PHILIPPINES: Sandigan

Catholic rebels oppose Marcos

From Manila's imposing cathedral to tin-roofed chapels in the barrios (villages) outside Cotabato, Roman Catholic priests throughout the Philippines last week read out a pastoral letter on the country's most emotional religious issue: the morality of violence. The letter, which was signed by all of the country's 98 bishops, warned that incitement to revolutionary violence is "criminally irresponsible." But the bishops also lashed out at government corruption and violations of human rights, and declared that in the face of "manifest, longstanding tyranny," the use of force "is not absolutely ruled out." This was a thinly veiled warning that church leaders might one day no longer condemn open rebellion against the regime of President Ferdinand Marcos.

For a growing number of Catholic militants in the Philippines, that day has apparently arrived. TIME has learned that a clandestine Catholic group, led by several priests and called the Democratic Socialist Party, has organized its own small guerrilla movement, composed of ex-seminarians and other devout laymen. Since 85% of Filipinos are Catholic, the guerrilla group is a highly symbolic new challenge to Marcos and the seven years of martial law. The movement is left-wing but also antiCommunist, and thus could represent an eventual counterforce to the much broader Communist insurgency.

Sandigan,* as the Catholic guerrilla organization is known, claims it has about 100 members operating in three widely separated regions: in Luzon north of Manila, on the island of Samar and in southern Mindanao. Since early this year, its armed bands have been infiltrating villages to establish bases and food-supply depots. Militarily, they are totally overshadowed by the Communists' New Peoples Army, which numbers 2,000 to 3,000. Nonetheless, one Democratic Socialis Party leader—a Jesuit priest who insists that he is still "in very good standing" with his order—claims that the Sandigan group operating near Davao in Mindanao has already made its first kills in skirmishes against tribal paramilitary forces.

The majority of the clerics still favor nonviolence. How does the so-called Christian left, then, justify violent action? "Effective love of neighbor sometimes requires drastic measures," one of the movement's priests told TIME. "Our decision to go for armed struggle was forced upon us. It has become clear this is not a reformist government. It is a fascist government."