The Christians for National Liberation (CNL), the underground revolutionary political organization of Christians, vehemently denounces the bourgeois Philippine government’s claim that puppet, dictator, tyrant, and deposed Ferdinand Marcos Sr. left behind a “golden age of peace and prosperity.” We exclaim with a resounding voice that never it was. Instead, it was a “darkest age of tyranny and oppression.”

The dictator’s son, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., shows the same adherence to US-China puppetry through neoliberal prescriptions and repression. Marcos Jr.’s statement at the New York Stock Exchange: “It is very clear to me in my vision for the way that the country will move forward that I cannot see the Philippines in the future without having the United States as a partner,” demonstrates continued subservience to imperialism.

This only strengthens CNL’s conviction to support the beginning of a new order in Philippine society through the victory of the national democratic revolution with a socialist perspective until communism is completely set in place.

Fifty years since the martial law declaration, we decry the claim it was an age of prosperity when under dictator Marcos Sr., debt had swollen from $2 billion in 1972 to $20 billion in 1972. The avaricious Marcoses accumulated an estimated amount of $10 billion (P579 billion). No one should claim prosperity when majority Filipino people languished in scarcity then and now.

CNL refutes the claim it was the age of peace when during the Marcos dictatorship. Amnesty International (AI) described it clearly: “unleashed a wave of crimes under international law and grave human rights violations, including tens of thousands of people arbitrarily arrested and detained, tortured, forcibly disappeared, and killed.” And “…from 1972 to 1981, and in the remainder of the 20-year regime of Marcos, 70,000 people were imprisoned, 3,257 were killed and 34,000 were tortured.”

Worth commemorating is the conviction and heartfelt dedication of lay leaders, priest, nuns and pastors who turned away from self-preservation and comfort, organized the CNL and embraced the people’s revolution. Many of them joined the New People’s Army (NPA). They were those who discerned God to the poor and downtrodden, a God who sees and hear the misery and cry of the people and a God who journeys with them towards liberation (Exodus 3:7-10). They were those who fully understood what Karl Marx taught that the state was an organ of class rule, an organ for the oppression of one class by another. Moreso, we laud the relentless valor the NPA and all other Filipino martyrs and heroes from then on until today. Their great sacrifices deserve the highest honor and commendation.

Remembering the martyrs of Christian faith, we acclaim Jerry D. Imbong in his paper “Uncovering Christianity’s ‘Dangerous Memory’: Christians for National Liberation (CNL) and the Church’s Revolutionary Legacy” beautifully relates:

In an effort to continue and sustain the subversive memory of the past and to live out their life of prophetic discipleship in the present, Christians had to engage in more radical ways of expressing their life of prophetic discipleship. The Christians for National Liberation (CNL) was born in the most turbulent, brutal, and repressive President Marcos’s dictatorial regime. Calling themselves “Christians and Revolutionaries”, CNL members were forced to work underground (UG) when Martial Law was declared by Marcos in 1972. Many priests, religious nuns and brothers, and lay leaders joined the armed resistance in the countryside. For CNL members, this is the highest expression of loving God and loving one’s neighbor.

In building the dictatorship of the proletariat (working class), we are reminded of Vladimir Lenin: “The workers’ state is the first state in human history that upholds the rule of the majority of the population against exploitative and oppressive minorities”. Affirming this, we proclaim the supreme rule of the proletariat, i.e., the dictatorship of the majority contrary to the dictatorship of the minority in a bourgeoisie reign or class dictatorship, as socialism being the transition period before communism.

Waging the national revolution with a socialist perspective is an essential prerequisite for this transition. Throughout this, the working class overpowers resistance by the bourgeoisie and shall extinguish the social relations of production underlying the class system, and build a new, classless society. The pattern of social and economic relations would be “from each according to his capacity according to his right.”

For us revolutionary Christians, socialism is abundant life for everybody while communism is “new heaven and earth.” Lo and behold, we await with expectancy while at work for the dawn of a new age where socialism is set forth, where imperialism, bureaucratic capitalism, and feudalism are smashed and life abundant amongst peoples and nations triumphs.

CNL sustains unwavering support for the armed revolution by arousing, organizing, and mobilizing the faithful; bringing the same to the struggle of the masses to the minimum and to the fold of the New People’s Army-Communist Party of the Philippines to the maximum.

Consolidate and expand our ranks!
Unite and overthrow the US-Marcos II Tyranny by advancing the National Democratic Revolution with a socialist perspective! Onward with the people’s war!
Long live the National Democratic Front of the Philippines!

Long live the New People’s Army!
Long live the Communist Party of the Philippines!