Columban Fr Terence Twohig RIP

Fr Terence (Traolach) Twohig

(16 April 1938 - 30 March 2016)

Fr Terence P. F. Twohig, known as 'Terry', was born in Donnycarney, Dublin on 16 April 1938. 

Our Lady of Consolation Church, Donnycarney [Website]

He was educated at St Patrickʼs National School, Drumcondra, Coláiste Mhuire, Parnel Square, and Mount St Josephʼs College, Roscrea. He entered the Columban seminary, St Columban's, College, Dalgan Park, Ireland, in September 1956 and was ordained priest on 21 December 1962.

St Columban, Mount St Joseph's, Roscrea

Stained glass window by Harry Clarke (1931)

Appointed to the Philippines in 1963, he was assigned to Mindanao. He served in Dumalinao, Kapatagan and Kolambugan, before being assigned to Ireland for three years on promotion work. 

Lake Lanaw from Marawi City [Wikipedia]

On his return to Mindanao he served in Kolambugan, Kiwalan and Iligan City. He then spent the next ten years in parishes in the Prelature of Marawi, where around 95 per cent of the people are Muslims, in Marawi City, Malabang and Karomatan (now Sultan Naga Dimaporo). For part of that time he lived in a Muslim village in order to learn the Maranao language, spoken by the majority of Muslims in the two Lanao provinces, and become closer to the people. This was a difficult time for Father Terry.

A Muslim friend later wrote to him, Father we really miss you back here. You have been a wonderful man to us, better than any good Muslim has been. We really needed help, and the help unexpectedly came from you who have been accused by our folk as an adversary . . . I want you to know that there are Muslims, pure Muslims, who appreciate your work. Should I have the opportunity I would work, and be proud of working, side by side with you, to  bring justice and peace to both our peoples.

In 1990, Father Terry spent a sabbatical year in Birmingham, England, doing  Islamic Studies. On his return to the Philippines, he spent three years in Pagadian Diocese. 

On hearing of Fr Terry's death, Sultan Maguid Maruhom, a Muslim friend in Pagadian, sent this message that was read at the end of the funeral Mass: I am very sad to know that Fr Terry Twohig passed away yesterday in Ireland. As I pray for his soul, I and my family also extend our heartfelt condolences to his family and to the Columban Fathers. Father Terry was a good man who spent long years of his life in the Philippines, particularly in Mindanao, to serve our people with abundance of heart and help sow the seeds of peace in this part of the world. I am one of his Muslim friends whom he had much inspired to take the challenge in bridging understanding and building peace between people of different faiths. One thing that made him very close to my heart was that in my time of great trouble this good man always came to help and console me. He never abandoned me as a friend despite the risk. Though he may have left us for good, I am sure my memory of him will always stay. Indeed he was a friend I will never forget and he will inspire me forever.

St Joseph's Church, Balcurris, Ballymun, Dublin

Assigned once again to Ireland, he spent ten happy years with the people of Ballymun. On 16 May 1998 while he was celebrating Mass for 60 children making their First Holy Communion a shooting incident took place in the church. In his homily at the funeral, Fr Donal Hogan noted: Of course Terry later visited the gunman in jail a number of times – ever the merciful one – indeed the Christ-like one. 

RTÉ report on shooting in St Joseph’s Church

Am important part of Father Terry's life was his involvement with the Jesus Caritas Fraternity of Priests, in Mindanao and later in Dublin, inspired by the spirituality of Blessed Charles de Foucauld.

Failing health forced Father Terry to the Dalgan Nursing Home in 2004. He was a gentle, good-humoured man, always interested in people. A very committed missionary, he made every effort to reach out to the Muslims of Mindanao, knowing that only the witness of true Christian charity would, and did indeed, make an impression on them. 

Father Terry died on 30 March 2016.May he rest in peace. Surely goodness and kindness shall follow me . . . (Psalm 23 [22]:6, Grail translation).

Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam uasal. May his noble soul be at the right hand of God.

St Columban's Cemetery, Dalgan Park

Prayer of Abandonment
Blessed Charles de Foucauld

Father,

I abandon myself into your hands;

do with me what you will.

Whatever you may do, I thank you:

I am ready for all, I accept all.

Let only your will be done in me,

and in all your creatures –

I wish no more than this, O Lord.

Into your hands I commend my soul:

I offer it to you with all the love of my heart,

for I love you, Lord, and so need to give myself,

to surrender myself into your hands without reserve,

and with boundless confidence,

for you are my Father.

A Proud Dubliner

Like most Irish people, Father Terry had a strong attachment to his native county/city. No doubt this was part of the strong sense of rootedness that enabled him to reach out to Muslims in Mindanao. During his funeral Mass his battered Breviary and a Dublin shirt were brought up as symbols of his life.

Members of the Dublin Gaelic Football team [Dublin GAA]

At the end of the burial of a Catholic in Ireland a decade of the Rosary is prayed.  And after that at the burial of a Columban the Salve Regina is sung. At Father Terry's funeral another song was added, Molly Malone (Cockles and Mussels), the theme song of Dubliners, especially those from the city. Father Terry probably never heard this recent version in Dutch, sung by Ancora, but I'm sure he would have enjoyed it.

Columban Fr Joseph Shiels RIP

Fr Joseph Matthew Shiels

(1930 - 2015)

Fr Joseph M. Shiels died in the Nursing Home at St Columban's, Dalgan Park, Navan, Ireland, on Sunday 4 October 2015.

Born in Paisley, Scotland, on 3 March 1930, he was educated at St Charles Parochial School, Paisley, Waterside Boys PES, Derry, and St Columb’s College, Derry. He came to St Columban’s, Dalgan Park, in 1947 and was ordained priest on 21 December 1953.

St Mirin Catholic Cathedral, Paisley [Wikipedia]

He was appointed to the southern island of Mindanao in the Philippines. After language studies, he served in Ozamis, Clarin (both in Misamis Occidental), Lanipao (Lanao del Norte) and later in Tangub (Misamis Occidental). After his first vacation he served from 1962 to 1970 in Lopez-Jaena (Misamis Occidental) where he helped the poor local farmers to increase their income considerably by planting the Lakatan variety of bananas in the spaces between their coconut trees. 

From 1972 to 1976 he served in the parishes of Aloran, and Jimenez (both in Misamis Occidental).

St John the Baptist Church, Jimenez [Wikipedia]

In 1977 he undertook studies in Pastoral Counselling in Chicago. On his return to the Philippines in the 1980s, he served in Pagadian City, and then in Marawi City, followed by Lianga (Surigao del Sur), Linamon, Suarez and Buru-un (all in Lanao del Norte), in the Diocese of Iligan, until 2003. On returning to Ireland he lived in Derry and served as acting-Parish Priest in the Parish of Desertmartin. 

Desertmartin, County Derry [Wikipedia]

While in Derry, Father Joe researched and published his book Christian Transition, (Gracewing, Herefordshire 2007). He was always an independent thinker who liked to interpret events, and enjoyed a good discussion. He found pastoral work fulfilling and was happy to help out in Derry as long as his health permitted. 

 May he rest in peace.

Columban Fr Daniel Baragry RIP

Fr Daniel M. Baragry

11 May 1930 - 9 January 2015

Fr Daniel ('Dan') Baragry was born on 11 May 1930 in Tipperary Town, County Tipperary, Ireland. Educated at Christian Brothers School, Tipperary, and The Abbey School, Tipperary, he came to St Columban's, Dalgan Park, Navan, in September 1948 and was ordained priest on 21 December 1954.

Main Street, Tipperary Town [Wikipedia]

Father Dan was assigned to the Philippines and spent the next 45 years happily working in that country. The first 35 years were all spent in parishes in the southern island of Mindanao. He served in Pagadian City (Zamboanga del Sur), Mahinog (Camiguin Island), Malabang (Lanao del Sur), Tangub City (Misamis Occidental), Bacolod (Lanao del Norte), Anakan (Gingoog City, Misamis Oriental), Alubijid (Misamis Oriental), Marihatag (Surigao del Sur) and Linamon  (Lanao del Norte).

Pagadian City, on Illana Bay [Wikipedia]

A man of prodigious energy, he served for example in Anakan, a very rough, rugged, mountainous parish, which had a logging camp and a total of eighty-three small scattered communities. Dan was out almost every day on his motor-bike, visiting one or other community. On his return to the parish house, after a short rest, he had the energy to play tennis, and after a shower and supper, there was always the designated prayer time. A former superior said of him 'Dan always wanted the hard assignments;  he worked hard, played hard and prayed hard'. When the new area of Tandag was taken on, Dan was one of the first to volunteer, even though his assignment was an eight-hour drive from the Columban Central House in Cagayan de Oro.

San Agustin Cathedral, Cagayan de Oro City [Wikipedia, Shubert Ciencia]

In the early 1990s, Father Dan took some units of Clinical Pastoral Education. Later, residing in the formation house in Cebu City,  he undertook a new apostolate with patients, and their families of the psychiatric wing of Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center, a government hospital.  In this apostolate he served those most neglected by society. By the year 2000 his own health required care and he spent a year in Manila before returning home to Ireland in April 2001. As long as he was active he did some book-keeping work in the farm office before being confined to the Dalgan Nursing Home where he died on 9 January after participating in the morning Eucharist. Father Dan was a quiet, dedicated, loyal Columban with a gentle sense of humour. 

May he rest in peace.

Slievenamon is the unofficial anthem of Tipperary people and is sung here by the late Frank Patterson, from Clonmel, County Tipperary.

Slievenamon, County Tipperary [Photo:Wikimedia Commons user Trounce]

Bishop Nereo P. Odchimar of Tandag, which covers the province of Surigao del Sur, wrote in an email to Fr Pat Raleigh, Columban Regional Director in Ireland: Kindly convey to the Columban Fathers and to Fr Dan's family condolence and prayers from the Diocese of Tandag. Thanks for giving us a great missionary who was an inspiration for our younger priests.

Fr Raleigh noted that on the night that Dan died the nurse on duty, Ruby, and one of the carers, Susanne, were from the Philippines. How appropriate. 

Elma Guia O'Connell, a Filipina who served as a Columban lay missionary in Taiwan and is now married in Ireland, emailed me, We are on the way back to Dungarvan from Navan where we attended the funeral of Fr Dan Baragry yesterday in Dalgan. I don't know much about Fr Dan but once you know one Columban who dedicated his life to the Filipino people, it feels like you know them all.

Father Dan and I spent some years together on the formation team in Cebu City. He experienced real joy in spending every morning from Monday to Friday with the patients in the psychiatric wing of the hospital where he worked. He had great patience and remarkable kindness, a kindness that his late brother, Fr Frank Baragry who died in 1997, also had. Father Frank spent 40 years in Mindanao as a Columban missionary. Their nephew, Fr Dan Baragray CSsR, the newly-elected Provincial of the Dublin Province of the Redemptorists, also worked in the Philippines, first as a student and later as a priest. Long-distance phone-calls between the two Dan Baragrys used to cause some confusion when they had to be done through an operator!

Something I will always remember about Father Dan is his very firm and welcoming handshake.

Basílica Minore del Santo Niño de Cebú [Wikipedia]

Columban Fr Francis Carey RIP

Fr Francis Carey

(19 August 1937 - 6 December 2014)

‘He had a gentle presence and a kind heart.’ That is how Fr Dan O’Malley, Regional Director of the Columbans in the Philippines, described Fr Francis Carey when he informed the membership of his death on Saturday 6 December. Father Frank was diagnosed with a form of cancer late in October. His death has been a great shock to all who knew him.

Father Frank was the son of Paul and Marion Carey and was born in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. He attended a secondary school there run by the Christian Brothers. He received his formation as a Columban in Sassafras, Victoria, and in Wahroonga and Turramurra, New South Wales. He was ordained in St Patrick’s Cathedral, Melbourne, on 13 December 1962 by Archbishop Ernest Victor Tweedy, at the time the Archbishop Emeritus of Hobart, Tasmania. 

St Patrick's Cathedral, Melbourne [Wikipedia]

Father Frank often recounted the difficulty in finding a bishop and setting a date for his ordination, since all the active bishops in Australia were at the first session of the Second Vatican Council, which ended on 8 December. His father, a solicitor (lawyer), phoned the Columban superior at the time in Australia telling him that he understood the difficulty but that he, Paul, was responsible for arranging the family celebration and needed to know the date as soon as possible. The date was set very quickly!

A Columban who knew Father Frank very well wrote, ‘He had a great relationship with his father.  When he’d arrive home on holidays from the seminary Frank and his Dad would spend the whole night catching up. He got many of his priorities and values from his Dad. He hated to see people bossing others around.’

St Michael's Cathedral, Iligan City [Wikipedia]

Father Frank arrived in the Philippines in September 1963 and was assigned to Mindanao. After language studies he spent more than five years in parish work, He served for relatively short periods in Oroquieta City and Bonifacio in Misamis Occidental, Kinoguitan, Balingaon and Linugos, Misamais Oriental, and Malabang, Lanao del Sur. He then spent almost four years in St Michael’s, Iligan City, now the cathedral of the Diocese of Iligan. There he formed a great friendship with the late Fr Peter Steen who was parish priest at the time.

Father Peter had a very sharp wit and once remarked at the breakfast table in Manila when we got news of the death of a Columban priest in Ireland who had been in the Philippines for many years and who tended to be on the strict side, ‘He’ll probably find that God is a lot kinder than he thought he was’. When told of this in an email some years later Father Frank responded, ‘The statement about X was the ultimate Steen. He certainly believed in a God of understanding.’

Father Frank might have been speaking about himself. One who knew him very well described him as ‘unflappable, calm and non-judgmental. He was balanced, weighed things up and saw both sides. He allowed people to have their point of view and could sit with ambiguities and opposites. But he had great courage and always made up his own mind.’

Christ healing the blind, El Greco, 1570-75

Galleria Nozionale, Parma, Italy [Web Gallery of Art]

Fr Carey’s life as a priest was guided especially by Luke 4:18-19: ‘”The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.”’ A friend noted, 'Even with the ecology it was about healing, reconciling and liberating.’  Luke 4:14-19 was the gospel read at his request at the funeral Mass in Our Lady of Remedies Church, Malate, Manila, on 11 December, with the passage Jesus read, Isaiah 61:1-3, as the First Reading.

This is what guided him when he spent nearly seven years, from 1969 till 1976, in Australia, working as a chaplain to overseas students, promoting the work of Columbans throughout the world and seeking vocations to the missionary priesthood. He could be creatively practical. He once spent a month in an outback parish in Australia and told the people on his first Sunday there that he couldn’t cook and would appreciate it if each day of his stay a different family would invite him to their home for a hot meal. The people were delighted to do so and around 30 families by welcoming this friendly missionary priest learned quite a bit about the work of the Columbans in the Philippines.

Shearing the Rams, Tom Roberts, 1890

National Gallery of Victoria [Wikipedia]

On his return to the Philippines in 1976 Father Frank spent nearly a year in the parish of Tambulig, Zamboanga del Sur, before moving to Manila where he was to spend most of the rest of his life, apart from a stint on mission promotion in Australia from 1991 to 1996 in Victoria, Western Australia and New South Wales. From 1981 until 1991 he worked with third-level students in Manila, with periods as chaplain in Philippine Women’s University, Far Eastern University, and with Student Catholic Action, which was founded by Columban Fr Edward J. McCarthy in the 1930s.

Sanctuary, Our Lady of Remedies Church, Malate [Wikipedia]

From 1996 till 2002 Father Frank was an assistant priest at Our Lady of Remedies Parish, Malate, Manila. The Center for Ecozoic Living and Learning (CELL) and the Eco-Farm Retreat Centre in Silang, Cavite, south of Manila, the brainchild of Columban Fr John Leydon whose vision was shared by Elin Mondejar, the owner of the land where CELL is located. Father Frank was part of this from its early days.  This Center demonstrates permaculture and organic farming and zero waste management in place of landfill. Malate Parish was also involved in this project. Fr Dominic Nolan, also from Melbourne and deeply involved in the project for many years, described Father Frank as ‘the glue that kept CELL together.’

A Columban employee who visited CELL in 2009 wrote in an online tribute, ‘Thank you for giving me inspiration in advocating and living a life dedicated to nourishing the earth and everything that God put in it. I remember my short time at CELL, feeling the earth, inhaling the freshness of the surroundings, enjoying the meals that were served to us straight from the lush garden, everything. I will never forget the excitement I saw in your eyes when you munched on some mint leaves just to convince us that these things are actually good and can nourish our bodies.’ This same person, a young married woman, said to me on hearing of his death, ‘I would have loved to have asked him to adopt me!’ This echoes what St Athanasius wrote in his life of St Anthony the Abbot: ‘And so all the people of the village, and the good men with whom he associated saw what kind of man he was, and they called him “The friend of God”. Some loved him as a son, and others as though he were a brother.’

Our Lady of Atonement Cathedral, Baguio City [Wikipedia]

Father Frank, who over the years quietly helped raise a considerable amount of money for the education of students, continued to be involved in CELL even though in recent years he was in charge of the Columban house in Baguio City, in the mountains of northern Luzon. It was there that he began to feel ill in October and returned to Manila.

Pope Francis wrote in Evangelii Gaudium, The Joy of the Gospel, ‘When we live out a spirituality of drawing nearer to others and seeking their welfare, our hearts are opened wide to the Lord’s great and most beautiful gifts (No 272).’ May the gentle heart of Fr Francis Carey be opened wide to the gift of eternal life.

Father Frank loved jazz music. In the video above Stéphane Grappelli (on the left), one of the greatest jazz violinists, plays with Yehudi Menuhin, one of the great classical violinists. Yehudi Menuhin once lived in the house in Sassafras, Victoria, where Father Frank began his formation as a Columban seminarian.

'Here is the Lamb of God . . .' Sunday Reflections, 2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A

Madonna and Child with the Lamb of God, Cesare de Sesto, c.1615 

[Web Gallery of Art]

In the Philippines the liturgy is that of the Feast of the Santo  Niño (Holy Child). You'll find Sunday Reflections for that here.

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)                                  

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, India [optional], Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa)

Gospel John 1:29-34 (New Revised StandardVersion, Catholic Edition, Canada) 

The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and declared, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.’  I myself did not know him; but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel.”  And John testified, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him.  I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’  And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.”

San Alfonso de Liguori Parish, Rome, 6 January 2014.

Some wonderful photos of Pope Francis with the lamb here.

My friend Frances Molloy in England, founder and project manager of Pastoral Care Project, a ministry in the Archdiocese of Birmingham to persons with dementia and to their carers, told me a beautiful story in an email just after Christmas:

Behold . . . My granddaughter aged 4 was playing with 'Jesus' family', as they are known to her, our hand-knitted nativity set, and she noticed the empty manger. A little later she came to me and said, 'Grandma, I've put the lamb in the manger'. Quite a moment . . .

The Lamb of God is one of the names of Jesus, pointing towards his sacrificial death on Calvary. St John the Baptist, who introduces Jesus to us with the words Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! was to be martyred not long afterwards. The purpose of the mission of St John the Baptist was that he [Jesus] might be revealed to Israel. This is the mission to which each of us is called.

In his letter to the 10 new cardinals he announced last Sunday Pope Francis writes: And, although this may appear paradoxical, the ability to look further and to love more universally with greater intensity may be acquired only by following the same path of the Lord: the path of self-effacement and humility, taking on the role of a servant.

St John the Baptist followed that path: After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me. His mission was to lead people towards Jesus. One of the new cardinals is Archbishop Orlando B. Quevedo OMI of Cotabato where just more than half of the 12,000,000 plus people are Catholics. Most of the others are Muslims.

The first Oblates came to the Philippines in 1939 from North America and included Canadians and Americans. They went to parts of Mindanao with a large Muslim population. Like the Columbans, to which I belong, they have their martyrs, as Fr Eliseo Mercado Jr OMI writes: The OMIs have had their share of martyrs in their 70 years in the Philip­pines. The first martyr was election-related. Fr Nelson Javellana and his volunteers of the first Philippine move­ment for clean and honest elections were ambushed near Tambunan, Cotabato on 3 November 1970. Three martyrs shed their blood in Sulu and Tawi-Tawi. They are Bishop Benjamin de Je­sus on 4 February 1997, Fr Benjamin Inocencio on 28 December 2000 and Fr Jesus Reynaldo Roda on 15 January 2008.

Cardinal-designate Quevedo, who has been deeply involved in Christian-Muslim dialogue in Mindanao for many years, would have known those four men very well. He knows what is is to follow the same path of the Lord.

Below is an article published in Misyon, the Columban magazine I edit here in the Philippines, in May-June 2008, the first online-only edition. The author, Fr Roberto C. Layson OMI, whose ordination on 10 December 1988 I attended, was working with Bishop Benjamin de Jesus when he was murdered in 1997. Here he writes about his friend and confrere Fr Jesus Reynaldo A. Roda OMI whose life and death proclaimed Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! 

They too Mourned for Him

by Fr Roberto C. Layson OMI

Fr Jesus Reynaldo A. Roda OMI, ‘Father Rey’, expected it all along. But not the people of Tabawan, whom he had served for ten years before his brutal murder on 15 January at the hands of his abductors. One of Father Rey’s Muslim scholars described the immediate reaction of the local people: ‘It was as if a big bomb was dropped in our midst and we got the shock of our lives. The whole island mourned. Some lost their appetite. Some kids don’t want to go to school anymore’.

Father Rey

Desecration of Sacred Grounds

Tabawan is one of the beautiful islands of Tawi-Tawi, the southernmost province of the Philippine archipelago. It is inhabited by peace-loving Samals and prides itself on being a peaceful and tolerant society. That is why the brutal murder of a missionary priest in this island is hard for the local inhabitants to accept. Ultimately, they saw it as a desecration of their sacred ground.

The Oblates of Mary Immaculate, a missionary congregation, started to establish mission stations in the Muslim-dominated provinces of Cotabato, Sulu, and Tawi-Tawi in 1939. Since then, they have been living with Muslims while serving the minority Christian population of the islands.

After World War II, the Oblates put up Notre Dame Schools in the islands to respond to the increasing demand for education in the region. These were welcomed by the local Muslims. Not only that. Over the years, the local people also started to develop strong affection for the missionaries. This was especially true in the case of Fr Leopold Gregoire OMI, a Canadian.

Fr Gregoire was the director of Notre Dame School in Tabawan for 20 years until his death. He died many years ago but until now, not only the Notre Dame community celebrates his birthday every year but the entire island. The celebration is called ‘Father Gregoire Day’ and goes on for three days with a lot of fanfare. The town has a population of more or less 20,000, with only thirty Christians.

For Love of Others

It was around 7:30 in the evening. Father Rey was praying inside the chapel, as he used to do after supper, when he was taken forcibly by his captors. When he refused to go with them, they shot him dead. The Oblates in the Vicariate have agreed among themselves not to go with the attackers in the event of a kidnapping attempt. The reason is that in many kidnapping incidents in Mindanao, the subsequent military operations usually take their toll not only among the combatants but also among the civilians. Father Rey chose to sacrifice his life in order to prevent the loss of more lives.

There were some students at the campus at the time of the killing. They were taking a computer class. The class is held in the evening because it’s the only time that the school generator is running. There is no electricity on the island. When the armed men left, they took Mr Taup, a Muslim teacher, with them.

Losing one of their own

Ordained on 10 May 1980, Father Rey had deep compassion for the poor. He was in the forefront of justice and peace work in the Diocese of Kidapawan during the Martial Law days. Prior to his assignment in Tabawan, he was a missionary in Thailand where he interacted with Buddhist society. In Tabawan, he not only directed the school and supported many scholars but also implemented several socio-economic projects for the poor in close coordination with a number of NGOs and government agencies. In 2003, he was actively involved during the surge of deportees from Sabah, Malaysia, providing them with food and shelter.

The death of Father Rey brought back to my memory that fateful day, 4 February 1997, when Bishop Benjamin de Jesus OMI was murdered in front of Mt Carmel Cathedral in Jolo. This was followed nearly four years later by another tragedy when Fr Benjamin Inocencio OMI was murdered at the back of the same cathedral on 28 December 2000.

Just like what happened after the deaths of Bishop Ben and Father Benjie, the Muslims mourned. They also mourned Father Rey’s death, especially the people of Tabawan whom he had learned to love. They literally had lost one of themselves.

One in Sorrow

I saw Samud being interviewed by Ces Drilon on ABS-CBN TV. He is the same convento boy, a Muslim, whom I met when I was based in Bongao from 1990 to 1994. The day after the killing, Fr Raul M. Biasbas OMI, a classmate of Father Rey on another island in Tawi-Tawi, called Samud by cellphone to ask what had really happened. ‘I’m very sorry, Father, I was not able to protect Father Rey,’ he answered in tears.

I spoke to Wija, one of Father Rey’s scholars, also a Muslim. She called him ‘Tatay’, ‘Dad’. During the commotion at the convento with the armed men, she rushed to help him but he shouted at her, ‘Anak, tumakbo ka na!’, ‘Run, daughter!’ She accompanied the body of Father Rey from Tabawan to Cotabato on board a military helicopter provided by the Philippine Air Force. She brought with her an album containing pictures of Father Rey and herself, which she keeps with fondness.

In Bongao island where Father Rey was waked for two days, Muslims and Christians filled Holy Rosary Church. The Muslims even brought food during the wake. In Cotabato City, Muslims and Christians were crying along the highway as Father Rey’s remains were transported from Awang Airport to a funeral parlor in the city. Many Muslims also came during the wake and attended the burial at the Oblate cemetery in Tamontaka.

This was very consoling. While we grieved for the death of Father Rey, we found solace not only in the support of fellow Christians but also in the support given by Muslims, including the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and several NGOs, through their personal condolences and public condemnations of the murder.

Boundaries Transcended

To me, this outpouring of support reveals that human goodness transcends even religious boundaries. Indeed, it is possible for Muslims and Christians to work together to create a peaceful society if only we learn to shed our human biases and focus on doing God’s will for his people.

We do not exactly know what Father Rey was telling God when he was praying inside the chapel. Perhaps, he was telling Him about his many dreams for the people of Tabawan. Now that he is gone, only the memory of Father Rey remains in the hearts of the Muslim and Christian inhabitants of this island.

Father Rey would have turned 54 on 5 February, less than a month after his murder.

From Messiah by Handel, sung by the Mogens Dahl Chamber Choir, Denmark

Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world (John 1:29, Authorized [King James] Version).