A Special Haven

(An excerpt of the homily of the Most Rev. Romulo G. Valles, D.D., during the Day 1 of Pastoral Visit at Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish, Obrero, April 22, 2024.)

What is the purpose of the visitation of Bishop?

Simply, Bishop comes to its territory like a parish not to inspect, not to find odd, but simply as the shepherd of the church in our area to see and to feel the pulse of faith in the people, and not to find fault, not to inspect but more I’d like to encourage you to tell wonderful stories about your faith that grace is operating maybe you would tell some problems, wala may katilingban na walay problema, but we would like to hear from one another stories of faith to tell us that the good shepherd is in the midst. Even the threats in life, we are confident that we are the sheep of the good shepherd, ingon si Jesus karon sa ebanghelyo, “Ako ang maayong magbalantay, bantayan gyud nako na walay mo sulod sa toril, sa enclosure diin nahimutang ang mga anak sa Dios.”

But also, I did not prepare for this next thing that I’d like to say because it is in my head, as a Bishop, that our parish is also seen and still is, as a parish of a Chinese community, it is still officially a Chinese traditional name, the Chinese parish in the Archdiocese, that’s why I’m very happy to see that the welcome is very much Chinese and color. Very happy.

Now, why is that very important and to keep that and be proud of that even if a good number of us are not Chinese but we help together. In the life of the Archdiocese, we try to make the Sacred Heart Parish as a special haven for Chinese people, Catholics, and even non-Catholics and keeping the beauty and richness of the Chinese culture, that’s very imperative for the Catholic church, to say it and do it explicitly. We would like to say it to the world and to Davao that the Sacred Heart is a crucial parish for the Chinese community, Why? When the church started, with Jewish people, very clear that the church started with many Jewish people believing in Christ, that the church, the community of disciples of Jesus will be Jewish. In fact, naa sa ilang attitude na “walay mo sagol, kita lang” but very early in the church, by its very nature, the faith and the story of Jesus was brought not only to the Jews but in the story today, the good news of Jesus was brought across the border, across the boundary to the Gentiles. The culture of the Gentiles is very different from the Jewish people.

And in today’s first reading, we can see that transition from first, murag mistaken understanding that the gospel is only for the Jews but very early on, it has to be brought to another culture, to the Gentiles. And we see the first reading that it is alright and from then on, for the Jewish culture what we call now Palestine area it was brought to the Gentiles, to the Greeks, to the Romans, to other parts or what we call Europe. Brought to the East, to the Philippines, to Japan and so having a parish like Sacred Heart with a special flavor, special color. It is a parish of a Chinese community is very much new to the Gospel so therefore, as I visit your parish, I would say this in this first mass “Let us help together, maintain that mission, that color, that special character of our Parish to be a haven, a place to keep a Chinese culture become part of a Catholic culture of Davao.” Maintain that people would come like myself to your parish you can see right away that this is a special openness, special place where the Chinese culture and ways of the way things would flourish, how do we keep, why? Because we all know now that the Lord has created all of us, placed us in many parts of the world and we grew in different cultures but all together, if we come together, we’ll become a beautiful tapestry as it were. All God’s creation, and we come together and it is wonderful to see various colors of God’s creation.

In a special way, I become repetitious. In a very special way, your parish has that mission. It is a parish for all but please maintain its history that it began and will continue to be a parish for the Chinese way, in the community life of our Archdiocese. I hope that those Chinese in other parishes, they are here in every special day of the Chinese calendar and culture, they would come to this parish. Maintain a special mission to be haven for Chinese people or Catholics and even those non- Catholics.