on the campus of San Carlos Seminary,
Guadalupe Viejo,
Makati San Carlos Seminary was the first diocesan seminary established in the Philippines. In 1562, the
Council of Trent decreed that every bishop must establish a center of clerical education and training for his diocese. In 1581,
Domingo de Salazar, OP, the first
Bishop of Manila, decreed the establishment of a seminary to prepare native men for the priesthood and ecclesiastical dignities. Despite several attempts, his dream crystallized 125 years later as both Church and State did what the poverty of the colony and other adverse circumstances would afford. Several colleges where ecclesiastical and religious native vocations might be fostered were founded in the early 17th century: the Jesuits' Colegio de San José (1601),
Colegio de Santo Tomás (1611) of the Dominicans,
Colegio de San Juan de Letrán and Colegio de San Pedro y San Pablo (1632). Although these various schools trained future priests, a unified diocesan seminary was lacking.
Early centuries in Manila In 1592, King
Philip II of Spain enjoined that the pertinent decree of Trent be implemented in the Indies. He ordered all archbishops and bishops of the Indies to found and support seminaries decreed by the Council of Trent for the formation of native clergy. Since the Philippines was then under the
Patronato Real system, on April 28, 1702, King
Philip V of Spain ordered the establishment of a seminary in Manila for eight seminarians. However, this plan was modified by Giovanni Battista Sidoti, an Italian priest accompanying Archbishop Charles Thomas Maillard de Tournon,
papal legate to
Peking, on the way to China. He worked for the erection in Manila of an Asian regional seminary for seventy-two seminarians of the
Far East, with the approval of Archbishop Diego Camacho y Ávila. The seminary was named
Real Colegio Seminario de San Clemente in honour of Pope
Clement XI. Having learned of the development, the King ordered the closure and demolition of the seminary building, the execution of his original plan, and the transfer of Archbishop Camacho to
Mexico. From 1702 to 1730, seminarians took their courses of philosophy and theology at the Colegio de San José and Colegio de Santo Tomás. The number of seminarians increased several times. On December 8, 1707, Archbishop Francisco de la Cuesta, Camacho's successor, opened the seminary. In 1715, he renamed the institution to
Real Seminario de San Felipe after the King's patron saint. It was located in front of the
Archbishop's Palace in Intramuros. In 1728, Archbishop Carlos Bermúdez de Castro had a dispute with the Governor-General over his right to nominate professors at San Felipe. He argued that the seminary was an ecclesiastical institution to be administered by the archbishop in conformity with the decrees of the Council of Trent and the laws of the Indies. His successor, Archbishop Juan Ángel Rodríguez, continued de Castro's fight over the archbishop's right to guide the seminary. However, civil authorities rebuffed them under the pretext of the
Patronato Real. The impetus for a review of how the
Patronato Real administered the seminary came when Bishop Miguel Lino de Espeleta of Cebu became Acting
Governor-General of the Philippines from 1759 to 1761. He insisted that the royal treasury pay its obligations to the seminary which amounted to 54,000 pesos from 1705 to 1759. The royal treasury had committed 1,200 pesos for the yearly maintenance of the seminary. Hence, during the fifty-four years of the seminary, the royal contribution to the seminary averaged only 200 pesos a year. The
British Invasion in 1762 dispersed the seminarians. It was only on January 25, 1768, that the seminary was re-opened by Archbishop Basílio Sancho de Santa Justa y Rufina, naming it
Colegio Seminario Ecclesiástico de Manila. It was placed under the royal patronage of
King Charles II. On November 16, 1778, the King ordered a visitation of the seminary. As a result, reforms were instituted, and the magnificent buildings of the expelled Jesuits, the Church and Colegio de San Ignacio were assigned to the diocesan seminary. For some thirty years (1784–1817), the Colegio de San José and the diocesan seminary, which began to be called in 1786 as
Real Seminario Conciliar de San Carlos in honour of the King, existed side-by-side. San Carlos was located from 1784 to 1880 on Calle Real de Palacio (now General Luna Street) and Calle Escuela (now Victoria Street). The
Vincentian Fathers took charge over the seminary on August 2, 1862, under the patronage of
Queen Isabella II and with the support of Archbishop Gregorio Melitón Martínez de Santa Cruz. Rev. Fr. Gregorio Velasco, CM became the first Vincentian Rector of the conciliar seminary. Earthquakes in 1852, 1863, and 1880 damaged the Church of San Ignacio and the seminary building itself. Following the last earthquake, the Vincentians temporarily moved their charges to their Casa del Ocampo at 959 Calle San Marcelino (1880–1883). In 1883, Archbishop Pedro Payo, O.P constructed a new seminary building between the new Jesuit church of San Ignacio and the Archbishop's property on Calle Arzobispo. The building was rented in 1925 by
Ateneo de Manila and was called
Patio de San Javier. At present, it is the quarters for the employees of the Intramuros guest house of the archdiocese. In 1897, the seminary moved to a new building built under the direction of Archbishop Bernardino Nozaleda. It occupied a whole block bordered by Beaterio, Anda, and Real de Palacio (now General Luna) Streets. The seminary stayed in this building for only a year (1897–1898). With the outbreak of the
Philippine Revolution, the archbishop ordered its closure. The building, for a while leased by the Americans, became known as Saint Paul's Hospital, under the charge of Saint Paul de Chartres Sisters and later the
Maryknoll Sisters. Between the years 1900–1911, the seminary existed in an old building along Calle Arzobispo beside the new San Ignacio Church. On May 20, 1905, the administration of the seminary was turned over by the American Archbishop Jeremiah Harty to the Jesuits. This arrangement under the Jesuits lasted for only six years until August 17, 1911. In the next two years, San Carlos was fused with Seminario de San Javier (the name given by the Jesuits, upon their return to the Philippines, to Colegio de San José) on Padre Faura Street in
Ermita. The few seminarians then went to San Javier for their studies until 1913, when San Javier was closed.
