CRIMINAL LAW AND FAMILY LAW:

 Aquinas justified the necessity of both civil and penal law

 Man needs civil law to determine how he will deal with others
 Punishments are needed to those “depraved and prone to vice, and nit easily
amenable to words
 To be restrained from evil by force and fear
 Penal law forces humans to do or resist doing an act until it becomes his second
nature
 Aquinas distinguishes general from particular justice
 General justice refers to legal justice that serves the community
 Also referred to as distributive justice as its distributes the common good
 Particular justice is in relation to individuals who are individually different
 Rendering justice does not necessarily mean same treatment but equitable treatment on
what the other deserves by natural or contractual/positive right: that is rendering to each
that “which is due to him according to equality of proportion”
 This qualification on justice justifies the Doctrine of reasonable classification under the
Equal Protection Clause
 Consistency must be observed in justice
 Justice is a habit whereby a man renders to each one his due by a constant and
perpetual will

RESTITUTION AND RETRIBUTION

 Restitution is an act of commutative justice where equality is established by giving back

what is taken
 Restitution can be made by repayment of the equivalent or by compensation
 Art. 104-107 of the RPC similarly provide fro restitution with the value to be determined
by the court
 Reparation that takes into consideration the value of the property to the injured party and
indemnification
 Retribution through exemplary punishment restores order when a person violates the
law thus violates the civil order and common good
 A punishment must consist of something perceived to be evil by the wrongdoer by
depriving him of a good, so that potential wrongdoers will refrain from breaking the law if
only to avoid the penalty.
 Punishment perceived as bad by the lawbreaker, it will be for the common good of the
community and also good to the criminal since the law will break his excessive
indulgence of his will

CONDITIONS OF CRIMINAL LIABILITY

 Voluntariness and involuntariness of actions must be taken into account in judging

liability
 Voluntariness requires an act of knowledge and an act of will “to wish and to act”
 Aquinas faulted as species of imprudence “thoughtlessness” or defect in judgement,
inconstancy of action and lack of due care or negligence
 The RPC follows the same principles
 Art. 3 punishes both acts and omissions that violate the law including faults arising from
imprudence, negligence, lack of foresight, and lack of skill
 Art. 4 provides that a criminal act must be performed not only intended.
 Violence and fear can cause involuntariness of actions
 Violence, one is externally compelled contrary to one’s will
 Fear, one does an act because one wills it, but because one wants to avoid the
evil feared
  Art. 12 of RPC similarly makes irresistible force and uncontrollable fear
exempting circumstances for criminal liability
 Ignorance also causes involuntariness however it is distinguished between antecedent,
concomitant and consequent ignorance:

 Antecedent ignorance is ignorance of the circumstances of one’s act

 In Philippine law is akin to mistake of fact (ignorantia facti) which may excuse a
party from the legal consequences of one’s conduct
 Refers to unintended accidents despite due care without fault or intention

 Concomitant ignorance is when despite ignorance of what was committed, a

criminal act would nevertheless be done had the circumstances been right
 Refers to aberration ictus and error in personae in Art. 4 of RPC, where there is
an unintended commission of a felony when a different crime and victikm was in
fact intended

 Consequent ignorance if it was deliberate with respect to what one can and
ought to know
 Art. 3 of the Civil code applies to Consequent ignorance

 A circumstance affects liability “either by way of measure, as time and place, or by

qualifying the act as the mode of acting”
 Touches the effect when considering what is done
 Touches the cause of the act as to the final cause by the circumstance why
 As to material cause or object in the circumstance about what
 As to principal efficient cause in the circumstance who
 As to the instrumental efficient cause in the circumstance by what aids

WOJTYLA’S ON PERSON LOVE AND SEX

 What is natural to beasts is subnatural to humans

 Man has the power of self-determination and free wil to choose his sexual acts unlike
animals
 A person is rational, his sexual activity being “choices” are issues of morality- of a
personal responsibility and freedom
 Man is not simply a sexual being, is a sexual person

THE SEXUAL PARTNER AS A PERSON

 A person must thus be loved as he or she is, accepted and regarded in his totality and
not only sexually desired
 Sexual objectification reduces a person to a consumer item, indispensable once another
person possesses the same attribute or when one loses desirable traits
 Love is the only legitimate sexual response to a person which ensures that the other will
not be treated only as a sexual object
 The value of a person demands an unconditional commitment of the will in the fullest
possible way
SEX

 Occurs in the demand for committed love in marriage

 There is meeting of bodies and souls; of minds, emotions, and sensibilities
 Persons are most susceptible, given up and lost to the other in moments of orgasm
 Consequences , life and death; love and hatred
 Sex without its life-makinhg and love making value runs the risk of reducing sexual
persons to mere pleasure commodities
PLEASURE AND LOVE

 Pleasure is natural and good but not the highest good

 Love is the fullest realization of the possibilities of man; expects and discovers more
from oneself because of the affirmation of the other
 Altero-centrism; the sexual instinct moves the “I” of the instinct of self-preservation to the
”I” of another;
 Losing oneself to -the other, one gains oneself with the other
 Self-sacrifice and self-limitation; man longs for love more than freedom; freedom is the
means and love is the end
 Sexual urge is a natural drive
 Sensuality is not a sin since it can be biological; dynamic, sensual reactions are a
manifestation and runs its full course even if met with opposition
 Sexual desire exists because one needs the other sex
 Urge is an expression of the need for a complement

THE MEANING OF TOTAL SELF-GIVING

 A fully developed sexual relationship is only possible in a durable union where total self-
giving is encouraged
 Cohabitation and trial marriages are conditional; indicates that the couple is not ready for
a long term commitment
 Commitment of monogamy in marriage signifies the maturity of the union between the
man and woman, testifies that theirs is love on which a lasting union and community can
be based, a family can rightly be found
 Sex is more enjoyable between couples when they have the right to live in total intimacy
 Total self-giving is frustrated by contraception since it forms an artificial barrier in their
act of lovemaking; disrupts the natural order (natural cycle of a woman as part of her
being)
 Fertility should be seen as a gift not a disease to be medicated
 Love is not just something in the man and in the woman rather something common to
them
 Love is bilateral; shared and interpersonal; a force which joins and unites
 Trust can happen between couple if they know that they regard as lifetime partners
 Love is gauged by responsibility; inseparability
 Trajectory goal of marriage, for two people become one and their union and original
calling no man must put asunder

THE CHURCH AND THE STATE

 Four political models of church and state relations

 Sacred heteronomy
 Spiritual concerns are perceived as superior to the material and therefore religion
rules all affirs of life
 Not viable in the Philippines since majority of catholic churches affirms the state’s
rights to exist independently from spiritual affirs

 First profane autonomy

 Gives the government power over sacred
 Occurs in the communist countries
 The government appoints bishops in the official “patriotic catholic church”
 Churches must be registered
 Religious concerns exceeds national boundaries and temporal interests, state
will be inadequate in controlling the affairs of a church
 Overpowering religions lead to state implosion
  Second profane autonomy
 Western (American) ideal
 There is a demarcation between church and state geared towards independent
co-existence
 Religion becomes a private affair
 Philippine constitution advocates this model following the American constitution

 Theandric ontonomy
 From the Greek word “theos or god” and andros meaning man
 Weaves together the political and spiritual fabric of society
 Eastern philosophy generally prefers this model
 Law and religion are combined in legal concepts
Islam has no organized clergy or hierarchy for its politiccs to disassociate