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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