As Governor Taft stated before the United States Senate, it would be impolitic to allow the tenants to possess the lands without payment, because such a plan would be promotive of socialistic ideas. The friarsʼ land referred to does not include their urban property in and around Manila, which, with the buildings thereon, they are allowed to retain for the maintenance of those members of their Orders who still hope to remain in the Islands. In July, 1904, there were about 350 friars in the Islands, including the Recoletos in Cavite and the few who were amicably received by the people in provincial parishes, exclusively in their sacerdotal capacity. At this period, at least, the Filipinos were not unanimous in rejecting friars as parish priests. Bishop Hendrichs, of Cebú, told me that he had received a deputation of natives from Bojol Island, begging him to appoint friars to their parishes. In May, 1903, the Centro Católico, a body of lay Filipinos, well enough educated to understand the new position of the clergy, addressed a memorial to the Papal delegate, Monsignor Guidi, expressing their earnest desire for the retention of the friars. In the localities where their presence is desired their influence over the people is great. Their return to such parishes is well worth considering. Their ability to restrain the natives extravagances is superior to that of any lay authority, and it is obvious that, under the new conditions of government, they could never again produce a conflict like that of the past.
The administrator of the archbishopric of Manila, Father Martin Garcia Alcocér, retired to Spain (October 25, 1903) on the appointment of the present American Archbishop, Monsignor Jeremiah J. Harty, who arrived in the capital in January, 1904. He is a man of pleasing countenance, commanding presence, and an impressive orator. Since 1898 churches and chapels of many denominations and creeds have been opened in the Islands. Natives join them from various motives, for it would be venturesome to assert that they are all moved by religious conviction. In Zamboanga I had the pleasure of meeting an enthusiastic propagandist, who assured me with pride that he had drawn quite a number of christian natives from their old belief. His sincerity of purpose enlisted my admiration, but his explanation of the advantages accruing to his neophytes was too recondite for my understanding.
The limpid purity of purpose in the lofty ideal of uplifting all humanity, so characteristic of the Roman Catholic Church in Europe, was unfortunately obscured in the latter days of Spanish dominion in these Islands by the multifarious devices to convert the Church into a money-making channel. If the true religious spirit ever pervaded the provincial Filipinoʼs mind, it was quickly impaired in his struggle to resist the pastorʼs greed, unless he yielded to it and developed into a fanatic or a monomaniac.[14]
Astute Filipinos, of quicker discernment than their fellows, did not fail to perceive the material advantages to be reaped from a religious system, quite apart from the religion itself, in the power of union and its pecuniary potentiality. As a result thereof there came into existence, at the close of Spanish rule, the Philippine Independent Church, more popularly known as the Aglipayan Church. Some eight or nine years before the Philippine Rebellion a young Filipino went to Spain, where he imbibed the socialistic, almost anarchical, views of such political extremists as Lerroux and Blasco-Ybañez. By nature of a revolutionary spirit, the doctrines of these politicians fascinated him so far as to convert him into an intransigent opponent of Spanish rule in his native country. In 1891 he went to London, where the circumstance of the visit of the two priests alluded to at p. [383] was related to him. He saw in their suggestion a powerful factor for undermining the supremacy of the friars. The young Filipino pondered seriously over it, and when the events of 1898 created the opportunity, he returned to the Islands impressed with the belief that independence could only be gained by union, and that a pseudo-religious organization was a good medium for that union.
The antecedents and the subsequent career of the initiator of the Philippine Independent Church would not lead one to suppose that there was more religion in him than there was in the scheme itself. The principle involved was purely that of independence; the incidence of its development being in this case pseudo-religious, with the view of substituting the Filipino for the alien in his possession of sway over the Filipinosʼ minds, for a purpose. The initiator of the scheme, not being himself a gownsman, was naturally constrained to delegate its execution to a priest, whilst he organized another union, under a different title, which finally brought incarceration to himself and disaster to his successor.
The Rt. Rev. Bishop Gregorio Aglípay
High Bishop of the Philippine Independent Church.
Gregorio Aglípay, the head of the Philippine Independent, or Aglipayan, Church, was born at Bátac, in the province of Ilocos Norte, on May 7, 1860, of poor parents, who owned a patch of tobacco land on which young Gregorio worked. Together with his father, he was led to prison at the age of sixteen for not having planted the obligatory minimum of 4,000 plants (vide p. [294]). On his release he left field-work and went to Manila, where he took his first lessons at the house of a Philippine lawyer, Julian Cárpio. Two years afterwards, whilst working in a menial capacity, he attended the school of San Juan de Letran. Through a poor relation he was recommended to the notice of the Dominican friars, under whose patronage he entered Saint Thomasʼs University, where he graduated in philosophy and arts. Then he returned to his province, entered the seminary, and became a sub-deacon of the diocese of Nueva Segovia. In 1889 he was ordained a priest in Manila, Canon Sanchez Luna being his sponsor, and he said his first mass in the church of Santa Cruz. Although the friars had frequently admonished him for his liberal tendencies, he was appointed coadjutor curate of several provincial parishes, and was acting in that capacity at Victoria (Tárlac) when the rebellion of 1896 broke out. About that time he received a warning from a native priest in another parish that the Spaniards would certainly arrest him on suspicion of being in sympathy with the rebels. In fear of his life he escaped to Manila, where he found a staunch friend in Canon Sanchez Luna, who allowed him to stay at his house on the pretext of illness. Canon Luna, who was a Spaniard, obtained from Gov.-General Blanco papers in favour of Aglípay to ensure his safety back to Victoria. Aglípay then left the capital, making use of the safe-conduct pass to go straight to the rebel camp, where, with the title of chaplain to General Tinioʼs forces, he was present at several engagements and enjoyed the friendship of General Emilio Aguinaldo. The Malolos Government appointed him Vicar-General, and after the War of Independence broke out he assumed command of a large body of insurgents in the mountain region of his native province. In 1899 he proclaimed himself chief of the Philippine Independent Church, whereupon the Archbishop publicly excommunicated him. Later on he voluntarily presented himself to the military authorities, and obtained pardon under the amnesty proclamation.
Dr. Mariano Sevilla and several other most enlightened Philippine priests were in friendly relation with Aglípay for some time, but eventually various circumstances contributed to alienate them from his cause. In his overtures towards those whose co-operation he sought there was a notable want of frankness and a disposition to treat them with that diplomatic reserve compatible only with negotiations between two adverse parties. His association with the lay initiator of the scheme, unrevealed at the outset, incidentally came to their knowledge with surprise and disapproval. Judging, too, from the well-known tenets of the initiatorʼs associates, there was a suspicion lest the proposed Philippine Independent Church were really only a detail in a more comprehensive plan involving absolute separation from foreign control in any shape. Again, he hesitated openly to declare his views with respect to the relations with Rome. Conscience here seemed to play a lesser part than expediency. The millions in the world who conscientiously disclaim the supremacy of the Pope, at least openly avow it. In the present case the question of submission to, or rebellion against, the Apostolic successor was quite subordinate to the material success of the plans for independence. It is difficult to see in all this the evidence of religious conviction.