ASIA PACIFIC VISITORS CONFERENCE - MANILA 2011
April 6, 2011
APVC Group outside Adamson University. The sculpture depicts St Vincent with students
From March 14-18, 2011, a meeting of the Asia-Pacific Visitors (APVC) was held in the Philippnes in the city of Manila. Present were the Visitors from the Provinces of the Philippines, China, North India, South India, Indonesia and Australia. Also at the meeting were the Assistant General, Fr Varghese Thottamkara CM, and the Regional Superiors of Vietnam, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. Australians attending were Fr Greg Cooney CM (Visitor of the Australian Province) and Fr Greg Walsh CM , Superior of the International Mission in Solomon Islands.
The Agenda of the meeting followed the usual pattern of such meetings and
included reports from each of the Provinces, planning for the next Regional Formators’ Meeting to be held in Taiwan
in February 2012, and planning for the
Solomon Islands Mission.
During the days of the meeting, the Visitors were able to visit an orphanage (Hospicio de San Jose) run by the Daughters of Charity and the Parish conducted by the confreres at Payatas. This Parish was established in the Manila garbage dump site some years ago to care for the displaced poor who make their living out of sifting garbage.
A highlight of the meeting were two presentations on the methodology of Systemic Change, which aims at empowering the poor to break the cycle of poverty.
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| At Vincentian Hills Seminary, Angono. (now a Retreat Centre), (Fr Constancio Gan is seated on right) | During a meeting |
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| From left: Fr Greg Walsh (Superior of Mission Solomon Islands) with Fr Rolando Santos (Visitor of the Philippines) and Fr Homero Marin (Superior of the Mission in Papua New Guinea | |
Fr Greg Cooney (Visitor of Australian Province) was to meet some of the Filipino Confreres who had studied in Australia in the 1960s – Frs Constancio Gan CM, Renato Ruelos CM and Mariano da Silva CM . They were happy to see Greg., and sent their best wishes to the many confreres in Australia whom they know.