AfricaPrayers during the brothers stay in Manila
St John Bosco Parish, A. Arnaiz. Ave. (Pasay Road) 1200 Makati City: on Friday 27 and Saturday 28 February after 6 pm Mass.
EDSA Shrine on Monday March 3 at 6 pm (after the 5.30 pm mass), led by a group of young people; the brothers will join in the prayer
Chapel of CBCP Building on Thursday March 5, at 12.15 noon time, it will be led by the brothers.
CBCP Building, 470 General Luna Street, Intramuros
Chapel of the Little Sisters of Jesus on Thursday March 5 at 7.30 pm, led by the brothers. 21 Alchan Street (Boni) Mandaluyong City
All Saints 2008: A weekend at Masbate
“Today the wind is blowing so pleasantly and so freshly: this shows how much God loves us. He has made everything so beautiful. We have only to open our eyes. There are so many reasons to be grateful and delighted.” These were the words of a woman during a sharing group last weekend. In the Philippines, it is still the rainy season, but at All Saints the sun shone, it was warm and a light breeze did us good.
We had gathered together for the weekend on the island of Masbate in a really special place. A few years ago the first “Fazenda da Esperança” in Asia started here: a project which began in Brazil. Here they welcome, for a year, people who want to get off drug dependency. Here they draw courage and strength from the Word of God and discover that the Gospel can change your life. Each day begins with a common prayer, and with listening to the Gospel of the day. What is this Word of God which can accompany us today and which we want to put into practice? The songs of Taizé are not unfamiliar for these thirty or so young men and women. They often sing one or other of them during their morning meetings and before starting work in the fields of the farm. Each person has their task in the rice fields or the dairy production. Some guests joined us for the meeting: some who co-operate with pastoral care of the young or in the parishes of the town, sisters from congregations nearby, and a little group from the Baptist community, a friend of the Fazenda.
During the two days we gathered together for prayers in the common room, fitted out as a small chapel. The sisters of the Community who live on the site had prepared a welcoming room with petals of tropical flowers from the garden, candles, a very simple cross, and orange material. We were able to open the doors giving onto the terrace, so that everyone could find a place, as this room usually holds many fewer people! In the morning and in the afternoon, we met together for sharing in small groups. The paragraph from the Letter from Cochabamba inviting reflection on the widening of our friendship to include all people was the starting point for our sharing.
After a time of personal reflection and of sharing in small groups, we came back together in a big circle. Someone from each group presented their most important experience. Paying great attention, we listened to one another. The great diversity of the participants was reflected in the various stories. Some people were so touched by certain accounts that tears were shed. We discovered how people opened up to the Spirit of God and how each one found something within their reach. One of the sisters, who works in town, told how she tries to widen friendship and create a more human atmosphere in everyday life, by a word or a question, in contact with people in the street, with the small shopkeepers, with the drivers of motorbike taxis. The young people, who have only lived for a little time at la Fazenda, told how, here, they were able to open their hearts, little by little, and welcome a friendship again, after the numerous wounds from their families, life on the street, and the world of drugs and prostitution.
For many of these young people, it was the first time at All Saints that they were not able to go to the cemeteries to be near the graves of those they have respected and loved. Everywhere in the Philippines, people meet up to light candles in front of the graves. Some stay there all night. One young person, who lived at Taizé for three months in 2007, told about the meetings she took part in there. During the prayer around the cross and the celebration of light on Saturday evening, something of the hope of the resurrection, that is already transforming our lives, became discernible. We ended these three days with a celebration of light as at Taizé, passing the candle flame from one to another as a sign of the resurrection of Christ. Everyone had a thought for the people whose graves they would have liked to visit. We were grateful for these days lived together, during which we were able to discover how God is present in our daily life. He gives us signs of his love, which allow us to go through the days of our life – not just this sunny November day…
The meeting at Masbate was part of a series of meetings across the country. Three of us travelling together. The 7,107 islands of the Philippines make up a country of very great diversity. This was noticeable in all the meetings, and we rejoiced when such very diverse people enriched these weekends through the signs of their cultures and languages. Some young people had walked for a day to take part in a meeting in the northern part of the country. They surprised us with their songs which broadened the common prayers. Down there, they have preserved a language and music of their own. They usually dance during their liturgical celebrations with these very rhythmical songs. Everyone sang the “Gloria” and the “Our Father”. This partially recalled the music of the Andes and so it was not only with the Letter that we felt close to the young people of Cochabamba. It is often quite impressive to see the commitment of the young people when at home, in their communities. Some of them are themselves living in difficult economic and family conditions. Sometimes after their parents have separated or one of them has died, the young person has to take on heavy responsibilities, whilst still so young, for even younger brothers and sisters – which is a big challenge. Sometimes they quite simply lack the money to be able to take public transport in their parish communities so as to participate in celebrations or times of sharing. These same young people wish to be signs of hope in their country and to live what is expressed in the Letter from Cochabamba: “Reconciliation can transform our societies in depth. The Spirit of the risen Christ renews the face of the earth. Let us allow this dynamism of the resurrection to propel us forward! Let us not be discouraged by the complexity of the problems we face. Let us not forget that we can begin with very little.” We are discovering here almost every day, in a very practical way, how this is being realised.
