How are our kailiyans faring in the ongoing Southeast Asian Games (SEA) in Thailand? So far so good. We have at least four medalists. At least? Well we don’t know all our kailiyans participating in the Games, so there could be more than four. Here are the Igorot/iCordillera medalists so far:
Gold:
Mariane Mariano, muay thai
University of the Cordilleras
Our quote of the day comes from Fr. Rex Reyes, the new head of the National Council of Churches in the Philippines:
“I will definitely strengthen the program on indigenous peoples, not because I am an indigenous person myself, but because the churches can also learn a lot from indigenous peoples’ sense of justice, community and stewardship of creation.”
“As Christians, we have to affirm all that is good in the culture of our indigenous communities. We can affirm, for example, the strong sense of community and culture of sharing of indigenous peoples as our safeguard against the individualist and consumerist values being pushed by capitalist globalization.”
One of our new commenters, Thoroughbred (welcome to this blog and thank you for the tip), wrote about Eric Salvador in his/her comment here, so we went a-looking for information about Eric. But first, here’s what Thoroughbred wrote in case you missed it:
Another proud Igorot achiever I know, is Roderick “Eric” Salvador from Lomon, Kapangan, Benguet. He won Mr. Philippines (not the body building competition but the male version of BB. Pilipinas).
Here’s more information on Jaylord Langbayan, the 16 year old kid who is going to participate in a United Nations special session on children. Read more about him in our first post. Now, here’s some info on where he comes from.
Jaylord Langbayan, boy, 16 years old
Jaylord is a senior student at Dipaculao National High School. He was born in Cainta, Rizal, where he spent the first seven years of his life. His parents worked at the nearby ceramics factory, but when the factory closed down, the family relocated to Mucdol, Dipaculao, in the province of Aurora, where his father’s uncle lent them a piece of land to till. His mother now works as a housekeeper and his father as a farmer.
Congrats to our kailiyan Fr. Rex Reyes of Sagada, Mt. Province. He’s been elected as the next General Secretary of the National Council of Churches in the Philippines, an ecumenical body composed of ten churches (mainly Protestant) with a combined membership of about ten million.
Of all places, I found the information about Fr. Reyes’ election in Preludium, an American blog I occasionally visit. Hah. I should really go to church more often to know about things like this. (If recent church attendance is the basis for going to heaven, I’m sure St. Peter or whoever guards the gate to heaven will bar it when I present myself hehe.)
Anyway, this should be a happy day for progressive Anglicans from the developing world. We’re sure Fr. Rex will provide a voice that is different from the modern-day Pharisee that is Archbishop Akinola, the title-obsessed and self-appointed spokesman of Anglicans in the global south.