Faith, Performance, and the Politics of Prayers:
A Reckoning with "Events Place" Catholicism
There’s a disquiet in the air—echoing through churches, scrolling across timelines, murmured in family dinners, and shouted in online comment sections. It’s the kind of disquiet that comes when faith meets façade, when religion is paraded louder than it is practiced. And nowhere is this clearer than in the strange contradiction of Filipino Catholicism today—especially when the faithful mourn a pope, cheer for a new one, and simultaneously defend a blasphemous leader who has mocked that very same Church.
Recently, Vice President Sara Duterte joined the Catholic community in mourning the death of Pope Francis. She called him “the shepherd who taught us to be compassionate, forgiving, and merciful in a world poisoned by social inequities, greed, hate and wars.” It was a solemn statement. Measured. Respectful. As expected, it was met with praise from her supporters—many of whom identify as “devout Catholics.”
And yet, the contradiction is impossible to ignore.
These same “devout” individuals continue to idolize and defend Rodrigo Duterte, a man who once cursed the Pope, suggested bishops should be killed, and belittled God as “stupid”—later waving it off as “just a joke.” And now, these same believers pray to God for Duterte’s freedom following his arrest and detention in The Hague. They light candles, share verses, post prayers online. But for whom? And to what end?
This isn’t faith. It’s theater.
It is Events Place Catholicism: religion as spectacle, performance, and costume. These are the Catholics who post selfies inside St. Peter’s Basilica, marvel at Rome’s architecture, and dream of a Filipino pope—but stay silent about injustice, poverty, or the moral rot in their own neighborhoods. They fill churches for weddings and baptisms but defend oppression and corruption as long as it suits their political alignment. And when their faith is questioned, they weaponize scripture or claim “free will,” as if that excuses allegiance to tyranny.
Recently, as rumors swirled about the next pope, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) urged the faithful not to campaign publicly for Cardinal Tagle. Their concern? That such acts could be misconstrued as attempts to influence the conclave. But in making that plea, they themselves implied what they feared—that the faithful were too naive to know better. That their prayers could be interpreted as manipulation rather than devotion.
To many, this wasn’t just tone-deaf—it was patronizing.
Are the Filipino faithful really so immature that their prayers for Tagle would scandalize the Vatican? One commentator responded with precision: “To you misguided priests and bishops of the CBCP, the prayers of the Filipino for a Filipino to be chosen pope are not directed at the electoral college in the Vatican. The prayers are to God, as all prayers are to God.”
That is the heart of it. Prayers are not campaigns. They are not press releases or political rallies. They are expressions of hope. They are spiritual longings, not nationalist slogans. So sure—pray for Tagle. Hope for him. But also hope that your faith is not merely a performance. Not an aesthetic. Not a curated collection of religious habits detached from the radical demands of the Gospel.
Because here’s the deeper question: If you can hope for a Filipino pope, can you also hope for justice in this forsaken nation? Can you long for a Church that doesn’t just shine in Rome, but speaks out in Manila, in Davao, in Caloocan?
Or, more bluntly: Which is better—a Filipino pope, or Duterte?
It’s appalling to see Catholics cry at the beauty of papal liturgies while defending the violence, misogyny, and mockery that Duterte has unleashed. This is not a mere political contradiction. It is a spiritual one. And it demands reckoning.
Don’t talk about “choice” as if that settles it. Don’t invoke free will as a defense when choices run against the very Gospel claiming to uphold. If one is Christian—what more a Catholic— one's choices are not meant to align with one's convenience. They are meant to reflect Christ. And yes, painfully, one's choice can go against God’s.
Expect now the babbling defenses of sola scriptura or sola fide—as if latching onto isolated verses or proclaiming “faith alone” could shield you from accountability. But Catholicism has never operated on loopholes. Faith without works is dead. And faith that only moves lips and not lives is little more than noise.
So let this be said clearly: If one wants a Filipino pope, then live as if believing in the Church he would lead. If one mourns a pope, then carry his message beyond the funeral. If one prays, then pray also for courage—to speak truth, to stand with the poor, to call out the wolves in shepherd’s clothing.
Because faith is not meant to flatter one's nationalism. It is meant to challenge one's soul.
The true scandal is not in the prayers of the faithful. The scandal is in a Church that fears those prayers, dismisses them, or worse, lets them co-exist with tyranny. The scandal is in the silence that follows murder, the applause that greets cruelty, the blessings that crown corruption.
The Filipino people do not need another pageant of piety. They need truth. They need faith with a backbone. They need a Church that lives what it preaches and preaches what it dares to live.
Until then, all the chanting, praying, and weeping will be little more than performance.
And heaven is not moved by performance.