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PHILIPPINES
Student
Christian Movement Report
by Athea Penalosa and Lei Sanchez
SCMP
in the context of Philippine Realities
History
SCM Philippines has roots in the
campus ministerial work of the Philippine Federation of Christian Youth
Fellowships (PFCYF), the youth department of the Philippine Federation of
Christian Churches (PFCC; now the National Council of Churches in the
The studentry, being relatively
free and mobile among the youth, became the more active and vocal part of the
PFCYF. Thus, the Student Work Committee (SWC) was formed; designed to
coordinate student Christian groups and organizations, and to be fully
in-charge of the campus ministry work.
During the holding of the WSCF
General Committee Meeting in
On December 27, 1960, the First
National Assembly was held in
During the late 60's and early
70's, the country's social crisis was getting worse. This resulted to public
unrest, igniting protests and mass actions specially among the ranks of
students. SCMP's life was rekindled when it held a
Special Assembly redefining its objectives and directions. There was great
awareness among the members of the nationalist and democratic aspirations
burning in the mainstream of student life. SCMP's
belief in the faith of totally liberating the oppressed people gave impetus to
its active involvement in the social struggle. It realigned itself with the
larger student and people's movement taking the side of the poor and the
oppressed.
It was during the May 1971
Congress that the decision for the SCMP to adopt National Democracy as its
political line was made. Immediately, SCMP joined the Movement for a Democratic
Philippines (MDP), the national alliance of national-democratic mass
organizations. Its slogan then was: Love your neighbor. Serve the people.
Struggle for national liberation and democracy!
The Movement became more militant
in performing its sectoral task. It called for the maximum participation of
Christians in the overall struggle of the people. This call was realized when
the Christians for National Liberation (CNL) was established, with SCMP as one
of its founding members. However, when Martial Law was declared on September
21, 1972, SCMP had mellowed down in terms of its organizing work in the
campuses. Several of its members were arrested, detained, tortured and murdered
by the fascist Marcos dictatorship while performing their Christian duties.
Other members participated in the armed struggle in the countrysides,
choosing the arduous and difficult path of liberating the people through the destruction
of the un-Christian setup of society.
At the end of the 1970's, SCMP
was able to consolidate its remaining members and hold seminars and bible
studies. It was among the first organizations that dared to reorganize in the
open. On January 20-22, 1978 the SCMP was formally re-established in a National
Assembly held at UP Los Banos. It steadily grew in the following years, with
organizing work expanding outside Metro Manila. It also strengthened its
international solidarity work with other SCM's worldwide and forged stronger
relations with them. The movement was truly revitalized.
The 80's saw the Movement at the
forefront in forwarding the ecumenical movement among youth and students. It regained
its militancy and progressive stance in immersing completely with the people's
struggle. It openly participated in the anti-dictatorship mass actions. A year
after the "People's Power" uprising in 1986, the newly installed
Aquino administration declared its US-tailored Total War Policy against the
Filipino people. On January
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1987, peasants holding a peaceful rally were massacred in Mendiola (at the doorstep of the government's seat of power
in Malacanang). This situation challenged the Movement to persevere in
organizing and building links with other people's and students' organizations.
Orientation
SCM Philippines believes that
faith alone cannot change social structures. It
is important to have a clear political line. The process of changing social
structures entail analysis of concrete conditions, program of action and
alternative to the existing order. Thus, the SCM embraces the National
Democratic line and program which offers concrete solution to the concrete
problems of our society.
As a national-democratic mass
organization, SCMP believes that the root causes of the Filipino people's
oppression and repression is the unholy trinity of Imperialism, Bureaucrat
Capitalism and Feudalism. These basic problems are manifest in the landlord and
bourgeois-comprador-ruled government that is subservient to imperialist
interests; in the export-oriented, import-dependent, debt-driven economy; and
in the colonial, commercialized and repressive culture.
SCMP believes that nationalist
industrialization founded on genuine agrarian reform is a fundamental step
towards liberating the Filipino people from the bondage of poverty. SCMP also
believes that the strength of the national democratic alliance lies on the
basic alliance of workers and peasants, and its unity with other oppressed
sectors in the Philippine society.
As an ecumenical organization,
SCMP encourages common understanding of salvific history as contextualized in
Philippine society. Therefore, it is a meeting place of Christian students, of
different faiths, discerning its Christian calling amidst suffering and
poverty.
