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November 2016
Pope Francis and other religious leaders have been committed to bring together representatives of the different faiths to pray for the much-needed peace in our planet.
The meeting of Pope Francis with the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar University in mid-year highlighted a continuity of efforts among different faiths to counter terrorism and promote peace in the world. Collaboration between religions is a necessary condition for the good of humanity.
Last July, Muslims attended Sunday Mass across France to show solidarity in denouncing the killing of an elderly priest in a church by two terrorists. The interfaith celebration signaled the need for sharing and prayer between believers of both religions as a way to defeat fundamentalism and violence.
Home to Christians and Muslims, the southern island of Mindanao in the Philippines has been beset by religious conflicts. Hand-in-hand, people of both faiths continue to strive to work for peace, despite glaring differences, like links in a diverse chain.
Working for over twenty years helping drug dependents recover from abuse and addiction in a rehabilitation sanctuary for young people using chemical substances, I learned that they are not criminals but in need of medical help and intervention.
Under India’s caste system, the Dalits or “Untouchables” clean dry latrines, sewer lines and septic tanks. For his crusade against this inhumane work and for helping manual scavengers to take on more dignified jobs, Bezwada Wilson is one of the six recipients of this year’s Ramon Magsaysay Award.
Electronic multinationals are accused of using cobalt from companies employing children, as young as seven years old, working in dangerous conditions. Human rights activists urge these giant corporations to take responsibility over the source of the raw materials for their components.
First Catholic priest in Soviet Kazakhstan, Fr. Wladyslaw served 13 years of hard labor in a detention camp. Despite persecution, he went on exercising his priestly ministry without reserve, caring for people and serving them. On his beatification, on September 11, he was called a “courageous missionary of Christ in distant lands of Eastern Europe.”
The month of November begins with the solemnity of All Saints, followed by the commemoration of the Faithful Departed. These celebrations invite us to cultivate the “communion of the saints”; to reflect on our supreme calling, that of the common vocation to sanctity.
If it does not do something drastic now, the Philippines would be the first country in Asia to completely lose its forest cover soon. Experts say that the country lost most of its forest in the past 50 years. The next generation will have to seek solutions to this problem.
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