The 2016 International Eucharistic Congress held in Cebu, Philippines has been four years in the making, which planned event was heralded by Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI at the conclusion of the last IES in Dublin, Ireland, in June 2012[1]
After
years of organizing the event, Cebu has concluded its hosting
of the eight day-long event on Sunday, January 31. The country last hosted the
IEC in 1937 held in Manila, which was the first IEC in Asia.
The
(IEC) is an international assembly of people to reflect on the Eucharist, recognized as the "highest form of worship." in Catholic Church.
This
second opportunity of events was held in Archdiocesan Seminaries of Cebu, a
P550 million[2] pavilion
built for the congress, which cost was entirely shouldered by a private
development firm.
The
week long congress that witnesses the partaking of the faithful and clergy from
across the globe finished in style with a personal video-message from Pope Francis
himself who also announces that the next Congress will be in Budapest, Hungary in
the year 2020[3].
The
international Catholic spiritual festival draws approximately 15,000 delegates from over
70 countries to listen to some of the most enthused and Spirit-filled speakers
in the world today, dealing with some of the most serious issues of this
generation.
5,000
street children receive their First Holy Communion.
Evening torch-light procession stretches
over 5 kilometers witnessing the
participation of nearly 2 million crowd representing all ages and social groups.
Cardinal
Timothy Dolan of New York thanks many Filipino priests who occupy parishes in
Europe and America that were in crisis brought by insufficient local vocations.
About
a million of people[4] pin their ears back to the homily during the closing Mass
on Sunday, officiated by Charles Maung Cardinal Bo, the special envoy of Pope
Francis. He concentrates on the family
and youth, claiming its special role in bringing the good tidings both locally
and off-shore.
In
a video message,[5] Pope
Francis exhorts Catholics to be missionaries and to spread Jesus’ love to the
world, encourages the delegates to be true missionary disciples to spread Jesus
"redemptive love towards reconciliation, impartiality and tranquility." He also muses over his Philippine trip in 2015, where he affirmed Filipinos' "deep faith and resilience", and recollects how Typhoon
Yolanda brought out everyone’s charity.
The
Pope says, "It brought immense devastation to the Philippines, yet it also
brought in its wake an immense outpouring of solidarity, generosity and
goodness. People set about rebuilding not just homes but lives. The Eucharist
speaks to us of that power which flows from the Cross and constantly brings new
life. It changes hearts. It enables us to be caring, to protect the poor and
the vulnerable, and to be sensitive to the cry of our brothers and sisters in
need. It teaches us to act with integrity and to reject injustice and
corruption which poison the roots of society."
Los
Angeles Auxiliary Bishop Robert E. Barron[6] who speaks at a session on Jan. 26,
says that popular culture’s message of individuals being “infinitely right” is
“repugnant to (Catholics’) Eucharistic faith.” Christianity is “running on
fumes” as it attempts to oppose the trend of people leaving the Church or avoiding
the Eucharist.
According
to him only 30 percent of Catholics in the United States actually receive
Communion, which is a disaster he says.
Catholic
faithful “did not invent (their) own story, we belong to a story” and that is
“God’s drama,” unlike the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche’s ideology of
self-invention, he says at a news briefing following his presentation at the
congress, he emphasizes.
Renown
for being an author of numerous books and a longtime faculty member, then
president of Mundelein Seminary, major seminary of the Archdiocese of Chicago,
Bishop Barron says that the call of the Church today is to preserve Catholics
and exert a pull on.
“If
the Church can’t find a way to tell that story in a theo-dramatic way, people
will drift away to this easy self-invention philosophy... “So it is a
real challenge to the Church. … We’ve got to be bold. We’ve got to be
confident. We’ve got to be smart,” he says.
Patrician
Brother Peter John Hayes of Ballyfin, Ireland, who’s in the gathering of approximately 12,000 who
listen to Bishop Barron, also takes notes and clicks cameras as the latter underscores
the message of the Eucharist as a meal, a sacrifice and Jesus’ “the real
presence.” He mentions the fading away of those taking the Eucharist. “When
you wonder, ‘What do we have to do? What can we do? What can I do? … At an
event like this … we get it that some of us are on the same road, anyway,” he shares.
