Christine B.

Diones December 13, 2019

BS Economics GEC 109/ History 5

Rizal’s Attitude Towards the Friars

(A Reflection Paper)

In the Spanish colonial administration, the local priests held considerable political
power. All local officials are under by the friar’s power. He could tag an individual as
subversive and exile him to a place very far from his home. The parish priests possessed
extensive agricultural lands whence thousands of Filipinos were tenants of Spanish
landowners and could be evicted by them. He punishes cruelly if his commands are not
executed. That is why, any agitation against Spanish government and any complaint
against the abuses of colonial administration were bound to involve agitation against
friars.

Jose Rizal and his family were so devoted to Catholic but not until Rizal
experienced different instances that must have been colored his attitude towards friars
especially the “friar’s rule”. The imprisonment of Dona Teadora ordered by the servant of
the friar made an impression to Rizal and was not easily erased. Especially when his
brother Paciano needed to drop out in UST in 1872 to avoid troubles with the friars and
the fact that Jose must have to adopt the last name Rizal instead of Mercado to avoid
difficulties arising from their connection with Father Burgos. He would also never forget
his acquaintances who were illegitimate children of friars. These early impressions were
later strengthened by several painful experiences involving his family.

His father was involved in an accident and was blackmailed. It was all about when
parish priest in Calamba had died and the vicar of the district want to take possessions
of the funds belonging to the church. But the money was kept in a safe so he called Don
Francisco and asked him to advance the money in the safe in gold. But Don Francisco
objected, the friar threatened nim about the secrets that would put them in shame if made
public. So he paid the required amount of gold, afraid of what those secrets might be.
 One of the factors that-served to embitter Rizal against the friars was the eviction
of his family and many people in his town from their homes and lands in Calamba. The
Mercados acquired additional territory in Pansol, for which Paciano was very grateful.
Three years later, Paciano was talking in a different vein. He wanted to get rid of Pansol
because of what he observed about the burdened with the canon. All people in Calamba
have struggled with the actual relationship between the friars as the “owners” and the
inhabitants as the “tenants” whom they paid a yearly rental called the canon. Most people
complain against the so-called canon because it was excessive, arbitrarily, and
progressively increased with no proper receipts given so that they couldn’t prove that they
had paid sufficiently and was exacted and even increased regardless of whether the
harvest was good or bad, or whether were high or low. Until the very serious cholera
epidemic of 1882 came followed by the very heavy rains that affect their rice harvest. As
result, the people had no money with which to pay the ever-increasing canon. To the
friars, this was a simple case; the people were under to pay canon, they did not pay,
therefore they were in default and should be evicted.

The people of Calamba refused to pay the rent on certain lands for the reason that
they were not part of the Dominican Hacienda. The Dominicans brought the matter to the
municipal court and lost the case. The Mercado’s appealed the case, first to Manila and
then to Spain. They eventually lost the case. Thus, authorized the friars proceeded to the
eviction that carried out in some cases with a brutality that is difficult to believe. The
meantime, Rizal’s father, brother and two brothers-in-law had been sent into exile, some
to Mindoro, and one to Bohol.

But it was the cruelty to his mother that aroused Rizal’s greatest indignation. She
was 64, considered an old age in those days. With one daughter, ‘she was taken under
guard from one town to another over rough roads. She begged to be allowed to travel by
boat along the lake, offering to pay the fare themselves and their guards, but it was
refused. This maltreatment was actually at the hands of the guardia civil, but she blamed
the friars as the root of her troubles, and from being a pious woman, she became
embittered and disillusioned in her religion.
 Nevertheless, Rizal had some secular priest that he admired and one of them was
Father Leoncio Lopez. He described him as wise, holy, kind, just, learned, and not
meddling politics; Rizal’s idea of an ideal priest.