All set for Rosales’ first Mass as cardinal
Apr 05, 2006
The country’s Catholic hierarchy is set to celebrate today the recent elevation of Manila Archbishop Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales to the College of Cardinals in Vatican City with a thanksgiving Mass at the Manila Cathedral to be attended by local and foreign officials.
(The Philippine Star 04/01/2006) President Arroyo is expected to attend the 10 a.m. Mass that will also be joined by ambassadors and representatives of the embassies of Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Chile, Cuba, India, Nigeria and Sri Lanka, the Archdiocese of Manila confirmed yesterday.
Rosales will be the main celebrant of the Mass — his first in the country after his official elevation in a consistory led by Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican City in Rome, Italy last week.
Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal, the most senior member of the country’s hierarchy, will deliver the homily while other bishops will concelebrate the Mass.
The new cardinal came back to the country last Thursday night on a Lufthansa Airline flight from Rome. He stayed at the Vatican for 12 days to attend various programs for his elevation with 14 other new cardinals from other countries.
In a brief meeting with reporters at the airport, Rosales hinted at what he had discussed with the Pope in their meeting last Monday: "The Pope told me twice that the Philippines will play an important role in Asia in the next years."
Before today’s Mass, Rosales met with his priests in the archdiocese last night for evening vespers at the cathedral.
After the celebration prepared by the Archdiocese of Manila, Rosales is set to meet the youth on April 2 and urban poor on April 3 before he visits his hometown in Batangas on April 4 and 5.
Rosales, who has been dubbed by fellow prelates as a "silent worker," is a known advocate of the welfare of the poor. He put up the "Pondong Pinoy" project to raise funds from small donations and feed poor Filipinos all over the country.
Before the Manila archbishop left for Rome last March 17, he met with journalists and confessed that he felt unworthy of his new assignment and incompetent "in the sense of the expectation of some people but not incompetent in the sense of what God wants me to do."
Rosales, who expressed eagerness to meet with the Holy Father, was joined by his staff: Fr. Reginald Malicdem, Sr. Elsa Belen, and Fr. Genaro Diwa, Minister of the Ministry of Liturgical Affairs of the Archdiocese of Manila.
Immediately after the cardinal arrived in Rome, he went on retreat at the convent of the Little Sisters of Jesus in Tre Fontane until last Tuesday.
Rosales, 73, is the sixth Filipino prelate to be elevated to the College of Cardinals. He now joins the line of Filipino cardinals including Rufino Santos, Julio Rosales (no relation) and Jaime Sin.
The two living cardinals are Jose Sanchez, who is retired in the Vatican, and Ricardo Vidal, the archbishop of Cebu.
As a cardinal, Rosales would be addressed as "His Eminence" and is now a senior ecclesiastical official in the Roman Catholic Church, ranking just below the Pope and appointed by him as a member of the College of Cardinals during a consistory.
The duties of the cardinals are to attend the meetings of the Sacred College and to make themselves available individually if the Pope desires their counsel.
Cardinals have additional duties either leading many of the Church’s dioceses and archdioceses or running the Roman Curia.
The most important function of cardinals in the Church is to elect a new pope, who usually comes from their rank.
Rosales was born on Aug. 10, 1932. He was ordained as a priest on March 23, 1958.
In August 1974, he was appointed by the late Pope Paul VI as auxiliary bishop of Manila. While in that capacity he also served as Bishop-in-Charge of Antipolo (East Antipolo, Rizal) and Director of the Pontifical Mission Society. From 1980 to 1982 he took charge of San Carlos Seminary as Rector.
In June 1982, he was appointed Coadjutor Bishop of the then Prelature (later) Diocese of Malaybalay, Bukidnon, and shortly assumed as the Ordinary. And in December 1992, the late Pope John Paul II assigned him to the archdiocese of Lipa, his home and original diocese.
He was formally installed archbishop of Manila on Nov. 21, 2003.
All set for Rosales’ first Mass as cardinal