Taken
from the Gospel of Luke, the bishop draws the character of two disciples who
fail to grasp that the risen Lord was right next to them on Easter. He
emphasizes that they were “walking the wrong way,” turning away from God as
everyone does, since people are all sinners. This one makes it hard to attach
importance to Jesus in their lives. He points out that upon hearing of His
words and were compelled by the power of His life, then beseech Him to stay, He
shares a meal with them and give the same command He had given the night before
He died, “Do this in memory of me.”
Humans
pay no attention to Jesus’ commands repeatedly, but “over the centuries that
one dominical command has been extraordinarily did as told. That revelation of
the pattern of His life in the Breaking of the Bread is the occasion the
faithful “get it” and are no longer walking the wrong way, he, he stresses.
The
bishop brings to light the Eucharist as a sacrifice, a theme that was the
least-known and least-developed, he says.
He
articulates that God does not need the sacrifices of the faithful as He
“doesn’t need anything,” but by returning something to God, they “are united to
Him.”
“The
little we bring, if offered to God in the right spirit, breaks against the rock
of the divine self-sufficiency and comes back elevated and multiplied for our
benefit,” he highlights.
Julius
Maquiling an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion for 25 years from Cagayan de Oro Archdiocese in the southern Philippines find this concept of
sacrifice as striking and who was touched to be reminiscent “that the bread is
the true bread, Jesus Christ.”
“Wealth, pleasure, honor, power … we sinners,
we go lusting after them all time, but they won’t satisfy us. Look for eternal
things, eternal bread,” Bishop Barron says in his talk.
The
charismatic Bishop recounts that “If He’s the word of God, [then] what He says
is. What He says reaches into the very roots of something and changes it.
Really, truly and substantially present, yes,” connecting it to an occasion when
Jesus professes His Body and Blood are offered for everyone.
New
York Cardinal Timothy Dolan,[7]
a theological scholar, in his talk about “Mary and the Holy Eucharist,” says
that the Virgin Mother was an “intimate part” of the Eucharist since she
carried Christ in her womb. Catholics could carry Jesus in them like Mary when
receiving Communion. “What Mary carried in nature we carry in supernature,” he
stresses. Mary
was with Jesus during the Crucifixion so that Catholics should be geared up to
face persecution and affliction, referring to the Communist persecution in Eastern Europe. Likewise,
he addresses Chinese Catholics and reminds them of Bishop Dominic Tang who was
arrested after the Communist takeover wherein after five years of prison was
offered by Communist jailers a reprieve to be able to do anything he wished for
a day. Dolan recalls that after saying a
mass as Bishop Tang desired, he was brought back to his cell with the door padlocked.”
Cardinal
Charles Maung Bo of Yangon,[8] Pope Francis' personal representative to the
International Eucharistic Congress in the Philippines, told a group of
prisoners known as the "dancing inmates" of Cebu to "never,
never, never, give up hope." "Darkness
cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate;
only love can do that," quoting Martin Luther King Jr. in his
short talk with the prisoners during a visit on Jan. 26.
In
a short dialogue with prisoners, Cardinal Bo, who mingled with the inmates
urges them to pray for each other. "Your
prayers are powerful because God is very near to you. So pray for all of us.
Pray for a more beautiful, peaceful Philippines," the prelate said.
The
cardinal assured the prisoners, who danced under the rain, that "life is
not about waiting for the storms to pass but it is about learning to dance in
the rain."
"Yes,
you have danced in the rain. Your dance is a beautiful love directed straight
to the heart of all of us," said Cardinal Bo.
Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle[9] slams
individualism at a global Catholic congress.
