LUKBAN
Next he told the authorities not to recognize jurisdiction of the priests over their diocese . He went so far as the provincial council to reorder the parishes and reassign priests without reference to ecclesiastical authority .
When the priests protested against this usurpation , Lukban threatened them , and on 6 December forced them to sign their acceptance of his schismatic intervention . Apparently all were threatened into signing , but as soon as they were able to do so , they abandoned the island of Samar and sailed to Tanauan , Leyte . From there , they published a collective protest declaring that their signatures were obtained by coercion . Shortly afterward , the entire clergy protested against the confiscation of church funds in both provinces of Leyte and Samar . 27
For a place like Samar whose people had been steeped in Catholicism for hundreds of years , it would not have been easy to change their beliefs overnight and follow the dictates of Lukban and his Aglipayan doctrine . To be sure it would have impacted on their sympathies for the revolutionary undertakings and the war preparations Lukban was making . In this respect , isolating the clergy could have been his worst debacle at this early stage of the war .
Endnotes
1 James H . Blount , The American Occupation of the Philippines , 1898-1912 , 97 2 Reynaldo H . Imperial , Leyte ( 1898-1902 ): The Philippine-American War , University of the Philippines , Diliman , Quezon City , 1996 , p . 46 3 Ibid 4 Hurley , Victor , Jungle Patrol , The Story of the Philippine Constabulary , ( E . P . Dutton , New York , 1938 ), p . 89 5 Philippine Commission Reports 1901 6 Ibid 7 “ The Roman Catholic Diocese of Calbayog ,” Pagduaw 2012 : http :// pagduaw2012 . weebly . com / the-church . html 8 Report of War Commission 1900 9 Philippine Insurgent Records , 1896-1901 , with Associated Records of the United States War Department , 1900-1906 , ( Vibal Publishing House ) Exhibit 1242.1 10 Carl J . Bordeos , http :// lavezares . webs . com / didyouknow . htm 11 Imperial , pp . 46-47 12 John R . M . Taylor , Exhibit 1371 , The Philippine Insurrection Against the United States . Vol . II ( Eugenio Lopez Philippine Historical Series , 1968 ) 13 Exhibit 1321 , p . 427 14 Op Cit , Taylor Exhibit . 15 PIR 2019.7
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