Embedded impunity

The immediate often blurs the significant. Pope Francis’ press conference aboard the plane returning from his South Korea visit is an example.

He made “a chopping gesture and a whistling sound as if to say death comes sooner or later for everyone.” Headlines cascaded on Francis saying he probably had two, at most three more years to serve. Then, “it’s off to the Father’s house,” the Pope said with a smile.

What if health faltered to where he could not discharge his duties? He would resign “even if such a step does not appeal to some theologians.”

That smudged Francis’ statement that there were no more problems blocking the beatification process for Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero who had been murdered by a sniper  from the paramilitary “escuadrones de la muerte.”

That resonates here. Fr. Fausto “Pops” Tentorio, 59, served indigent tribal people in North Cotabato for 39 years. He was gunned down on Oct. 17, 2011, at his parish in Arakan.

The Armed Forces of the Philippines’ Eastern Mindanao Command (Eastmincom) denied it had any hand in Tentorio’s rubout. But the Eastmincom spokesperson admitted it did tag the priest as “friendly” to the New People’s Army. Did the military remember that the Master welcomed sinners and tax collectors?

In El Salvador, the conservative Romero was jolted by the death squad murders. He evolved into an outspoken critic against the brutal suppression of leftist rebels by the right-wing government in the 1980-1992 civil strife. Romero was shot as he lifted the Host during consecration.

Romero’s cause is now before the Congregation for the Causes of Saints. The congregation oversees the complex process that leads to canonization, after screening for the declaration of “heroic virtues” and beatification. The Pope has the final say.

Tentorio shepherded his flock and cobbled programs from child immunization to adult literacy. Thousands of those he cared for trudged alongside his coffin. “For many years, Father Tentorio served the people… in a courageous and indefatigable way,” wrote then Pope Benedict XVI. “He was a good priest, a fervent believer…”

He belonged to the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (Pime). Pime members work in many countries—like Algeria in Africa, Mexico in Latin America, Papua New Guinea, Thailand and the Philippines. The Vatican recognized Pime in 1926. Today, Pime supports  more than 500 missionaries in 18 countries.

As pastor, Tentorio “sought justice for lumad or indigenous people, dispossessed of their land, harassed by armed men, when government seemed to abandon them,” Kidapawan Bishop Romulo de la Cruz recalled. Siding with the oppressed “can earn you enemies who go after even the kindest of men.”

A UN commission later established that death squad leader Roberto D’Aubuisson ordered the killing of Romero. Here, Eastmincom continues to deny it had any hand in Tentorio’s rubout.

Up to now, the murderers of Tentorio have not been pinned down, reports Asia Philippines from Kidapawan in North Cotabato.

The investigation is snarled by contradictory and false leads. Jimmy and Robert Ato were arrested in December 2011. So were five members of the paramilitary group Bagani led by Jan Corbala, also known as “Commander Iring.” Two witnesses have retracted.

“Someone is trying to block or deflect the investigations,” suspects Fr. Peter Geremia of Pime. Look at the paramilitary groups that patrol the area, “they seem untouchable… We are locked into a system of impunity and a system of corruption.” Father Geremia stresses there are also other victims of extrajudicial executions.

It is a measure of Tentorio’s integrity that even Mindanao communists tried to hijack his name. In a full-page ad published in the Inquirer issue of Oct. 26, 2013, the Southern Mindanao Regional Party committee hailed Tentorio as “Beloved Servant of the Masses.” Siegfred M. Red, “secretary,” signed the ad. This was unprecedented.

Tentorio was selfless, not because of his priestly vocation but “because he learned from the masses”—the ad’s spin. “The masses alone are the creators of history.” This is, of course, Mao Zedong 101. “Party members should take their cue from the masses, and reinterpret policy with respect to the benefit of the masses,” the Great Helmsman wrote.

Sundays, Tatay Pops would give “brief but sound homilies that affected people’s lives,” the paid ad stated. “In his sermons, he guided peasants and the masses… to embrace the

national democratic struggle.” That’s communist shorthand for conflict.

The military insists they did not tag Tentorio as a “communist”—thereby making him a target for hitmen. “The ad… is a deceptive attempt to insinuate that the military is behind his murder,” Eastmincom’s spokesperson protested.

Tentorio’s assassins have not been brought to justice. The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines and Pime are pressing government to nail the killer and mastermind. “What makes us so indignant is the impunity of the perpetrators,” the Italian ambassador fumed. What will we tell Pope Francis when he visits in January 2015?

“Your dream is my dream,” Father Tentorio wrote in his last will and testament, made public by his Pime confreres. Scribbled in the Visayan dialect he was fluent in, Father Pops added: “Your struggle is my struggle. You and I are one: companions in building the Kingdom of God.”

That resonates in Romero’s note: “Nothing we do is complete, which is another way of saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us… We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker. We are workers, not master builders, ministers, not messiahs. We are prophets of a future not our own.”

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(E-mail: juanlmercado@gmail.com)