Peace! Kalilintad! Shalom!

Author: A Dose of God Today

  • Serve Ta: On Being an OMPH Parishioner-Redemptorist

    Serve Ta: On Being an OMPH Parishioner-Redemptorist

    (This article was first published in the BULAWANONG GASA: OMPH Parish Golden Jubilee 1972-2022 coffee table book.)

    At 52, on my 29th year as Redemptorist Missionary & on my 25th year as ordained priest, I have much to be thankful of the many graces God has shared me all throughout these years. Along the vocation & privilege of serving our Lord as Redemptorist missionary priest, I am humbly given a chance to witness how the Lord has continually worked His wonders in us through us, His followers.

    In 1996, being its first ordinand, I have been part of the birthing & have witnessed the growing years of Redemptorist Cebu Province. To revive the stagnant mission-efforts in Negros Oriental region, as a young priest, I have organized Dumaguete Redemptorist Mission Team doing mission around Negros Oriental & Siquijor Island, that somehow awaken missionary dynamism within Dumaguete Diocese, which has paved a way for collaborations with the local church’s BEC ministry, organization & formation endeavors, and the missionary formation of Redemptorist postulants-then, whom some of them are now promising Redemptorist missionary priests & brother .

    While studying in Leuven, Belgium, I have been involved with various Filipino Catholic communities in Belgium, Netherlands & Germany during weekends & breaks. After gaining my licentiate & some stints with teaching at SATMI, as our collaborative effort with other units & explorative initiative for migrant ministry, I found myself in Gwangju in South Korea, ministering to our OFWs & all English-speaking migrants as spiritual director for all Filipino Catholic Communities in the Archdiocese.

    Journeying with our Lord, humbly grateful I am indeed, to have witnessed & been part of God’s wonders being revealed & God’s miracles being offered to all us now & always.

    Be as it may be, all of these graces I take great credit not only on my missionary experiences & journey as Redemptorist missionary priest, but on my growing & formative years as parishioner of Our Mother Perpetual Help-Bajada.

    Yes, I am a Redemptorist for life & I am also a parishioner of OMPH-Bajada in life. Since as a kid until adulthood, I have grown under the tutelage of Redemptorists and of the OMPH Bajada Parish all my life. And now happens to be also the Only REDEMPTORIST so-far whose family is originally from our OMPH parish.

    Daily gazing at the backdrop of the great Mt. Apo, I remember, growing as a kid in Buhangin, I cannot help but wonder about the world beyond out there. From a protective and less-involved but regular church-goer family (of seafarer father), world-out-there, life-beyond family & school was made known to me with a simple invitation: “SERVE Ta”.

    At a young age of eight, me & my classmate buddies found ourselves serving Sunday masses as Knights of the Altar – or altar boys in our parish church. There, we come not only to learn how to serve, participate, & understand sacraments, but also were able to meet and grow with other kids & people from other BEC communities. Through these experiences, we were initiated to our Catholic religion & church life, most especially to parish life – a life beyond family, schools, & neighborhood. Since then, the words “Serve ta” became part of our vocabulary as we grew in age & maturity as parishioner and as Christians.

    As OMPH Bajada parish has grown & evolved these years, for us parishioners who have been part of the parish ever since before and even until we have branched out into other parishes and countries, the challenges & responses to the invitation of “SERVE ta” has always been part of the language-vocabulary of our parish church life within our BECs & families in whatever capacities & talents.   

    As Parishioners, we are also grateful to the Redemptorist charism and for the witness of Redemptorists we have journeyed with, here in Davao, as we have been formed & grown in the spirit of involvement, voluntarism, and charitable service for our dear parish. Through the Redemptorist we have come to know, love & serve our Lord & our Church. In our parish, we also come to experience Redemptorists as missionaries. They are dear & close to us but they are transitory – never permanent. Redemptorists come and go. Some left but most, still remains. Same way as part of our parish is now apart from us, as they are now a new parish, Redemptorists as well as us OMPH parishioners as we are, evolves not only for our good but moreso for the better version of our faith-life in Christ.

    However & Whatever might be in store for us now & for the near the future, the challenge for us OMPH parishioners here at home & abroad,  & for me – specifically as OMPH parishioner Redemptorist, remains still and always: “SERVE Ta”.

    Proficiat. 축하합니다Congratulations to OMPH Bajada Parish on our Golden Anniversary    

  • LOL: Law Of Love

    LOL: Law Of Love

    June 8, 2022 – Wednesday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary Time

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/060822.cfm)

    “Sa classroom may batas, bawal lumabas, oh bawal lumabas. Pero pag sinabi, pag nag-comply ka na bawal na lumabas… pero may ginawa ka sa pinagbabawal nila, inayos mo yong law ng classroom niyo at sinubmit mo ulit… ay pwede na pala ikaw lumabas.” Sounds familiar?

