Mass Baptism in Kiamba, Philippines

September 30, 2015

    

On Saturday, September 26, 2015, nearly two hundred formerly Catholic Filipinos were received into the Orthodox Church through the sacrament of holy baptism, as reported on the Philippine Orthodox Church—Moscow Patriarchate Facebook page and the Philippine Mission of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROCOR) page.

Despite massive waves that repeatedly knocked them over, Frs. Silouan Thompson and Stanislav Rasputin celebrated the baptism of 187 new Orthodox Christians, lasting six hours.

The newly-baptized are parishioners of four former Philippine Independent Catholic Church parishes in the Sarangani province: St. Joseph the Worker Parish (now St. Joseph the Betrothed Orthodox Church) in Poblacion Kiamba; San Isidro Labrador parish (now St. Isidore of Chios Orthodox Church) in Salakit; Nuestra Sra. Sela Paz parish (now Holy Theophany Orthodox Church) in Kayupo; and the Mission of the Theotokos of the Life-Giving Spring in the town of Maitum, Sarangani Province.

There are now nine parishes of the Moscow Patriarchate in the Philippines in addition to another twenty still undergoing catechism. There remain around two hundred faithful to be baptized from these four parishes who were prevented from attending due to distance and bad weather, among other reasons. Their reception is yet to be scheduled.

Saturday’s mass baptism took place after almost two years of catechism and was followed by the Divine Liturgy in which the newly-baptized received Holy Communion for the first time.

    

Fr. Silouan writes: “Kiamba is in an area where the Moro Nationalist Liberation Front (Islamic secessionist group) is quite active, and a number of foreigners have been abducted this week by various groups of evildoers, so we were grateful for the escort the Philippine National Police provided for our sacrament and our procession from the church to the beach and back (even if their machine guns were a little strange to American eyes).”

Fr. Silouan is presently the only resident priest of the Russian Orthodox Church in Mindanao, often traveling to preach and serve the Liturgy in the various missions in addition to his own of St. John Maximovitch in Santa Maria, although there are plans to assign a second permanent priest by the end of the year.

    

9/30/2015

Comments
Keith L10/20/2017 11:57 am
Convert the Muslims instead...from extremism and fundamentalism
ChiRho12/9/2015 10:24 pm
Glory to God!
Patricio Franko11/13/2015 7:11 am
Thanks Silouan
The Aglipayans, referenced above as "Independent Catholics," belong to what, respectfully, is a nationalistic, ex-Catholic cult in the Phillipines. As a Catholic, I am happy to see them convert to Orthodoxy and consider them members of the Church now. Please convert them all because they have had their minds poisoned against the Roman Catholic Church and so it can do little for them.
Priest Silouan Thompson10/1/2015 12:11 am
One correction: The people we baptized were formerly Aglipayans -- members of an independent national church, not Roman Catholics.
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