Filipino evangelists

Feb 7, 2016

In the parish of the Good Shepherd, Hurunui, a significant number of our parishioners have arrived here in recent years from the Philippines. Their presence is a great gift for us, as for the diocese and for the country. A number of our new priests and seminarians are also from the Philippines.

Last month at the Eucharistic Congress held in Cebu, Philippines, Bishop Robert Barron, Auxiliary bishop in Los Angeles addressed the thousands of people gathered. He began his one hour presentation with words of gratitude to the people of the Philippines saying:

“I don’t know any church right now in the world right now that is more vibrant than the Filipino church… It’s the Filipino community that is keeping many churches around the world alive…In God’s often strange providence he’ll take a particular church, a particular people, and use them as a means to invigorate and evangelise the rest of the Catholic world, and the Church of the Philippines is playing this role now…”

Thanks be to God!

0 Comments

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Latest Posts

Ascension

Ascension

Most people think of the Ascension of Jesus as being a ‘departure’ moment. Jesus was here and now he is gone. We imagine Jesus going up into the clouds and the disciples waving farewell from below.
This is an unhelpful image.
It is essential that we understand what does happen and what does not happen in the Ascension event.
It would be easy to wrongly think that in his ministry showed us how to build the city of God on earth, and now he has gone and the mission is left to us.

touching the sacred

touching the sacred

A few years ago I was on Rēkohu Chatham Islands for what has become one of Aotearoa New Zealand’s most sacred days, the ANZAC day of remembrance in gratitude for those who gave their lives, their health, their youth, their service that we may live in peace.
The art above was produced by one of the students at the local Te One school.

every which way

every which way

A good number of Food For Faith readers have discovered one of the more recent FFF initiatives, the weekly Homily Studio.
The recording of this half-hour podcast is one of the highlights of my week.

in the room

in the room

Today’s reflection marks the end of the FFF Lent-to-Easter daily email posts. Thank you for your company on this journey.  While these daily posts (for those who have signed up for the Lent / Advent reflections at this link) will take a break until Advent, those who have signed up to receive every post or regular posts at this link.  You might take a moment now to visit this page now to check your email preferences.

During retreat this week I found myself pondering just how difficult it is to accept that God, in Jesus, is really with me today.

disciplined discipleship

disciplined discipleship

As I write I’m nearing the end of retreat days with a group of fifty priests from across the USA.  As I mentioned a couple of days ago the diversity and youth of the group is remarkable with the majority being aged under 40 and a good number ordained for fewer than five years.