by Father Michael Panicali
St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta famously asked, “How can there be too many children? It is like saying, ‘There are too many flowers.’ ”
The first stop I made after arriving in the Philippines in late August for a 10-day visit to San Fabian, a town four hours to the northwest of Manila, was to the magnificent and storied Minor Basilica of the Queen of the Most Holy Rosary of Manaoag.
Before entering, I was swarmed by women and children vigorously (sometimes aggressively) selling religious paraphernalia, the likes of rosary beads, fans, bracelets, trinkets, and bottles of coconut oil featuring the image of Our Lady of Manaoag. I had braced myself beforehand for the sight of poverty, but in those moments, poverty took on human faces. Children’s faces.
Can one argue that one child selling religious items is one too many? That the garden has too many flowers?
As secularization becomes more prevalent in the West, such is not the case in the Philippines. This was the thrust of my homily during the Sunday Mass I celebrated at the Church of San Fabian, Pope and Martyr, wherein I basically implored the faithful to remain Filipino!
On this Catholic island nation (in actuality, 7,000 islands in total), where faith is enthusiastically displayed in crowded churches, on the sides of motor vehicles, and in bustling schools, including seminaries, one cannot help but feel, in a palpable way, the manifestation of Jesus’ command to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth.
Disciples are being formed. Armies for Christ are being raised.
My impression, though admittedly a cursory one across a scant 10 days and limited to only one corner of the island, is nevertheless, that those forces that look to supplant knowledge of God, and reliance on his providence, while replacing Christianity with secularism and irreligion, have not taken root in the Philippines, certainly not to the extent they have across many Western nations.
In my homily, I highlighted that there is enough food to feed the world. There are enough resources for all human beings across God’s green earth to flourish. The chief reason for hunger and poverty is not that there is a deficiency in God’s providence, but that sin — both personal and social — has run amok.
Sin breeds poverty, hunger, and grave socioeconomic disparities. Remedies for this sickness cannot include that which violates God’s laws and his design for human flourishing; rather, they must include the upholding of the Gospel.
The more flowers in the garden, the more beautiful the landscape.
Father Michael Panicali is the parochial vicar for St. Helen Church in Howard Beach.