NEWSFLASH
IN ROME PINOYS THUNDERED WITH CHEERS AT BEATIFICATION OF PEDRO CALUNGSOD
Manila, March 6, 2000 - More than 5,000 Filipinos in Italy and from the Philippines attended the beatification ceremony for Pedro Calungsod at the Vatican on March 5. Churches all over the nation celebrated by pealing of church bells and masses of thanksgiving as the ceremony was happening in Rome.
President Joseph Estrada and First Lady Luisa "Loi" Ejercito Estrada led the Philippine delegation to the Vatican that witnessed Pope John Paul II beatified Calungsod and 29 other candidates.
A separate delegation from Guam, where Calungsod was martyred in 1672, was also in attendance led by Archbishop Anthony Sablan Apuron of the Archdiocese of Agana.
As the Pope proclaimed the beatification rites of PEdro Calungsod, cheers from thousands of Filipinos in the crowd boomed with emotion.
A Visayan missionary catechist, Calungsod was martyred for his Catholic faith in Guam at age 17 on April 2, 1672.
He arrived in Guam with Jesuit missionaries on June 16, 1668 to start a mission in the Marianas which was then under the Diocese of Cebu.
Calungsod and his companions, however, were killed by the natives for trying to spread the Catholic faith in Guam.
Last Saturday a statue
of the new saint was unveiled in a catholic cathedral in Cebu. He is the
second martyr to be beatified from the Philippines, the first being St.
Lorenzo Ruiz beatified in 1981.
Reported by: Sol
Jose Vanzi
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