John sees Jesus and suddenly says: “Behold, the Lamb of God! He who takes away the sin of the world!” These words, accompanied by a look and a gesture of the hand, pointing to Him, Jesus.

He will see Him a second time and say the same words losing two of his disciples. Jesus turns to them and ask: “What do you want?” Nothing! They looked at him and followed him.

John calls him Lamb, a name popular among the Jews because it was the name of a gentle animal used in Temple for sacrifices and during the Rites of the Passover.

It was as if John had somehow intuited that Jesus, the Messiah, would die on a sort of sacrificial altar to save the world, creation. But he doesn’t say so in his Gospel.

It was, in any case, a thought rejected by the Jews of that time, who instead expected a “conquering, warrior, and armed Messiah.”

On the contrary, here he appears as a docile Messiah who does not show his claws, but endures and suffers, capable, however, of removing, absorbing, and purifying the enormous mass of evil spread throughout the world. But only he could do this.

“This is my beloved Son; in him I have placed my pride.” “Pride” is a word that, when associated with God, has something great yet small on earth, living among millions of living beings: I send him among you to redeem with his humanity “men of every tribe and language and people and nation” and thus generate a new, widespread and free humanity turned toward good and God.

A New Jerusalem, square with twelve gates, descending from heaven. Timeless because the Temple: “Almighty God and the Lamb.” The sun and moon will disappear, and there will always be light. But this was written in the Apocalypse, discovered after nearly four centuries of silence, in the 4th century by a seer.

The Heavenly Jerusalem, of course, depicts an eternal Church, which, however here in our world, in expectation, cannot look only at itself. Although powerful, it must feel small, rejecting all triumphalism because it must humbly point, with a finger, a hand, the gaze of its eyes, and that of Faith, to Jesus alone. Alone: ​​”Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” He is the only one who saves!

These are also the words we recite during Mass, when, at communion, the Body and Blood of Christ are presented to us.

A liturgical gesture that, with “Behold! Behold Christ, the Lamb!”, invites us to never take our gaze from him, dead on the cross and not to forget other lambs who shed innocent blood for the good of all in a world that is often brutal, dark, and selfish.

This is why the Lamb is depicted immaculate, immobile, with an impossible but catching gaze and a hole in his chest, as if it had been made by a bullet, from which blood continually gushes. We must somehow curb its flow before the end of time.

Many rulers, in Jesus’ time, behaved as if they were “stars,” because they felt important, powerful, famous, and imperial. But their splendour was artificial, the fruit of cold calculations and power plays, and they were almost never able to respond to the people’s need for peace and hope.

But it was not King Herod’s ostentatious visibility that revealed the miracle of Christmas to the Magi, because the light of our comet was meant to illuminate the tiny face of a newborn baby, born in a small, forgotten village. And the warm light of that star revealed “the beauty of the face of the Father” (Isaiah 60:2), Emmanuel, the God among us, compassionate, tender, and a light to enlighten the people.

Herod did not see the star, but as we know, this star does not reveal itself to the powerful with their eyes fixed on the earth, to the lands to be occupied, the riches to be possessed, and the weapons to be amassed. The Epiphany comet is high above, guiding the eyes of everyone around the world who sincerely seeks the author of life. Indeed, she often comes seeking us before we even ask.

Precisely for this reason, in the nativity scene, we depict the Magi with different faces, different races, with the physical features of the various peoples of the earth, of people with many professions, to remind us that God invites everyone, always. God seeks everyone.

Today, in a time when people and nations have increasingly powerful means of communication, we seem less willing to take action to help the most vulnerable, to accept and embrace diversity! We are more attracted by the prevailing visibility of rulers who look elsewhere, not at men, but at things!

Our comet, the Wisdom, once it has passed, invites us to close our eyes, memorize it, and begin an inner journey typical of those seeking the meaning of life, as expressed in the words of the Gospel and witnessed by the works of Jesus.

The Magi had decided to see Him “who was born King of the Jews”; and they did not stop until they saw Him. Jesus never became King of the Jews, but they felt immense joy, and on their return, they meditated on what they had witnessed, becoming stars themselves, like the apostles after the resurrection of their Master, guides and lights of the world.

