We Are Back!

The ongoing search
Denver interviewed by RPN -9
JM explains the similarities between Jun and Ninoy
The New Gen
The Buttenbruch truth searchers with Fr. Raymun (center part, behind Eman, last row)
MISA PARA SA KATOTOHANAN. We went to Baclaran as our symbolic "pakikiisa" with the nation' s urgent entreaty: please save this nation. This has become a battle between good and evil, but a battle whose feuding and warring characters are not clearly cut as evil and good...we need discernment. On Monday morning, we decided to go and be back in the scene! May not be as drammatic as the classical SVDs in the social justice arena...but just being there...observing, praying, listening, discerning...in a new quest for JTB - Justified True Belief!

The Castle's Oratory (2)

How lovely is Your dwelling place O Lord!
Fr. Provincial and his "attention technique"
Fr. Provincial, Fr. Gerry Mr. Chua (benefactor), and Fr. PabsFr. Glenn during the Opening Rites

Incensing
Rites of the Altar
The sems and their prayerbooks
Bending the knees before the Lord
Her first "dwellers"

The original chapel was the area occupied by the present library. This year, this sacred space has finally returned to the castle, this time at the ground floor of the eastern turrets. This space keeps the Presence in her bosom. This is a great blessing indeed! I rejoice when I hear them say, let us go to the house of the Lord!

(Special thanks to the generous hearts, the Chua and the Madrid family, and our passionate Fathers and Formators who kept us in mind in all these developments, our Saints - Arnold and Joseph, together with the Blessed and to the One who made all these things possible)

The Castle's Oratory (1)

On Friday, February 22, 2008, a great event shall occur - finally, the castle's new oratory will be blessed. The former procurator's office and the accounting office gave way to another space, this time - a liturgical space. The Buttenbruch dwellers will now have their own oratory - Come, let us sing and worship the Lord!
Upnext: The Castle's Oratory (2)

We Went Up a Mountain! (part 2)(see full story at www.svdphc.org)

Mass some feet away

Fr. Provincial presiding
On your mark, get set...
missionaries at work
A (celestial) confrere for every tree
Long live JPIC!
feeling international
The CKMS Horde with Fathers Ben and Rod
Till next centennial

next time!

This was a dream come true for Fr. Ben Beltran, SVD. It started with a simple dream of honoring the deceased members of the Society of the Divine Word who had lived and served in the Philippines for the past one hundred years. Tree-planting is immortalizing them - thus, every tree planted has a name tag, bearing the name of a confrere. As they grow on the mountains of Montalban, these trees will save water and hopefully, "refill" the water tables below for the next generations of people. The dream is water for everybody in the future - water from the mountains on which our SVD confreres continue to stand - such love, such immortal love! What an honor to be part of this dream - cheers to the next hundred years! May God bless us all!

We Went Up a Mountain! (part 1)

tis the calm before the storm...before the climb
thinking it's just a hill up there...
all sheep and cattle, yes even the savage beasts
caged!

On the way towards a noble pursuit

Some portions of my heart...

Tree Planting/ Mountain Hiking in Montalban

Sometimes, i envy Sisyphus. At least,the rock rolls down and your hero is left exhausted and doomed to take up the whole divine punishment again from ground zero. But in my case, my "rock" will rock your wits to no end...this "rock" chats while waiting for the liturgy to start, screams during siesta, dreams of sleeping forever, plays until 5:45 on Thursdays, drops by the TV room at 5:50, then takes a bath at 5:58 and wonders why he is scolded for coming at 6:15 (eh naligo naman siya!)... so on and so forth. By the way, this "rock" is aka seminarista. Si Sisyphus dinadaanan ng bato, ako dinadaganan ng bato!Sisyphus' rock rolls down to ground zero, ako i'm grounded until i turned zero. Although they could not qualify for Mr. Devil or Satan of the Year, neither are they angels! But let me say, angels in the making. I always remind myself that they are the ones called. Of course, not all will be chosen, but definitely, they were all led to this place. What am i to do but to help them listen to the ongoing call. They are still prone to hear many voices before they can hear the VOICE. Bisan makapungot na kaayo, and sometimes I do lose my top and erupt from time to time, I always feel secure in the idea that I am just a shepherd, taking care of the Master's sheep. It has evolved into a privilege to be of service to these selected guys. Who will make it to the end? only the Master knows. One thing for sure, they are works-in-progress. One day i went to a mall - i moved around - passing by the stalls and boutiques- in fact, it was more of an aimless walking. I allowed myself to get drowned by the mall's atmosphere of unbridled noise and exaggerated spaces and piped-in music. That was my idea of spending my free day - but some minutes after i just felt out-of-place. The noise didn't have that crispy sounds of pool chips hitting each other and disturbing my sleep during siesta. The music could not come close to the squeaky "What if God was one of us?" emanating from the squeaky vocal cords habitating in the nearby dorm, accompanied by a 5-string guitar. The boutiques paled in comparison to the sci-fi inspired dorms which sometimes give me the creeps! The young creatures walking aimlessly too in the mall were not as interesting as the 70+ human and sometimes seemingly-human substances moving around in their black and white colors, camouflaging as sacred organisms, running up and down the staircases of grand old Buttenburk!...then I realized and took 50 deep breaths before I can truly accept that I miss them. I looked at my cellphone, and the clock image displayed 2:07 pm...okay, there's still time...rosary starts at 3pm. On the way, i listened to some sounds in my head and tried to figure out what setting shall I use for the vespers...then I laughed, well anyway, all those notes will settle down to recto tono. I am afraid that this sound will remain in my heart for a long, long time.