Grand opening provokes reminder from cardinal
Dec 04, 2005
The opening extravaganza of the Southeast Asian Games last Friday night failed to impress Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal. He was thinking of feeding poor children and the homeless instead.
(Sun Star, November 27, 2005) Archdiocesan media liaison officer Msgr. Achilles Dakay said the cardinal believes the millions spent on the welcome ceremony for the athletes and officials from the 11 member-countries should have been used for a feeding program.
“They should have spent as much money feeding the children and the people on the streets,” Dakay told reporters.
The Cebu City Government reportedly allocated more than P3 million for the Cebu-SEA Games Organizing Committee (Cebu-Soc), and over P300,000 was spent for the fireworks that capped the event at the Cebu City Sports Center.
The cardinal has always been vocal about poverty and oppression in his homilies. He has a feeding program every Sunday at the Sacred Heart Church.
Every Sunday, from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m., poor children and adults line up in a tent outside the church, where they are given food. This has been ongoing for five years now.
About 500 to 1,000 people every Sunday benefit from the feeding program, Dakay said.
“We feed, we don’t ask questions,” Dakay said of the program that was inspired by Mother Teresa of Calcutta.
“I don’t think those who are not poor would pretend to be poor just to get free food. I also don’t think people pretend to be hungry just to eat,” Dakay joked when asked if the church is wary that there will be “gatecrashers” in the feeding program.
Those who have become regulars at the feeding program were given T-shirts with the words “alagad nga kabus” (poor servant) written on the back. Below it is a passage from Matthew 25: “I was hungry and you fed me.”
Dakay said the cardinal had this idea back when he was still the parish priest of the Metropolitan Cebu Cathedral. Outside the church, Vidal would notice the children scrambling for food come lunchtime.
Other feeding programs are also organized by different parishes within the week, but Sacred Heart Church has been consistently doing it for five years.
Grand opening provokes reminder from cardinal