Years in Mandaluyong , in 1940 For economic reasons, on May 19, 1913, Harty decided to transfer seminarians to the former
Asilo de Mandaloya, which was constructed by the Augustinians in 1716 and had been abandoned since around 1900. In June 1913, the Vincentians were again put in charge of the seminary. The seminary's name in honor of San Carlos Borromeo was by then definite. In 1927, to separate the major seminarians from the minor seminarians, San Carlos was again housed at
Casa de Ocampo along San Marcelino Street in Manila. In 1936, due to the construction of a new building along San Marcelino, the major seminarians joined the minor seminarians in
Mandaluyong. In the ensuing years, San Carlos Seminary returned to San Marcelino Street in the newly built
Vincentian Central House. In 1941, the major and minor seminarians were reunited in Mandaluyong, which was closed that December at the outbreak of the
Second World War. It reopened in 1946, but the issue of a large number of enrolees needed action in the postwar era.
Move to Makati of the Main Chapel of San Carlos Seminary In 1916, Harty was succeeded by Archbishop
Michael O'Doherty, who reigned until 1949. His successor,
Archbishop of Cebu Gabriel M. Reyes, and the first native Filipino Archbishop of Manila, had planned and ordered the construction of a new campus in Makati to accommodate the huge number of students. In 1951, he blessed the cornerstone for the new building of San Carlos Seminary in Guadalupe Viejo village along Highway 54 (now
Epifanio de los Santos Avenue or EDSA). On January 24, 1953, Cardinal
Norman Thomas Gilroy,
Archbishop of Sydney and papal legate to the First Plenary Council of the Philippines, blessed the new building. The Manila seminarians and professors transferred from Mandaluyong to the Makati site to begin the school year 1953–1954. The new seminary building housed both major and minor seminarians of the Archdiocese of Manila (which then also covered Rizal, Cavite and Bulacan and Laguna). The right wing was occupied by minor seminarians and the left wing by major seminarians. In the middle of the building is the common chapel, and in the basement, the
refectory. In 1951, the
Congregation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (CICM, known as the Belgian or Scheut Fathers) had been tasked by Rome with the formation of seminarians in
Lipa, where Bishop Rufino J. Santos (later Archbishop of Manila in 1953 and the first Filipino cardinal in 1960) was the diocesan administrator. On June 10, 1953, it was announced that the CICM Fathers would take over San Carlos Seminary from the Vincentians, and so the major seminarians in Lipa were transferred to Makati on June 15 and 16. On June 25, the new school year began with a
Mass of the
Holy Spirit. In 1955, the minor seminarians were then separated from the Philosophy and Theology departments and transferred to the newly erected Our Lady of Guadalupe Minor Seminary, which was blessed on August 22, 1955. It was located a block away from San Carlos Seminary in the direction of the
Pasig River, near the present day Guadalupe MRT station. In 1973, Cardinal Santos turned over the seminary administration from the CICM Fathers to the diocesan priests led by
Oscar V. Cruz, who later became Auxiliary Bishop of Manila in 1976. The construction of the new building of the San Carlos Graduate School of Theology and the Archbishop Gabriel M. Reyes Memorial Library began in 1985, and they were completed and blessed by Cardinal Sin and Cardinal Ricardo Vidal, Archbishop of Cebu, on June 29, 1987. In that same year, the two-winged edifice for the Holy Apostles Senior Seminary (HASS) and the San Lorenzo Ruiz Lay Formation Center (or LayForce) was constructed. The Lorenzo Mission Institute (LMI), aimed at forming priestly candidates for the missions to the Chinese communities was built in 1989. In 1990, Bahay-Pari, a house for priests, was put up for the ongoing formation, physical rest and spiritual rejuvenation for the Manila clergy. On March 13, 1995, the cornerstone of Holy Apostles Senior Seminary was laid to give way to the full-swing formation of the laity at the Layforce Building. When
Bishop of Imus Luis Antonio G. Tagle became Archbishop of Manila in 2011, he continued the vision of his predecessor Cardinal Rosales, to uplift and deepen the formation program of the seminarians through regular pastoral and theological updating and strengthening the seminary's thrust in human formation of the seminarians. Some of the historic events that took place in San Carlos Seminary were the following: the Second Plenary Council of the Philippines (January 20 to February 17, 1991); the Sixth Plenary Assembly of the
Federation of Asian Bishops' Conferences (January 10–19, 1995); the visit of
Pope John Paul II (January 15, 1995); the National Pastoral Consultation on Church Renewal (January 20–27, 2001); and the Second National Rural Congress (July 7–8, 2008). Through the years, the seminary has produced many dedicated and zealous men who have served for the mission of the church. Some of San Carlos Seminary's distinguished alumni include the
Gomburza priests
Mariano Gómez and
Jacinto Zamora, priest-martyrs executed by the Spanish government for supposed involvement in the 1872
Cavite Mutiny and thus inspired the
Revolution; Cardinal
Rufino Santos; and Cardinal
Ricardo Vidal,
Archbishop of Cebu. The seminary is considered a national heritage structure, as it was designed by
Juan Nakpil,
National Artist for Architecture. == Priest-formators of San Carlos Seminary ==