Columban Fr Cireneo Matulac with Regina's family. Photo: Fr Cireneo Matulac
When I am at home, I say Mass in our barrio chapel (kapilya) on Sundays. One Sunday, I noticed that there were some new faces in the community, and I thought to myself that I had been away a long time from this place. I have been a Columban missionary for twenty years and was assigned to other countries.
Now, I work in Manila in our formation programme for Columban students and get a chance to have more frequent and longer home vacations.
I am from the Diocese of Ipil, which is in the south of the Philippines in Mindanao, in the province of Zamboanga Sibugay. Recently, I have been working in Manila for the formation of our students. I have also begun to reconnect with my home BEC (basic ecclesial community). Our barrio chapel does not have Mass every Sunday, but the community has their own Sunday liturgy presided over by the kaabag (which means in English a helper, deputy, or trustee).
The main church of a typical parish in the Philippines sits in the town centre and the far-flung barrios within the parish have their own chapel (kapilya) visited by a priest once or twice a month when he also celebrates Mass and other sacraments.
One of the new faces that stood out for me was a new convert to the community. Her name is Regina. I eventually got to know her and her family, who faithfully come to the Sunday liturgy. Regina used to belong to a local Christian sect but was not really at home there. She started to search for a Christian community where she felt welcome and had the space and time to deepen her faith in Jesus. She started coming to our kapilya on Sundays and attended Catechism classes, and she felt that this was the right community for her. She decided to be baptised first, and then her two daughters, eleven and nine years old at that time, were also baptised. Now, she is preparing her youngest child (an 8-year-old boy) for baptism.
I find her story quite moving because it is not common in the Philippines to have adult converts to Catholicism in a country where most people are Catholics. We just take it for granted that people will go to Mass on Sundays except for those who go to their own Christian churches. This might make us oblivious to the fact that there are other people out there who are still in search of a community where they can belong.
Every time I am home for a break and get a chance to celebrate the Mass in our barrio chapel, I make sure that I talk to Regina and her children after Mass. The two daughters are now altar servers and very happy to come with their mother to the kapilya on Sundays. The children are also involved with the youth activities in the parish. I am happy they have found a community where they feel welcome, safe, and joyful - indeed, one that makes them feel they belong.
I remember Pope Francis saying that the Gospel is proclaimed effectively not by force but through tenderness and mercy. We attract people to our community when we try to live out the Gospel in words and deeds. May Regina and her family, through the grace and mercy of God, deepen their faith in Jesus and experience true joy in their newly found Christian community.
Columban Fr Cireneo Matulac lives and works in the Philippines.
Listen to "Regina"
Related links
- Read more from The Far East - June 2024
