Don’t force your niqab on us, CBCP

Did you hear about the woman in Egypt who was assaulted and whose hair was forcibly cut?

On Sunday, a Christian woman had her hairstyle forcibly changed by two women in Egypt (who happened to be wearing niqabs), in an apparent attempt to instill the notion that ALL Egyptian women should be wearing the niqab when in public.

The niqab is the veil or face covering that Islam requires of its female members to wear in certain instances. (Not to be confused with the burka.)

The Christian woman was called an “infidel” and was pushed off the train (they were in the metro/train station). This broke her arm.

It brought to my mind what the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) is doing in our own country.

Specifically, with the RH Bill.

You see, the niqab-wearing women believed that their chosen religion was the standard to follow for all of Egypt. While it has been established that the woman they assaulted was a Christian, that didn’t matter one whit to them: all they could think of was, if you are a woman in Egypt, you should wear a niqab.

Similarly, our bishops are confusing the entire Philippines as being Catholic.

They don’t seem to care that under our form of government, a democracy that is secular in nature, anyone is free to choose their religion. It means you can choose to be a Catholic. It also means you can choose to be a non-Catholic. However that fact is manifested (one chooses another religion or no religion at all).

Once these facts are clearly established, it becomes incomprehensible why the CBCP is so adamant in insisting that their view on the RH Bill – particularly which forms of contraception they deem “acceptable” and “moral” — is the only way to go.

I think it’s because they have gotten away with it for so long, this position that they have occupied in this country as the religious majority has been unchallenged.

They don’t care that this country has a sizeable religious minority. They make threats — both veiled and obvious — to our lawmakers regarding their political mortality if they approved of the RH Bill. The lawmakers who are against the bill have reasons like “it is against our faith,” clearly a statement of intolerance, one that presumes and assumes we have a uniform faith and a singular religion.

Being the religious majority does not give you the right to run roughshod over everyone else, in the way these two Islamic women in Egypt broke the arm of the Christian woman.

Being the religious majority does not give you the right to assault our beliefs or non-belief as “immoral,” the way these two Islamic women in Egypt thought of the Christian woman.

Being the religious majority does not give you the right to change the laws in this land to suit your taste, the way these two Islamic women in Egypt tried to change the Christian woman’s hairstyle.

Don’t force your niqab on us. – Rappler.com