Christmas ends with light, so let us renew, after the Jubilee of Hope, our “stellar” journey to proclaim what many hope and pray for, but have never seen: a world without darkness.

Every nativity scene shows us Jesus with his mother, Mary, and Joseph, in a hut in Bethlehem, far from home. He chose to be born away from home and today the Gospel (Matthew 2:13) presents us with the Holy Family forced again far from home, into exile; seeking refuge in Egypt.

Today, millions of families can recognize themselves in this sad reality. Fathers, mothers, and children fleeing hunger, war, and persecution, seeking safe and dignified places where they can reunite their broken families and dream to go back to their homeland.
So, as today we are gazing upon the Holy Family of Nazareth forced to flee, let us remember this humanity on the run and their broken families.

But there are also “hidden exiles” within our own families, communities, social centers, and in the places of labor, who are sometimes treated as burdensome presences or exploited simply for their physical force.
The kingdom of heaven is not like this; there, says St. Paul, only charity reigns and reunited the people. (Colossians 3:14)

For Jesus’ family, this exile was also an opportunity to understand that together we make better progress when we must keep evil at bay. The flight into Egypt due to Herod’s threats shows us too that God will “exile” Himself, distances Himself, and the Church with Him, from the wicked decisions of bellicose rulers and those who aid them eager to receive in return financial and fiscal strategies, made without mercy in order to increase their wealth. Decisons and strategies beyond the reach of normal families.
These bring only poverty, abandonment, distrust, and the desire to escape. There is no choice; we must distance ourselves from these decisions and strategies to better protect ourselves and our families.

We can do this, voluntarily, because Jesus’ family teaches us that there will always be a dream and the hope of finding and building a homeland made up of honest women and men where we can live, work, and walk freely. Where charity holds everything together, says St. Paul. A fragment of the Kingdom of Heaven here on earth

CBCP Philippines

VATICAN— Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle said corruption contradicts God’s plan as he led the Simbang Gabi Mass for Filipinos at St. Peter’s Basilica on Sunday. With Christmas near, Tagle urged the faithful to align life decisions with God’s will, rejecting consumerism, personal gain and shallow measures of success.

“When the opportunity to steal and cheat comes knocking, why are so many wide awake? When the plan is corruption, no one sleeps. But when it is God’s plan, everyone is asleep,” said Tagle, pro-prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization.

He called on Filipinos to examine whether their ambitions reflect God’s saving plan revealed in Jesus. “Is your life plan connected to God’s plan? Or perhaps our plans in life lead only to destruction—bringing harm to ourselves, to others, to society and to creation?” Tagle said.

The cardinal pointed to the Virgin Mary and St. Joseph as models of faithful planning, describing them as the original witnesses of Advent and Christmas who adjusted their lives in obedience to God.

He also said Christmas should not be reduced to memories, material pursuits or financial goals, but lived daily through faith, service and moral responsibility. “We were not created to cling to piles of money. We were not created to cling to countless followers. We were not created to hoard all kinds of things to buy, only to realize afterward that we do not really need them,” Tagle added.

More than a thousand Filipinos from across Rome and other countries attended the Mass, filling the basilica with hymns and prayers reflecting a deeply rooted Advent tradition. The celebration was organized by the Sentro Pilipino Chaplaincy (SPC) in Rome and drew clergy, religious and lay faithful, including Philippine Ambassador to the Holy See Myla Grace Macahilig and Philippine Ambassador to Italy Nathaniel Imperial.

Fr. Ronan Ayag, SPC chaplain, said the Simbang Gabi celebration is especially meaningful for Filipino migrants in Rome. “This is important for us Filipino migrants in the Diocese of Rome,” Ayag said. “It strengthens our faith, especially since we are far from our loved ones as Christmas approaches, and it gives guidance to our faith.”