    While we earlier adjust to the constrains demanded of health protocols & restrictions of Covid-pandemic times – although subject to a lot of misinterpretations, somehow these words of Kim Chui particularly highlight our certain unhealthy attitudes towards observance of the law. It may sound clever & smart, but definitely there is something unhealthy & devious about such attitude towards laws & commandments. Yes, we do tend to fix, outwit, or by-passing the law (may ginawa, inayos at sinubmit) for our own convenience & advantages rather than abiding for common good.

    In our gospel today, Jesus said: “I have come not to abolish but to fulfill the laws or the prophets.” Though he was judged as trouble-maker and law-breaker of the established Jewish laws & traditions, Jesus is teaching us here that he is not into the business & attitude of fixing the law – not into deconstructing, downgrading or upgrading, reviewing, making or abolishing the law. But rather, Jesus is fulfilling the law – doing, observing, practicing & teaching the value & spirit of the law. His affairs are the fulfillment & observance, rather than fixing or circumventing God’s commandment of Love.

    In other words, in our loving God & others as we love ourselves, like Him Jesus wants us to be concerned more on WHAT should be done than on only HOW things should be done. Like Him, Jesus wants us to do & teach the RIGHT things rather than on how things done rightly or properly. Because experience teaches us that we can do wrong things in a right and proper way, and we can make mistake in doing the Right things. OR we can do the right things in love in a right way, like Jesus.

    As we receive anew the gift of the Holy Spirit after Easter Season, we are now back to Ordinary time in our Liturgical Year calendar. How to practice our faith life as Easter people, believers of the risen Lord, guided now by the Holy Spirit is the very challenge of Ordinary liturgical Time. And this is deeply reflected on our particular attitude towards God’s commandment of Love.

    Like Jesus, are we doing the Right things rightly and fulfilling the Law of Love? Or are we just rightly/properly doing right and wrong thing, and more like fixing & by-passing, outwitting, sidestepping the commandment to love?

    In our love and loving, Mother of Perpetual Help.. Mother ever Help us.

  • FINDING OUR FULFILLMENT 

    FINDING OUR FULFILLMENT 

    June 7, 2022 – Wednesday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary Time

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/060822.cfm)

    In our search to what fulfills us, we could face many trials, challenges and battles which could give us failures, disappointments and frustrations. This process of finding our fulfillment not only strengthens us but also purifies our motivations and builds up our person. Thus, it is in finding our fulfillment in life that we also discover and understand better ourselves and our relationships with others.

    Speaking of such fulfillment, our readings today point us towards our greatest fulfillment in life. This is what we have heard in today’s first reading from the First Book of Kings. The many prophets who worshipped Baal must have been in search of what would hopefully fulfill their life. Yet, it was Elijah who challenged them to look and examine better what they were following. Indeed, though they were many, but then, they were wrong. Baal was not the fulfillment of their life. They realized that no matter how hard they called on Baal, there was no response at all. Baal was a false god, giving them false hopes.

    Elijah rather proved to them that the Lord is God. The Lord burnt the altar of sacrifice and that fire was the symbol that God indeed, is their fulfillment. This was expressed by all at the end of the reading, “The Lord is God! The Lord is God!”

    This fulfillment is reechoed in our Gospel today. The Gospel of Matthew reveals to us that Jesus is the fulfillment of our life. Jesus declares that he fulfills the law and the prophet. This became an argument between the Jewish leaders and Jesus. They thought that Jesus abolished the Law and Prophets, which composed the whole tradition of their people. For them, the Law and the Prophets, and all those teachings were the fundamentals of their faith. The commandments written in the scriptures motivated them to live as faithful Jews.

    However, Jesus himself denied that he abolished the law and the teachings of the prophets and the whole tradition of the Hebrew Scriptures. Jesus is actually the fulfillment of the promises in the whole Hebrew Scriptures. The person of Jesus is the very inspiration of the scriptures.

    But then, the Jewish leaders missed the whole point. They were not able to recognize Jesus, the true inspiration. They focused more on themselves, on what they can gain and on their privileged status.

    This will happen also to us when we think that our achievements, successes and titles are our main inspiration, and when we believe that pleasing people around us will make us fulfilled and happy. But we are wrong, these will only make us more anxious, fearful and unsatisfied.

    We are rather called to find our true fulfillment there in the most important part of our life, and that is, in our relationships. These include our relationship with God and with one another, with our family and friends. Yet, let us never forget that at the very center of all our relationships, is the person of Jesus, who is our true fulfillment. Kabay pa.

  •  My ASSIGNMENT AS DAVAO PARISH PRIEST:  “Galloping Around the Barrios” 2002-2004

     My ASSIGNMENT AS DAVAO PARISH PRIEST:  “Galloping Around the Barrios” 2002-2004

    After having been unexpectedly and abruptly transferred to join the mission team in Tacloban, I was given another unexpected and sudden assignment as parish-priest of our parish in Davao. Again this was a change in venue and type of apostolate I was totally unprepared for. On top of this, it happened in the middle of the triennium (the usual three-year term).

