.

Global restiveness

2011-11-04T07:22:00.002-08:00

THE recent wave of popular uprising that started on December 18, 2011 in Tunisia has now escalated far and wide. It was beyond the imagination of even the most astute social forecasters. For who would even thought that Hosni Mubarak would bow out that fast after 30 years of power in Egypt? Or, most astonishingly, who would have ever drawn up a scenario for a demagogue like Colonel Muammar

Year of Faith

2011-10-26T07:20:00.001-08:00

POPE Benedict the XVI has officially announced the Year of Faith that will commence on October 11, 2012 and end on November 24, 2013—the feast of Christ the King. This will mark the 50th anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council and the 20th anniversary of Blessed John Paul II’s publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The formal announcement was made last October 15

The winter out of the Arab Spring

2011-10-05T19:26:00.000-08:00

EARLY this year, the world was glued to the unfolding of the so-called Arab Spring that started in Tunisia and high-peaked with the expulsion of the powerful Hosni Mubarak out of his own Egypt. Most global bystanders thought that a trailblazer of a new paradigm was in the offing. International news organizations were feeding viewers with video footages of protesting crowds who were mostly young

Rice sufficiency

2011-10-01T14:17:00.000-08:00

IN the wake of two successive strong typhoons “Pedring” and “Quiel” that hit Central Luzon, the Department of Agriculture gave an assurance that rice in these areas will last until December this year. Reportedly only about 350,000 metric tons of palay were damage during the typhoons, which accounts for only about half of the 800,000 MT surplus of the 3 million MT of palay that this region’s

Gambling money worsens the poor

2011-09-28T19:24:00.000-08:00

IN July this year, the Senate inquiry on the cars granted by Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) to a couple of bishops has shown that the supposedly well-crafted PR work of PCSO to demolish the church (that is staunchly against the legislation of the Reproductive Health Bill) was not too well-crafted after all—it backfired. Cans of worms were opened and the public saw how this gambling

The pro-RH lie

2011-09-14T19:22:00.000-08:00

IN last week’s senate hearing a Pro-RH Senator finally admitted that the heavily hyped eleven maternal deaths per day in the Philippines is a public relations phrase “used by NGOs to drive home a point.” The doctoring of statistics is certainly a case of intellectual dishonesty that can never be whitewashed by any intention no matter how good. In this case, the intention is even doubly dubious

Impact of WYD 2011

2011-08-29T07:08:00.000-08:00

THE two million young people from all over the world that gathered in Madrid for the 26th World Youth Day last August 16 to 21 could have easily been a big media event—or at least according to usual journalism books. Gathering that big volume of young people especially at a time following the pro-democracy youth of the Arab Spring and the aimless youth riots in London cannot but hit the pages

The state of PNoy

2011-08-01T19:05:00.000-08:00

THE 53-minute or so State of the Nation Address (SONA) of President Benigno Aquino III last July 25 may have captured a considerable majority of the masses—for whom it was seemingly intended by the way it was projected over nationwide radio and TV, but less to those who appeared not so keen at the august halls of the House—yet sectoral groups were far from bolstered. According to various

RH President

2011-07-20T18:43:00.000-08:00

AFTER almost a year now in office, President Benigno Simeon Aquino III seems to have been very persistent with only one agenda: the passage of the Reproductive Health Bill. If there is anything interesting that can highlight best his first year in office that will be his unrelenting engagement with Catholic bishops on the same worn out issue, the RH bill. He may be the first president in this

Poverty

2011-07-16T18:20:00.000-08:00

THE National Secretariat for Social Action is spearheading a National Poverty Summit next month. The objective of the summit, according to Fr. Edu Gariguez, executive secretary of NASSA, is to look into the real causes of poverty and “decide which way to take.” There had been big conferences and even commendable studies on the real causes of poverty notably by the government during the

The waivers at PCSO

2011-07-12T19:00:00.000-08:00

AROUND the last week of May this year, Bayan Muna party-list Representative Neri Javier Colmenares submitted for investigation in the House of Representatives a P50-billion worth of transactions involving the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) with TMA, an Australian company that supplies PCSO with thermal paper in a signed contract that has a lifespan of 50 years. Among others, he also