Stavo, per caso, leggendo la notizia che leader di grande spessore politico sono stati uditi a chiacchierare tra di loro su come estendere la loro vita a 150 anni. Poi “ho dovuto” leggere gli ultimi miei referti sanitari, tra quali il PSA: valore a 44. Poco da rallegrarsi e fine ravvicinata. 44!!! 44???

Per non solo quale strano pensiero, nel 1959 a 15 anni mi ero messo in testa una età precisa dove avrei smesso di litigare con i pensieri della morte e quelli terribili del resto dei mortali: la fissai a 44 anni, gli anni di mio padre quell’anno: mi dissero poi che assomigliava all’attore francese Jean Marais. Non so spiegarmi come avvenne; ero seduto vicino a lui sotto un portico in Via San Fermo dal quale si poteva ammirare Laveno Mombello e in distanza il Lago Maggiore. Stava parlando con un suo collega ceramista e improvvisamente, tra me e me, decisi: “A me basta raggiungere i suoi quarantaquattro anni e morta lì!

Invece, per chissà quale grazia ricevuta dal Signore, dal 1988 ho continuato a procedere anno dopo anno, anche se per scelta fatta, quarantaquattrenne.

Diciamo che questa “fissazione” mi ha permesso di passare il resto della vita, nelle Filippine e in Italia, da “anonimo passante a basso profilo”, senza alcun vero obiettivo in testa: a 44 anni e un giorno entravo nel cosiddetto “futuro” senza più preoccuparmi di essere coerente con le scelte, promesse e giuramenti fatti nei passati 43 anni e 364 giorni: quelli sì che hanno contato; questi ultimi, invece, li ritengo una grazia ricevuta dal Buon Dio.

Devo confessare, però, che anche la mia grezza fede si è congelata a 44 anni come granello di senapa coagulato in un ghiacciaio e mai sbocciato del tutto. Colpa di quel pensiero fisso a 15 anni e della grazia ricevuta di ulteriori anni.

In ogni caso, da questa mia odierna e civile età, 81 anni, ma contratta a 44 (e a 44 di PSA), vedo altri che non si preoccupano affatto di fissare come termine del loro “sviluppo” una precisa età. Ma manco ci pensano. Sono occupati ad allungare quella biologica con infusi, medicine e trapianti di organi “sani” e nemmeno si pongono domande esistenziali sul senso finale della vita futura.

A 44 anni virtuali, parafrasando il pensiero di un premio Nobel nel 1944, mi rimane strano che nell’arco di 2000 (o 1700 se da Nicea) anni il problema fondamentale (concepito per essere raggiunto dalle donne e uomini di ogni epoca a una precisa età) rimanga irrisolto. Da quelle date, infatti, l’unico messaggio che ha senso è: “Abbiate cura l’un l’altro per il bene di tutti” e morta lì.  A chi rimanda continuamente quella data fine, alla fine gli rimane ben poco tempo per considerare la vita come bene ricevuto o Grazia di Dio.

Io ci sono arrivato, non so come, guardando mio padre a 15 anni, altri magari a 12, o a 39, o a 65, ma possono farlo anche coloro “orfani” e che hanno l’età anagrafica verso gli 80: Xi, Putin e Trump, i politici beccati a chiacchierare su come “non morire”, sono tra i 72 e i 79 anni: ce la faranno?  Chissà! Congelati suppongo.

Luciano

CNN By Lex Harvey

Ace Aguirre was just two bites into his oatmeal on the morning of November 4 when he noticed something strange: mud had seeped onto the living room floor of his bungalow in Cotcot, a village in the Philippines’ Cebu province. The moments that followed will be forever seared into Aguirre’s memory. His living room furniture floating; the terrifying few minutes when he wasn’t sure he’d be able to pry the front door open; his son praying to God as the water rose to their chests; his daughter, who can’t swim, perched high on a pillar as water and cars gushed by, inches from her feet.

“I don’t know how we were able to survive. One detail that didn’t go our way and many of us could have died,” Aguirre told CNN. That morning Typhoon Kalmaegi dumped over a month’s worth of rain, causing rivers and waterways in Cebu to swell and unleashing catastrophic flash flooding that killed more than 230 people nationwide. One of the dead was Aguirre’s neighbor, a mother of two, who drowned when she became trapped in her kitchen. He had tried to save her but couldn’t get her out in time.

