Manila's Roman Catholic archbishop said the Philippines' dominant religion must accept part of the blame for the country's rapid population growth amid widespread poverty.
Archbishop Gaudencio Rosales said the church's shepherds had failed to instill in their flocks the necessity for conjugal discipline in the bedroom.
The predominantly Catholic Philippines has one of the highest birth rates in Asia at 2.36 percent annually, or 1.7 million new births every year, official figures show. The population of 84 million is projected to double within the next 30 years.
"There's not enough (effort) in the church to sell the idea and the concept of the church's position," Rosales told the Foreign Correspondents Association here.
"Some of my brothers refused that duty," he said. "They have not explained and there were not any supportive institutions and structures to strengthen the position of the church. On that part the church is found wanting."
Rosales said it was "wrong" to describe the church, which opposes artificial birth control methods, as against family planning.
"The church believes that you could rear the children you can afford," he said.
However, "the conjugal act must always be open to the possibility of life" and therefore those Catholic couples who could no longer afford to raise another child should exercise discipline to avoid intercourse when the woman is fertile.
"A person who cannot discipline himself in the bedroom will not properly discipline himself in the traffic," he said.
Rosales said he and other church leaders were distressed at the widespread poverty in the Philippines, which he estimated afflicts 63 percent of the population.
About 12 million Filipinos "do not have the chance to eat three meals a day," he added.