MANILA, Jan. 28, 2012— Church leaders are called to bring hope to the country marked by calamities, social problems and political chaos, the head of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines said.
Under the “dark clouds and in the midst of poverty and suffering”, CBCP president and Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma urged his fellow prelates to “own and declare that there is hope.”
“As bishops, we are to give people a reason for living and hoping,” said Palma in his speech during the opening of the 104th CBCP plenary assembly today at the Pope Pius XII Center in Manila.
“It is not a wishful thinking but a well-grounded hope when we expect of blessings and good things to come,” he said.
The Church official spoke about the thousands of people who died and hundreds of houses swept away in Iligan, Cagayan de Oro and Dumaguete due to Typhoon Sendong last December.
Aside from the natural calamities, there are also a lot of other factors that cause untold pain and suffering to the Filipinos, according to him.
He cited the reality of graft of corruption, unemployment and unabated devastation of forests and seas which “led to poverty and related problems.”
Palma also cited the “obvious confrontations among the main branches of our government” which “make us wish we are not stuck up in pinning down the guilty but instead we are now marching and collaborating with each other in implementing laws and programs that bring about growth and development.”
His comments would seem to be in direct reference to the ongoing row between the Aquino administration and the Supreme Court.
“Certainly we can say there are dark clouds in the sky,” said Palma.
“Given the above agenda, we know we are given hope, trustworthy hope. Hence we can face our present even if it is arduous; our present can be lived and accepted because it leads to a goal,” he said.
Around 100 bishops are gathered today until Monday in a closed-door meeting to tackle Church and pressing national concerns.
This is the first that the plenary assembly is presided by Palma being the new head of the bishops’ collegial body with Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas as vice president.
Among those seen in the meeting were Papal nuncio Archbishop Guiseppe Pinto, Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle and retired Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal. [CBCPNews]
http://www.cbcpnews.com/?q=node/18360
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