[Editor’s note: You may read Elena’s article, ‘I Thought God didn’t care’, at www.misyononline.com by typing her name in the search box].
I told my oncologist honestly that I was running out of finances to continue treatment. I was supposed to have regular checkups for at least five years and go through a series of laboratory tests. Cancer is a wasting disease both to the patients’ health and their pockets. It drains money by the thousands and even millions for the rich.
The Cross-event is the selfrevelation of God in the form of a three-fold love. As Catholics we believe that on the Cross we can find the love of God the Father for Jesus Christ, the love of the Son for His Father and the love that is given and received for humanity, the Holy Spirit. It is from the Cross that we come to know the will of the Father for His Son, the acceptance of the Son of the Father’s will and the overflowing love of the Father and the Son who both suffer for the sake of humanity.
I love my cell phone. I enjoy texting. I don’t know what I will do if I lose this cell phone. That could instantly stop my communications and at this point, that is how I mainly keep in touch with my family, the staff I work with in our organization, our hundreds of contacts (yes, my phonebook can carry a thousand names) and the nuns – most of them, even our 82-year-old Sister, have a cell phone now.I text fast, especially when I put it in the dictionary mode. I am awed at how the right word comes out and tells you if your spelling is wrong. I don’t care too much about using text language. Sometimes, I can hardly understand messages that come into my unit: FYI / BTW/ GB / TYVM. Or: ‘Gdpm,Sr. pwd b mgtn0ng?ksi po d n sumsagt bf k s mga txt ko. May ngyri samn n0ng 1 gabi. Sb nya mahal nya k0 pr0 bkit d sya sa2got? An0po ga2wn ko?’ Although I am learning how to read them now. And starting to txt that way too! . . .You see, I don’t only own a Communicator . . . I am also a COMMUNICATOR! I am a writer, lecturer, a radio announcer and a TV host. I have been writing for our school organ since high school and until now I submit articles to magazines, newspapers, and lately to websites. I conduct seminars on health, values education (especially for teens and their teachers), responsible parenthood lectures to couples in urban poor communities, and talk at international pro-life conferences . . .
The author contributed to Our Hideaway in March-April 2006
I am an avid reader of this God-given magazine. I’ve been enjoying the fruits of Misyon for almost a decade now. The hectic schedule during college years wasn’t reason enough for me to set aside any issue of Misyon. During semestral and summer breaks, reading and rereading Misyon issues from cover to cover also become my inevitable recreation. I can’t help feeling thankful to all the staff and contributors of Misyon. Every time I read an issue, especially vocation stories, I felt inspired and renewed. Then and now, Misyon has continually helped me in discerning and nurturing what vocation to respond to. With God’s grace I feel that I’m almost done in discerning the vocation I’m called to. Thanks to Misyon for being part of the process.
Sister Clare Garcillano SPC
On Saturday, 19 May, I arrived in Dili, East Timor, with so much anxiety. I had finally arrived in my new mission, after waiting for three months. Thinking of what awaited me in this war-torn area and not knowing the main languages made me a little worried. However, I felt some confidence coming to this former colony of Portugal knowing Portuguese. Truly, I did not feel lost at Dili Airport upon arrival. The people there spoke Portuguese, if not that fluently, at least well enough to carry on a conversation. Later I discovered that only those Timorese educated during the colonization by Portugal, which ended in 1975, spoke Portuguese. It is used in government offices and in the business sector and is one of two official languages, the other being Tetum, the national language. Most people can speak Bahasa Indonesia, the result of 27 years of Indonesian occupation. A few speak English, especially UN personnel and the staff of NGOs, many of whom are from Australia, New Zealand and the Philippines.
Father James H. Kroeger MM
James H. Kroeger MM is Professor of Systematic Theology, Missiology, and Islamics at the Loyola School of Theology in Manila. Currently, he is President of the Philippine Association of Catholic Missiologists (PACM), Secretary-Convenor of the Asian Missionary Societies Forum (AMSAL), and consultant to the Asian Bishops’ (FABC) Office of Evangelization. His most recent books are: The Future of the Asian Churches (2002), Becoming Local Church (2003) and Once Upon a Time in Asia: Stories of Harmony and Peace (2006, Manila: Claretian Publications).
By: Father Seán Coyle SSC
I remember the smiling face of the young Italian man cheerfully helping to lower Tony into the baths in Lourdes during Easter Week 1991. Tony was very tall but partly disabled and brain-damaged from a car accident in Ireland. The Italian and his compatriots had come to the shrine of the Blessed Mother at their own expense to assist pilgrims, whether disabled or not. And the extraordinary thing about the baths is that you put your clothes back on without drying yourself and don’t feel uncomfortable. I was with a group from Ireland with serious disabilities. I shared a room with Tony, Tom, an older man who had had polio as a child, and Joe, a married man the same age as myself and the leader of our group.
By: Mark Ivan T. Merilo
Mark Ivan Merilo is a student of Sacred Heart Seminary in Palo, Leyte. Below he shares about a Sister who inspired him to become a priest. He wrote this simple tribute as a surprise for her Silver Jubilee Celebration.
This is the story of a woman who gave me the inspiration to enter the seminary and to be like her, working in the Vineyard of the Lord. She is a woman serving the Lord unconditionally.
Sr Alicia A. Amparo OND is a member of the Society of the Oblates of Notre Dame (www.omiphil.org/ond_sisters.htm), founded in 1956 in Cotabato by then Bishop, later Archbishop, Gérard Mongeau OMI and Father, later Bishop, George E. Dion OMI. She is currently assigned to the Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish in Barrio Obrero, Davao City. Her work there is very different from that of her previous assignment when she was a teacher in Notre Dame of Abuyog in Leyte.
LEO P. DIVINAGRACIA, from Pototan, Iloilo, is a Mill Hill Missionary theology student studying in Tangaza College (www.tangaza.org) in Nairobi, Kenya. You can learn more about Kibera, where the author does pastoral work at www.cuea.edu, atnews.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/2297279.stm and aten.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kibera. The main website of the Mill Hill Missionaries, whose official name is St Joseph’s Missionary Society, is www.millhillmissionaries.com
I left the Philippines for my theological studies here in Nairobi, Kenya, on 11 August 2006. To leave our families and friends and stay in a place where we are total strangers is indeed very difficult. This is the life of being a missionary: as we journey we must learn to let go even if it is very difficult.
By: Violeta Villaraiz
Violie had an article in Misyon before about her experience as an Assumption Volunteer in Cameroon. She went to Korea in April as a Columban lay missionary.
Part of my Mission Orientation Program as a trainee Columban lay missionary was the ‘Mindanao Exposure’ when our team, ‘RP 16’, experienced different programs and activities of the Church there. These included Basic Ecclesial Communities (BECs) and the involvement of Columbans in different areas. This is my reflection on our Interfaith Dialogue of Life in Marawi with our Maranao Muslim brothers and sisters.
