MANILA, Philippines (RNS/ENI) She helped battle a 20-year-serving strongman, and joined with a popular cardinal in rallying people to a peaceful revolution.

Now, more than 23 years later, Corazon Aquino is fighting for her life with colon cancer, and she says the prayers of a grateful nation continue to sustain her as her family has entrusted her condition “to God’s will.”

The former Philippine president’s health has continued to deteriorate, her family said on Monday (July 20). The people in this mostly Roman Catholic country have been offering special prayers for the 76-year-old former leader, who has been hospitalized for a month.

Aquino was not deeply involved in politics until the assassination of her husband, Benigno Aquino, in 1983. Swept to power in 1986 by a civilian-backed military revolt that ousted dictator Ferdinand Marcos, she pledged and strived to remake the Marcos government.

She was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2008.

Prayers for the former president are coming not only from Catholics but also from other denominations and religious groups. Those prayers continue to sustain the former president, “even if the odds are against her,” her youngest daughter, television host Kris Aquino, told a national TV audience on July 13.

“My mom is in pain, and I thank and appeal to supporters for prayers so her suffering would be lessened,” Kris Aquino later told ABS-CBN television news on Sunday.

The Philippines’ church-run Catholic Media Network has called for prayers for Aquino, whom it described as a devout Catholic “in thoughts, words and deeds.”

The network operates Radio Veritas, which, in 1986, aired the calls of the late Cardinal Jaime Sin of Manila for the faithful to rally behind Aquino. Many thousands of Filipinos eventually came out on the streets, and braved the tanks and guns of Marcos’ soldiers in what has been described as the “People Power Revolution.” The network said Aquino had been “the key in restoring democracy,” and “a beacon of hope” for the nation.