Church And Martial Law In The Philippines: The Continuing Debate

Abstract

The martial law r?gime of President Ferdinand Marcos has widened divisions within the Roman Catholic and Protestant Churches in the debate over the political commit ment proper to Christians in the Philippines. Indeed, fundamental divisions had been apparent before September 1972. The churches, like the universities, were caught up in the intellectual ferment which characterized the period before martial law and church leaders were seriously split over the political options open to clergy and laity in what was thought to be a highly unstable and even revolutionary situation. A signifi cant minority of churchmen were influenced by secular movements such as the New and the Civil Rights movement in the U.S. as well as by Latin American libera tion theology, notably the writings of Gustavo Gutierrez and Paulo Friere. The Latin American guerrilla priest, Camilo Torres, was also well-known among Filipino semi narians in the early seventies. While only a minority of the clergy could conceive of a fusion of and Marxist social and political thinking, the Christian Left quickly gathered momen tum between 1968 and 1972. In 1968, Roman Catholic diocesan clergy formed Philippine Priests Inc. (PPI), mainly to provide retirement and other practical bene fits but the organization quickly acquired a radical platform. Its successive annual conventions adopted an increasingly revolutionary critique of Philippine society. Dele gates to the Third National Convention over 18-19 March 1972 pledged the PPI to mobilize and organize our people in a well-planned program for a protracted and disciplined struggle for liberation. The enemies of the people were identified as foreign imperialism, local landlordism and bureaucratic capitalism. Two Filipino priests, Fathers (Frs.) Ed de la Torre, Society of the Divine Word (S.V.D.), and Luis Jalandoni (both subsequently arrested) were prominent in radi calizing many of the 1,500 members of the PPI. Both were also influential with Pro testant radicals in the Student Movement of the Philippines, which, in 1971, committed itself to the programme of the Maoist Communist Party of the Philippines (CCP), also founded during the late 1960s.1 As the Kilusang Kristiyano ng Kabataang Pilipino (KKKP), the ecumenical Student Movement published a statement of aims and a constitution in 1971 which integrated Latin American liberation theology with local Maoism. Christians were exhorted to be servants of the Revolution and to learn from the Marxists as well as the masses in the liberation struggle against American imperialism and local capitalism and feudalism. The churches were condemned as bastions of clerico-fascism in collaboration with the