He says, “We don’t only share food. We share life... Restore the family
meals...The basic unit of the meal is the table, the common table. Nowadays,
the basic unit of the meal is ‘my plate.’ And if I have my plate with food on
it, I can go anywhere and by myself.”...“But that is not a meal.”...That is
just eating...Individualistic persons know how to eat, but they don’t know how
to participate in a meal,” the cardinal said.
The discussion likewise tackles the “social dimension”
of the Eucharist, which includes everyday concerns such as eating meals and
broader issues such as a “throwaway culture” in all sectors of society.
Tagle urges to recover family meals not just to
families per se,” but to a wider community. “There are a number of factors
preventing people from coming together and sharing.” One of these is traffic,
which precluded mothers and fathers to come home in time for dinner, he says.
“So instead of coming together in one table, around
the same food, each one takes his or her own plate. ‘I go to my television, I
go to my computer, I go to my iPod.’ And then we all eat. But not together, as
a meal,” he accentuates.
“It is during
common meals that we also share common stories. We don’t only share food. We
share life... Trust, sharing, sensitivity are all developed around the meal
table...It’s not developed in a seminar,” he adds.
Archbishop Jose Serofia Palma[10]
says, “We are convinced that the Holy Spirit sends us forth in order to
proclaim the story of Jesus. This Congress is like the gathering of the early
disciples when they joyfully shared stories of how each of them encountered the
Risen Lord in the Scripture and in the Breaking of the Bread.”
Eight
hundred inmates[11] at the Cebu Provincial
Detention and Rehabilitation Center perform in front of Cardinal Charles Maung
Bo, papal legate to the 51st International Eucharistic Congress on Tuesday. He
visits and blesses the inmates as part of the week-long congress.
References:
[1] 51st International Eucharistic Congress kicks off in Cebu http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2016/01/23/%E2%80%8E51st_international_eucharistic_congress_kicks_off_in_cebu_%E2%80%8E/1203278
[1] 51st International Eucharistic Congress kicks off in Cebu http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2016/01/23/%E2%80%8E51st_international_eucharistic_congress_kicks_off_in_cebu_%E2%80%8E/1203278
[2] Look: The International Eucharistic Congress in
Cebu, http://cnnphilippines.com/regional/2016/01/31/LOOK-The-International-Eucharistic-Congress-in-Cebu.html
[3] Seà n-Patrick Lovett, Vatican Radio, The
International Eucharistic Congress wraps up in Cebu, http://www.news.va/en/news/the-international-eucharistic-congress-wraps-up-in
[4] KG, GMA News, http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/553492/news/nation/one-million-faithful-join-eucharistic-congress-closing-mass
[5] ABS-CBN News, Watch: Pope Francis
ends 51st IEC in Cebu, http://news.abs-cbn.com/nation/01/31/16/watch-pope-francis-ends-51st-iec-in-cebu
[6] Simone Orendain, Catholic News Service, Christianity ‘running on fumes,’ U.S. bishop tells international Eucharistic Congress, http://www.catholicsun.org/2016/01/26/christianity-running-on-fumes-u-s-bishop-tells-international-eucharistic-congress/
[7] Lito Zulueta, Philippine Daily
Inquirer, Popular New York Cardinal Dolan braves huge blizzard to be in Cebu, http://globalnation.inquirer.net/135884/popular-new-york-cardinal-dolan-braves-huge-blizzard-to-be-in-cebu
[8] Papal envoy tells dancing inmates not to lose hope, http://www.ucanews.com/news/papal-envoy-tells-dancing-inmates-not-to-lose-hope/75067
[9] Paterno Esmaquel II, ‘Restore family meals,’ Cardinal Tagle says at IEC, http://www.rappler.com/nation/120604-cardinal-tagle-iec-2016-family-meals
[10] 51st IEC President Archbishop Jose Palma issues Congress Statement, http://www.cbcpnews.com/iec2016/?p=604
[11] Maria Tan, ABS-CBN News, Cebu inmates perform for
Papal rep, http://news.abs-cbn.com/image/nation/regions/01/26/16/cebu-inmates-perform-for-papal-rep
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment