Jesuits and Recollects in Mindanao in the 19th Century1

Would that I were here to talk about the Jesuits and Recollects in the 20th century when relationships have never been so good! Spanish Recollect superiors really took a bow before the Jesuit brand of education. Consider how Fr. Simeón Asensio—and Fr. Germán Chicote after him— would go to San Jose Seminary of the in Quezon City every Saturday afternoon or Sunday morning of the school year to fetch all those fine young Filipino seminarians of the Augustinian Recollect Order, who were then being trained by the Jesuits, and bring them all to San Sebastian Convent in the late fifties and early sixties. You have Fr. Emeterio Buñao, Fr. Hubert Dunstan Decena, Fr. Pedro Escanillas among you, to attest to that. Recall the closeness and camaraderie of the Jesuits and the University of San Jose-Recoletos religious in Cebu City. Quite aware am I of how the Jesuits dealt with the Recollects in return in our century. I know of an old Jesuit priest, assigned for quite some time in Sacred Heart School of Cebu City and presently an Ateneo chaplain, who never said mass whenever he was in Madrid in any church in the Spanish capital, except in Santa Rita parish church along Gaztambide, which belongs to the Augustinian Recollects. It was probably because the Jesuit priest lived just across the street along Cea Bermudez, a stone’s throw from Santa Rita, but more because of his closeness with those Recollects he had met in Cebu City. I learnt later that the Sacred Heart School solely for Chinese boys first opened its classes at the classrooms of Colegio de San Jose-Recoletos and the Jesuits resided the Recollect convent. I also know an Ateneo school administrator who used to come to our home to meet his Johnny Walker and I, with my imbibed Spanish traits and culture, would have my own Carlos III or Fundador and we spent the night

1*A lecture delivered at the National Conference on Recoletos 400: History, Legacy and Culture, at San Sebastian College-Recoletos, , , on 3 December 2004. discussing both important and trivial matters, of course, not necessarily related to history at all. I have nothing against the Jesuits of course. It’s hard and excruciating, though, to delve into the past and talk about the Jesuits and Recollects in Mindanao in the 19th century without the rancor there was in the context of history. But we have to do this in order to clarify gray areas of research on the controversy that was most crucial in Philippine history. It was fortunate for me that in August 2002 I delivered a lecture before students and faculty, mostly from the Department of European Languages, on the two unpublished letters of Fr. Pedro Peláez on the secularization controversy. It was at the audio-visual room of our Department, Bulwagang Rizal, University of the Philippines-Diliman. The professorial chair lecture was a result of my research in 1997 in Sevilla and Madrid, Spain where I was given a beca hispanista [Hispanist research scholarship] by the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs to do some extensive research on Baler, Tayabas, now part of Aurora province, [in the stone church of Baler the last of the Spanish troops dug in for almost a year not knowing that the war was long over], and on other favorite topics related to Hispanic research: Bohol, San Sebastian Church, Cavite, Recollect legacy and culture. On the topic of the Jesuits and Recollects in Mindanao in the 19th century, therefore, I know whereof I speak. During those almost three months of stay in Marcilla (Navarra), Madrid and Sevilla, I discovered two letters—actually, a whole dossier of letters and other communications—penned by Fr. Pedro Peláez, the governor general, the assessor as well as two letters of the Augustinian Recollect of Manila José Aranguren. You have to bear in mind that after this Recollect archbishop died, his secretario capitular de cámara y de gobierno Pedro Peláez became the vicar capitular of the Archdiocese of Manila sede vacante. You have to bear in mind too that Fr. Peláez eventually adopted many ideas and policies of the Recollect Archbishop José Aranguren on the secularization issue. When the wanted to grab a parish here in Sampaloc, the Recollect archbishop adamantly opposed the move, saying: “No, this parish belongs to the secular clergy.” When the Recollect confreres wanted to grab a parish in Cavite, and they were able to get it eventually owing to the governor general’s order, the Recollect archbishop in a letter of the voluminous dossier, where the letters of Fr. Peláez were also found, said: “No, my Recollect confreres (he was a Recollect too), you have no right to get the parishes in Cavite because they rightfully belong to the secular clergy.” So, where did Fr. Peláez get such pro-secular clergy ideas, his love and support to the cause of the Filipino secular clergy? No doubt from the Recollect archbishop of Manila. I am not trying to denigrate Fr. Peláez and his unsullied reputation, his struggle for the rights of the secular clergy, but we got to put the controversy from some perspective. He acquired for sure his ideas from the friar archbishop of Manila, and this archbishop was a Recollect, of whom Peláez was his secretary. We got to give credit where credit is due. Some brilliant ideas and great deeds of defending the rights of the Filipino secular clergy did originate from friars. Let’s go back to history now, meaning, let’s talk about the chronology of events. On 26 November 1857 the Dominican bishop of the Diocese of Cebu—the jurisdiction of Cebu included Marianas, Mindanao and the Visayas—Msgr. Romualdo Jimeno asked Madrid to have the newly restored Society of Jesus assigned to Mindanao. [Surigao