Perceptions

2011-06-22T05:33:00.002-08:00

A COLUMNIST and supporters of the Reproductive Health Bill now crawling in social networks zeroed in on half-hazard financial data of some dioceses and religious congregations that reportedly have placements in banks and investment houses allegedly running into billions of pesos. Obviously, the equation they are trying to crack is to project the Catholic Church in the Philippines to be very

New Evangelization

2011-06-08T05:21:00.000-08:00

LAST month Pope Benedict XVI formally instituted a new dicastery or a new department at the Roman Curia named the “Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization.” Apparently, this has been in his mind for sometime now, perhaps taking cue from the Novo millennio ineunte of his predecessor, now Blessed John Paul II. Expectedly, this dicastery will become very handy during the

Corruption and the RH

2011-05-11T13:27:00.000-08:00

GIVEN the prevailing notoriety of the Philippines that is perceived as the most corrupt country in Asia, at least according to the 2007 perception survey conducted by Political & Economic Risk Consultancy (PERC), it would not be too hard to swallow the expose of Senate majority leader Vicente Sotto III last May 10 that P2.6 billion allocations of the Department of Health (DOH) for Maternal,

Tell the world of his love

2011-04-27T19:33:00.003-08:00

THE beatification of Pope John Paul II on May 1 will have a healing effect on the Catholic Church that had been bruised for over a decade now by multifaceted onslaughts due mainly to sexual aberrations of some of her clergy. As pastor of the universal church for over 26 years (1978-2005), he mended conflicts not only within the walls of the church but even in the secular world. He can do no

Japan’s crisis

2011-04-15T18:53:00.000-08:00

AS a people, Japan’s handling of its continuing crisis brought about a battery of calamities was no less than exemplary that has earned both envy and growing admiration of international bystanders. People suffering in silence were seen highly considerate with fellow victims especially when it came to relief distribution that otherwise exudes the worst in man in most countries—even the Hurricane

Spirituality in the defense of life

2011-03-30T08:38:00.000-08:00

IMUS Bishop Chito Tagle in his homily at the Thanksgiving Mass for Life held at the Manila Cathedral last March 23, 2011, called for developing “spirituality towards the defense of life”. That was not only superb; it was very opportune at this point in time when working relentlessly for the passage of the Reproductive Health Bill seems to be the main obsession of some legislators, and, therefore,

Is it springtime in the Arab world?

2011-03-12T00:25:00.001-08:00

IS the popular uprising that started in Tunisia and now raging in Bahrain, Yemen and Libya a political virus that is infecting the Arab countries? Is it an orchestrated scheme of some fundamentalist groups the likes of Muslim Brotherhood in pursuit of a more sinister global agenda? Or is it just that people are already weary of overstaying regimes as in the case of Tunisia (21 years), Egypt (30

RH in social networks

2011-02-17T19:31:00.003-08:00

SURELY, it was not by a careless twist of fate that the architect of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, was voted Time’s person of the year. It was because of the tremendous revolution that this social medium has triggered especially on how people the world over interact with each other, spontaneously bringing about a democratization of information and, perhaps, power. With about 600 million users and

A new template

2011-02-04T23:57:00.001-08:00

IF the 30-year repressive rule of President Hosni Mubarak crumbles—and most of the world hopes it would—then what political observers call “new template” for change will have so much bearing on Arab countries all the way from Algeria to Yemen that look up to Egypt, the most populous Arab nation. Political pundits surmise that neighboring Arab countries maybe taking the cue from Mubarak. Writer

Dialogues

2011-02-02T22:54:00.002-08:00

PRO-LIFERS in this part of the world have been watching with keen interest, and some understandably with skepticism, the dialogues between Malacañang and the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) which started on November 19, 2010 and second-rounded on January 24, 2011. Last January 31, however, when the CBCP released a pastoral letter titled “Choosing Life, Rejecting the RH Bill

PCP-II @ 20

2011-01-19T23:52:00.001-08:00

THE Second Plenary Council of the Philippines is twenty years old. Celebrated on January 20 to February 17 1991 at the Holy Apostles Seminary in Makati City, it was the first plenary council ever held in the Catholic world since the promulgation of the 1983 Code of Canon Law. PCP-II was brave and bold. It challenged the Church in the Philippine “to be a community of disciples, a church of the

