MANILA, Philippines—In Matthew, Jesus tells his disciples that at the end of time, He will return and all the nations shall be gathered before Him where He will separate people from one another “as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.” And He states clearly the basis for separating some from the others: “I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.” Asked in turn, by the saved, when they ever did that, He replies: “Just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.”

For Filipino Roman Catholics in the Archdiocese of Manila, last week’s Palm Sunday was commemorated with a pastoral statement, from Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales and his fellow bishops, on political matters. It was titled “Towards A Morally Rebuilt Nation.”

Perhaps at no other time in history have the spiritual principles of Catholicism been more compatible with the requirements of a secular democracy. Since 2005, the Catholic hierarchy has been urging Catholics and non-Catholics alike, to come together as citizens, to reflect on the political situation afflicting the country. That process includes reflecting on the general and specific causes of the political crisis, assigning responsibility, and determining the proper cure.

Time and again, the bishops have faced criticisms over their timidity in calling for a concrete solution, while their critics and defenders fail to recognize their own inability—or unwillingness—to undertake the sober reflection the hierarchy has recommended. And the lines the hierarchy has drawn, not shirking its duty to define faith and morals.

This, Cardinal Rosales and his brother bishops in Manila did, again, when they wrote, “Shamefully we have been known to be a nation whose prime industry has been identified as politics simply because politics is the main route to power, which, in turn, is the main route to wealth. In this country people use politics to get money, and more politics to protect more money.”

Who can argue with the honesty of that observation? Or the truthfulness of this statement: “Corruption radically distorts the role of representative institutions, because they become an arena for political bartering between clients’ requests and governmental services. In this way political choices favor the narrow objectives of those who possess the means to influence these choices and are an obstacle to bringing the common good of all citizens.”

Indeed, this is so; and while there may be those who yearn for excommunication to be imposed on corrupt officials, and for interdiction on communities that live lives of such scandal that some think they ought to be denied the comforts of the Mass, the bishops are correct in insisting that the cure for a political problem must arise from the consensus of the body politic—and not come from authority figures in our religious life.

Christians can derive comfort from knowing the sheep will be separated from the goats when human history ends, as they believe it must, ultimately, end. But there is also a specific danger our entire secular society must confront: that in a society filled with wrongdoing, does a call for national repentance mean that in the end, no one will be held to account? We cannot contest the spiritual benefits of undertaking, as Cardinal Rosales seems to prefer, the equivalent of the Israelites’ wandering around the desert. He believes in a Promised Land—a spiritual paradise. It is his duty, after all, to shepherd his flock to that destination.

Yet he and the hierarchy, in doing so, ignore one Bible story—of Christ driving the money changers out of the temple. This is the substance of the most cutting of all criticism against the hierarchy—not least because it comes from members of the clergy, or even of the hierarchy, themselves: that in calling for morality, the bishops ignore the existence of a “Diocese of Malacañang.”