The Friars: The Ayatollahs and the Taliban in Colonial Philippines

Protest erupted in Iran due to the death of a 22-year-old girl in the custody of the Morality police. The Iranians reacted with public demonstrations clamoring for the downfall of their Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Major protests erupted, with Tehran residents rallying against the regime's repressive acts against women, especially those not complying with the Islamic dress code. Consequently, the Iranian security forces started arresting and executing suspected leaders of the protest. Meanwhile, a UN expert in Afghanistan requested the Taliban authorities to stop public flogging and executions immediately. Iran and Afghanistan are the two countries presently ruled by the clerics. The Ayatollahs have ruled Iran for the past 50 years, and the Taliban returned and established Islamic authority in Afghanistan. Several human rights groups accused the Ayatollahs of "persistent impunity for human rights violations." The Iranian's massive crackdown on their citizens involved in massive protests became an international concern.

Similarly, the Taliban of Afghanistan returned to power and ushered in a sustained attack on human rights. Amnesty International reported that the Taliban impose their authority with impunity through violent repression of minorities and women. Do you think these abuses will happen in the Philippines? Unfortunately, these abuses occurred in the Philippines.

Compared to the Philippines, these two countries' experiences were cake walk. During the Spanish colonial period, these religious orders, the Augustinians, Dominicans, and Franciscans, ruled the Philippines for centuries. Even as late as the 1800s, the friars exercise executive functions of the government on the local level. They were the center of power in towns and provinces. Observe the lay of a typical Poblacion in the Philippines, several meters from the church is the municipal building. The proximity was because the friars were responsible for keeping public records such as the census and tax records. They maintain public health and education and supervise the selection of town officials and local police. More than that, they kept a record of the behavior of locals for character reference. They were the morality police. The secrets they gained from confession easily allowed them to lead authorities to potential troublemakers. Since fewer Spaniards lived outside Manila, it was very convenient for the civil authorities to rely on the religious order to maintain Spanish rule. Hence, critics called the Spanish colonial rule in the country a friarocracy. In other words, the friars were the Ayatollahs and the Taliban, the rule of the clerics.

During the same period arises, controversies over secularization persist in the church. It was a principal practice in most Catholic countries, which involved placing the religious order under the bishop's authority to visit and discipline. The friars succeeded in thwarting the efforts of the archbishop of Manila to impose visitation. As a compromise, the religious order's regional or provincial superiors supervise the friars. The religious order strongly resisted secularization, which was designed to replace the friars who came from Spain with the Filipino priests the local bishop ordained. Using the racial card, the friars, over several centuries, successfully convinced the ecclesiastical authorities that Filipino priests were incompetent in meeting parochial responsibilities.

Contrary to the church policy that countries converted to Christianity, such as the Philippines, the religious order must relinquish parish duties to indigenous diocesan priests. In 1872, the friars convinced the civil authorities to publicly execute three Filipino secular priests, the GOMBURZA, accused of masterminding the Cavite mutiny. It was fake news that the friars concocted because they hated the guts of the three Filipino priests leading the secularization movement. The GOMBURZA embodies the religious aspirations of Filipinos. Due to the racial and national dimensions, secularization issues become the root of a broader demand for political reforms.

The friars secured a firm economic position guaranteed through their extensive landholdings. With most civil Spanish colonials in the Philippines dependent on the massive profit from the Galleon trade, there was very little interest in developing agriculture. They were happy to relinquish the responsibility of developing the agriculture to the friars, who took advantage of the situation to grab lands to become the largest landlords, leasing to the people their agriculture estate and receiving rents to live opulently during the 18th century as feudal lords. In one incident, the Dominicans forcibly evicted the entire community in Calamba, including the family of Rizal, due to the letter Rizal drafted on behalf of the Calamba tenants and sent to the Governor General demanding land reform.

