By Sr Anne Carbon SSC
Sister Anne, a psychiatric nurse by profession, is a Columban Sister form Cagayan de Oro. Misyon has featured a number of her articles about her missionary work in Peru.
On 10 October 2008, World Mental Health Day, the Commission on Mental Health of Ayacucho celebrated its fifth anniversary. Looking back on those five years, I cannot but thank God for the many advances that have made it possible for us to initiate and carry forward different programs at our clinic.
By Jeshiene S. Padilla
These past few years of my 19 in this world, I’ve learned so many things that I had taken for granted. I had ignored people instead of taking good care of them; I only assumed that they already know how much I valued them. But sometimes it's not enough to keep things unsaid. 
Dear Father Coyle,
I am an avid reader of Misyon, probably because my mother used to be a promoter. But since it’s now available online, I have free access to it and an article a week is a good medium for reflection. Misyon seems to highlight the lives of modern-day heroes in their own simple yet extraordinary ways.
By Marife Padao
Marife ‘Epie’ Padao, a physical therapist by profession, is from Katipunan, Zamboanga del Sur,a former Columban parish in the Diocese of Pagadian, and is now working in the Columban parish in Dublin, Ireland.
Leaving family in the province for greener pastures in the big city is quite common for a fresh college graduate to do. It was 1997 in Manila when I volunteered at the Elderly Program in Payatas, Quezon City, where the Vincentian Fathers are based. Payatas is the place where the trash slide happened in July 2000. My purpose was to acquire a volunteer certificate for future use for applying abroad while doing my self-review for the board exam.
By Corazon Mendoza
The author, from Dumalinao, Zamboanga del Sur, is a teacher in Zamboanga del Sur National High School, (ZSNHS), Pagadian City . There's also a picture of the school emblem there]. She grew up in what was then a Columban parish and worked for many years in Columban parishes, often in dangerous situations.
October 2007 I thought of asking the students in my Values Education classes to start giving 25 cents everyday for the poor. The ‘poor' I had in mind were students who can't pay their tuition fees before final examinations, when students are required to clear school obligations.
Simple and clear explanation of the purpose
By Gelkoff Calmerin
It was July 11 when my friends from Buklod Study Center, Bacolod City, and I left the Philippines for Australia, the host country for this year’s World Youth Day celebration. Personally, I was excited with this trip for it was my first outside the Philippines. Well, I was also pretty tired because I had my examinations just the day before we left.
Nevertheless, nothing would keep my spirits from being up. This was a once in a lifetime event. Meeting our Holy Father and hundreds of thousands of other pilgrims from around the world was really something to look forward to.
‘Girls, wear skirts tomorrow!’
Alma told her story in the September-October 2003 issue of Misyon. This article is related to what she wrote then. Alma passed the Civil Service and Teachers' Board exams in 2007.
‘S-K-I-R-T-S!!! Not again!’
Announcements like this during my college days used to make my day glum. It’s not that I hated wearing skirts, but my appearance when wearing them concerned me most and thus made me crawl from shame.
One of my downfalls was that I had no self confidence when it came to my body structures. I didn’t have that ‘Coca-cola figure’ to be proud of. I just had the typical body of an Igorot with strong, robust calves and arms due to heavy work in the fields. That’s why I didn’t have the nerve to wear mini-skirts just like everybody else did. When I tried it once, it seemed that everyone was staring at me and saying in their minds, ‘Hey! Look at that. She’s got no shame at all parading those robust, scarred calves!’ Those sarcastic glares just gave me the strength to dash to my boarding house to change my clothes. So during my high school years, I had my uniform skirts tailored three to four inches below the knee to conceal my calves.
By Father Gary Walker
The author, an Australian, is editor of The Far East, the magazine of the Columbans in Australia and New Zealand. He has worked in Fiji and Belize and also served six years as a member of the Columban General Council.
Holy Family Home is a cross between a boarding school and a refuge. It is a safe haven of brightly colored walls, plants and peacefulness on the outskirts of Bacolod, a city on the sugar-rich island of Negros in the Philippines. The 40 or so girls who live there and the 15 or so college students who live in a house near the city center are from poor families who cannot afford to educate their daughters or from families in which the girls could be at risk if they were living at home.
Fr Gerardo A. Alminaza of the Diocese of Bacolod was ordained bishop in San Sebastian Cathedral there on 4 August. The following day he was installed as auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Jaro in St Elizabeth Metropolitan Cathedral there. Bacolod is a suffragan diocese of Jaro, located in Iloilo City, an hour to the west by fast sea-craft. The main consecrating bishop was Papal Nuncio Edward Joseph Adams, with Archbishop Angel N. Lagdameo of Jaro, current president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, and Bishop Vicente M. Navarra of Bacolod as principal co-consecrators.
The new bishop is a ‘product’ of the Columbans, having grown up in San Jose, Sipalay City, now part of the Diocese of Kabankalan, separated from Bacolod in 1987, and consisting of what was the main territory in the southern part of the province of Negros Occidental entrusted to the Columbans in 1950. Bishop Alminaza’s parish priest during his high school years in Cabarrus Catholic College, San Jose, was Fr Patrick Hurley, one of the Columban pioneers in Negros and still, at the age of 84, serving in the Chaplaincy of Our Lady of Peace, Biscom Sugar Central, Binalbagan. The late Fr Augustine Rowe was the priest in San Jose when Bishop Gerry was ordained in 1986. The new priest’s only parish assignment was in Kabankalan, working there with Columbans for a year or so after his ordination. He has spent the rest of his priesthood in formation work and studying. He was on the staff of the major seminary in Jaro for some years and so is no stranger to his new diocese, where he will be based at the cathedral.
By Fr Shay Cullen
Columban Father Shay Cullen of PREDA, www.preda.org, ordained in 1969, has been working in Olongapo for many years now with children and women who have been sexually abused. His weekly Reflections are published in newspapers and magazines in a number of countries and appear each week in www.misyononline.com/misyonforum under Father Cullen’s Corner. Your comments there will be most welcome. On 13 September he received the International Irish Person of the Year Award in Dublin in a nationally televised ceremony which each year since 1975 celebrates ‘Irish talent, bravery and fortitude’.