Disturbing agenda

2011-01-15T11:51:00.000-08:00

THE year 2011 opened, at least for Catholics, with the Holy Father’s “Religious freedom, the path to peace”—his traditional message for the World Day of Peace, the 44th this year. Obviously, this message and all the calls for peace that he has been saying during the last few months were in response to the rise in Islamic fundamentalism. In his January 1 Angelus, he pointed out two alarming

Intolerance

2011-01-05T23:48:00.000-08:00

“A MAN who is convinced of the truth of his religious is indeed never tolerant,” Albert Einstein was once quoted. But that is, of course, a way of saying. What is pervasive is religious intolerance that maybe regarded as an anthropological phenomenon that has been around since day one. At a Country Report on Human Rights a couple of years ago, John Shattuck of the U.S. State Department for

Early glitches

2010-12-15T23:43:00.000-08:00

THE seeming success of the first automated national elections in this country obviously has dominated the highlights of the year 2010. And this came about amid doubts, debates and prejudices that the electoral body and the incumbent leadership could ever beget clean and honest polls. Today, of course, doubt seems to be still lingering on. But this may just be part of the Filipino cultural

The social concern challenge

2010-12-06T23:45:00.000-08:00

THE message of Pope Benedict XVI delivered in audience on November 29 to the first batch of Philippine bishops who went to Rome on the occasion of their visit ad limina Apostolorum maybe viewed as a congratulatory to the Philippine church. The Pontiff commended the Church in the Philippines “for seeking to play its part in support of human life from conception until natural death, and in defense

Dissonance in the Church?

2010-11-05T23:37:00.001-08:00

CALL the Catholic Church any name, as is commonly done today in social networks, or even accuse her of being out of touch with reality as one recently did when he carelessly dared the church to peep under the bridges in Metro Manila and discover that the world is swarming with unwanted population—without realizing that it is the likes of Caritas Manila or religious and social action groups that

“Irresponsible parenthood”

2010-10-27T06:27:00.000-08:00

IN Facebook, a cursory comment was lodged at Good Morning CBCP saying in “jejemon,” “wla na…konti na lng ki2tain nla kng konti na lng bi2nyagan.” (No more… they will earn little if those to be baptized are getting fewer). Obviously, the one who commented was referring, if sarcastically, to the efforts of the Catholic Church to oppose the legislation of the Reproductive Health Bill because, once

RH is not about health

2010-10-07T15:50:00.000-08:00

NO, the Reproductive Health Bill is not about health. It is about population deceleration, so that if there is less population there will be less mouth to feed and therefore, or so the equation goes, better economy. It is about eugenics, so that in order to ascertain their happy survival the superior races, who are the wealthier, are financing the deterioration of the lower and poorer ones.

The Jueteng agenda

2010-09-30T15:53:00.003-08:00

AT first blush it would seem that Archbishop Oscar Cruz is a solitary prophet crying in the wilderness yet with admirable courage and gait in his crusade against what he calls a persistent curse that is Jueteng. But actually he is not. He is backed up with three pastoral statements of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines. In 2003, the bishops issued “Eradicate Gambling: It is

Hostaging the Filipino people

2010-09-08T18:55:00.003-08:00

THE Manila archbishop is right. The botched hostage rescue operation of the special forces of the Philippine National Police is, in the words of the Cardinal, “…really a black-eye…the worst thing that ever happened to us.” There has been no other instance in Philippine history when other nationals, especially China and Hong Kong, reviled the country but this infamous hostage drama that claimed

An icon of love for the poor

2010-09-02T06:26:00.002-08:00

BARELY two decades after the dawn of a new outlook of the social doctrine of the Church in Rerum Novarum of Pope Leo XIII, Mother Teresa of Calcutta was born in the world that would challenge her to live her whole life in pursuit of—in the words of Centessimus Annus of Pope John Paul II—“the defense of the human person and the safeguarding of human dignity.” Of late, or on the dates surrounding

Graviora delicta

2010-08-21T04:42:00.000-08:00

WHEN the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith published the Normae de gravioribus delictis (Norms concerning the most serious crimes) last July 15, 2010, the media, which Fr. Federico Lumbardi, the Vatican spokesperson, referred to as “non-specialist public,” was immediately on hand to lash out its own reading of the norms. The loudest among them was the New York Times which eclectically

