CBCP tags fallen priest a martyr; presses for resolution of EJKs

Fellow priests, activists and friends remember slain Fr. Marcelito Paez for helping the poor and victims of abuse. —ARMAND GALANG

For the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, the slain Fr. Marcelito “Tito” Paez was not just an addition to the list of victims of extrajudicial killings. He was a martyr.

More than two weeks after Paez’ murder, the CBCP urged the government not just to investigate his death but also resolve those of countless other killings in the past year.

CBCP president and Davao archbishop Romulo Valles made the call in a statement issued 17 days after the retired priest was gunned down in Nueva Ecija.

“We also call on the authorities in government to conduct a serious investigation on the murder of Father Tito,” the prelate said in a statement dated December 21.

He also urged the government to “bring to a resolution… the countless other ‘deaths under investigation’ that have seriously disturbed our peace as a nation in the past several months.”

The statement, which commented in part on the extra-judicial killings in the past year, was the first for the CBCP under the leadership of Valles, a known friend of President Duterte.

Paez, 72, was gunned down by motorcycle-riding assailants as he was driving his vehicle in Barangay Lambakin in Jaen town last December 4.

The murder of the retired priest reportedly happened hours after he helped facilitate the release of a political prisoner.

Paez had served the Diocese of San Jose, Nueva Ecija for 32 years and was the coordinator of the Rural Missionaries of the Philippines in Central Luzon.

The CBCP, however, refused to consider the murdered priest as “just another addition to the already very long list of victims of extrajudicial killings in our country.”

“No, Father Tito wasn’t just a victim; he should be counted among our martyrs. Victims have no choice with their fate; martyrs do,” Valles stressed.

The CBCP president paid tribute to Paez’s choice to be on the side of the poor and the downtrodden, particularly the farmers whose dignity the late priest defended.

“In short, Father Tito embraced his ministry with full awareness of its possible hazards on his own safety. He knew about the risks of his kind of work on his life,” Valles said.

Valles noted that the gunmen may have been after the prisoner who was freed with Paez’s help, as the assailants may have thought that the prisoner was still with the priest.

According to the CBCP president, Paez even had the courage to tell his assailants, “I am a priest!” even as he bled profusely from two bullet wounds.

“On hearing this, his assailants ran away; they must have been surprised to find out that this priest had taken two of the nine bullets meant for the man they had really intended to kill,” Valles said.

The prelate stressed that Paez had offered his life for another person, calling it a “greater love.” “We draw courage and inspiration from that ‘greater love’ of Father Tito.”