Although the government cannot expect the Catholic Church hierarchy to promote artificial contraception, there are opportunities for working closely in the areas of population policy and family planning.

This was suggested by Dr. Alejandro Herrin, professor at the UP School of Economics, in his paper with the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) titled Lack of Consensus Characterizes Philippine Population Policy.

According to Herrin, it is possible for the government and the Catholic Church Church to work together in promoting social and economic policies that can influence fertility indirectly in the long run.

Herrin alluded to the Pastoral Letter by Bishop Antonio J. Ledesma entitled Natural Family PlanningA Pastoral Approach as an indication that a church-government collaboration on family planning is workable. Bishop Ledesma suggested the possibility of moving from the Churchs earlier position of critical noncollaboration with the government to one of principled collaboration with respect to family planning.

The other area wherein the Church and the government could work together is in promoting modern natural family planning methods, the only methods that the Catholic Church hierarchy considers as morally acceptable, Herrin noted

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