State of the nation

2010-07-27T18:44:00.000-08:00

THIS time the State of the Nation Address was different. It was far cry from the SONAs of paper boats, super maids and super regions, strong republic and the “ramdam ang kaulanran” sort of crap. But President Benigno Aquino III somehow unfurled a more honest state of the nation—a nation in shambles if only because of leaders who were more engrossed with party politics and self-aggrandizement

Bracing up for the new Roman Missal

2010-07-23T18:29:00.001-08:00

THE Vatican has given “recognitio” or statement of acceptance to the English version of the Third Edition of the Roman Missal. In a formal gathering held at the Vatican on April 28, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI was handed a copy of the complete version of the English translation that contained the “recognitio,” dated March 25, 2010, and signed by Cardinal Antonio Canizares Llovera, prefect of the

Why not also “bang-bang”

2010-07-10T05:59:00.001-08:00

AS usual, militant groups always come up fast with acronyms, posters and grafittis. Immediately after the inaugural of President Benigno Aquino III, they slugged with: “Itigil ang bang-bang, hindi lang ang wang-wang!” They were referring, of course, to the extrajudicial killings that cross-boarded to the new administration without letup right on the very same platform of impunity that,

Deodorizing history

2010-07-10T05:42:00.003-08:00

THE over half-million warm bodies, made warmer by the sweltering humidity, at the Quirino Grandstand who attended the inaugural of President Noynoy Aquino last June 30 was a statement—a statement for change made clearer by the crowd during the mass recitation of “Panata ng Pagbabago” (Oath for Change).That may have been the biggest inaugural crowd in Philippine history not to mention the

Sexualization of children

2010-06-23T19:01:00.003-08:00

AT press time the Secretary of the Department of Education seem to have stepped back from implementing the sex education curriculum saying “we have decided to hold sex education module in abeyance until a final decision is made on the consulting process.” At first blush that seems to be happy development. But this is no cause for jubilation for the parents who went out of their way to sue the

Hi-tech manipulation

2010-06-04T18:51:00.000-08:00

WAS there really cheating during the first automated polls in the Philippines held last May 10, 2010? Of course, there was. Believably, it has always been so since the first national elections in 1946 (after the rebirth of Philippine independence in July 4, 1946) but only gained widespread notoriety during the snap elections in 1986 that saw computer encoders walking out for failing to swallow

The matter of truth

2010-05-27T23:10:00.002-08:00

THE President of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines and Tandag Bishop Nereo Odchimar is right when he dared whistleblowers to substantiate allegations of election fraud with solid proof or else drop the claims. Indeed, if there is solid evidence such allegations should be taken seriously and duly investigated. Otherwise they may be taken as fishing expeditions that can end up

Journey to political renewal

2010-05-12T01:31:00.001-08:00

ALTHOUGH the current electoral process is still far from over, the general national feeling is that of amazement and perhaps satisfaction. It is not farfetched that some may even hail some awards to the Comelec and those responsible for its developing success. The manual count that took ages to accomplish because, admittedly, it took the long route of manipulations which included the notorious

Space for optimism

2010-05-02T19:39:00.002-08:00

IT’S barely a week before the first automated national elections in the Philippines and everybody seem still grounded on procedures—distrusted, unpopular and smeared procedures, if you may. The cynicism is all about the failure rate of the Precinct Count Optical Scanner (PCOS) machines, the bloated voters list and the hovering ghosts of the “garci gang”. But instead of procedures, the

But why Benedict XVI?

