Br. Isagani Miro Valle, O.Carm.
December 28, 1959 – May 14, 1983
The following is reposted from the blog OCarm Memoriam with some edits.
Today, May 14, we remember Br. Isagani Miro Valle, O.Carm., who was martyred in Buenavista, Agusan del Norte at the height of the dictatorship of then Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos.
Br. Isagani Valle was born on December 28, 1959 in Mahayang, Zamboanga. Originally, his parents were from Ormoc City but the search for greener pastures led his parents to leave their beloved city. New opportunities led the family to move again to San Francisco, Agusan del Sur where the children of the family continued their education.
Valle finished his secondary education from Father Urios High School of San Francisco, Agusan del Sur, a school managed by the Carmelite Order. Gani showed exceptional intelligence and was friendly towards his classmates. They would describe him as very patient, smiles a lot and is always ready to help those in need, especially his poor classmates.
Inspired by the priests, his vocation to priesthood flourished. One time, when the family returned to Ormoc City, Brother Gani decided to take the examination of priesthood in Palo Diocese which he easily passed.
He then entered the seminary in Palo in 1972. His classmates (Monsignor Bernardo Pantin and Fr. Manuel Ocaña) attested that he always topped their exams. But when his family decided to return to Agusan, he decided to leave the seminary and join the. In Agusan, he was active in the Parish of the Sacred Heart administered by the Carmelites in San Francisco, Agusan del Sur. This service in the parish, ignited in him once again, the passion to become a religious.
Inspired by the service the Carmelites rendered to the community of Agusan, Isagani decided to join the Carmelite Order. From 1977 until 1981, he studied as a Carmelite seminarian at the Our Lady of the Angels Seminary (OLAS) and St. Joseph’s College in Quezon City.
During his novitiate, he was involved with different student organizations demanding change on the unjust structures of the Philippine government. He received his temporary profession to the Order in the year 1982.
Gani is remembered by the Carmelites through his advocacy with the poor and the marginalized. His words of his passion for people is reflected in the following excerpt from one of his study-group reflections, expressing his unwavering stance for justice:
“We still have to see a theology that proceeds from the people and goes back to the people; a theology which contains the lives and experiences of the masses; a theology that is dialogical. This needs real immersion in the lives, sufferings and struggles of the people. It is being written in the midst of the slums, in dialogue with the poor and their life-situation: It is that place where we, seminarians, have to listen and learn. It will, for sure, be different from a theology written in airconditioned rooms. We must work and struggle for this theology – liberative and developmental of the people, and transformative fo reality.”
He lived out these words.
The Carmelites let their seminarians experience the life of the poorest of the poor during their exposures so that they may live out like Jesus Christ who once preached, “foxes have holes, birds have nests but the son of man has nowhere to lay his head.”
During one such exposure in Mindanao, on May 14, 1983, he was killed by the police in Buenavista, Agusan del Norte. He wanted to get a first-hand experience of what life was like for the poor people living on the edge between military violence and liberation.
While attending a fiesta in Buenavista, he was seen strolling around with two companion farmers who were suspected to be members of the New People’s Army. Following a tip from an informer, the police force of Buenavista swooped on them and mowed them down with a rain of bullets.
Their bullet-ridden bodies were displayed in front of the Municipal Hall of Buenavista and buried afterwards without a coffin in a common grave at a cemetery.
His life inspired his religious friends. Sr. Asuncion Martinez, ICM to write a tribute for him:
Brother Gani!
With pride and deep reverence
We salute you,
Our youthful hero and martyr.With longing you had desired to be a PRIEST.
A priest of God, with a heart of flesh –
To love, to serve, to pray, to sacrifice for our oppressed,
and exploited dehumanized BROTHERS.Brother Gani,
In this crucial time of our people’s history,
You wanted to plunge yourself
into the stream of our struggle
to be ALL things to all.Perhaps, you wanted to be the priest of the slums,
Among the homeless and jobless;
To be the labor-priest
standing by the striking workers,
Or the priest crawling and groping
In the black tunnels of collapsing mines.You wanted to be a priest among
Our uprooted peasants, dumped and herded
Inside company plantations; harassed and
driven away from their smoking villages.Or a priest
ministering to the Tingguians and Kalingas
at the foot of the Cordillera mountains.
Or somebody among the Manobos and T’bolis
of Mindanao, withering and starving in
their dried cracked gaping fields,
having nothing to harvest, nothing to eat
nothing to plant.Surely Gani,
Your supreme desire
was to be a priest
among our brother revolutionaries,
stationed in the jungles and mountain passes,
fighting for JUSTICE-FREEDOM
for our COUNTRY and our PEOPLE.Brother Gani,
As you saw the vastness and urgency of your mission,
You could no longer wait for your ordination day!
You boldly ventured into treacherous paths
and forbidden grounds to bind
the wounds of those who had fallen
by the wayside, to defend the scattered sheep
against the hungry wolves.
But above all you craved and hungered
for the glorious embrace
of your brothers in the struggle.Brother Gani, this was your last and deepest dream.
Yet a dream that was suddenly blasted by the gun,
and by a traitor’s bullet
snatching you away from us and our people.Brother, that day became your solemn ordination day.
You then became truly a priest,
Our prophet, our martyr –
Anointed with your own blood,
vested in priestly robes of bleeding scarlet.
As your temple, you had only the open skies
and as your altar the very soil
moistened by your blood.No bishop to consecrate you
but only the loyal and daring poor
who tenderly and reverently lifted
your broken body
for the salvation and liberation of our people.Brother Gani,
people thought you were alone
for your solemn mass –
no, you were not alone.
You passionately carried in your heart
Your downtrodden brothers
and all your faltering fellow religious
and church workers,
to celebrate with you,
in your first and last Mass,
your Mass of Resurrection.Gani,
infuse into the very depths of our being
your indomitable courage!
Courage to dare to speak out the truth,
Courage to fight for justice
Courage to work relentlessly
for Freedom of our country!Gani, they have killed you
but they can never silence you.
Your prophetic voice resounds
in every church, school and seminaryOh! May it never stop!
Until the last priest and nun, brother,
pastor, deacon, seminarian, pastoral worker
has valiantly joined the struggle,
the march to freedom,
towards our final Resurrection
as a fully liberated people in a land
where there are no more tyrants
no more slaves,
“where there will be no more death,
no mourning nor crying no pain.” (Rev. 21:4)Father Isagani,
we proudly salute you
our PRIEST, our PROPHET,
our HERO and MARTYR,
our very own BROTHER!
Brother Isagani’s body was transferred from San Francisco, Agusan del Sur to the Catholic cemetery of Ormoc, Leyte beside his father and other relatives, but later on to the Carmelite Spirituality Center in Milagro, Ormoc. On his tombstone is written the words, “IN OBSEQUIO IESU CHRISTI” for indeed he died IN ALLEGIANCE TO JESUS CHRIST whom he followed even unto his death.
You may also want to read:
CARMELITE MARTYR TRANSFERRED TO FINAL RESTING PLACE