Torrential downpours and deadly flooding in the tropical, disaster-prone Philippines are not new. But revelations in recent months that politicians, officials and contractors had looted billions of dollars from the nationwide program supposed to mitigate their effects have roiled the country.

Prior to the deadly flooding, a citizens’ group in Cebu had called for an audit of flood control projects along the Cotcot River, upstream from where Aguirre lives, according to local media. The scandal has embroiled dozens of high-ranking lawmakers and officials who allegedly received kickbacks to award contracts. Those revelations have sparked huge youth-led anti-government protests against corruption and wealthy elites, similar to those seen this year in Indonesia and Nepal.

Aguirre had been watching the political drama unfold far away in Manila, the capital, for months, but he didn’t expect it to come to his doorstep. “All of a sudden you become a direct victim,” he said. “It hits different.”

The flooding in November prompted Cebu’s governor Pamela Baricuatro to demand an investigation into the 26 billion pesos ($443 million) in flood-control projects in the province which officials in Manila admitted “should have been working” by the time disaster struck.

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. later visited the region and promised to clear and clean the waterways, and de-clog drainage systems, in time for rainy season next year. The previous July he had revealed a government flood control program worth more than 545 billion pesos ($9.2 billion) had been plagued by corruption. He said an internal audit found many of the 10,000 projects his government had overseen since he came to power in 2022 had been built using substandard materials or not at all, he said, referring to the projects as “ghost projects.”

When Marcos Jr exposed the fraud, he “opened a can of worms” that has since spun out of his control, said Sol Iglesias, associate professor of Political Science at the University of the Philippines.

Testimonies in the House and Senate have revealed “an entire system of plunder and corruption that has been facilitated by the very agencies that were responsible for budgeting, planning, implementing, monitoring and checking on the financial soundness of these infrastructures,” Iglesias said. In September, Finance Secretary Raph Recto told a Senate hearing up to 118.5 billion pesos ($2 billion) in funding for flood control may have been lost to corruption in the past two years, according to the Associated Press news agency.

Marcos Jr has vowed to jail at least 37 congressmen and other officials responsible for the scams by Christmas, and seven have been thrown behind bars so far. The government has also frozen about 12 billion pesos ($204 million) in assets of individuals linked to the scandal. The scandal has galvanized ordinary Filipinos, who have taken to the streets to protest decades of unchecked corruption.

“This is the last straw for the Filipino people,” said Tiffany Faith Brillante, the head of Youth Rage Against Corruption in the Philippines, which has been involved in the protests. “The corruption today is no longer just a symptom of weak governance,” she said. “It’s deeply rooted in how power is held in the government, how budgets are allocated, and how accountability is constantly avoided.”

Marcos Jr has insisted he did not know of the fraud being perpetrated. He has positioned himself as a corruption crusader, shaming those responsible for the graft and egging on the protesters. But as more top-ranking officials have become implicated in the scandal, some have pointed the finger back at the president.

One of those people is Zaldy Co, a one-time Marcos Jr ally and former House appropriations committee chairperson, who has become one of the central figures accused in the scandal. He fled the country and is currently a fugitive. While in hiding, he posted a series of explosive videos to his social media account, accusing Marcos Jr and his family members of profiting from the corruption – charges which the president has denied. Marcos’s family members have also been caught up in the drama. Ferdinand Martin Romualdez, a cousin of Marcos, resigned as House Speaker in September over the controversy, though he has denied any involvement in the scandal.

Beyond the scale of the alleged theft, what has made this scandal hit so hard is that for many Filipinos it feels like history is repeating itself, said Aries Arugay, a Filipino political scientist and visiting senior fellow at the Singapore-based think tank ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute. “Corruption and the Marcoses are almost synonyms in Philippine politics,” Arugay said. Marcos Jr’s father, the dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr, ruled the Philippines with an iron fist from 1965 until his ouster in 1986, with the country living under martial law for about half that time. His regime committed systemic human rights abuses and engaged in widespread corruption, stealing an estimated $10 billion from public coffers.

