Violeta Marcos

Ma. Violeta Marcos, AMP (Born Maria Remedios Marcos), July 18, 1937 - April 30, 2001 was a Filipino Roman Catholic Nun who was best known as the co-founder and first director of the Augustinian Missionaries of the Philippines (AMP), and for her contributions to the resistance in opposition to the Martial Law dicatorship of Ferdinand Marcos - first through her diocesan social action involvements in Negros Occidental, and later as part of the human rights organization Task Force Detainees of the Philippines (TFDP).

The Sr. Ma. Violeta Marcos Wholistic Healing Center of the Augustinian Missionaries of the Philippines in Infanta, Quezon is named after her. Her name is inscribed at the Bantayog ng mga Bayani as one of the heroes who fought for justice and democracy during the Martial Law era.

Education and early career

See also: La Consolacion College Manila

Born Maria Remedios Marcos, Sr. Violeta originally studied Chemistry, and after graduating, took up a teaching position at La Consolacion College Manila before entering the convent. In 1966, she became the director of La Consolacion College.

Assignment to Negros island

In the early 1970s, Sr. Violeta accepted an assignment as administrator and principal of La Consolacion College in La Carlota City, Negros Occidental. With the island of Negros ridden by conflicts between poor workers and Marcos-associated landowners at the time, this assignment led to what Sr. Violeta considered her awakening to the social issues of the time.

Martial law

When Ferdinand Marcos announced in September 1972 that he was placing the Philippines under Martial Law, the social conflicts between workers and landowners on Negros island became even worse, and Sr. Violeta became increasingly involved in human rights activism. in 1975, she left the academe to serve as fulltime secretary of a group of religious and lay workers called the Justice for Sugar Workers Committee. She was also instrumental in the founding of the Negros Occidental Women Religious Association (NOWRA), and became of the Task Force Detainees of the Philippines organized by the Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines.

Work with Bishop Fortich

Sr. Violeta was instrumental in convincing Bishop Antonio Fortich of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bacolod to become a voice for justice for the people of Negros, who were often victims of various Human Rights violations of the Marcos administration. She worked with a priest who had made an extensive collection of photographs of human rights abuses in Negros island, organizing them into collections and making copies. They gave these collections to the Bishop as documentation of the maltreatment of the people of Negros, persuading the Bishop that the congregation in Negros needed to take the side of poor people.

Founding of the Augustinian Missionaries of the Philippines

Sr. Violeta and a group of other sisters from the Augustinian Sisters of Our Lady of Consolation in 1989, and when the request was granted in 1989, she became co-founder and first superior general of the the Augustinian Missionaries of the Philippines.