2010-04-11T01:09:00.001-08:00

BENEDCIT XVI was 78 when he assumed the Chair of Peter in April of 2005. On that calm Sunday morning he was installed at St. Peter’s square before world leaders and over half a million pilgrims coming from all parts of the world. He spoke of his inadequacies as Pontiff and how the prayers of the faithful would sustain him in his tremendous task. “I am not alone. I do not have to carry alone

A season of purification

2010-03-30T19:08:00.001-08:00

GLOBAL news organizations hollered stories like “Pope opens Holy Week amid sex abuse crisis” and variations on the resurgent theme of a church put to shame by pedophiles among its ranks. The New York Times have been singled out to have said the loudest when it splattered on its front page last week the story that the Holy Father had prevented sanctions against Fr. Lawrence Murphy, a Milwaukee

The condom alibi

2010-03-17T19:06:00.000-08:00

SOME people at the health department maybe aptly portrayed, wrongly or rightly, to be on a rampage in condom promotions—which include public distribution of the rubber in bus terminals on Valentine’s Day, spinning media hype, gathering support from celebrities and operating public relations, among others. And this, not to mention the costly mobilizations of women militant groups. And there’s

DOH on a rampage

2010-02-27T00:35:00.001-08:00

OF LATE, we got bungled up with the news that the secretary of government’s Department of Health is again on a rampage. This time she is going to distribute pills. Philippine Star quoted her as saying: “I think it’s the right thing to do in order to promote the health of the people and that is a mandate the DOH has. We are just doing what we are supposed to do.” Of course, the DOH is doing

A “Lenten” justice

2010-02-17T19:55:00.001-08:00

THROUGH his pontifical reign, Pope Benedict XVI has a cadence of Lenten messages seemingly orchestrated as a syllabus starting with his first in 2006 when he talked about development—but development that transcended like the “gaze” of Christ (Mt 9:36) that penetrated worldly cares towards eschatological demands. In the years that followed, he dwelt on the traditional “weapons” of the Lenten

In praise of the media

2010-02-07T00:25:00.000-08:00

DESPITE a heap of Vatican documents beginning with Vigilanti Cura of 1936 and the landmark conciliar decree Inter Mirifica of 1963, and the annual papal messages initiated by John Paul II during World Communications Day that exhorts the Church to deeply engage with the media, some leaders of the Catholic Church, at least in the country, still find it uncomfortable, to say it too mildly, to get

The success of the 2nd National Congress of the Clergy

2010-01-30T18:45:00.000-08:00

THERE is no mistaking that the 2nd National Congress of the Clergy was a phenomenal success. The sight of more than Five Thousand priests robed in white was spectacular—during liturgical celebrations especially at confessions, and on the 1.2-kilometer procession towards Cuneta Astrodome in Pasay City. But numbers alone do not a success make—except from the mobilization point of view. And

To walk with the laity

2010-01-20T09:59:00.000-08:00

WHILE YouthPinoy, an aggrupation of young people that calls themselves “online missionaries,” made a big splash over the weekend at the launching of its portal with the Apostolic Nuncio, some bishops, priests and about two thousand young people in attendance, a group of lay people unceremoniously uploaded an urgent letter to an online global petition hosting site. Titled “Urgent Letter from the

Forecasters and soothsayers

2010-01-12T18:57:00.000-08:00

AS if by force of habit, or is it by strategic political spin?, government forecasters the likes of National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) and the whole caboodle of Palace technocrats always races with the soothsayers of Quiapo and the Feng Shui connoisseurs of Binondo in cracking the crystal ball for what’s in store for the country in every new year. Immediately after the smog of

Peace and the environment

2010-01-08T07:09:00.000-08:00

THE old Latin saw, si viz pacem para bellum (if you want peace prepare for war) that is historically attributed to the Roman military writer Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus, has inspired political leaders from the third century until lately when stockpiling nuclear arsenal was meant to deter, or so it seemed, global strife. With no reference to Leo Tolstoy’s novel that surrounds Napoleon’s

The rebellion spin

2009-12-09T18:35:00.000-08:00

AT press time when the historic joint session of Congress deliberating on the merits or otherwise of Proclamation 1959—that declared martial law in Maguindanao province—is still on progress, the growing popular logic does not see how Malacañang based its daring on Section 18, Art VII of the Constitution that states: “In case of invasion or rebellion, when the public safety requires it, (the

Justifying Martial Law

2009-12-07T18:30:00.000-08:00

EQUALLY stunning and, perhaps, as gruesome as the massacre of 57 civilians on November 23 in Brgy. Masilay, Ampatuan, Maguindanao, was Proclamation No. 1959 “Proclaiming a State of Martial Law and Suspending the Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus in the Province of Maguindanao, Except for Certain Areas” which was made public only in the evening of December 4, 2009. The reasons concocted for