April - May 2008
Previously, brothers spent some weeks in Manila in April-May 2008.
“Right at the start of our stay in Manila, we were invited to lead a workshop on prayer at a formation center at Bukal ng Tipan in Taytay, some way outside the city. Since they had heard that we were coming to the Philippines, we were invited to speak with youth animators: priests and sisters and young lay people from different parishes. The questions raised were often quite practical: how to organize a prayer with songs from Taizé, how to prepare the place where the prayer is to be held, how to encourage the people to sing, etc. Some of the participants already knew the songs, but they did not know how to prepare a prayer that was meditative and simple. During one of the small group sessions, one of the animators remarked, "For me, before I discovered Taizé, singing during prayer was not necessary! The most important part was silence and adoration. But know I dare to sing."
Our principle aim during this visit to the Philippines is to contact – or renew contact with - the dioceses in the “National Capital Region of Manila”, with their different institutions, seminaries and communities. One outstanding evening was a prayer in the Diocese of Novaliches, in the Parish of St. Peter. When we arrived, there were young people already queuing up. We asked how many people they were expecting. In the event over 300 young people took part. Before we began, two young people who had been to Taizé in previous years shared their experiences; one of them spoke at length about the European meeting in Zagreb. The choir had really practiced the songs, the psalm was sung in Tagalog and the prayer began with the procession of the cross, carried by the young people into the prayer hall and it concluded with prayer around the cross, with many of them having to wait with patience their turn to approach the cross.
Another notable visit was to Bahay Maria, a house for street children. There are 30 children including 4 babies and 1 retarded child. Even as we entered the gate, the children started to run towards us and to scream with joy to welcome us. They took our hands and put them to their foreheads: a very Philippino sign of respect. We had dinner with them and ended the day with prayer together in the chapel. The children sang the Taizé songs very well, the older ones accompanying them on the guitar. And they even sang “Bénissez le Seigneur” in French!
We also take part in the prayer at the EDSA Shrine, every Monday after the celebration of the Eucharist. This weekly prayer with songs from Taizé started about 13 years ago, shortly after the World Youth Days in Manila in 1995. Quite a number of young people who had been to Taizé in previous years come to join with us for the evening.”
Gratitude
“I’ve got to tell you about the impressive meeting we had with a young Chinese seminarian studying at the “Chinese Mission Institute” here in Manila. He had just spent four weeks in a neigbourhood of squatters, with a family of eleven people living in one single room. The family lives on next to nothing, selling things in the street. There is one job for the whole family, in a jeepney terminal. Every day, the men take it in turns to do this job. Eleven people are living off one salary and the sale of a few vegetables. You could see the tiredness on the young man’s face, and the insect bites… One of us asked, “What marked you most?” He replied immediately, “Hunger… I was hungry every day”. He said it not like a complaint but in solidarity with what the family that had welcomed him was living every day. In his face you could see not only tiredness; there was more than that, almost a happiness. He said, “I have discovered what gratitude is. Until now I took everything I had as if it belonged to me. Now I realize that everything is a gift. And I am grateful for everything.”
“Something very similar could be seen in the faces of the women who have opened their home to thirty street children. The house had served as offices for an NGO and a secretariat for organizing conferences under the aegis of the church. One day, they were asked to take charge of a little girl, still a baby, deeply disabled mentally and physically. This proved to be the starting point of a whole adventure of welcoming others and a major transformation in the lives of these women. There are now thirty street children, four of whom are very young. Mari, who arrived, profoundly disabled, when she was very small, and who was given one or two years to live, is now a young woman, still as disabled as ever, but with whom there is a real communication. We ate with them and prayed together. You could see in the faces of these women who had opened their doors and their hearts not only tiredness but a real gratitude for all that these children bring them”.