My association with the Philippines – its people, their history and their continuing struggle – is the most pervasive and transforming influence in my life.
There are some specific September dates I find very easy to remember. September 11, 2001: The coordinated terrorist attacks by the Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda against the United States. September 12 2014: The day our business in Rockhampton – Clear Waters Financial Planning – celebrated its final release from the Franchise Company Elders Financial Planning (aka The Crocodile...
Anak dagat Can you really study theology while living in a fishing village, in a small hut of four rooms, sleeping on mats, sitting cross-legged taking your meals, cooking on a charcoal burner outside the hut? Such was the situation of four young men studying to be Redemptorists when I visited them in barrio Anak Dagat (literally, Child of the Sea) in Batangas Province, Philippines. ...
Written in 1986 Leaving the Redemptorist Seminary on Mariposa Street in Cubao, Quezon City, you turn left and walk about three hundred meters to C Benitez Street. Turn right at the T-junction and you walk past a Buddhist Temple behind high cement walls. There are many high cement walls in this area. Three hundred meters past the temple the cement walls give way to high...
Mark 1: 29-39 Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time Mark presents Jesus as the MessiahThe Messiah crucifiedWho by his suffering and death would redeem humankindAnd so fulfil the Plan of the FatherThis Jesus is acknowledged as the Son of GodBy the Spirit in the form of a dove following his baptism in the river JordanBy the demon expelled by Jesus in the synagogue at CapernaumBy the Centurion as Jesus...
The Father had a dreama vision for all peoplewho live under the starsupon the earth by the seasa vision of life whereinharmony as a white riverflowed between hills of caredown valleys of justicea dream of prosperity forthe farmer who cares for his cropas a mother cares for her childa dream of abundance forthe fisherman who with courageand risk braves the uncertaintyof the watersto recover life...
For seven years – 1975 to 1982 – I lived as a Catholic Missionary Priest in the Bicol provinces of the Philippines, working almost exclusively in the smaller towns and barrios. As time progressed, I was confronted in an ever-deepening way by the poverty and injustice experienced by the people I lived among in these rural areas. This became a radical challenge to my faith: in a...
KAALAGAD Gospel Reflection – October 11th 2020 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time Matthew 22:1-14 The Parable of the Wedding Banquet Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. Again he sent...
Written after the People Power movement in the Philippines removed Ferdinand Marcos as President and ended a long period of Martial Law The task before us now, if we would not perish, is to cast aside our ancient prejudices and build the future This reflection is a personal sharing of my own journey as I have been confronted by life and death, suffering and resurrection, hope and despair...
Written in 1985. Faith and theology had been cracked open by the reality of peoples’ lives. We sought to discover and express a spirituality arising from the struggle of those seeking justice and their “true place in the world” We walk, crawl, stumble,grope in our little caves, within our prison walls believingour illusions to be the truth of lifeWe are so sure, so secure, so...
Written February 2020 while visiting family and friends in the Philippines. I had just heard that Bong was dead. He did not die simply, he was shot. At close range. In a supposedly secure house. An assassination. The military will not release his body until someone authoritatively identifies him as Bong Bellen of Bacacay in the Province of Albay with a two-million-peso bounty on his head. Bong...