The flood control scandal has reminded Filipinos of the dark days many experienced under Marcos Sr. One of the biggest anti-corruption protests was held on a significant date, September 21, when in 1972 Marcos Sr imposed martial law. Marcos Jr’s landslide victory in 2022 marked an extraordinary comeback for the notorious political family, which critics claimed was made possible in part by disinformation campaigns which whitewashed the history of the Marcos era.

And though officials have warned the looting of the flood prevention program may have started under Marcos’ predecessor Rodrigo Duterte, the disparity between the lifestyles of the elite and regular Filipinos has been a source of anger under the current president. Social media videos posted by the children of wealthy politicians and contractors flaunting their lavish lifestyles have added salt to the wounds of angry citizens, Arugay said. “When people are being submerged in flood water, the politicians are in Paris, riding their private jets,” he said.

This backlash against so-called “nepo kids” mirrors similar anti-corruption protests across Asia this year, including in Indonesia and Nepal, where Gen-Z led protests overthrew the government. Like those protests, young people have been some of the loudest voices calling for accountability in the Philippines.

“We inherit the consequences of corruption and systemic abuse in our country if the government continues to steal, oppress and ignore the people,” Brillante said. “We really want to hold accountable and jail every single official involved in corruption,” Brillante said. “President Marcos cannot be spared, because at the end of the day, he’s the one who signs and approves the national budget every single year.”

While public confidence in Marcos Jr has wavered, he’s not likely to meet the same fate as his father, who was unseated in a public uprising. Marcos Jr is more than halfway through his six-year term, and Philippine presidents have single term limits, so he will not be eligible for re-election in 2028.

“We haven’t seen the equivalent of a smoking gun,” Iglesias said. “But if (we get) that smoking gun, for example, evidence of his directly benefitting financially from this corruption, then that will I think push the administration over the edge. Right now, it’s teetering.”

Recent public opinion polling by the firm WR Numero found Marcos Jr’s satisfaction rating was 21% in November, a 14% drop from August. For someone who came so close to losing everything, Aguirre is upbeat and grateful. But he’s not optimistic that this wave of public momentum will produce any meaningful change in the Philippines. “With our resilience, we can still move forward, but the quality of life will still be the same.”

Nelle Filippine il termine “pork barrel” si riferisce alla spesa pubblica per progetti locali, spesso inutili, pensati per ottenere voti dagli elettori per un politico, piuttosto che per il bene nazionale.

Il termine punta il dito a quei politici che destinano denaro ai loro distretti per progetti locali (ad esempio, ponti, gallerie, sovvenzioni) in cambio di voti o donazioni per la prossima campagna elettorale.

Nel 2013, la Corte Suprema ha stabilito che i “fondi di fortuna” che consentono ai legislatori di decidere come spendere il denaro del bilancio nazionale annuale sono incostituzionali.

Recentemente la Commissione Bicamerale del governo filippino ha approvato il bilancio nazionale 2026 subito definito dai più critici come un “bilancio di tipo pork barrel” che consolida la politica clientelare e non riduce di certo la corruzione.

Le accuse puntano ai membri del Senato che avrebbero nascosto, nel bilancio nazionale per il 2026, fondi per dipendenti pubblici e pazienti indigenti

Il presidente del Senato ha affermato che le disposizioni di bilancio sono state pubblicate sul sito web del Senato: “Quindi, se qualcuno fa questa accusa, significa che non capisce o non ha letto”. In realtà molte di queste decisioni sono state elaborate a porte chiuse.

Naturalmente il Dipartimento dei Lavori Pubblici e delle Autostrade è un potenziale canale per il sistema pork barrel dopo che la commissione ha approvato il bilancio di 529,6 miliardi di pesos (9,5 miliardi di dollari) per questa agenzia. Il Dipartimento ha fatto capire che l’importo include gli “stanziabili” e gli inserimenti dei legislatori, a lungo collegati a tangenti, pagamenti anticipati e progetti infrastrutturali dettati dalla politica presente.

