Shahbaz Bhatti شہبازبھٹی
(9 September 1968 – 2 March 2011)

‘I want to live for Christ and it is for Him that I want to die.’

The Church in the Philippines is engaged in a nine-year preparation for the celebration in 2021 of the 500th anniversary of the arrival of Christianity in the Philippines in 1521. The first year of that preparation was the Year of Faith, 2013, observed throughout the world at the initiative of Pope Benedict XVI. The bishops of the Philippines have declared 2014, the second year of preparation for the celebration in 2021, as the Year of the Laity in the country.

Pope Francis in his apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, The Joy of the Gospel (EG), calls each one of us to share that joy with others.

In EG 102 Pope Francis writes:‘Even if many are now involved in the lay ministries, this involvement is not reflected in a greater penetration of Christian values in the social, political and economic sectors. It often remains tied to tasks within the Church, without a real commitment to applying the Gospel to the transformation of society.’ 

By Claudette I. Galacgac

The author finished her Bachelor of Arts in English, major in Language at the University of South Eastern Philippines in Davao City. Claudette has been involved in campus journalism since high school. Here, she shared how reading an article in Misyon has touched her and has made her look back her experiences too.

Upon reading the article Dealing Positively with Life Despite Uncertainties (Misyon, September-October 2012), I could say that I have wasted my time grieving over silly and petty matters. Unlike the author, I don’t have a disability affecting any aspect of my life, only financial instability. Ric is a polio victim but he has managed to keep a positive outlook on life which has led him to where he is now. The story of his life somehow changed my perspective.

By Fr John Keenan

The author is a Columban priest from Ireland who first came to the Philippines in 1966. Apart from a few years working in Britain he has been here since then. He is chaplain at Centro Escolar University, Manila.

To mark the Year of Faith and the New Evangelization, which ended on 24 November, the Solemnity of Christ the King, a very inspiring Philippine Conference on New Evangelization (PCNE), convened by Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle, Archbishop of Manila, was held at the Pontifical University of Sto Tomas (UST), Manila, 16-18 October 2013.

Located in the Quadricentennial Pavilion, an ultra modern arena with seating accommdation for some 6000 people on three raised terraces, it was indeed an awe-inspiring spectacle enhanced by colorful cinematic, light and sound effects. The altar on a raised colorful platform served as the focal point for the vast crowd of participants. Masterly planned and organized by some 60 people under the able leadership of Henrietta T. de Villa, former ambassador of the Philippines to the Holy See, it can serve as a model of conference planning for people anywhere in the world.

In his homily at the opening Mass Cardinal Tagle welcomed delegates from Brunei, Taiwan, Jakarta, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Japan, India and the USA as well as from all over the Philippines. This was shortly after the devastating earthquake in Cebu and Bohol in which some 186 people lost their lives and 583 were injured. Many ancient and historic churches were also destroyed. Cardinal Tagle expressed his solidarity with the victims and their families. The collections at all the Masses of the conference, to which the religious, priests and bishops contributed, were to offer them some help and support.

The theme was ‘God Can Make All Things New’..

According to the Cardinal the whole point of the PCNE is a humble contribution to the construction and strengthening of the Church rooted in Jesus, His words in the Spirit in the midst of ruins. Quoting what God reputedly said to St Francis, ‘Build my Church, rebuild my Church’, Cardinal Tagle said that the people of Cebu and Bohol have promised to do this. They are the real living Church.

The journey of the Church in the Philippines and the role of Popular Devotions in the New Evangelisation was ably explained by Fr Catalino Arevalo, S.J.
Archbishop Emeritus Leonardo Z. Legaspi OP of Caceres explained the great devotion which the Bicolanos have to Our Lady of Peñafrancia.

Our Lady of Peñafrancia

Celebration of Our Lady of Peñafrancia, Dublin, Ireland, 2012

By Jimmy A. Badilla

In obedience to the call of the Church to spread the Good News, Neocatechumenal Communities all over the world initiated a ‘Great Mission’ during the recently ended Year of Faith - reaching out to as many people as possible and hoping to share the love and mercy of God that they themselves have experienced in their lives thereby offering hope and salvation to the desolate, the forsaken, the downtrodden. Yolanda victims need the love of God more than all the material things that many of us want to comfort them with.  It is good, proper, and just that we give them whatever relief items we can afford, but above all as Christians we are called to let them feel how God works in our sufferings, how He wants to be with us as we agonize and bear our burdens, how He wants to give us hope and invite us to believe that after all ‘Man does not live by bread alone but by the words that come from the mouth of God’.  Popular Missions of the Neocatechumenal Communities in various typhoon-hit places in the Philippines are ongoing.

Estancia, Iloilo, is the Tacloban of Western Visayas. People died. Houses and properties were destroyed. The future seemed bleak and uncertain as no immediate chance at normalcy could be gleaned, except some reported plans from Canadians and other foreign groups to give sustained support for rehabilitation to those severely affected by Supertyphoon Haiyan/Yolanda. And the Philippine Government's usual promises that yet await concrete results.

This is what I ask of you. Be shepherds with the smell of the sheep. POPE FRANCIS

Meanwhile, the people of Estancia needed to grab at any good thing that might come their way just to survive: food, used clothing, tarpaulin or thin roofing--anything that could help them try and rebuild their lives once more. They need to move on. And they need people, too, to talk with them, feel their pain, their loss, their suffering. They need somebody to empathize with them. They need some shoulders to cry on to. They need to feel that God is alive through their fellow men.