SCMP is also a student
organization, with many chapters on campuses nationwide. It promotes and
defends students democratic rights and welfare.
SCMP is mass organization. It is
open to all regardless of faith, gender and economic status.
Program
Ecumenical Liturgical Fellowships. This is an
ecumenical encounter which nurtures indigenous and creative worship reflective
of people's life and struggle. This is done among members as well as
non-members.
Study
circles.
These are study groups which tackle Philippine History Current Realities and Biblio-Theological Reflections (BTR).
Worship dialogues. This is a
joint worship between SCM, workers, peasants and other oppressed sectors in
society, celebrating the life and struggle of each sector.
Basic Masses Integration. This is an
immersion program open to members and non-members alike. Integration areas
include countryside (peasants), factories and picketlines
(workers), slums (urban poor), etc. There are also Weekend Exposures open to
students.
Men and Women Caucuses. These are
caucuses that help men and women members to identify, understand and resolve
the roots of oppression and exploitation of women.
Leadership Training Camps. These are venues
to hone members' skills on organizing, facilitating study groups,
liturgy-making, writing, and other skills.
Social Action. Through this program, SCMP is
able to participate in relief and rehabilitation of victims of man-made and
natural calamities, mainly through medical missions and relief operations.
International Solidarity Work. This program
nurtures relations of SCMP with other organizations abroad. It also strengthens
relations with SCMs of different countries through exchange exposure programs
and constant communication.
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Current
problems and difficulties in SCMP
SCMP currently has around 2,000
members nationwide. Its membership is steadily increasing, specially since last
year. But the biggest problem facing SCM organizationally (or internally) is
consolidation of its members. This means that SCMP cannot consolidate its
members as fast as it can recruit them.
One of the problem areas being
looked into is organizational education. SCMP is currently reviewing its
Education Curriculum, with the objective of providing sufficient organizational
and political education to its members. In the past, there is overlapping and
imbalance between organizational and political education in SCMP.
As part of the larger student
movement, SCM suffers the same difficulty as other student organizations in the
country. The repression of students democratic rights and welfare hits SCMP
concretely through the banning/black listing of student organizations in some
campuses; control of organizational activities in the campus by school administrators;
repressive student policies; and attacks on freedom of speech (censorship) and
organization in some campuses, among others. Under the Philippines 2000
program of the Ramos regime, there is the Education 2000 program under which
the repression students' rights and welfare is further heightened.
Women
in the SCM Philippines
Half of SCMP's
membership is composed of women. Many of them hold important positions in the organization.
SCMP provides members of all genders equal opportunity to develop as good
Christians, as well as competent leaders of the community and the nation. Its
structure and principles does not discriminate between the genders. It also
holds educational discussions on gender issues, as well as criticism and
self-criticism (CSC) sessions to weed-out discriminating tendencies.
But admittedly, this is not
enough. After all, SCMP members are part of Philippine society where the
culture is predominantly colonial, commercialized and repressive. This culture
looks at women as second-class citizens; treats women as commodities and
objects of sex; and expects them to be docile. Although SCMP tries to subvert
this kind of culture through education, CSC, and integration, there are still
members (male and female), who carry this kind of thinking. But this is no
reason to be sad. SCMP recognizes the fact that its effort is but part of the
larger cultural struggle being launched by the national-democratic movement.
SCMP as a national-democratic
organization believes that women's liberation is brought about by liberation
from class oppression . Gender discrimination is not without class basis. In
the
As such, SCMP has no separate
women's program or desk inside the organization. Women's issues and agenda is
an integral part of SCMP's overall program. As stated
in the earlier paragraphs, SCMP holds educational discussions, "Men and
Women Caucuses", CSCs, and integration to raise
the consciousness of its members regarding gender issues.
The
Role of WSCF Asia Pacific
The WSCF Regional Women's Program
can support and assist SCMP with regard to women's concern and empowerment by:
- providing information on women's issues,
situation and organizations in the region and in the world; -providing venues
for interaction, discussion with women from other countries;
- providing venues for unity with other women
on common issues and concerns;
- assisting different SCM's, and women's desks
in forging common programs of action, exchange programs for mutual benefit;
- providing material and financial assistance
for women's activities and programs.
