Daughters of Charity Serve and Fight for Rights of the Indigenous

The clout of a strong republic is gauged by the compassion it extends to the weakest citizens. …Daughters of Charity nuns, who live among the Atis and serve them, stand up for the embattled Atis (Philippines).As in Mindanao, after outsiders (“Bisayas”) came, Atis were muscled off the land, the Inquirer Visayas noted. Only then did the Atis realize the “Bisayas had other notions of land ownership.”

Exploiting the weak is not a Filipino monopoly. It has occurred in Australia, the United States, Indonesia, among other places.

“In Honduras and the Philippines, indigenous people have been systematically forced into more marginal (lands) which echoes the ‘native reserves’ of Southern and East Africa,” notes the Journal of Agrarian Change. “They’re frequently denied social and political rights. And struggles often focus on asserting these.”

Today’s “reserve” in Boracay is a one-hectare lot in Sitio Bolabog, a 10-minute tricycle ride from the tourist strip. Some 200 or so Atis live there in huts, malnourished, sickly, poorly educated. Although laws, like the Indigenous Peoples’ Right Act (RA 8371) offer protection, they’re insecure.

Bishop Jose Romero Lazoto wants the Kalibo church to live the Second Plenary Council’s call for “a preferential option for the poor, a church of the poor.”

The Catholic Church protest was ignored. It’s not the first time. “How many divisions has the Pope?” Josef Stalin scoffed in one of history’s grossest under-estimations. Can “Paradise’s” tourist trade afford front-page photos of nuns, serving the Atis, dragged from their nipa hut convent?
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