Coming from the New Year’s Eve Mass he officiated for the Manila Peninsula rebels at Camp Crame, running priest Fr. Robert Reyes lamented the absence of the late Manila Archbishop Jaime Cardinal Sin in the aftermath of the November 29 standoff. “All the more that I’m missing Cardinal Sin,” Reyes said.
Reyes said that since Sin’s death in June 2005, the country has seen a Catholic Church leadership that has seemingly become “complacent and afraid” save for some critical statements issued by the influential Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) under the presidency of Jaro Archbishop Angel Lagdameo.
Known to challenge political authority, Sin became a potent figure that brought changes in the country’s political landscape.
He almost single-handedly summoned a million people to Edsa in 1986 that became the People Power Revolution that ousted the dictator Ferdinand Marcos.
Sin also played a key-role in the ouster of former president Joseph Estrada who was eventually convicted of plunder.
The Peninsula Manila incident had detained Senator Antonio Trillanes IV, Army Brigadier General Danilo Lim, and the Magdalo soldiers renew their call for the ouster of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo because of alleged corruption in her government.
Reyes maintained that he only became part of the incident by accident but ultimately realized that it should have been an event that posed a challenge to the Catholic Church leadership.
“Kailangan na lang ba manahimik? Puro dasal na lang ba at huwag na makialam sa society (Do we have to keep silent? Do we have to just pray always and not care about society)?” said Reyes, whose activism has irked the Church hierarchy.
“It’s time for the Church to speak,” Reyes added.
The time, he said, would be the plenary of the CBCP scheduled at the end of this month.
Reyes surmised that the Arroyo government could now even “be scared of what they (bishops) will say.”
Reyes described the noon Mass he officiated last December 31 for Trillanes, Lim, the officers, and their families as “emotional.”
“Quite a few broke down,” Reyes said.
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