Rizal

After six months of stay, he left for Europe for the second time on February 3,1888 to pursue the task he had set for himself. His brief stay enabled him to judge the effect of his Noli Me Tangere. He knew he was a marked man for writing the book which not only shook the Spanish rule, but precisely rattled more the foundation of authority in the Philippines - the Catholic church and its teachings.
The military trial of Rizal was not meant to administer justice throughout the land. It was done purposely to execute him in public so that the Filipinos would be frightened to death and subsequently to stop dreaming of freedom under free thought. Thus, when the so-called Spanish rule was thrown out with the interference of the US naval forces, what stayed behind to continue controlling Filipino minds and dominating Filipino hearts was the Catholic Church. Via Catholic schools, colleges, and universities – Catholic teachings prevailed in the Philippines. Consider the average Filipino in this 21st century. He is more conversant about the fantastic life and times of Jesus Christ than he knows anything about the realistic life and times of Jose Rizal. And to think Jose Rizal was born in the Philippines - a Christian country. Jesus Christ was born, if at all, in Israel that is today not even a Christian country. It is a Jewish State.
Catholic friars claimed that before he was executed Rizal retracted and asked for the forgiveness of his sin against God and for the pardon of his crime against the Filipino people. These developments, however, are based upon religious hogwash. The Rizal retraction scandal was concocted by the religious cowards. Just as much as the religious cowards of our day – the Knights of Rizal - continue to be afraid to stand up to defend Rizal’s great intellectual capacity as a rare Filipino gifted with the capacity not only to think but even to die for a just and a decent cause. Poch Suzara