The 37th death anniversary of Fr. Michael Paul Rodrigo will be celebrated on November 10 this year. He was a Catholic Priest belonging to the Oblate Congregation (OMI) working in the village hamlet of Alukalavita-Buttala in the Monerāgala District, where he had founded a Christian-Buddhist Fellowship and Dialogue Centre since 1980.
He was brutally gunned down at point-blank range on that fateful evening on November 10 in the middle of a Holy Mass he was celebrating with two of his co-workers. The assassination was carried out following a series of death-threats against his presence and work in Buttala. To this day those responsible for this dastardly crime remain unknown. It is indeed a tragedy continuing to be a mystery surrounding the death of an innocent man who paid the price for bravely facing challenges that came from the powers-that-be who cast suspicion and questioned his work among the poor farmers and peasants of this historic Ūva-Wellassa province.
Once an agriculturally thriving area, with soil rich for farming and paddy cultivation, about 80,000 acres of this land had been taken over for a sugar-cane project by a multi-national corporation – the Booker-Tate Agriculture International established a factory in Pelawatte thus making local farmers and peasants lose their land as well as their means of employment and traditional farming livelihoods.
Fr. Michael Rodrigo had taken up issues with the then Government and even wrote to the President about the injustice that was crippling the lives of the poor people of Wellassa and asking for redress. The Wellassa episode causing the erosion of local enterprise is a tragic instance of the ill effects of the open-economy unleashed at that time.
There was serious concern over the environmental impact caused by deforestation and the use of chemical fertiliser. The priest in solidarity with the bhikkhus and the people of Buttala raised a strong voice against this oppression of the poor and demanded social justice to the peasants of Ūva.
Clashed
Fr Rodrigo often clashed with the authorities on behalf of the youth in Buttala. The Centre for Buddhist-Christian dialogue titled ‘Suba Seth Gedara’ was a humble wattle and daub house which later transformed into a clinic, a school and small library to address the community’s health and educational needs. It also housed a garden for indigenous medicinal plants to match. The Centre facilitated collaboration between the farming youth and undegraduates which helped improve the skills and techniques of their trade.
Fr. Michael Rodrigo was born on June 30, 1927 in Dehiwela and had his secondary education at St.Peter’s College, Bambalapitiiya.
He was trained for priesthood in Rome where he was ordained as a priest on April 4, 1954. On his return to the island, he was posted to the staff of the newly inaugurated National Seminary of Ampitiya and eventually proceeded to Rome again for a Ph.D. (1957) at the prestigious Jesuit-run Gregorian University.
After a spell of teaching in Ampitiya he embarked on a sabbatical to Paris where at the Catholic Institute of Paris he earned a doctorate in Theology (1973). Though equipped with two doctorates with research in Buddhist-Christian comparative studies, he declined a professorship in Paris and chose instead active social involvement with the rural poor.
Always interested in Buddhism as a vehicle of dialogue with the Buddhists of his motherland, his doctoral thesis in Rome was on, ‘Some Aspects of Enlightenment of the Buddha’ making an in-depth psychological and metaphysical analysis of the enlightenment and was awarded First Class Honours. The second doctorate in Paris was titled, ‘The Moral Passover from selfishness to selflessness in Christianity and other Religions in Sri Lanka’.
On his return from Paris, he assisted Bishop Leo Nanayakkara OSB of the Badulla Diocese to inaugurate a new style of a seminary where priestly training was more contextual including exposure programs. This experimental seminary was titled ‘Sēvaka Sevana’ in Bandārawela.
From here Fr. Rodrigo extended his interest to live for the poor and chose Buttala, one of the poorest villages in the Monerāgala District, thus directing his knowledge and experience for the care and liberation of the poor who had lost their land and livelihood. He decided to do it in an entirely Buddhist milieu (99 percent). In due course winning over the bhikkhus, he was able to work together with the people in many projects that affected the living standards of the people, education and religious formation of the youth.
Winds of change
It was the time when the winds of change came over the Catholic Church which opened to the world and its joys and hopes, to the various religious traditions and cultural diversities of humanity as well as identifying with struggles of the poor and the oppressed. Fr. Michael Rodrigo, brimming with this spirit of reform plunged himself into action in his own home-country, Sri Lanka.venturing right into a Buddhist village (99 percent), where poverty was wide-spread.
