Archbishop urges Catholics to pray for end to war, violence, poverty

Archbishop Socrates Villegas

DAGUPAN CITY, Philippines — Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas, the president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), has called on the Catholic faithful to start the New Year by praying for an end to war, violence, hunger and poverty.

“Today is the feast of peace, that all may live as one. We pray that war may end and hunger may be gone,” Villegas said in his New Year message posted on his archdiocese’s website (rcald.org).

“We pray for peace in Syria, healing for every troubled heart and for typhoon victims that they can soon rise up and start a new life,” he added.

Villegas also sought prayers to end kidnappings, violence and terrorism, and for the “conversion of the corrupt.”

He said that as the Lord made all things new, “we look at the year behind us with gratitude for its blessings.”

“We look at the New Year eagerly, hoping for the best to come, We believe in His tender love, secure in the embrace of the Son,” Villegas said.

Retired Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz, who also served as CBCP president, on the other hand, called for the end to the killing of journalists in the country.

“Such was the recent and emphatic, clear, and loud shouts of people from Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao. In particular, such is the lamentation and plea made by the families and friends of murdered journalists—murders that have been long going on in the Philippines,” he said in a blog post (ovc.blogspot.com) on Friday.

He said the public has become angry over the killing of journalists “for saying or writing the truth…about individuals who are not exactly known for their sanctity in promoting what is proper, true and just in Philippine society.”

“Truth is something dangerous and…hated by those guilty of graft and corrupt practices, of depravity and perversion, of vicious behavior and criminal acts,” Cruz added.

The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines said 27 journalists and media workers have been killed since 2010 when President Aquino started his term. In December alone, three journalists in Mindanao were felled by assassins’ bullets.

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