The religious freedom of Jose Rizal

By Herbert Vego

THE last red-letter day in our “outgoing” 2025 calendar is today, December 30, which commemorates the 129^th death anniversary of our national hero, Dr. Jose Rizal.

This morning, President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. will lead the Rizal Day rites at the Rizal National Monument in Manila.

The theme of this year’s commemoration says, “Rizal: Sa Pagbangon ng mga Mamamayan, Aral at Diwa Mo ang Tunay na Gabay” (Rizal: In the People’s Rising, Your Teachings and Spirit are the True Guide).

With that in mind, let us review a few of his religious teachings based on historical documents.

On April 4, 1893, while in exile in Dapitan (now a city in Zamboanga del Norte), Rizal wrote a letter in Spanish to Jesuit superior Fr. Pablo Pastells, where he espoused belief in God but rejected organized religion.

As translated in English by the late Fr. Raul J. Bonoan, S.J., that letter said, “All the brilliant and subtle arguments of Your Reverence, which I shall not attempt to refute because I would have to write a treatise, cannot convince me that the Catholic Church is endowed with infallibility. The religion of Christ was the most perfect, but due to the modifications introduced into it, by malice or religious fanaticism, it has become like an edifice, which because of so many modifications has been so disfigured and threatens to fall apart.”

In Rizal’s mind, freedom of religion may also be called “freedom from religion,” which  means thinking for ourselves, not swallowing hook, line and sinker religious dogmas that could transform us into robots.

Rizal wrote in his last Spanish poem “Mi Ultimo Adios” as translated, “For I go where no slave before the oppressor bends, where faith can never kill, and God reigns everywhere.”

Rizal taught that what God had given us is a rational mind. Anybody who allows his God-given mind to be controlled by others fears that disobedience to the Church – which, in his time, shared power with the state — could lead to the death penalty.

Unfortunately, while it has already been more than a century since we gained our independence from Spain, we are still under the spell of religious leaders who threaten us with fire and brimstone if we don’t share their beliefs.

Rizal learned about erroneous theocratic decisions, as shown by the conviction and life imprisonment under house arrest of famous Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei for heresy in 1633; all because he had taught that the Earth revolves around the Sun.

The official Church position at that time was that the Sun revolved around the Earth – an idea borrowed from Greek philosopher Aristotle.

It was not until 346 years later in 1979 that Pope John Paul II declared that the Roman Catholic Church “may have been mistaken in condemning Galileo.”

History does not revere the Church for being pro-life. If that were so, why has She killed millions of “heretics” from the dawn of the Christian era to the 18th Century?

Rizal had learned about the reign of the Roman Emperor Constantine (306-337 AD), when heretics (persons opposed to church teachings) were tortured and murdered.

Centuries later, on March 25, 1199, Pope Innocent III declared that “anyone who attempted to construe a personal view of God which conflicted with the church dogma must be burned without pity.”

The reign of Pope Gregory IX (1227-1241) saw the beginning of the Inquisition, a campaign of torture, mutilation, mass murder and destruction of human life.

In 1254, to ease the job of the inquisitors, Pope Innocent IV decreed that accusers could remain anonymous, preventing the victims from confronting them and defending themselves.

The inquisitors grew very rich, accepting bribes and fines from the wealthy who paid to avoid being prosecuted and dispossessed of property.

Rizal clarified in the same letter to Fr. Pastells, however, that while he had lost faith in religion, he had never doubted the existence of God: “How can I doubt God when I am convinced of my own existence? Whoever recognizes the effect recognizes the cause. To doubt God would be to doubt one’s conscience and consequently, to doubt everything; and then, what is life for?”

-oOo-

MORE POWER AFTER FIVE

FIVE years of More Electric and Power Corporation (MORE Power) has made it the most successful distribution utility in the Philippines.

MORE President/CEO Roel Z. Castro has proven it so.

In an interview with Angel Tan on the radio/TV show “MORE Power at Your Service,” Castro humbly cited “public clamor” as the inspiration behind the company’s growth from 65,000 clients in 2020 to almost 110,000 this year.

He said it’s the clamor of residents of the 2^nd and 4^th districts of Iloilo that propelled the approval of the law expanding its franchise to Passi City and 15 towns.

MORE Power may soon energize all seven towns of the 1^st District if House Bill No. 6292 of Rep. Janet Garin morphs into law, which would further expand the company’s franchise to seven municipalities within her turf.

For a brief history, it was on February 14, 2019 when former President Rodrigo Duterte signed RA 11212 granting MORE Power the franchise to replace Panay Electric Co. in Iloilo City.

On February 28, 2020, MORE Power took over PECO’s distribution franchise.

Republic Act No. 11918 (July 30, 2022) authorized MORE Power to expand to Passi City and the municipalities of Alimodian, Leganes, Leon, New Lucena, Pavia, San Miguel, Santa Barbara, Zarraga, Anilao, Banate, Barotac Nuevo, Dingle, Dueñas, Dumangas and San Enrique.