    God must have smiled when He let our Council approve this assignment. Their decision was a response to a request made by Fr. Sean Purcell, then parish- priest of Davao. As Fr. Purcell put it:  he had been parish priest for 23 years and he was now 60 years of age. So, he wanted a change to a more restful and reflective assignment. He then suggested that in his place be assigned a “younger man that we could let loose to gallop around the barrios.”

    The “younger man’s” appointment “to gallop around the barrios” did not materialize. Instead the Council appointed me, one senior to Fr. Purcell in age by three years and in ordination by two years. My galloping around the barrios as the new parish priest of our Davao parish lasted two years (2002-2004) when I was again abruptly given another short-term appointment.

    Now at 71 years of age, I was appointed parish priest for the first time. At that time our Bajada (Davao) parish was a sprawling territory covering some 62 small chapel communities, spread out from the national highway in front of the church to the rural communities into interior villages from behind the church. Challenging as the task ahead might have seemed to me after Archbishop Capalla officially installed me as pastor of our Bajada parish, I started in my old age to learn to be parish-priest by doing. 

    Fortunately, by this time the struggle for “liberating” the parishioners of Buhangin area from their eviction the agitation for relocation had become a thing of the past. This is a story that is told in another article “The Buhangin Story”.

    When I started taking over the care of our Davao parish, I faced many challenges, but at the same time I was blessed inherited many blessings. I  had no full-time parish assistant. All the other priests in the community were engaged in formation or teaching  work in the Davao Studentate (Redemptorist Major Seminary). However, one of the formation teachers was officially assigned as my part-time assistant. The other priests on the teaching staff generously helped with the sacramental and liturgical services in the busy parish church. 

    It was a blessing that I had a good team of full-time lay parish workers. One or other of them would accompany and assist me as I made the rounds of the small chapel communities, driving the ADVENTURE ,  the reliable all-purpose parish vehicle.

    I was also blessed in having inherited a very active parish, thanks to the creative and tireless efforts of the previous parish priests and their parish collaborators.  The parish was noted for its liturgical celebrations and social concerns ministry. Evangelization and catechetical activities kept the parish workers on their feet most of the time.

    The youth in particular were actively involved in parish life. They participated fully in National Youth Day celebrations and held parish Alphonsian Pilgrimage gatherings. Contests among the BEC youth groups included “Cheer-dance” and talent competitions.

    The youth revealed their talent in a special way in colorful and reflective liturgical celebrations of Christmas and Holy Week. These celebrations are memorialized in album pictorials of the Nativity and Passion plays.

    With all these activities to animate and accompany, this ageing parish priest was not given a chance to grow old! It did not take me long to not only adjust to but even to get to love my uncharted journey as parish priest in my twilight years.

    But just as I was getting to feel at home in my assignment as parish priest of our Davao parish, I was shaken out of my comfort zone by a new appointment.  A phone call from Archbishop Capalla informed me that the Apostolic Nuncio was in the archbishop’s residence and wanted to speak to me. His Excellency, the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Antonio Franco, after getting me to sit down in front of him, broke the news of my new appointment as gently as he could, saying, “I have come to ask you a favor in behalf of the Holy See.  The bishop of Iligan is resigning officially for ill-health and they are asking to take care of the diocese as its Apostolic Administrator until a new bishop is assigned. It was the last “favor” I would have dreamed of being asked no matter how gently.

    Thus ended without a formal goodbye my short two-year term as parish priest of our Davao parish. I  had to rush my entrance to Iligan as the outgoing bishop said he had no more jurisdictional power once I had been formally appointed as administrator of his diocese. So, in the evening the following day, I took the night bus to Iligan arriving there at dawn to begin my life in the uncharted life in the unknown.

    Thank God for the Tacloban hiatus, even though it was only for two short years. One never knows what lies ahead.

  • Generosity brings life and light

    Generosity brings life and light

    June 7, 2022 – Tuesday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary Time

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/060722.cfm)

    It was through the widow in Zarephath that Elijah was sent by the Lord. The land was in drought, people were poor and growing hungry because of the scarcity of food. Yet, the request of Elijah for some bread and water did not prevent the widow to give the small things she had. Indeed, the widow remained kind and accommodating to the stranger, Elijah, expressed through her generosity.

    Through her generosity, it allowed the Lord to work wonders with her who despite her poverty and insecurity in life she remained kind. Consequently, the Scripture revealed to us how the jar of flour never been emptied and the jug of oil never been dry. This is God’s generosity and providence.

    Generosity, then, is also an expression of trust and confidence in the providence and kindness of God. The Lord shall never let a generous and trusting person to run out of surprises in life.

    But aside from the surprises that God does through our generosity, is also the effect of our generosity to people around us. The Gospel of Matthew today speaks of this as Jesus proclaims, “You are salt of the earth. You are light of the world.”

    A generous heart brings life and light. It inspires and uplifts those who are struggling. Thus, a true believer of the Lord expresses generosity that comes from the heart in order to bring life and light into our homes, communities and organizations.

    This may calls us then to express our generosity by not just extending our material resources to those in need, but also our presence and friendship, our understanding and compassion to those who need them. Kabay pa.