Saints!

Carlos Celdran has become an instant celebrity for some weeks now. And if in case you’re not aware why, you must have been out of the planet. He disrupted the homily at a Mass celebrated at the Manila Cathedral, where no less than Cardinal Rosales, Archbishop of Manila, was among the celebrants. He hurled up an improvised placard and at the top of his voice, shouted at the members of the clergy to “stop getting involved in politics.”

Upon his arrest, support for him has steadily been snowballing. Facebook accounts were set up in his honor and those who made their reactions publicly had generally only two things to say:

1. To free Carlos Celdran

2. To criticize the Catholic Church

Assessing the quantity and quality of the discourse, I was saddened by the great majority of those who have elevated Celdran to hero status for being brave enough to challenge the leaders of the Catholic Church.

In times like these, we don’t expect the members of the clergy and even the religious congregations to exclusively do the talking. They are very much identified with the Church,and for simple minded folks, it’s just that, the priests and religious are the church.

And so, I believe that the most effective stance against the passing of the RH bill is beyond us. We are against the present form of the reproductive health bill as it contradicts the very morals we hold and even if we try to sound objective and rational about it, people have made up their minds.

Amidst the clutter of comments, I found the insights of lay people most enlightening, if not comforting. These level-headed Catholics have been vigilant in taking up the cudgels in defending the stand of the CBCP against the passing of the RH bill and surprisingly, they seem to be well versed in the teachings of the Church. Some claim to have read Humanae Vitae, and they seem to have been enlightened with it.

My point is this.

We don’t only become evangelizers when we write our names with the initials SDB or when we are ordained for priesthood. Our ministry begins now. We have the privilege of meeting our students on a weekly basis. We have to give our best in catechizing them. This is especially true for public school students who may be receiving the last religious instruction in their lifetime.

The students we have at present, who have received the finest values and religious instruction, may not just become apologists in the future, but probably even more, saints.

Santa Subito!

I got this piece from the New York Times.

Chiara Lubich, Who Founded Catholic Lay Group, Dies at 88
by Ian Fisher

ROME — Chiara Lubich, who became one of the most influential women in the Roman Catholic Church as the founder of the Focolare lay movement, which works to improve ties among faiths, died early Friday at her home south of Rome. She was 88. Chiara Lubich, Who Founded Catholic Lay Group, Dies at 88

Her death was announced by the group. She had long been in frail health and died shortly after being discharged Thursday, at her request, after a long stay in Gemelli Hospital in Rome.

Ms. Lubich began Focolare as a small group of religious laywomen in northern Italy during World War II. Some of the group’s early meetings took place in air raid shelters under American bombardment.

She later wrote: “Is there an ideal that does not die, that no bombs can destroy, an ideal we can give our whole selves to? Yes, there is. It is God.”

But rather than joining a convent, she focused her devotion on the idea that lay people could also lead full religious lives. In recent years lay movements like hers gained increasing influence in the church and among popes. At her death, Focolare, whose name means “hearth,” counted 140,000 core members and more than two million followers in 182 countries.

As a measure of her stature, Pope Benedict XVI sent the movement a telegram of condolence on Friday, praising her “constant commitment for communion in the church, for ecumenical dialogue and for brotherhood among people.” Her funeral Mass, scheduled for Tuesday in Rome, will be celebrated by the Vatican’s second in command, its secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone.

She was born Silvia Lubich on Jan. 22, 1920, in Trent, in northern Italy. She later changed her first name to Chiara, which is Clare in English, out of admiration for St. Clare of Assisi. At 19, she experienced a religious awakening in the shrine city of Loreto, Italy, in which she said later she intuited that lay people could play a deeper, more organized role in the church. Similar groups like Opus Dei, Communion and Liberation, and the Community of Sant’Egidio — all outside the church hierarchy — have a prominent voice in Catholic life.

In 1943, while working as an elementary school teacher, Ms. Lubich began meeting with other women, vowing to devote their lives to the poor. The group expanded to include men and formed communities with several levels of adherence. The most devoted single members take a vow of chastity and turn their belongings over to the movement.

Focolare initially focused its work in war-ravaged Western Europe, then expanded into the Soviet bloc. Over time, the group moved into developing nations and, taking the word “unity” as a refrain, began focusing on interreligious dialogue. In 1997, Ms. Lubich met with 800 Buddhist monks in Thailand, the same year she preached at the Malcolm Shabazz Mosque in Harlem. She received the Templeton Prize for progress in religion in 1977 and was awarded the Unesco Prize for Peace Education in 1996.

In a church where men play the dominant role, Ms. Lubich said in a 2003 interview with John L. Allen Jr. of The National Catholic Reporter that she had once asked Pope John Paul II if he was uncomfortable with a woman holding such a high-profile job.

“Magari!” she said the pope replied, roughly meaning, “Are you kidding?” or “If only.”

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