Anche i forti aumenti per i programmi di assistenza sociale sono sotto scrutinio. L’assistenza a persone in situazioni di crisi è salita a 63,9 miliardi di pesos (1,1 miliardi di dollari), mentre il programma di assistenza medica ai pazienti indigenti e finanziariamente inabili è salito a 51 miliardi di pesos (910 milioni di dollari). Questi programmi, come già è successo, rimangono fortemente mediati dai politici locali e sono vulnerabili alle politiche clientelari.

Naturalmente i programmi di aiuto sono i preferiti dai legislatori e incoraggiano il clientelismo, per cui, chi vuole beneficiarne, deve rivolgersi sempre a un politico, per chiedere l’assistenza sanitaria o lettere di garanzia. E si sa come i politici tendono a favorire i loro alleati.

Se nella distribuzione individuale il “pork barrell” è una diffusa pratica, a livello di macro-allocazioni, si favoriscono sempre coloro che sono più vicini a chi detiene il potere”.

Per i critici non si tratta di abolire l’assistenza finanziaria o la protezione sociale, ma dovrebbero essere depoliticizzati. Eliminare l’elemento clientelare da questi programmi senza chiedere favori a un politico locale o potente.

Pablo Virgilio David

THE PHILIPPINES : WORLD’S #1 SOURCE OF OCEAN TRASH

This image is painful to look at. The Philippines—our beloved archipelago of 7,641 islands—is ranked Number 1 in the world in contributing trash to the ocean. Not number one in reading, science, or mathematics. Not number one in good governance or environmental stewardship. But number one in polluting the very seas that give us life.

How did we get here?

More than twenty years ago, we passed one of the most progressive laws in Asia: RA 9003, the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act. I remember reading it and being struck by its moral clarity. The law abolished open dumpsites. It required every LGU to dispose of solid waste legally only through sanitary landfills—but sanitary landfills are meant to receive only residual waste. That is possible only if segregation from source actually happens.

Because that is the heart of RA 9003: Segregation, Composting, Recycling → Residual Waste (the least possible amount).

But what have we done instead?

We continue a national habit of throwing everything together—biodegradable, recyclable, hazardous, medical, industrial—into the same black bag, the same truck, the same dumpsite. So our landfills are filled to the brim not because our waste is too much, but because we refuse to obey the most basic rule: segregate your trash. Sanitary landfills, without segregation, become nothing more than unsanitary landfills.

And we see the consequences everywhere.

Where in the world do fishponds become garbage pits? In the Philippines.

In Navotas, where leachate from these “unsanitary landfills” has poisoned aquaculture, killed livelihoods, and threatened food security. The sea that once fed our people is now choking with plastic washed down through our canals, creeks, and rivers by torrential rains into the ocean. We did this—to ourselves, to our neighbors, to our children.

We love to blame government, or corporations, or the informal waste sector. But the truth is harder: RA 9003 failed because we, as a nation, refused to change our daily habits. Because we did not have the discipline to segregate. Because too many LGUs opted for the easy way out—hauling and dumping—as if “out of sight” meant “out of responsibility.” Because corruption fattened itself on hauling contracts and tipping fees rather than investing in real waste reduction, composting, and Materials Recovery Facilities.

This is one of the great ecological sins of our time. A sin not only against creation, but against the poor who suffer first from polluted water, poisoned fish, and floods worsened by canals clogged with our own negligence. A sin against future generations whose shores will be lined not with seashells, but with our plastic shame.

But guilt is not the ending.

Repentance is. And repentance means change.

Segregate from home. Demand that LGUs comply with RA 9003. Support recycling and composting. Stop treating the ocean as a bottomless pit. And start treating our country as the fragile, beautiful, irreplaceable archipelago that God entrusted to our care.

We can do better.

For the sake of the seas that surround us, the children who will inherit them, and the Creator who commanded us to “till and keep” His garden— we must do better.

Jesus tells us that, as at the time of the Flood, so will his return be: people ate and drank, married, sold, planted, and built.