Thus, SCMP is of the opinion that
RWP would be invaluable as a link with other women and women's movements; as
educators on women's issues and concerns; as initiators of women's unites; and
supporters of women's activities and programs.
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INDONESIAN
STUDENT CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT
by Elvy Ria Pasaribu
and Lisda Marianti
A. The
National Movement and the Role of Women SCMs
Indonesian SCM (ISCM) was born at
February 9, 1950 as a movement bears the function of church service in the midst
of student context. ISCM existed through the participation of Christian student
in two struggles, ecumenical movement in one side and
ISCM has a vision to prepare the
future Christian leaders who have competency to move social transformation. To
catch this vision ISCM arranges much way and facilities for empowering student.
The objectives of ISCM are to invite student to know Jesus Christ as the Lord
and Savior and serve Him faithfully in daily work through student actions as
Bible study, worship, leadership training, workshop, discussion on human-life
issues and service-action to empower every subjects of life.
There are two kinds of ISCM
programmes, first, regular cadre education (with the formal curriculum ) from
basic level in local branch until the national level. Second is the
service-action in the midst of university, church and society, it is an efforts
to practice the concern of ISCM for human empowering which emphasizes on
solidarity with marginalized people, pro-democracy movement, building human
right and building justice for all creation.
Right now there are 56 local
branches of ISCM spread out in university-towns in 27 provinces of
In ISCM's
constitution there is no point discriminate man or women, because the
constitution contains the principal points of movement existence, like the
theological and legal foundations, vision, mission, objectives, how to manage
the business meeting in local-national level, the ways to practice the
objectives, etc.
The classical problem we face is the
financial support. We don't have regular aid from government. Senior members as
the donors could help us partially because they have so many other service
fields need their financial support. So we have to search other possibility
from some institutions (including churches) which has same vision and concern
with ISCM.
Another problem, we work
voluntarily, we could not ask people we served to pay some many and we could
not get some profit from that work. Until now we still try to raise money from
publishing some books ( contains report of some discussions/study meeting).
Until now EAP-WSCF become the only continual financial assistance we get and it
really helpful for our programmes.
Women members are quite many in
ISCM, more than 50%. The participation of women in leadership, 50% on an
average in local branch level ( sometimes more than it ). There are eight women
become local chairperson and secretary right now. But unfortunately, in
national ex.
Actually women members
participate actively in every programme of ISCM. They involved deeply and
seriously in every committees of activities. But until now near most of women
prefer the technical jobs like arranging consumption-accommodation, doing
secretariat jobs , cleaning, cooking, etc, than doing the more complicated job
like management and making decision. All of the women activities just like an
expansion of housekeeper works. It happened not because the women are not
qualified, not because the structure or policy of ISCM and not because ISCM did
not open a chance for women, but it is the problem of social values. ISCM women
members had internalized patriarchal values since their childhood, that the
leader is father and mother is a housekeeper. The second problem, most of women
prefer to looking for the professional works than to spend their ages in ISCM.
And it is normal for Indonesian women to get married in 25-35 years old ( or
younger than it ). Working in SCM become uninteresting choice. Once more, it is
the problem of social-traditional values.
ISCM responded these problems
through giving the special attention and policy for empowering women. For long
time ago until now ISCM has women department and working group on gender issues
in local and national levels. The objective is to search many ways to help
women to express themselves.
B. The Women's
Programme or Concern
Women
department and working group on gender issues functioning in every biennial
period of service. In local level it works to manage women activities like
Bible study ( especially focused in women problems ), study group on women
issues, leadership training and presentation of women in every activities. In
national level the working group on gender issues arranges the national women
programmes like leadership training, workshop and collecting data. To do all of
these ISCM always makes a partnership with as many as possible other women's
groups.
Women's department is formed by
local ex.
C. The Role of
WSCF Asia Pacific
The WSCF Regional Women's
Programme ( RWP ) should become a wider reference to
do the Women's programmes in ISCM. If it possible WSCF RWP could make more
facilities to support women, by giving scholarship, support programme, etc. For
this aim we really appreciate the good communication like sharing women
information, publications and also financial support. The role of WSCF in
empowering women in ISCM is quite good. We really felt the continual support
and got so much constructive experiences from WSCF in empowering women.