History of the Philippines (1898–1946) in the context of "Governor-General of the Philippines"

The Philippine Independent Church (Filipino: Malayang Simbahan ng Pilipinas; Ilocano: Nawaya a Simbaan ti Filipinas), officially referred to by its Philippine Spanish name Iglesia Filipina Independiente (IFI) and colloquially called the Aglipayan Church, is an independent catholic Christian denomination, in the form of a nationalist church, in the Philippines. Its revolutionary nationalist schism from the Catholic Church in the Philippines was proclaimed during the American colonial period in 1902, following the end of the Philippine–American War, by members of the country's first labor union federation, the Unión Obrera Democrática Filipina.

The foundation of the church was a response to the historical mistreatment and racial discrimination of Filipinos by Spaniard priests and partly influenced by the unjust executions of José Rizal and Filipino priests and prominent secularization movement figures Mariano Gomez, José Burgos, and Jacinto Zamora, during the former Spanish colonial rule in the country when Catholicism was still the state religion.

Corregidor (Tagalog: [ko.ɾɛ.hɪˈdoɾ], Spanish: [ko.re.xiˈðoɾ], Tagalog: Pulo ng Corregidor, Spanish: Isla del Corregidor) is an island located at the entrance of Manila Bay in the southwestern part of Luzon in the Philippines, and is considered part of Cavite City and thus the province of Cavite. It is located 48 kilometres (30 mi) west of Manila, the nation's capital city and one of its most important seaports for centuries since the Spanish colonial period. Due to its strategic location, Corregidor has historically been fortified with coastal artillery batteries to defend the entrance of Manila Bay and Manila itself from attacks by enemy warships.

Corregidor (Fort Mills) is the largest of the islands that formed the harbor defenses of Manila Bay, together with El Fraile Island (Fort Drum), Caballo Island (Fort Hughes), and Carabao Island (Fort Frank), which were all fortified during the American colonial period. The island was also the site of a small military airfield, as part of the defense.

Mandaluyong (/məndɑːˈlujɒŋ/ mən-dah-LOO-yong; Tagalog pronunciation: [mɐndɐˈlujoŋ]), officially the City of Mandaluyong (Filipino: Lungsod ng Mandaluyong, [luŋˈsod nɐŋ mɐndɐˈlujoŋ]), is a highly-urbanized city in the National Capital Region of the Philippines. According to the 2024 census, it has a population of 465,902 people.

Located directly east of Manila, Mandaluyong was originally a barrio of Santa Ana de Sapa (now a district of Manila) called San Felipe Neri. It separated and became its own town in 1841, and later acquired the name Mandaluyong in 1931 during the American occupation. In 1994, it became the first municipality of Metro Manila to become a city since the metropolis' establishment in 1975.

Pasay, officially the City of Pasay (Filipino: Lungsod ng Pasay; IPA: [ˈpaː.saɪ̯]), is a highly urbanized city in the National Capital Region of the Philippines. According to the 2024 census, it has a population of 453,186 people.

Due to its location just south of Manila, Pasay quickly became an urban town during the American colonial period. It is now best known for being the site of most of Ninoy Aquino International Airport and of complexes such as Newport City and the SM Central Business Park.

Chinese Filipinos (sometimes referred as Filipino Chinese or Chinoy/Tsinoy in the Philippines) are Filipinos of full or partial Chinese descent, but are typically born and raised in the Philippines. Chinese Filipinos are one of the largest overseas Chinese communities in Southeast Asia. A large proportion of Chinese Filipinos can trace their ancestry back to the Chinese province of Fujian.

Chinese immigration to the Philippines occurred mostly during the Spanish colonization of the islands between the 16th and 19th centuries, attracted by the lucrative trade of the Manila galleons. During this era, they were referred to as Sangley. They were mostly the Hokkien-speaking Hokkien people that later became the dominant group within the Filipino-Chinese community. In the 19th century, migration was triggered by the corrupt and bad governance of the late Qing dynasty, combined with economic problems in China due to the Western and Japanese colonial wars and Opium Wars. It subsequently continued during the 20th century, from American colonial times, through the post-independence era to Cold War, to the present. In 2013, according to older records held by the Senate of the Philippines, there were approximately 1.35 million ethnic (or pure) Chinese within the Philippine population, while Filipinos with any Chinese descent comprised 22.8 million of the population. However, the actual current figures are not known since the Philippine census does not usually take into account questions about ethnicity. Accordingly, the oldest Chinatown in the world is located in Binondo, Manila, founded on December 8, 1594.

As part of the worldwide Catholic Church, the Catholic Church in the Philippines (Filipino: Simbahang Katolika sa Pilipinas), or the Philippine Catholic Church or Philippine Roman Catholic Church, is part of the world's largest Christian church under the spiritual leadership of the Pope in Rome. The Philippines is one of the two nations in Asia having a substantial portion of the population professing the Catholic faith, along with East Timor, and has the third largest Catholic population in the world after Brazil and Mexico. The episcopal conference responsible in governing the faith is the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP).

Christianity, through Catholicism, was first brought to the Philippine islands by Spanish soldiers, missionaries and settlers, who arrived in waves beginning in the early 16th century in Cebu by way of colonization. Catholicism served as the country's state religion during the Spanish colonial period; since the American colonial period, the faith today is practiced in the context of a secular state. In 2023, it was estimated that 89 million Filipinos, or roughly 80% of the population profess the Catholic faith.