SAN FERNANDO, Philippines (AFP) - - Ten men and a woman were nailed to wooden crosses here on Good Friday in a bizarre ritual held annually despite the disapproval of the mainstream Roman Catholic church.

Several hundred local and foreign tourists watched under a hot sun as the 10 men, clad in white loincloths, and a woman in a white robe reenacted what the Bible describes as the crucifixion of Jesus Christ 2,000 years ago.

The 11 staggered into a fenced-in knoll where neighbors dressed as Roman centurions awaited with wooden crosses, hammers and four-inch (10-centimetre) nails.

Bus driver Chito Sangalang grimaced as the nails were driven into his palms and feet as he was nailed to a cross. The cross was hoisted aloft for the crowd to see before Sangalang was taken down.

"It's amazing to see people sacrificing themselves for their sins," said American tourist Rey New, 40.

It was the 14th year Sangalang has been nailed to a cross. His brother Arnel was crucified for a seventh time along with eight other penitents.

Woman penitent Amparo Santos was crucified last.

Chito Sangalang told journalists that he was taking part in the annual crucifixion ritual to thank God for curing his mother of tuberculosis.

"I promised to do this for 15 years. This is my 14th year," he said.

The annual spectacle began when Sangalang was "arrested" by fellow worshippers dressed as Roman soldiers and brought before a man playing the role of Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor who authorized Jesus's death.

Accompanied by horse-riding "guards", he walked a dusty one-kilometer (0.6-miles) to the man-made knoll where he was nailed to the cross. Guards pretended to pierce his side with a spear.

The nails, soaked in alcohol beforehand, were pulled out after a few minutes.

Aside from the crucifixions, dozens of penitents walked barefoot in the village of San Pedro Cutud, beating their bare backs bloody with sticks laced with broken glass.

The Roman Catholic church has frowned upon such expressions of fealty, but penitents reenact them annually to seek special favors from God such as the healing of a sick relative or the meeting of a financial need.

"Faith is important, but let's not go to the extremes," Cardinal Jaime Sin, the highest-ranking church leader in the Philippines, has said.

Spain brought Catholicism to this southeast Asian archipelago with the sword of colonial conquest in 1521, and the Philippines remains the lone major Catholic outpost in Asia with more than 50 million Catholics.

The faith supplanted animism and Islam, which had arrived two centuries earlier, in all but a few areas in the large southern island of Mindanao.

In the Mindanao city of Zamboanga, large numbers of Roman Catholics stayed away from churches on Good Friday amid bomb threats attributed to Muslim extremists, residents said.

Soldiers and police armed with assault rifles guarded churches for afternoon masses following threats by the radical Islamic group Abu Sayyaf to attack Christian targets.

"We are afraid because there are threats of terrorists bombing churches here," said businesswoman Marites Fernandez, 27.

She, her husband and seven children broke tradition and avoided attending mass and a religious procession afterwards through the city, where 90 percent of the 500,000-strong population are Christians.

Fernandez's neighbours in Zamboanga's Tetuan district also stayed at home, most of them glued to television or radio sets where masses and Jesus's "Seven Last Words" while on the cross were aired live.

"Even my sister who has a statue of a saint did not attend the procession. It's very scary, we are just being careful," Fernandez told AFP.