and Misamis were to remain under Recollect jurisdiction.] According to the Recollect sources basing on the Novísima Recopilación de Indias, there was no due process. Why? Because Bishop Jimeno did not consult the Recollects who would be most upset with the dispossession of Mindanao parishes, who would be most affected by his request for Jesuit replacements. Remember when the Jesuits left Mindanao, they only had a handful of chaplaincies or mission stations where Spanish garrisons were located. So when the Jesuits were given Mindanao a century later, the Recollects in Madrid and Manila moved heaven and earth not be dispossessed of their twenty-seven parishes in Mindanao. When the powers-that-be refused to see their side, the Recollects simply complied with the royal order. And the Recollects’ main point of contention: no due process at all. They were not consulted neither by the bishop of Cebu, nor by the governor general in Manila, nor by the Spanish Overseas Minister in Madrid. And where would you send all these twenty-seven Recollect priests who would be thereafter jobless? Where would you assign them? So the Recollects kept on harping on the argument that there was no due process. If you read carefully the dossier of notes and letters in the Archivo Histórico Nacional in Madrid (I think there were more than 70 manuscript pages. I had to copy all of them by hand because that was in 1997 and I had no laptop computer). The ideas of Fr. Pedro Peláez were quoted, patterned or literally lifted from Archbishop José Aranguren’s two letters. Aranguren in one of his letters also defended his Filipino secular priests, when asked by the Spanish governor general: “What are those priests doing there in Cavite? Are they doing some revolutionary activities?” The good archbishop said no. His priests were simply doing their job, going about with their pastoral tasks. Let me likewise comment on that oft-repeated phrase, la perla de los curatos that has now become a cliché we can find in almost any historical account or in any major history book whose author anyway copied one another’s idea or account. They say that when the parish priest of Antipolo passed away, they at once attached la perla de los curatos to Antipolo, if you know what that means. It means the pearl of the curacies which was deemed as the richest parish of the country, maybe up to the present (but, of course, there is that of Baclaran, teeming with countless people every Wednesday). Why do historians have to put the tag la perla de los curatos every time the death of the secular parish priest of Antipolo is mentioned. It is sadly understood that the Recollects immediately grabbed la perla de los curatos. The parish grab was done in exchange for some god-forsaken parish of Isabela in Basilan, now horrendously terrorized by the notorious Abu Sayyaf Group. These historians or history book authors in question have not read at all the letters of the Recollect prior provincial Fr. Juan Félix de la Encarnación to Fr. Peláez because they have not read the available Historia general de la Orden de los Agustinos Recoletos of Fr. Manuel Carceller. Fr. Juan Félix de la Encarnación did not immediately send a terna for the governor general to choose a parish priest for the Antipolo vacancy. Later on, Fr. Peláez begged him not do it. Fr. Juan Félix was all too cautious. He was sensitive to the delicate situation in the Philippines. Fr. Juan Félix was very much aware and even said so in a letter he wrote to Fr. Guillermo Agudo in Madrid on 19 February 1862: “There are many vacant parishes around, but I don’t make any move up to now. The case is very compromising… It could be the bottomless fount of disgusts, hatreds…” He was very cautious in assigning a Recollect parish priest immediately to any vacant curacy in the Archdiocese of Manila, although the royal decree of 10 September 1862 mandated him to do so. This prudent attitude stemmed from the fact that he was very much aware that any misstep would cause dire consequences. Some respected historians simply do not want to know about the Recollect side of the controversy that wracked the Philippine colonial church towards the end of the 19th century. Another thing: about Fr. José Apolonio Burgos, the disciple of Fr. Pedro Peláez in the UST [By the way, Fr. Pedro Peláez was born of true- blue Spanish parents. The full-blooded Spaniard was born in Pagsanjan, . He was not a Filipino but his Spanish lineage didn’t matter at all; his love and concern for the secular clergy was beyond any trace of a doubt.], who penned the manifesto Manifesto to the Noble Spanish People which the Loyal Address in Defense of their Honor and Loyalty that Have Been Grievously Offended by the Newspaper La Verdad of Madrid which was published anonymously in Manila on 27 June 1864, indeed mentioned that the Filipino secular priests Juan Zita, Modesto de Castro. Hermenigildo Narciso, were doing very well in their parishes. You might not know it, but these names were also taken from another letter of the cabildo catedralicio [cathedral chapter] of Manila which mentioned the accomplishments of these Filipino secular priests and this long letter was sent to Fr. Peláez. Indeed Fr. Burgos was the student of Fr. Peláez, and Fr. Burgos got his ideas from the letter of the cabildo catedralicio, which Fr. Peláez had requested so that he would include this letter in the memorial he sent to the Spanish monarch. Still there is another thing I would clearly point out: it would be very good to say that Fr. Peláez was a Filipino just like other historians would say and have said, like Zaide, Molina, Corpuz, and they keep on saying that. I don’t think they have gone to the Archdiocesan Archives of Manila