[Do] "not to take any step that will create uncertainties and further division brought about by genetic engineering. We should rise up to the challenges posed by modern biotechnology and above all protect the integrity of creation." (item 2)

The first item relates to Bishop Gutierrez's concerns about this Friday's Vatican-US biotech conference. The second to last year's push to get Vatican endorsement of GMOs.

For where to fax your concerns:
http://www.lobbywatch.org/archive2.asp?arcid=4372

1.Letter of Bishop Dinualdo Gutierrez
2.Bishop Gutierrez "alarmed" over Vatican and GMOs
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1.Letter of Bishop Dinualdo Gutierrez sent to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences

Your Excellency:

Greetings of Peace!

In behalf of the Episcopal Commission on Social Action-Justice and Peace (ECSA-JP) of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), I am writing to Your Excellency about the importance of the scheduled September 24, 2004 conference "Feeding a Hungry World: The Moral Imperative of Biotechnology."

We would like to express our support to the serious studies of biotech food from the point of view of our faith.

Thus, we expect that:

1) Sustainable agriculture be relentlessly promoted;

2) The benefits of biotechnology would reach the poor in the spirit of solidarity, the year October 2004 to September 2005 being the International Eucharistic Year;

3) Precautionary principle be applied to dubious
biotechnology; and

4) Development should be integral and holistic according to the spirit of "Populorum Progresio."

In Christ,
+ DIINUALDO GUTIERREZ, D.D. Chair, Episcopal Commission on Social Action, Justice and Peace Bishop, Diocese of Marbel
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2.Bishop Gutierrez alarmed by reports Vatican would endorse GMOs
Evangelista / MindaNews / 4 September 2003
http://www.mindanews.com/2003/09/04nws-gmo.html

MANILA -- Bishop Dinualdo Gutierrez of the Diocese of Marbel, the chair of the Episcopal Commission on Social Action, Justice and Peace of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines has expressed alarm over reports the Vatican will endorse genetically modified organisms or GMOs.

In a letter addressed to the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Justice and Pease head Archbishop Renate Rafaelle Martino on August 15 (but released only today. 4 September), Bishop Gutierrez said there have been recent reports in newspapers and in the internet that the Council would probably endorse GMO foods.

"If these reports are true, then I think it is really a matter we should consider with deep concern. Genetic engineering remains an intense issue in the Philippines after it was brought to national attention last May by a coalition opposed to the commercial release of Bacillus thuriengiensis Corn (Bt Corn). A 30-day hunger strike was conducted by the group in front of the Department of Agriculture building calling for a moratorium on the Bt corn release," he wrote.

"Here in my own Diocese, various protests and mass actions were already conducted even before the hunger strike, since South Cotabato in Mindanao is one of the field testing sites for Bt corn," the bishop noted.

Several groups, including farmers' alliances, scientists and members of the academe and the CBCP's Permanent Council and the National Secretariat for Social Action (NASSA), had expressed their opposition to the commercial release of the GMOs.

"A technology such as genetic engineering, whose long-term effects on human health and the environment are really unknown, should be applied with extreme caution following the precautionary principle. Bt corn and all the other products of genetic engineering pose a threat to genetic integrity, human safety and farmers' control over its basic means of production the seed", Gutierrez said.

GMO supporters say genetic engineering is the answer to the problem of hunger but Bishop Gutierrez said Filipino farmers will further "plunge into the depths of poverty in using GM crops. In the Philippines, as in the case anywhere in the world, the real problem is not on the inadequacy of food production but its inaccessibility and inequitable distribution to all people."

He stressed that the Church has to reflect and address societal issues. "We believe that the Pontifical Council on Justice and Peace also adheres to the principles of equality and justice. Any technological and scientific advancement must be subjected to moral scrutiny." Gutierrez reminded the Council of a statement in the Cathechism of the Catholic Church: "Science and technology by their very nature require unconditional respect for fundamental moral criteria. They must be at the service of the human person (and) in conformity with the plan and will of God."

For this reason, he added: "Any endorsement the Council will give regarding genetically modified crops and foods must be based on sound judgment and discernment guided by the teachings of our Church."

He also reminded Archbishop Martino of the Pope's "Sollicitudo Rei Socialis" of 1987 which states: "It is necessary to state once more the characteristic principle of Christian social doctrine: the goods of this world are originally meant for all. The right to private property is valid and necessary, but it does not nullify the value of this principle. Private property, in fact, is under a 'social mortgage', which means that it has an intrinsically social function, based upon and justified precisely by the principle of the universal destination of goods."

Bishop Gutierrez concluded his letter by imploring Martino "not to take any step that will create uncertainties and further division brought about by genetic engineering. We should rise up to the challenges posed by modern biotechnology and above all protect the integrity of creation."