4/14/2021 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly True, the removal as a missionary may have affected respondent's status as instructor of MBIS, but the Court is not convinced that there was an illegal dismissal. In this relation, We find the statement of the LA, that respondent's membership with Abiko Baptist Church of Japan as merely incidental to his main duties and responsibilities as an instructor,[30] misplaced. On the contrary, it is more appropriate to say that being an instructor of MBIS was part of respondent's mission work as a missionary/minister of BSAABC. Respondent's removal as a missionary of Abiko Baptist Church is different from his status as an instructor of MBIS. The Mission Policy Agreement[31] shows that the mission was accepted by respondent as early as September 15, 1998, while the appointment as an instructor was made on a different instrument, an Appointment Paper made effective in June 1999.[32] These two (2) instruments establish two (2) different positions held by respondent, and means that being a missionary of BSAABC is separate from being an instructor of MBIS, though they may be completely related. Be that as it may, petitioners' unrebutted claim that respondent voluntarily excused himself sometime in 2007 from teaching in MBIS, due to the distance of the school from his missionary work in San Carlos City,[33] raises doubt on the allegation of illegal dismissal. Second, We do not find in the records concrete evidence of the alleged monthly compensation of respondent amounting to $550. Respondent is not even consistent in claiming the exact amount of his supposed salary as he claims he was receiving $650 in his Motion for Reconsideration[34] with the NLRC and Petition[35] before the CA. Although petitioners do not deny that respondent was receiving "love gifts" in the amount of $550, they aver that these came from ABA and Abiko Baptist Church in Japan. Respondent also admitted that the "main bulk of the fund [came] from donor American Baptist Association[.]"[36] Thus, there may be merit in petitioners' claim that funds given to missionaries like respondent come from the ABA, not BSAABC or MBIS. In fact, the document from which the CA based its conclusion that there was payment of wages and the recipient thereof called a "salaried missionary" is the Mission Policy as contained in the ABA yearbook. In addition, the designation of "salaried missionary" is not determinative of the existence of an employer-employee relationship. "Salary" is a general term defined as remuneration for services given,[37] but the term does not establish a certain kind of relationship. Absent any clear indication that the amount respondent was allegedly receiving came from BSAABC or MBIS, or at the very least that ABA, Abiko Baptist Church of Japan and BSAABC and MBIS are one and the same, We cannot concretely establish payment of wages. As to the third element, We find that dismissal is inherent in religious congregations as they have the power to discipline their members. Admittedly, the nature of respondent's position as a missionary calls on the exercise of supervision by the church of which he is a member considering that the basis of the relationship between a religious corporation and its members is the latter's absolute adherence to a common religious or spiritual belief.[38] Although respondent's removal is clear from the https://elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/66079 5/24