where the life of Fr. Pedro Peláez is there written in black and white. It is in Spanish and the handwriting is too bad. But if you try hard you can understand the manuscripts. I would like also to make this clear that Fr. Pedro Peláez did not stay only for three months as vicar capitular of Manila. He stayed, according to one historian, “as acting archbishop of Manila,” (they don’t know this) for over a year. Archbishop Gregorio Melitón Martínez came to Manila in 1862. Actually he was preconized as bishop by Pius IX in 1861 and was consecrated in Madrid. He came to Manila in 1862. Another thing that I would like to point out further is what this Archbishop Melitón Martínez in his letter to Fray Francisco Gainza and to the papal nuncio in Madrid. He said that this guy Pedro Peláez should be kicked out of the Philippines. He should be kicked upstairs, though. He should be made a bishop in South America so that he would not be creating more trouble here in the Spanish colony. But Divine Providence intervened; Peláez died in the earthquake that struck the colonial capital on the eve of the Corpus Christi in 1863. Back to history, in 1857, therefore the Jesuits were requested by Bishop Jimeno to go to Mindanao. Immediately the Recollects made some maneuvers in Madrid. They wanted to stop the implementation of that decree, the dispossession of the Recollect confreres in Mindanao. For your information, the royal decree expelling the twenty-seven Recollects was signed on the eve of the feast of St. Ignatius. Of course, the royal order assigning the Recollects to vacant parishes in the Archdiocese of Manila that would become vacant was dated 10 September 1861, feast of Nicholas of Tolentino. According to a historian, the original desire of the Bishop was to add more workers in the vineyard of the Lord in Mindanao, as if the twenty- seven Recollects were not enough. Truly there was enough work for everybody, enough room for everyone, for able-bodied and committed missionaries. Originally, the bishop wanted to have Recollects and Jesuits “living happily ever after” together in Mindanao. I don’t know what happened but there were manipulations and maneuvers in Madrid, so the expulsion of the Recollects from Mindanao was decreed on the eve of the feast of Jesuit founder. What a strange coincidence indeed! We don’t know what transpired, but I guess I have to go back to Madrid, and if there is any offer for a research scholarship grant I would be willing to get it, in order to research about those persons who were so intent on kicking the Recollects out of Mindanao when in fact Bishop Jimeno was not of that idea. My last point: Why do you, revered historians, have to add immediately la perla de los curatos, when you mention the curacy and shrine of Antipolo during the secularization uproar? Para bang matakaw, ganid ang mga Recoletos. They were the victims in Mindanao, victims in the jurisdictional conflict in Mindanao and in the secularization controversy, as the opening salvo made by Fr. Cuesta in the first lecture this morning. I repeat, the Recollect friars were the victims in Mindanao, they were not the actors. They were victims, plain victims of political maneuvers in Madrid. They were not the protagonists in the conflict, but they were later deemed the antagonists in the First . The Recollects got the parish or mission assignment from the expelled Jesuits on account of the mandate by the colonial government and in return for their great evangelization efforts and untold sacrifices for the glory of God and His Church, they were to be expelled. What kind of compensation was that? All of a sudden came the royal decree throwing them away, dispossessing them of their parishes, making twenty-seven Recollects jobless just like that. So, it is only natural for them to ask for reassignments. Recollect chroniclers dubbed them indemnifications for the loss of their Mindanao parishes and missions. They have to be indemnified for the loss of what had worked for since 1768 when the Jesuits were expelled from Spanish dominions, including Mindanao, as well as for the loss of other missions and parishes they themselves founded in the 17th century. Also I would like to comment on Fr. Arcilla’s lecture when he said that the Recollects had taken over the missions in Mindanao, Bohol and Negros after the Jesuits were expelled from the Philippines. He should not have included Negros Island. I don’t know if that has been rectified. So, it’s really nice to talk about 20th and 21st centuries after all, when the relationship between Jesuits and Recollects has never been so good. You consider the Recollect priests who were sent to Rome. Where were they sent for graduate ecclesiastical studies? Most of them went to the Jesuit-owned Pontifical Gregorian University and Pontificio Istituto Biblico. Most of these Filipino Recollect priests who are now professors in Recollect formation houses or those priests occupying high positions in the Philippines, in Spain and Latin America were trained by Jesuits—at least in Sacred Scriptures, Dogmatic Theology, Biblical Theology, Philosophy, Spirituality and Canon Law. Think of Benedicto Jayoma, Felipe Maraya, Pastor Paloma, Hubert Dunstan Decena, Leander Barrot, Samson Silloriquez, Rex Bangcaya, Bernard Amparado, Joseph Philip Trayvilla and Ferdinand Hernando. Recall the Church History graduates of the Gregorian University, both Filipino and Spanish: René Paglinawan with a Licentiate in Church History, or Emilio Quilatan, José Javier Lizarraga and Ángel Martínez Cuesta, Doctors in Church History. The list of Augustinian Recollects who studied at the Gregorian University is rather lengthy. See how the Recollects extol the Jesuit brand of education.