This saying attributed to Confucius declares, "If your plan is for one-year plant rice. Suppose your plan is to for ten years, plant trees. If your plan is for one hundred years, educate children." The friars smartly planned for hundreds of years because they monopolized education in the Philippines at all levels. They controlled the intellectual and cultural life of the people. The Spanish colonials in 1863 finally decreed establishing a free educational system on the island that could break the monopoly. In 1867 there were 138,990 students enrolled in 593 primary schools, which steadily grew in 30 years to 200,000 students in 2,150 schools. Unfortunately, the friars supervised the system designed to break their monopoly, "sending the fox to guard the henhouse." Except for the Jesuits, who handled the teacher training colleges, the religious orders opposed teaching scientific and technical subjects, including foreign languages, to the Indios. In 1898, the Dominicans in Santo Tomas were teaching the same course they did in 1611, claiming that the earth was the center of the universe, 21 years before Galileo was brought to the inquisition for insisting that it was the earth that revolved around the sun, not the other way around.

Lifted directly from the pages of the novel of Rizal, the friorcacy perpetuated the wanton abuse of the people. The friars lasciviously breached their vow of chastity. Above all, in the eyes of the educated Filipinos, the friars' open contempt treatment of the people was inexcusable. These abuses grew to turn into deliberate racism. The Illustrados campaigned for reforms to grant the colonial Philippines a provincial status. However, the friars would have none of these. They believed the natives appreciated gambling and indolence more than allowing them old and new rights.

The 1839-41 Confradia de San Jose revolt symbolizes the religious aspirations and frustrations of the Filipinos. Apolinario de la Cruz (a.k.a. Hermano Pule), a Tagalog who led the revolt, was a devout Catholic wanting fervently to enter a religious order. After several rejections of his application by the racially conscious friars, he was confined as a lay brother and tasked to perform the menial task at a charitable institution in Manila. Inspired by religious zeal, he started the confradia, or brotherhood, intended to promote Roman Catholic devotion among Filipinos. In a year, Hermano Pule sent representatives to recruit in his province Tayabas, and the organization proliferated in Southern Tagalog. Initially, the organization did not contain any political objectives in its religious orientation. However, its vow of secrecy and the fact that they barred the Spanish and mestizos from membership aroused the colonial authorities' suspicion. The Spanish colonials banned the brotherhood in 1840.

Pushed to the corner, Hermano Pule left Manila in the later part of 1841, gathering thousands of followers armed themselves with rifles and bolos and establishing their bases in the villages of Tayabas. Like Moses preaching to the Hebrews that their deliverance was forthcoming, Hermano Pule proclaimed to his fanatical followers that God would deliver the Tagalog from slavery. The steadfastness of his followers grew stronger when they succeeded in repulsing the provincial detachment sent to disperse them. However, the authorities sent a much larger reinforcement. The elite of the Philippine military, the soldiers from Pampanga province, overwhelmed the rebel forces took the camp at Alitao after a great slaughter.

Pule managed to escape but was captured. He was hastily tried in court and, with some of his loyal followers, was found guilty. The death sentence was immediately served, Pule was beheaded, and his severed head was displayed on the roadside. Survivors of the movement left their villages and lived on the slopes of Mount Banahaw and Mount San Cristobal. The friars dared not to venture into these areas. Free to practice their belief, these areas become places of pilgrimage and folk religious centers. Eventually, the families of the followers of Pule in these areas become known as colorums.

The vestige of the rule of the clerics though not prominent compared to during the colonial times, remained with us. Examine the country's elite educational system behind the institutions clerics owned. Some clerics still use the pulpit as a political instrument. Recently, Pope Francis sacked the entire Caritas Internationalis, including the Cardinal, for gross mismanagement. The clerics commented on the shortcomings of public officials but could not put their own houses in order. Repeatedly history taught that clerics are very poor administrators, often corrupt and decadent. Ecclesiastics, as government administrators, tend to impose severe restrictions on women, suppress dissents, and resort to arbitrary arrest, detention, and gross abuses. Ignorance, epidemic, poverty, and fanaticism abounds during the Dark Ages, the Pope ruled Europe. The Ecclesiastics continue to work for the kingdom of this world, overlooking the scriptures when Jesus Christ said, "My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world."