Name: RRS - On behalf of the Diocese of Borongan
From: Borongan, Eastern Samar
Remote Name: 152.163.100.204

I am the incumbent Roman Catholic Bishop of the Diocese of Borongan, Eastern Samar. The Parish of Balangiga, the interested party, belongs to my ecclesiastical jurisdiction. It is for this reason that we are taking up the initiative of pursuing the process that would hopefully effect the retrieval of the Bells of Balangiga. As records account, in 1901 when the American Forces subdued Filipino rebels, the victorious U.S. Forces brought with them to the United States bells from the Church of the Parish of Balangiga, Samar. We are aware that two church bells are presently kept and displayed at F.E. Warren AFB WY and one bell in Korea with the 9th Infantry Division.

We perfectly understand the position taken by the U.S. Forces at that time. These bells enshrined for them the memories of their dead companions on that fateful 28th day of September 1901. For these were the very same bells, so it is said, that had been used to signal the attack. More than 50 US soldiers died in that encounter.

We, however, resolved our request to return the bells to the Catholic Parish of Balangiga. The said parish has more reasons to reclaim possession of the said bells. Records tell that the bells were the property of the Roman Catholic Church when they were taken by the U.S. Forces. They were church bells. They were religious artifacts with considerable significance in the Catholic tradition and practices. They summon people to prayer and worship. As such, they were inappropriate trophies of war. If ever it is true that the rebels used them as instruments of war, they did that act without the proper permission from the proper authority or owner of the bells.

The Diocese of Cebu, a Corporation sole, which was the rightful owner of the Church of Balangiga at the time of attack, did not give its permission to the rebels to use the bells for such a purpose.

These bells should keep my people in touch with the lives of their parents and grandparents, their past, their origin, their religious sentiments, their faith, their culture. It is for this reason that through the years my people in Balangiga have been longing to have their Church Bells returned to their church. For my part, as the duly constituted Bishop and therefore the legal shepherd of the Parish of Balangiga, I am laden with the grave obligation not only to assist them in this project, but also to take the initiative to retrieve these Bells, which rightfully belong to the Diocese of Borongan when the See was created in 1961.

Leonardo Y Medroso, DD Bishop of Borongan