My heart was filled with so much outrage upon hearing reports that Maute terrorists had destroyed graven images and other Christian artifacts at St. Mary’s Cathedral in Marawi City.
By desecrating edifices and artifacts held sacred by people of other faiths, Islamic State-inspired groups, and their local and foreign members, have shown that they do not believe in religious freedom. Worst of all, the death and destruction they have wrought in Marawi City clearly show they are a threat to humanity.
After desecrating the cathedral, the terrorists abducted a priest and his companions and used these hapless civilians as “human shields” against pursuing police and soldiers—which proves that they are in fact a cowardly bunch of bandits afraid to engage authorities in a face-to-face combat.
It is very hard to understand how these brutes proclaim that they are out to create a global Muslim caliphate while killing, even beheading, innocent civilians, including women and children, most of whom are Muslim believers, which they claim themselves to be despite their very un-Islamic crimes.
The Marawi City siege is a wake up call for all Filipinos, Christians and Muslims alike, to unite against terrorism and terrorists.
JOMARIE KAYE R. PATALINGHUG,
jokaye1995@gmail.com