The politics that kills

2009-11-25T03:17:00.003-08:00

THE recent massacre in Maguindanao has stunned the world. United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon led an international outcry against the “brutal” violence which he condemned as “heinous crime.” The European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, blurted a strongest condemnation to this “barbaric killing….of innocent civilians, including women, journalists and lawyers…” More

The pope and the youth in the digital world

2009-11-11T03:27:00.000-08:00

THE 26 years of petrine ministry of the late Pope John Paul II is crowded with monumental deeds of both ecclesiastical and social imports. The universal catechism, the new code of canon law and his intervention in the final collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, are just a few of his colossal legacies to humanity. Disputable as it may seem, but the most impact-making of the late Pope’s

Ending the Anglican “experiment”

2009-10-28T02:37:00.000-08:00

AT first blush it may look like it was Pope Benedict XVI who hammered the last nail to the Anglican crisis by issuing an Apostolic Constitution that will allow former Anglicans to enter full visible communion with the Roman Catholic Church while preserving elements of distinctive Anglican spiritual patrimony. On closer look, it was actually an opportune response of the Holy See to mounting

Now it’s the Pope’s word

2009-10-16T18:01:00.000-08:00

AFTER that very courageous post-election statement of Philippine Catholic Bishops in February of 1986, many more pastoral statements followed denouncing bad governance and the way politics is done in the country. In that statement, the one-liner that has launched a thousand courageous moves seems to be this: “Now is the time to speak up. Now is the time to repair the wrong. The wrong was

Twittering disasters

2009-10-07T02:33:00.001-08:00

THE world was watching as the flash floods brought about by tropical storm Ondoy drove thousands of Metro Manilans to scamper for safety in their rooftops or swam to higher grounds. In minutes, SMS that carried texts, videos and photos were transmitted to relatives and friends abroad. And twitter rattled numerous twits of alarm and pleadings for help. Barely three hours from the onset of the

The Metro Manila flooding: A disaster of mismanagement and corruption

2009-10-06T17:55:00.001-08:00

TROPICAL storm Ondoy, internationally known Ketsana, that hit mostly Central Luzon on September 26 was not even a typhoon. It was all about a two-day torrential rain with barely a wind. But it left the country with 295 people dead and counting, hundreds injured and many more missing. Damage to property according to government reports is estimated at P9.767 billion which counts P3.412 billion in

Epic flood

2009-09-30T02:45:00.002-08:00

CBCP President Angel Lagdameo calls it “epic flood”. Perhaps, because the inundation brought about by typhoon Ondoy was beyond the realm of the conventional. The flash floods swelled so fast and so vast to cover immediately about 80% of Metro Manila and outlaying provinces in just over an hour of that fateful Saturday morning. In a couple of hours later, the media was already showing people

The killing of a priest

2009-09-20T18:47:00.004-08:00

THE government or its instrumentalities may not have any hand in the killing Fr. Celilio Lucero of late, but common sentiments ride on the perception that it is most likely so. In fact, some progressive journalists fed on the report that no less than the commander-in-chief herself, on her recent visit to Northern Samar, allegedly tagged the priest as a communist—which is very unlikely—thereby

“Reform of the reform”

2009-09-02T05:02:00.004-08:00

VATICAN media has been expectedly aggressive like a hornets’ nest stirred by a blog of a known Vatican analyst, Andrea Tornielli, who has commented that the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, headed by Cardinal Antonio Canizares is reforming the reforms of the Second Vatican Council—“riforma della riforma,” he calls it. He finger points to the Holy Father as

Why the hoot!

