Group raps Aquino for scrapping meeting with visiting religious leader

MANILA, Philippines—Christian religious leaders  expressed disappointment Saturday with Malacañang’s change of heart when it decided to scrap a meeting between President Benigno Aquino and the Rev. Dr. Olav Fykse Tveit, secretary general of the World Council of Churches.

The Rev. Rex Reyes Jr., National Council of Churches in the Philippines  secretary general, described as “unfortunate” the Presidential Management Staff’s message to the NCCP Thursday that Mr. Aquino “has a very busy schedule” and could not meet with Tveit, who is in the country for a gathering of Protestant leaders around the world.

He said Tveit, a Norwegian, would have expressed support for the resumption of peace talks between the government and the communist National Democratic Front. Norway is actively helping in the process to put an end to the decades-old communist insurgency in the country.

“Dr. Tveit is very much aware of issues in the Philippines and while he would have raised certain concerns, he would have also conveyed support to the resumption of the formal peace negotiations,” Reyes said.

An NCCP insider said the fellowship of Protestant churches and Malacañang had long discussed the meeting and the Palace even asked Tveit what he would like to take up with the President.

Tveit earlier met with victims and families of human rights violations in the country, who blamed the atrocities on the government’s counterinsurgency plan code-named Oplan Bayanihan. The group urged the WCC to help lobby against it.

Reyes said a number of victims of extrajudicial killings from 2001 to the present belong to member churches of the WCC.

Tveit is in the country to attend the pre-assembly conference of the WCC Commission for World Mission and Evangelism at the Traders Hotel in Manila.

The conference, which will run until March 27, brings together around 300 church leaders from around the world from various Christian traditions — Protestants, Anglicans, Roman Catholics, independent churches, Orthodox and Pentecostal Churches.

The conference aims to “take a second look at mission and evangelism in the complex and difficult context,” the NCCP said.

The gathering was expected to adopt a paper on evangelism that would be presented to the WCC General Committee and later to the 10th General Assembly of the WCC to be held in Busan, South Korea in 2013.

Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle, who graced the occasion on Thursday, welcomed the religious leaders to the country. Among Catholic leaders participating in the conference are Fr. Jo Dizon, an activist priest, and Sr. Mary John Mananzan, chair of the Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines.