An Advent novena for priests

I came across this on the website of the Archdiocese of Denver, Colorado, USA. It is never too late to start praying for our priests, especially in the context of what has happened in Ireland.

An Advent novena for priests
By Roxanne King

Next week, the faithful are invited to recite a special novena to Mary under the title “Our Lady of the New Advent” and to offer the prayers for priests.

In the Denver Archdiocese, Dec. 16 is the feast of Our Lady of the New Advent. The nine-day novena would take place on the days leading up to and including the feast
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“On the liturgical calendar of the Archdiocese of Denver, which has been approved by the Holy See, the days from Dec. 8 through the 16th are ‘Days of Prayer to Mary,’” explained Msgr. Edward Buelt, pastor of Our Lady of Loreto Church in Foxfield and a member of the Presbyteral Council. “It seems most appropriate that in this Year for Priests the ‘Days of Prayer to Mary’ be dedicated as ‘Days of Prayer to Mary for Priests.’”

The archdiocese’s Year for Priests activities committee, which is led by Auxiliary Bishop James Conley, agreed. The faithful are therefore invited to pray the novena (see box on Page 13) either alone or with family or friends, at home or at their parish.

The Year for Priests, which began June 19 and runs through the same date next year, was proclaimed by Pope Benedict XVI to encourage priests to recommit themselves to their priestly vocation and as an occasion for the laity to pray for and support priests in their ministry.

The Our Lady of the New Advent prayer, which was composed by the Benedictine nuns of the Abbey of St. Walburga located in Virginia Dale, Colo., complements an icon created by Jesuit Father William Hart McNichols for the archdiocese 18 years ago at the request of then-archbishop, now Cardinal J. Francis Stafford.

Father McNichols, 60, is the son of former Colorado Gov. Stephen and Marjory McNichols. Born in Denver he has resided in New Mexico since 1990, where he works as an iconographer.

In the Our Lady of the New Advent icon, Mary is dressed in purple and holds her hands up in the orans posture of prayer in a gesture of intercession. The Christ Child, who shines forth from within her, holds a Columbine flower in his left hand. Behind the expectant mother, the Rocky Mountains rise up out of the Colorado plains.

The symbolism found in Our Lady of the New Advent makes her a particularly appropriate title under which to pray for priests.

The purple worn by Mary, Msgr. Buelt told the Denver Catholic Register in 1991, is the color for Advent and is used in the Scriptures to represent the dignity of the priesthood.

“The Virgin’s purple robes represent the fact that the laity, too, are dressed in purple because they exercise a true priesthood by virtue of their baptism,” Msgr. Buelt said, referring to the universal priesthood of the Christian whose witness, work and trials may be offered as a sacrifice of praise and intercession to sanctify the world.

“The Christ Child is within the mother’s being” he added, “because the universal priesthood of the baptized, as represented by Mary, is meant to nurture the particular priesthood of the ordained, as represented by Christ.”

At the same time, continued Msgr. Buelt, those ordained to the ministerial priesthood are to serve the universal priesthood of the baptized.

The Columbine the Christ Child holds is the state flower for Colorado and is an ancient iconographic symbol of the Holy Spirit.

“Columba is Latin for ‘dove,’” explained Father McNichols by phone from his office in Ranchos de Taos, N.M.

The single stem of the Columbine in the icon symbolizes the one true God and the three blossoms the persons of the Holy Trinity. Greek lettering on the icon identifies Mary as the “Mother of God” and Christ as the “Son of God.”In the Prayer to Our Lady of the New Advent, one implores: “O Lady and Mother of the One who was and is and is to come, dawn of the New Jerusalem, we earnestly beseech you, bring us by your intercession so to live in love that the Church, the Body of Christ, may stand in this world’s dark as fiery icon of the New Jerusalem.”

The “dark” the prayer mentions is not only the darkness of hatred, sin and evil in the world, but also the darkness of winter. With its short days and long, cold nights, winter can be difficult and depressing for many people as it compounds the other tribulations one experiences.

“It’s the darkest time of the year,” noted Father McNichols.

But we can take heart and find consolation in the holy season of Advent with its beautiful reminder of the salvation and new life won out of love for us by Christ—“the light of the world” (Jn 8:12)—which urges us to look with hopeful expectancy for his return at the end of time.

“The darkness of Advent,” Father McNichols asserted, “is therefore not the darkness of despair but the darkness of pregnancy and waiting for rebirth.”

The Prayer to Our Lady of the New Advent is especially good to offer for priests as their ministry calls for them to bring the good news of Jesus Christ and his love to the people, Fathr McNichols said.

“The priest is the bearer of the Gospel and the Gospel is the light to all nations,” he said. “To bring the light of new birth, new Advent, during a dark time is the vocation of the priest.”

Prayer to Our Lady of the New Advent

O Lady and Mother

of the One who was and is

and is to come,

dawn of the New Jerusalem,

we earnestly beseech you,

bring us by your intercession

so to live in love that the Church,the Body of Christ,

may stand in this world’s dark

as fiery iconof the New Jerusalem.

We ask you to obtain for us

this mercy through Jesus Christ,

your Son and Lord,

who lives and reigns

with the Father

in the Holy Spirit,

one God forever and ever.

Amen.

Follow with an "Our Father," a "Hail Mary" and a "Glory Be."

Closing Hymn: “O Come, O Come Emmanuel”

Optional: Scripture readings suggested by Father William McNichols to precede the prayers may be found online at http://puffin.creighton.edu/jesuit/andre/sj_nov2.html or call 303-715-3215.

For more information about Father McNichols and his icons, visit http://www.standreirublevicons.com/.

Apology (?) of papal nuncio to Ireland

Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza, Papal Nuncio to Ireland, outside Irish Department of Foreign Affairs yesterday

The Papal Nuncio to Ireland, Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza, met yesterday with Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs, Micheál Martin. The meeting was at the request of the latter due to the failure of the nuncio, of his predecessor and of the the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) to reply to letters from the Murphy Commission on the abuse of children by priests in the Archdiocese of Dublin.

Religious Affairs Correspondent Patsy McGarry reports in today's Irish Times:

Following a meeting with Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin in Iveagh House, Archbishop Leanza said: “I express my shock and dismay and certainly I understand the anger of the people and the suffering of those who were abused, so we certainly condemn this . . . If there was any mistake from our side we always apologise for this.”

Dr Leanza stressed there was no intention on the part of the Vatican not to co-operate with the Murphy commission and acknowledged that he himself should have responded to a letter from the commission.

Mr Martin said he had conveyed to the nuncio the Irish public’s “deep anger and outrage” over the Murphy report findings. He also insisted on full co-operation by the church with the ongoing inquiry by the Murphy commission into the handling of clerical child sex abuse allegations in Cloyne diocese.

At least the nuncio acknowledged that he should have replied to the letter sent to him. But his 'if there was any mistake from our side we always apologise for this' comes across to me as a non-apology.

RTÉ, Ireland's national TV and radio service, reports Vatican 'dismayed' at Murphy Report findings and there are links on that page to radio and TV reports. You will find links there to both audio and video reports.

Abusive priests teach, in effect, that Jesus is a child molester

I happened to come across one of the weekly columns that Canadian priest Fr Raymond de Souza (above) writes for the National Post and includes on his own website. This particle column, posted on 29 October, was The Vatican’s man in Canada . He was praising the outgoing nuncio to Canada, Archbishop Luigi Ventura.

What caught my eye was Father de Souza’s clarification of what a nuncio is and isn’t:

The apostolic nuncio is generally thought of as ambassador of one state to another, but that is not quite right. The Vatican City State does not have diplomatic relations with any country. Diplomatic relations are with the Holy See.

What’s the difference? The Holy See is the legal expression of the pope’s role as universal pastor of the Church. States maintain diplomatic relations with the supreme authority of the Catholic Church, which is recognized as a sovereign power in international law.

Mrs Mary O'Rourke TD (member of Irish parliament)

My reading of what Father de Souza wrote is that a nuncio represents the pope as pastor. That means that when the current papal nuncio to Ireland, Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza, who was appointed on 22 February last year, and his immediate predecessor, Archbishop Giuseppe Lazzarotto, now nuncio to Australia, refused to even reply to letters from the Murphy Commission, set up by the Irish government to look into the sexual abuse of children by priests in the Archdiocese of Dublin, they were, in effect, giving the ‘two fingers’ to these children – in the name of the universal pastor of the Church. Here is what the Dublin Report says about Rome’s refusal to cooperate:

Documents held by Rome

‘2.23 The Commission wrote to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) in Rome in September 2006 asking for information on the promulgation of the document Crimen Sollicitationis (see Chapter 4) as well as information on reports of clerical child sexual abuse which had been conveyed to the Congregation by the Archdiocese of Dublin in the period covered by the Commission. The CDF did not reply. However, it did contact the Department of Foreign Affairs stating that the Commission had not gone through appropriate diplomatic channels. The Commission is a body independent of government and does not consider it appropriate for it to use diplomatic channels.

‘2.24 The Commission wrote to the Papal Nuncio in February 2007 requesting that he forward to the Commission all documents in his possession relevant to the Commission's terms of reference, “which documents have not already been produced or will not be produced by Archbishop Martin”. The letter further requested the Papal Nuncio, if he had no such documentation, to confirm this. No reply was received. The Commission does not have the power to compel the production of documents by the Papal Nuncio or the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The Commission again wrote to the Papal Nuncio in 2009 enclosing extracts from the draft report which referred to him and his office as it was required to do. Again, no reply was received.’ (My emphases).

The CDF found time to complain to the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs about protocol but apparently didn’t give a damn about abused children in Dublin.

Irish Foreign Minister Micheál Martin

Last Saturday Paddy Agnew, The Irish Times correspondent in Rome wrote the following:

Last week I rang the Holy See press office looking for an official reaction to the Dublin diocesan report. The Vatican’s senior spokesman, Fr Federico Lombardi, patiently trotted out the standard Holy See line as to how such “matters” were the concern of the local church. The Vatican was aware of the seriousness of the report but did not want to interfere, added the spokesman.

Given that the report continued to greatly exercise and trouble minds in Ireland, I inquired next day if the Holy See had anything to add. This time, Fr Lombardi’s number two, Don Ciro Benedettini, answered the phone.

When he heard my voice, knowing what I would want to ask, Don Ciro began to laugh. It was a friendly, inoffensive laugh of the sort that said, “Come on, Paddy, We have nothing more to say on this matter.”

This to me indicates that the press people in the Vatican are out of touch. The lack of response of the two nuncios – acting officially in the name of Pope Benedict – and of the CDF show utter contempt. Do the two nuncios have the same contempt for Pope Benedict, whom they officially represent, as they do for the Irish people?

Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza, Papal Nuncio to Ireland

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin (left) with Archbishop Giuseppe Lazzarotto, previous papal nuncio to Ireland

Last week in the Dáil, the Irish parliament, Mary O’Rourke of the main government party, Fianna Fáil, spoke scathingly of the current nuncio: ‘Consider the discourtesy of the head of the Vatican parading around Ireland in his wonderful glitzy clothes but not replying to letters.’ She reminded me of something our rector, Fr Joe Flynn, one of three brothers who became Columbans and a canon lawyer, said in one of his First Friday talks in St Columban’s College, Dalgan Park, back in the 1960s, ‘If I were pope for half an hour I’d get rid of all those red belly-bands’.

Today, Tuesday, Archbishop Leanza will be visiting the office of the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Micheál Martin, to explain why he and his predecessor refused to reply to the Commission. He has been summoned by the minister. (Mr Martin was very much personally involved in the recent successful efforts to obtain the release of kidnapped Irish Columban Fr Michael Sinnott in the Philippines). The nuncio, at his own request, met the secretary general of the Department of Foreign Affairs, last week.

Cardinal Seán Brady, Archbishop of Armagh

Paddy Agnew and Patsy McGarry report in today’s Irish Times that Cardinal Seán Brady of Armagh and Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin will meet Pope Benedict to discuss the whole situation. Nuncio Leanza will be there too along with ‘Senior Vatican Curia figures with specific competence in this area’.

The Irish Times report includes this, to me, strange paragraph:

They [‘Vatican insiders’] say Friday’s meeting is a direct intervention from the Holy See, and has been called by an increasingly frustrated Pope Benedict XVI. The sources say the pope will argue the Irish clerical sex-abuse crisis has gone on far too long and will urge Irish church leaders to find a definitive exit from the crisis.

Is this more concern for ‘the good name’ of the [institutional] Church?

Vincent Browne wrote in his column Vatican cannot escape blame in abuse scandal in the Sunday Business Post last Sunday:

One final reflection. This quite proper outrage over the bishops and the cover-ups and the lies disguises a larger phenomenon.The incidence of child sex abuse in Ireland is enormous.

According to that Sexual Abuse and Violence in Ireland (SAVI) report of 2002, around 320,000 people were raped in childhood, and there is little reason to believe the incidence of child rape has diminished.The incidence of child rape among the clergy is certainly greater than among the population at large, but only about 4 per cent of child rapes have been perpetrated by the clergy.

The government shows no interest at all, aside from the odd photo opportunity.

In her column Fighting to implement change in a positive way in last Saturday’s Irish Times in which she commented on the Dublin Report, Breda O’Brien has this throwaway line: Not to mention the discovery last February that 20 children have died in [State] care since 2000 – to which we seem supremely indifferent.

While I find the SVI figure of 320,000 being raped in childhood difficult to believe, I hope that the 20 children who have died in State 'care' in recent years and the 96 percent of children – whatever the actual figure - abused by others rather than by priests or religious will not be forgotten.

But one awful reality is that the priests 'configured to Christ' by their ordination, as Pope John Paul emphasised so strongly in Pastores Dabo Vobis, who abused the four percent in Dublin in effect taught these children that Jesus is a child molester. One, as if to emphasise this, used a crucifix in raping a young girl.

The Church in Ireland and Rome/the Vatican/the Holy See cannot sweep this under the carpet.

New Filipino Columban priest: Fr Andrei Paz

Fr Andrei Paz, son of Antonio and Cleofe (Olpinda) Paz, was ordained priest this morning St Christopher Parish Church, Bangar, La Union, his home town, by Bishop Artemio Rillera SVD of San Fernando de la Union, Philippines. Father Andrei is the third of four children, he and his brother Jerico being 'sandwiched' between their sisters Mitzie and Katrina.

Being ordained deacon

The new priest was ordained deacon with Korean Columban Rev Kwon Tae-Moon, in Korean Martyrs' Catholic Church, Chicago, by Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki, auxiliary bishop of Chicago, on 7 June.

Presentation of gifts. Rev Kwon Tae-Moon and Rev Andrei Paz

Father Andrei has been serving as a deacon at Malate Catholic Church, Manila, and will continue there until he takes up an overseas mission next year.

To the newly-ordained priest we wish the old Latin greeting that means 'to many years': Ad multos annos!

All photos taken on 7 June

Fr Michael Sinnott welcomed home in Ireland

Fr Michael Sinnott with his sisters, Mrs Aine Kenny, left, and Mrs Kathleen O'Neill, right, at Dublin Airport, 3 December 2009

Today's Irish Times has a report by its Foreign Affairs Correspondent, Mary Fitzgerald, on the homecoming yesterday of Fr Michael Sinnott, who had been kidnapped on 11 October in the Philippines: Released priest hopes he can 'fade back into obscurity now'.

'Fr Michael Sinnott (79) was greeted by his family, fellow priests from the Columban Missionaries and Department of Foreign Affairs officials. “Apart from the weather, it’s always good to be back in Ireland,” he joked.'

The Columban priest arrived home exactly a week after the publication of the Dublin Report on child abuse by priests in the Archdiocese of Dublin, which has caused much anger and dismay at the way archbishops and bishops in the archdiocese dealt with or failed to deal with grave crimes by priests. The Irish Times says that Father Sinnott was aware of the report. It quotes him:

'I’m working myself with a very vulnerable section of the community, including people who have suffered from abuse. It is a heinous crime for anyone in authority to abuse children, especially priests,' he said. 'It’s difficult also because the morale of the good priests, the men who are doing their work day by day, is affected by all this.'

It further quotes him about his plans and hope for the future:

'I hope to go back to Pagadian to continue the work I have been doing for the last few years,' he said. 'Why wouldn’t I want to go back? I’ve been working all my life in the Philippines, and I’ll continue to do so for as long as I can.'

The full report is here.

The Irish Examiner also carries a story on Father Sinnott's return to his native country: Priest home after kidnap ordeal.

Elderly priest Fr Michael Sinnott made an emotional return to Ireland today for the first time since his month in captivity at the hands of Philippine rebels.

And the 79-year-old, who has a serious heart problem, vowed to go back to his work as a Columban missionary in Pagadian City on the island of Mindanao in the new year.

Fr Sinnott was embraced by family members as he arrived at Dublin airport.
“It was more or less tearful and hugging, rather than talking,” he said afterwards.

Full story here.

RTÉ, Ireland's national radio and TV service, carries the story Fr Sinnott arrives back in Ireland. The page carries links to the report on the Six One News and on the Nine News. The body of the report has a link to an interview with Father Sinnott by Joe O'Brien at Dublin Airport.

The Irish priest who was held captive in the Philippines for 31 days has arrived home to spend Christmas in his native Wexford.

Father Michael Sinnott, who was freed three weeks ago, intends to go back to the missions in the New year.

There were emotional scenes when he was met on arrival at Dublin airport this afternoon by his family. He was also greeted by fellow priests from the Columban Order and staff from the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Looking remarkably better that he did on his release on 11 November, Fr Sinnott said he was amazed by the publicity his kidnap generated both in the Philippines and here in Ireland. He thanked everyone for their prayers and good wishes.

Fr Sinnott said he never felt in any danger from his captives and they had told him they'd never kill a priest. His only fear was that he might be hurt if the military had tried to release him by force.

He said he has a return ticket to the Philippines for mid January, when he hopes to resume the work he has been undertaking for 50 years.

Fr Sinnott said he hopes there are not too many parties planned for him during his holiday.

Asked about the controversy over the handling of clerical child abuse here, Fr Sinnott said it is a very difficult time for good priests who are doing their work day by day.

Watch full interview

Father Sinnott flies home

The Catholic Church in Ireland is going through a very dark period at the moment. I hope and pray that the people there will see the true face of the priesthood in Fr Michael Sinnott who has lived his vocation with integrity and courage for the last 55 years. The Irish media, which is rightly highly critical of the lack of leadership - and worse - by Irish bishops, as shown in the Dublin Report, published on 26 November, has been very sympatico to Fr Michael Sinnott during his captivity. I wish my confrere a restful visit while at home with his family and friends.

CathNews Asia and CathNews Philippines carry the same story today under different headlines: Sinnott flies home to Ireland and Rescued priest flies home to Ireland. (Both are a service of UCANews). The source of the news is the Philippine Daily Inquirer where it is under the byline of Dona Pazzibugan.


Fr Sinnott being greeted after Mass in Malate Church, Manila. Fr Pat O'Donoghue in background

By Dona PazzibuganPhilippine Daily InquirerFirst Posted 17:25:00 12/03/2009

MANILA, Philippines -- Irish missionary Fr. Michael Sinnott, who was held captive by still unidentified armed men in Mindanao for 31 days, left for his homeland early Thursday.

“I feel fine going back home and looking forward to the weather (in Ireland). It’s windy, wet and cold,” the 79-year-old Columban missionary was quoted as saying by the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines news website shortly before he boarded his 1:05 a.m. flight at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport.

Full story here.

Yahoo News Philippines also carries the story: Rescued Irish priest Sinnott flies home. Their source is CBCPNews: Fr. Sinnott leaves for Ireland:

MANILA, Dec. 3, 2009— The 79-year old Irish missionary who was recently held by unidentified armed men in southern Philippines for 31 days left at 1:05 AM today on board Etihad Flight EY 421 for a five-week vacation in Ireland by way of Abu Dhabi.

Interviewed at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport past midnight today, Fr. Sinnott said “I feel find going back home and looking forward to the weather, it’s windy, wet and cold.”

He said he will visit Ireland first visiting Pagadian City and will be back on the 15th of January and proceed to Pagadian. While he was scheduled to return to Pagadian late last month, he was advised by his attending physician to remain in Manila to recover from the one-month stay in the boondocks of Mindanao.

“I wish my friends in Pagadian will have peace and no more kidnapping,” Fr. Sinnott said when asked of his Christmas wish for his closest friends in southern Philippines which he also considers home.

He said expects his relatives back home to ask him about his experience being a kidnap victim and hopes to share about his mission in Mindanao.

“I hope the Filipino people and the Catholic church in the Philippines will be able to obtain peace in Mindanao without any bloodshed we hope the elections will be successful and we’ll have an honest president,” Fr. Sinnott said when asked of his Christmas wish for the Filipino people.

Fr. Sinnott will celebrate his 80th birthday in Ireland during the second week of December (17th. He will observe the 55th anniversary of his ordination on the 21st).

Fr. Patrick O’Donoghue, regional director of the Missionary Society of St. Columban accompanied Fr. Sinnott during the trip. (Melo M. Acuna)

Deaf graduate's speech

Sarah O. Talibong (above) of LSU Ozamiz Deaf School commented on the story, Deaf student graduates with a magna, in the Misyon editor's blog, The Pilgrims' Inn, where I posted it on 29 November as well as on the Misyon Online Forum and here. At my request she sent me a link to Ana Kristina Macasaet Arce's graduation speech.



The link is on Deaf E-news. The two videos of the speech under the heading Ana Kristina Macasaet Arce's Graduation speech were posted on October 19.

Ana Kristina Macasaet Arce

Here is the text of the speech that Ana gave. I have highlighted some parts.

Brother President Victor Franco FSC, Vice Chancellors, Assistant Vice Chancellors, Deans, Administrators, Faculty, Parents, Sign Language Interpreters, Guests, fellow graduates, and the Benildean Community, Good Morning.

Let me begin my speech with this passage from the Holy Scriptures, found in Jeremiah 18, and I quote …"And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it". In pottery, the potter places a mold of clay on a table and the potter turns it around carefully. Using his hands, the potter will repeat the process several times until he gets the perfect shape. As hands are important to a potter, hands are also important to us, Deaf persons. Our main source of communication is through the use of our hands, we talk and express ourselves through them. And just like the potter whose hands make the perfect creation, we also hope to get the best if not the perfect performance for ourselves using our hands. With our hands, we can go places, change lives and make a difference.

I was born Deaf and when my parents discovered this, like most hearing parents of Deaf children, they felt that the only way for me to survive was if I learned to speak and so they enrolled me in different oral schools where I had to wear hearing aids and learn how to lip read. I was enrolled in four different oral schools and we tried to find something workable that would fit. I tried my best in these schools but still it wasn’t easy for me to adjust. And then my parents thought of trying it out in a school for the Deaf and they enrolled me at the Philippine School for the Deaf where sign language is used as the medium of communication. I quickly adjusted and started doing well in my academics, and received several awards in grade school and I was also the class valedictorian of my batch. I was also an achiever all throughout high school and even if I transferred to a Deaf private school during my senior year I still managed to finish with academic honors.

And then came College, during my first year I was enrolled in another college where Deaf and hearing college students were together in class. I found the experience to be more saddening than exciting. I often cried because my hearing classmates would exclude me in meetings and group projects, maybe because they thought I will not be able to understand them and communicate with them. I struggled to adjust and tried to show my hearing peers what I can do but they never gave me a chance to prove myself to them. Do you want to feel useless? I’m sure you don’t and neither do I or any other Deaf person for that matter. I tried to think that maybe my classmates were doing this because they have big hearts and are trying to understand me and make things easier for me, but I ended up frustrated and I was the one left trying to understand them. Before the end of the first semester, I had set my mind to move to another school, this time, one that offers a program for Deaf students.

And so it was through the efforts of my mother that we found DLS-CSB’s School of Deaf Education and Applied Studies. At DLS-CSB, SDEAS especially, not only did I find an academic institution, but I also found an environment where teachers and other members of the community welcomed us. I felt loved and cared for, and I felt that the school was like a family. I learned that I am a Deaf person; the word, Deaf, being spelled with a capital D, which means that I am identified, not merely as a person who cannot hear, but as someone who is part of the Deaf community, partaking in its unique culture and natural sign language. And with that, I believe that one of the best fruits of education is our ability to understand and change people’s attitude about the Deaf and other Persons with Disabilities, and that is what SDEAS’s education has given me. Our Benildean education has developed us Deaf persons into persons of dignity, integrity, and with a deep sense of spirituality, and we are now being given the chance to become productive members of society.

If you go around the different high schools for the Deaf I am sure that all of the students there will say that they all wish to go to college. However, very few schools offer quality education and those that do, are expensive schools, and most of the Deaf cannot afford to pay the high cost of tuition and fees. And aside from that most people, sad to say even some parents of Deaf students, assume that because we are Deaf we cannot succeed in college so better not send us to school. For students like us, going to school is no walk in the park. We often need to rely on kind-hearted teachers and interpreters to understand the lessons. Getting an education is a big challenge for us.

And so I am thankful to DLS-CSB for opening its doors and welcoming the Deaf regardless of our disability. We have learned so much from this school and we can now proudly say that we are complete Deaf persons and we now embody the teachings of Saint Benilde Romançon.
I especially wish to thank Br. Vic for his utmost concern for the Deaf and his big heart by increasing the number of slots for Deaf scholars from 30 to 60 students starting the school year of 2008-2009. My sincere thanks and appreciation to all of you hearing students for your willingness to interact with us and for making us feel that we are not an isolated group and that we can also be active participants in school activities and be a useful bunch of interesting students. That we, the Deaf students, are your peers…your equals.

At this point, allow me to make an appeal to all the hearing students and guests of this occasion. We may be Deaf persons but we can also do anything you can do, except hear. Communicating with our hands should not make a difference. We live in one country, one world. That means we also long for respect, inclusion in accessibility, and acceptance with dignity. We are not a different breed because of our disability. We also want to live in a society where people will not stare or frown at us or treat us differently. We are also human beings and we are similar regardless of our disability. Please allow us to show you what we can do; please, believe in us too. Let us prove to you that yes, the DEAF CAN. Dear fellow graduates, I hope that when you have established yourselves in the companies you are working for, or if you have successfully put up your own business, please remember the Deaf Benildeans who may need your help in advocating our skills and capabilities, remember us and other Deaf graduates who may have the talents and potentials to be a part of your companies and contribute to its growth.

To all our teachers, you are part of this achievement we are reaping today. You painstakingly taught us all the tools we would need to make us productive individuals and showed us the way towards academic independence. You instilled in us the core values of upright citizens and we will forever treasure our years with you in our hearts. To our parents, thank you for your patience and perseverance, for your selfless understanding of our endless needs, and your unconditional love and care that carried us through our countless years of struggle to get the degree that we received today. My utmost gratitude go to my own parents, Ramon and Vilma Arce, who loved, cared, and gave me all the support that enables me to stand before all of you today. We, the Deaf students, also wish to offer our sincerest thanks to all our interpreters with generous hearts, who are willing to serve the Deaf in assisting us in our communication needs.

I would like to enjoin my fellow graduates, especially my hearing batchmates, to always keep the Benildean Core Values in our hearts. Guided by these values, we can definitely scale to great heights. Let us never forget the people who made our presence here possible. Let us always remember the values of sharing and selflessness so that when we look back, we can proudly say that we lived a meaningful life and we made a difference in the lives of other people.
Graduation is not the end. It’s only the beginning of another journey towards a higher level of learning. Don’t be afraid to dream, for it can be the first step to achieving our goals. Always remember that with patience and hard work, success will be within our reach. The biggest challenge for all of us is to overcome our fears and uncertainty.

For those of you who still have doubts about your potentials, let me and my Deaf batchmates be the living testament of what we can all become despite our limitations. In previous years, only a handful of Deaf students would graduate every year. Today, 25 of my Deaf batchmates received our diploma, the biggest number so far, and this is a testament of our four years of struggle to attain our academic degree. I am probably the first Deaf Filipino Magna Cum Laude graduate, and I am not saying this to brag about my achievement. I am humbly sharing this with you to thank God, my potter, for molding me, His clay, into a wonderful human being. I believe we can reach our maximum potentials no matter what challenges we face in life, because God is our potter and we are his clay.

To all my fellow graduates, Congratulations and Good Luck! Remember to always be Proud To Be Benildeans and to always live Jesus in our hearts.

Thank you and good day.