Life in a Filipino jail is not a pleasant experience, unless you belong to the rich; then, though your movements may be somewhat curtailed by four walls, you might as well be living in The Ritz, luxuries on all sides: air-conditioning (vital in this climate), food fit for a king, sleeping quarters fit for a Cleopatra, […]
For a missionary priest
Farming in the Philippines
The story told in the book of Genesis, 22: 1-12 is among the most harrowing and heart-rending of the Old Testament tales. Harrowing, because it tells of how God commanded Abraham to sacrifice his only son Isaac, the son for whom he had waited for decades, and who had been vouchsafed to Abraham to be […]
When Ferdinand Magellan’s galleons sailed into Cebu harbour in the central Philippines in 1521, having sailed from Spain many months earlier, all seemed promisingly hopeful. Soon after arriving, he presented a native chieftain and his chief consort with several mementos of Christian significance – as a reward for their having converted to the novel faith. […]
The percentage of those going regularly to church is quite small, maybe less than 10%
In the bible, both Old and New Testaments, it is axiomatic that a child is a gift from the Lord: “For it was you who created my being, knit me together in my mother’s womb” (Psalm 139); “Truly children are a gift from the Lord, a blessing, the fruit of the womb” (Psalm 127), and […]
Yes, really.
So what happens when a person or a society lacks a “crap detector”?
In the very early days of Christianity, there was the phenomenon of the Desert Fathers (and Mothers), people who sought the wilderness so as to avoid the various distractions of society, to try to better practise the gospel way of life. Later was the example of St. Benedict (5th century), who built a monastery at Monte Cassino […]
Catholic church is one of the very few trans-national bodies which has the wherewithal to question or challenge any or all sovereign states
Yet the account ends with Goliath defeated, the wily David victorious. There is still hope.