A Quezon City judge has dismissed a charge of “offending religious feelings” filed against Catholic church exorcist Fr. Winston Cabading by now retired former Sandiganbayan Associate Justice Harriet Demetriou.

In a decision promulgated on May 7, Judge Zita Marie M.. Atienza-Fajardo of QC Regional Trial Court Branch 224 declared that Demetriou had failed to present sufficient evidence to convict the Dominican theologian for violation of Article 133 of the Revised Penal Code.

Judge Atienza-Fajardo also cleared Cabading from a charge of violation of Section 6 of the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012 that Demetriou also filed.

Cabading, who posted bail following his arrest last year, said he was confident that he would eventually be proven innocent of the charges filed by Demetriou, also a former judge and ex-chairperson of the Commission on Elections.

In her complaints filed in December 2022, Demetriou accused Cabading of offending her and the Catholic faithful’s religious feelings for being critical of the reported Marian apparition at a Carmelite Monastery of Lipa in 1948.

She also cited in the cybercrime case Facebook video that quoted Cabading for rejecting the LIpa apparition and image.

Just recently, the Vatican released a copy of the 1951 findings on the alleged apparition. The decree declared that there has been “no supernatural origin and character” that could be credited to the alleged sightings of the the Holy Virgin Mary.

Lipa Archbishop Gilbert Garcera said that on March 29, 1951, then Pope Pius XII approved the ruling rejecting the apparition to be true. The ruling was authenticated by Cardinal Victor Fernandez, the current DDF prefect under Pope Francis.

In her ruling, Judge Atienza Fajardo pointed out that Cabading cannot be held liable of the charges because his statements were not made in a place devoted to religious worship or during the celebratio of any religious ceremony.

Further, Cabading’s personal view that was uploaded on social media was under the account oe one Wendel Talibong who manages and owns the vlog “Pananampalataya at Katuwiran.”

The court noted that “a Facebook page dedicated solely on evangelism and propagation of faith” cannot be considered a religious ceremony.

“A religious ceremony includes masses, baptism, weddings, funerals, rituals and similar practices which involve prayers, hymns, readings and symbolic actions by the religious or the Church with the Church premises,” stressed Judge Atienza-Fajardo.

She pointed out that Talibong’s personal social media account: is a”mere vlog”.

Further, the RTC judge rejected Demetriou’s claim that statements attributed to Cabading were offenssive to the feelings of the people, stressing that:the acts must be directed against religious practice or dogma or ritual for the purpose of ridicule, as mocking or scoffing at or attempting to damage an object of religious veneration.”