The EWTN news portal reports that two Filipino bishops—Bishop Jose Colin Bagaforo and Archbishop Alberto Uy—have issued statements calling for greater Muslim-Christian solidarity and peace as Lent and Ramadan begin nearly simultaneously in February 2026. Bagaforo, chairman of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines’ (CBCP) Episcopal Commission on Interreligious Dialogue, described the shared timing as “a grace” that invites people to “slow down, to return to God, and to walk together in faith.” Uy, installed as archbishop of Cebu in September 2025, emphasized common humanity across religious lines, stating: “No matter what religion we are… we all share one basic truth: We are all brothers and sisters in our humanity.” Both prelates framed interfaith cooperation as a means to build peace, protect human dignity, and respond to conflict with understanding, while acknowledging the Philippines’ history of religious tension between the Christian majority and Muslim minority. The article notes that Muslims comprise an estimated 6–11% of the population, with most living in Mindanao, where decades of conflict have shifted from armed struggle to negotiation, culminating in the creation of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region. A statement from the National Commission on Muslim Filipinos echoed the theme of patience and compassion during the sacred seasons. The bishops’ messages contain no reference to the exclusive salvific role of the Catholic Church, the necessity of converting non-Catholics, or the social reign of Christ the King over all nations.
The Heresy of “Walking Together in Faith”
The bishops’ central phrase—“walk together in faith”—is a direct repudiation of Catholic dogma. Pre-conciliar teaching, unwavering and defined, holds that the Catholic Church is the sole ark of salvation outside of which no one can be saved. Pope Pius IX’s Syllabus of Errors (1864) condemns in the strongest terms the notion that “every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true” (Error 15) and that “man may, in the observance of any religion whatever, find the way of eternal salvation” (Error 16). The bishops’ language implies a parity between Christian fasting and Islamic Ramadan, treating both as equally valid paths to God. This is indifferentism, a pestilence anathematized by the Church. Pope Gregory XVI’s encyclical Mirari Vos (1832) declared that “it is not possible for God to approve of all religions… since they are opposed to one another… and therefore all are not pleasing to Him.” To speak of “walking together in faith” with Muslims is to deny the Dei Verbum—the Word of God made flesh in Christ—and to reduce faith to a vague naturalistic sentiment. The bishops omit the non-negotiable Catholic doctrine that “outside the Church there is no salvation” (Extra Ecclesiam Nulla Salus), a truth solemnly defined by Pope Boniface VIII in Unam Sanctam (1302) and reaffirmed by the Council of Florence (1442). Their silence on the absolute necessity of Catholic faith and baptism for salvation is a damning admission of apostasy.
The Naturalistic “Brothers and Sisters in Humanity” Fallacy
Archbishop Uy’s assertion that “we all share one basic truth: We are all brothers and sisters in our humanity” is pure naturalism, the very error condemned by St. Pius X in his oath against Modernism (Sacrorum Antistitum, 1910). Catholic theology distinguishes between the natural bond of human dignity (which all possess) and the supernatural bond of divine sonship through grace and incorporation into Christ. The bishops collapse this distinction, reducing the supernatural order to the natural. This is the essence of Modernism: the immanentization of the supernatural. Pope Pius IX’s Syllabus condemns the error that “human reason, without any reference whatsoever to God, is the sole arbiter of truth and falsehood” (Error 3) and that “the faith of Christ is in opposition to human reason” (Error 6). By grounding interfaith solidarity in “humanity” rather than in “the one Lord, one faith, one baptism” (Eph. 4:5), the bishops promote a secular humanism that the Church has always rejected. They ignore the teaching of Pope Leo XIII in Immortale Dei (1885) that “the true religion… is the one which God has revealed, and which is to be found in the Catholic Church alone.” Their message is a sacrilegious mockery of the Incarnation, which elevated human nature not to vague “brotherhood” but to divine sonship exclusively through Christ.
The Omission of Christ the King’s Social Reign
The bishops’ entire appeal is stripped of the foundational Catholic doctrine of the social reign of Christ the King, so clearly defined by Pope Pius XI in his 1925 encyclical Quas Primas. Pius XI established the feast of Christ the King precisely to combat the secularism that “denied Christ the Lord’s reign over all nations” and sought to “remove God and Jesus Christ from laws and states.” The encyclical states unequivocally: “His kingdom… encompasses all men… the entire human race is subject to the authority of Jesus Christ.” It declares that rulers and governments have a duty to “publicly honor Christ and obey Him,” and that “the state is happy not by one means, and man by another; for the state is nothing else than a harmonious association of men” (Quas Primas). The Filipino bishops say nothing of this. They do not call for the Philippines to recognize Christ as its King, to enact laws in conformity with His law, or to reject the secularist principle of state neutrality condemned by Pius IX in the Syllabus (Errors 19, 55). Their silence is a betrayal of the Rerum Novarum and Quadragesimo Anno social teaching, which demand that society be ordered according to Catholic principles. Instead, they promote a false peace based on religious pluralism, which Pius XI called the “plague of secularism, so-called laicism.” This is not peace but the peace of the Antichrist, which unites men in the rejection of Christ’s sovereignty.