2009-08-26T06:38:00.006-08:00

SCAPEGOATS the likes of “it’s a communist propaganda” or “it’s politically motivated” or, the more recent, “it’s a media hype” are too hackneyed to merit credence, or even just a whimper of attention. They used to sell good during the heyday of Marcos, because during the time of Martial Law there was no way to check the veracity of things except to groan for thy-kingdom-come. But today with

In search for the Asian face of Jesus

2009-08-21T12:11:00.001-08:00

THE work of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences (FABC) is basically pastoral. Or, at least, that is how its Secretary General, Cotabato Archbishop Orlando Quevedo, sees it. Being such, the primary pastoral focus articulated by the first FABC plenary assembly in Taipei in 1974 was building a renewed local church in a mission of integral evangelization in the midst of Asian realities, such

The makings of a heroic icon

2009-08-11T07:36:00.002-08:00

AGAINST the backdrop of a sullied political dispensation of the present and an equally murky conjugal regime of a haunting past, there maybe no mistaking to the observation of CBCP President and Jaro Archbishop Angel Lagdameo that no couple in Philippines history has had a greater positive impact than the late Senator Benigno Aquino, Jr. and his wife, former President Corazon Aquino. Both of them

Thanks to the bishops

2009-07-22T11:41:00.000-08:00

THE Pastoral Exhortation on Philippines Politics issued in September of 1997 maybe one of the best documents of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) so far since its incipience 64 years ago. Comprehensive as it is down-to-earth, the document seem to have gathered the perfection of the Second Plenary Council of the Philippines in that it called a spade a spade on matters of

Charity in truth

2009-07-15T06:46:00.003-08:00

RERUM Novarum of Pope Leo XIII in 1891 was a trailblazer. It was the first social encyclical that opened the eyes, though how late, of most in the Church who have been largely if eternally peroccupied only with either solving theological problems or refining the pageantry of the sacristy or both.A far cry from the usual concerns of the church that was more serious with indulgences rather than

Charity in truth

2009-07-15T03:06:00.000-08:00

RERUM Novarum of Pope Leo XIII in 1891 was a trailblazer. It was the first social encyclical that opened the eyes, though how late, of most in the Church who have been largely if eternally peroccupied only with either solving theological problems or refining the pageantry of the sacristy or both. A far cry from the usual concerns of the church that was more serious with indulgences rather than

Year for Priests

2009-06-20T06:33:00.001-08:00

THE annual themes from June 19, 2009 to June 19, 2010 are a mouthful. First, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) decided during their plenary assembly in January 2009, to declare a Year of the Two Hearts of Jesus and Mary for Peace-Building and Lay participation for Social Change, at the tail-end of the Year of St. Paul. The principal objective being the May 2010

Suffer the farmers

2009-05-27T06:35:00.000-08:00

THE farmers have been generally peaceful. They walk for hundreds of kilometers, as what those from Sumilao did, and even go as far as do hunger strikes, like what happened in December last year, to peacefully press for the land that justifiably belongs to them. But the police, and, by command responsibility, this administration have been intolerant and narrow-minded whenever there are

Yes, Virginia, Congress will approve CARP

2009-05-20T21:59:00.004-08:00

THE legislators in both houses of Congress are dragging their feet towards approving the bill that will extend the Agrarian Reform Program (CARP). But there is no mistaking that they will approve it, because not one of them will want to be tagged as anti-poor or anti-farmer—especially when the next election is just around the corner. To disapprove CARP is very un-political and no politician

Pacquiao Phenomenon

2009-05-12T00:36:00.002-08:00

MANNY Pacquiao is phenomenal. By sheer boxing prowess he has touched every chord of the Filipino psyche, or so it looks—but more so his demeanor in the ring that makes the simplicity of Manny Pacquiao all the more outstanding. He has brought down the curtains from ecclesiastical palaces to shanties and suspended sessions both in the sabongan and in the Congress as a herd of congressmen trooped

Caritas in Veritatis

2009-05-03T00:16:00.001-08:00

NOT from the ecclesiastical grapevine or from the rumor mill of the Vatican, but from the very president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace came the leak that the Holy Father is releasing his third encyclical in June. Last week the Italian media quoted Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the aforementioned Council, as saying, “I believe June 29, the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul,

Easter not a fairy tale

2009-04-13T00:53:00.000-08:00

AT first blush, one wonders why the Pontiff at his Easter Message delivered before he imparted his blessing “urbi et orbi”, argued that Easter is not based on a myth, a theory or a fairy tale, but rather on the very real historical event of Christ’s death and resurrection. The resurrection “is not a theory, but a historical reality…it is neither a myth nor a dream, it is not a vision or a utopia,

Kidnapping Capital

2009-04-04T15:10:00.001-08:00