did not want to be named.

He said that the children born of these women at the Heart of Mary Villa are jokingly branded as “Church property” or “Pamangkin ni sister (the sister’s niece/nephew),” as nuns and priests consider one another brothers and sisters.

After giving birth, the women at the Heart of Mary Villa are given the choice to either leave the baby behind or to keep the child. […]

(May 8) Church apologizes for priests’ sins, says errant priests minority:

The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines Wednesday expressed remorse for the sins committed by priests, including those who had violated their vow of celibacy.

Speaking for the CBCP in a rare press briefing, Msgr. Hernando Coronel, secretary general of the influential organization, also said the sex scandals currently rocking the Church worldwide would result in a “period of purification” for the local Catholic hierarchy.

“We apologize to the victims. We are sorry for the victims. We are sorry for the sins of the priests. We hope this will not happen again,” Coronel said.

Apologies and hope sound nice but note that when Coronel discusses how the Church will be handling cases of sexual misconduct by clergy, the law never figures in. Sorry, but if you’ve used your position to force anyone into having sex with you, defrocked or not you should face the legal consequences of your actions like any other rapist.
(Rape is a heinous crime in the Philippines; offenders are sentenced to reclusion perpetua and under special circumstances, they receive the death penalty. So especially if you’re a European or North American pedophile thinking of coming here on a sex tour: don’t.)