The situation proved ideal to begin his work of dialoguing with the Buddhists and working for their liberation, confronting the oppressive forces that were dehumanising the poor in Buttala. They needed to be empowered with knowledge and skills, trained to utilise their natural resources and live with dignity. When structures and systems get entrenched, liberation is needed to neutralise them to harmonise the liberation process.
He also wished to be an agent of reconciliation, healing the aching memory linked to Christianity in the aftermath of the Ūva-Wellassa rebellion of 1818 that led to the massacre of people by the colonial British. He had a thorough knowledge of Buddhism including texts in Pāli and could even give an ‘Anusāsanā’ on a Pōya day at the temple when requested. The bhikkhus and the Buddhist laity marvelled at his knowledge of Buddhism.
He was able to present the Buddhist radical teachings of the ‘Ten pāramithās’ and four ‘Brahma-vihāras’ such as mettā and karunā (mercy and loving kindness) aligning them with Christian moral values of mercy and compassion convinced that Buddhism and Christianity could co-exist.
Mettā comes from the Pāli word ‘mejjati’ ie: melting in loving kindness to all parallel to Christianity’s ‘compassion’ from the Greek meaning ‘welling from the bowels’. Both have kindred roots. What Fr. Michael Rodrigo did, was not merely social work but bringing religious teachings to bear on his work and on the people’s struggles. Oppression is both anti-Buddhist and anti-Christian. Working together, the religions could release the power needed to usher in liberation.
‘Pedagogy of the Oppressed’
He was against new-liberal economic policies embedded in the immoral agenda of the multi-national economic procedures especially the subcultures of the Governments in office. He followed the ‘Pedagogy of the Oppressed’ proposed by the Brazilian author Paolo Frêre who promulgated conscientisation as needed to unleash the forces of liberation which came alive at village level in Ūva-Wellassa.
Fr. Michael used to say that he is a Buddhist by culture and a Christian by religion. Dialogue was at the core of all his endeavours. While to Christians he posed the challenge of God’s preference of the poor, he invited the Buddhists to look closely at ‘anatta’ (impermanence) and ‘sangha’ to see their relevance in social life.
His true message lay in his lifestyle and spirituality, posing a challenge to the people of all faiths. His dream was to see Buddhists live genuinely according to the tenets of their religion and help one another attain contentment, peace, fraternity and justice: the Sāradharma virtues.
He was sensitive to the environment and decried deforestation and use of chemical fertiliser that poison the land, the home of the people. Instead, to overcome poverty, he improved rural agriculture and ecological mechanisms tapping local labour and resources. His rejection of the mega profit-maximising projects of the TNC’s was one of the factors that ignited suspicion and hostility from the powers-that-be. Added to this, unfortunately was the completely false accusation that he was a sypathiser of the JVP youth. The youth to whom Suba-Seth Gedara was open and came there seeking education, skill-learning and spiritual empowerment.
Father Michael was endowed with a sparkling sense of humour as well, adding lustre to his conversations and talks with gems of wit. He was surely the most educated man in the Ūva Province, a true prophet and the only stalwart who came forward to fight for the dignity of the peasantry of Buttala and forever to be remembered as a saint living and journeying with them.
There is recent news of him being declared a martyr-saint in the Catholic Church but people overwhelmingly affirm that he became a saint at the very moment of his death, having lived a life of love and concern for the poor and taking part in their struggles. An oft-repeated saying of Fr. Michael Rodrigo to be gratefully remembered at his anniversary is, “We must be ready to die for our people, if the hour comes and in the moment it comes”.
His last words have been in reference to Archbishop Saint Oscar Romero of San Salvador who was also gunned down at his altar in March 1980: “If they kill me, I shall rise in the hearts of the people… Let my blood be the seed of freedom and a sign that hope may soon be a reality to them”.
Fr. Michael Rodrigo OMI, our Sri Lankan prophet and martyr for justice continues to be alive in the memory of the people of Buttala. Celebrating his glorious death provides an occasion to renew our commitment to keeping his dream alive and be energised in our work of inter-religious dialogue and action for social justice.