The Conciliar Roots of Apostasy
The bishops’ statements are a direct fruit of the conciliar revolution. Their language mirrors the Modernist errors solemnly condemned by St. Pius X in the 1907 decree Lamentabili Sane Exitu. Proposition 15 of that decree states: “The method and principles by which the old scholastic doctors cultivated theology are no longer suitable to the demands of our times and to the progress of the sciences.” The bishops’ approach abandons Scholastic theology’s clear distinctions between truth and error, grace and nature, Church and world. They adopt the “hermeneutics of continuity” by treating pre-conciliar and post-conciliar teachings as compatible, when in fact Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae (religious liberty) and Nostra Aetate (non-Christian religions) are direct inversions of the Syllabus. The bishops’ “interreligious dialogue” is the practical implementation of Vatican II’s false ecumenism, which Pope Pius IX condemned as “the pest of indifferentism” (Syllabus, Error 16). Their failure to mention the need for Catholic conversion of Muslims is a direct consequence of the council’s heretical statement in Nostra Aetate that the Church “regards with sincere reverence the ways of conduct and the precepts of the Muslim religion.” This is blasphemy against the unique mediation of Christ, as defined by the Council of Trent (Session IV, Decree on Justification, Canon 1). The bishops are not Catholic leaders but functionaries of the conciliar sect, promoting the “abomination of desolation” in the holy place (Matt. 24:15).
The Scandal of Omitted Truths
The article’s most damning feature is what it omits. There is no mention of:
- The First Commandment: “I am the Lord thy God… thou shalt not have strange gods before me” (Ex. 20:2-3). Islam worships a false god (Allah) and rejects the Trinity and Incarnation—blasphemies that Catholics are bound to denounce.
- The duty of Catholic rulers to “defend the faith” (defensio fidei) and suppress public non-Catholic worship, as taught by Pope Pius IX in Quanta Cura (1864) and the Syllabus (Errors 77-79).
- The reality of jihad and the historical and ongoing persecution of Christians by Muslims, which the bishops whitewash in favor of sentimental “dialogue.”
- The necessity of the Unbloody Sacrifice of Calvary (the Traditional Latin Mass) as the sole true worship pleasing to God, which the Philippines’ post-conciliar “mass” has replaced with a Lutheran-style banquet.
- The fact that the “Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines” is a false structure erected after Vatican II, in opposition to the legitimate hierarchical governance of the Church. Its members, by participating in it, incur automatic excommunication under Pope Pius X’s Pascendi Dominici Gregis (1907) for associating with Modernists.
These omissions are not accidental but symptomatic of a complete apostasy. The bishops have exchanged the odium Dei (hatred of God) for the odium hominis (hatred of man’s divisions), but in doing so they betray Christ. Pope Pius XI in Quas Primas warned that when “God and Jesus Christ… are removed from laws and states… the foundations of that authority were destroyed.” The bishops are actively participating in this destruction by promoting a “peace” that excludes Christ’s kingship.
Conclusion: A Call to Repudiate the Conciliar Apostates
The statements of Bagaforo and Uy are not Catholic but Modernist heresy. They embody the synthesis of all errors condemned by St. Pius X: the evolution of dogma, the democratization of the Church, religious indifferentism, and the cult of man. Their call for “interfaith solidarity” is a satanic deception that leads souls to hell by obscuring the necessity of the Catholic faith. The faithful must reject these conciliar apostates and their “peace” which is no peace (Jer. 6:14). They must cling to the integral Catholic faith as it existed before the death of Pope Pius XII in 1958, when the Church was still the spotless bride of Christ. The true Catholic response to Islam is not dialogue but conversion, as commanded by Christ: “Going therefore, teach ye all nations… teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:19-20). The bishops have abandoned this mandate. They serve the prince of this world (John 12:31) and will face the judgment of Christ the King, whose reign they have denied. Let every Catholic flee their false “peace” and seek only the peace that comes from obedience to the unchangeable Roman Catholic and Apostolic Faith.
Source:
Filipino bishops call for peace as Lent and Ramadan converge (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 18.02.2026