These weren’t sinful actions, but beyond that, they had nothing else on their minds and so they didn’t realize the impending catastrophe Noah had announced.

Instead of saying, “Ah! Maybe he’s right!” “It will come sooner or later; so it’s best to always be prepared,” they said, “Ah! I have other, more pressing matters to attend to!” “Ah! Reducing CO2 in the atmosphere… well, yes… but for now, we have other more important things to do!”

Of course, we are better prepared today then at the time of Noah, but not so much… even the prospect of a near-term death doesn’t seem to detach us from the worries and pleasures of this world.

Nevertheless, there is still something even greater coming that must be considered worthy of discussion, a discussion to be passed on to future generations: the day of judgment.

Today, preaching that Jesus’ return is imminent, like that of the thief in the night or the Flood, seems like a sleepy prophecy spread over the centuries. Even so, the Church has the duty to remember it no matter what.

One way to do this is to not be idle and become, on an earthly pilgrimage, stubborn commuters awaiting the arrival of Jesus Christ. “Come, let us walk in the light” Hope, the first candle (the others: peace, joy, and love)

In the Philippines, the weather forecast agency is called PagAsa “Hope”, an ambitious project, that one day we will be able to predict the trajectory of a typhoon to avoid loss of life and build a better flooding control..

 But one more greatest hope for our Agency, the Church, is that one day all weapons will be melted down and transformed into tools useful for the spread of the common good! How wonderful it would be if, upon Jesus’ arrival, we could say: “They ate, they drank… and for a long time they no longer knew what it meant to shoot and kill others.” Science fiction? Yes.

In the U.S. there are 400 million firearms. Less in other countries, but the food of arms is immense. Like to say: they eat, drink, and ….shoot. A terrible way to prepare ourselves for the return of Jesus.

Even the Church, at times, has blessed weapons; today, finally, it has chosen “A Farewell to Arms”, the nonviolence and the rejection of armed combat. And let’s hope it stays that way.

This is possible if, like stubborn Christian commuters awaiting the Lord’s arrival, we bet now on hope, on the anticipation of a hope for peace as a real preparation for the arrival of the Prince of Peace!

The season of Advent will remind us of this for the umpteenth time.

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By CBCP News

A top Philippine church leader said “kinship” must guide the Church in Asia as it seeks to build bridges across the region’s many cultures and religions.

Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David of Kalookan, vice president of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences, said Asia’s cultural and spiritual diversity calls the Church to a deeper practice of listening, dialogue and shared mission.

“Asia is a vast mosaic of cultures, languages and religions. Yet in all this diversity, God is gently weaving us together into one family,” David said.

The outgoing president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines made the remarks ahead of the Asian Mission Congress in Penang, Malaysia, scheduled Nov. 27-30.

More than900 delegates from all Catholic communities across the continent, including10 cardinals, over100 bishops,150 priests,75 religious sisters, and hundreds of lay people.

He said the Church must “grow in synodality,” calling it a way of being rooted in humility and genuine encounter.

“We must learn to build bridges across religions, cultures and generations,” said David.

“We must be a Church that protects the dignity of every person, cares for the wounded planet, and speaks truth with compassion in societies marked with so much poverty, conflict and fear,” he added.

The cardinal said his hopes for the Church in the coming decade center on walking more closely with communities, especially young people.

“My vision is of a Church that walks closely with the peoples of Asia, especially the young, listening deeply to their dreams, their wounds, their longings for a more just and peaceful world,” he said.

He described Asian youth not only as the future of the Church but “its vibrant present,” calling their “creativity, questions, courage and even [their] struggles” gifts to the wider Christian community.

Many young Asians, he noted, face burdens such as poverty, discrimination, unemployment and climate anxiety.

“Yet I believe the Lord is calling you to become pilgrims of hope,” he told young Catholics. “[You] can help our communities see beyond despair and rediscover God’s promise of life.”

David said the spirit of “pakikipagkapwa”—a value expressing shared humanity and mutual care—captures the kind of mission the Church must embrace.

“This is what our pilgrimage is about— finding hope together, not alone,” he said