This chapter emphasizes a new conflict-ridden paradigm of religious division that stresses competition, contentiousness, and factionalism in the cathedral body to reconstruct social fields set in motion in early modern Manila. A micro-historical approach—focusing on how individuals and small communities experienced and influenced broader historical processes—is essential to understanding the relevance and complexity of these capitular bodies. Such an analysis places bishops, archbishops, and prebendaries within elite diocesan networks, revealing their connections to families and power groups whose interests extended beyond strictly religious matters.