The Mission Society of the Philippines
First of 2 parts
IN 1959, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines made a historic decision of great missionary import. In a pastoral letter issued on May 17 of that year they designated the year as Mission Year and declared that the Philippines Church was already to undertake mission work of her own.
The Mission Year was celebrated with various activities such as: regional mission convention and exhibits; seminars on missionary activity whose formal papers were presented; special vocation for promotion for both home and foreign missions; missions rallies on the parochial, deanery, and diocesan levels; and a National Mission Congress in Manila on December 3-6.
During the Eleventh Bishops’ Annual Meeting on January 27-31, 1964 at the San Carlos Major Seminary in Cebu City, Bishop Surban read as inspired talk concerning the God - given mission of Catholic Philippines in the evangelization of the country and the vision of early missionaries as well as of several popes in their letters to the Philippine hierarchy regarding the evangelization of mainland Asia, he prepared the establishment of the Foreign Mission Society of the Philippines. The Bishops unanimously approved the proposed project. They likewise unanimously endorsed Bishop Surban to be the National Director of the enterprise and tasked him to prepare a detailed plan of its organization (Blueprint for Mission Activity). And in their subsequent joint pastoral letter “On the Fourth Centenary of the Evangelization of the Philippines” (February 2, 1964), they expressed their intention to establish the Society which they henceforth considered as a monument to the forthcoming Fourth Centennial Celebration of the Christianization of the country.
Rome was, of course, regularly kept informed of the project. As a token of his appreciation of the initiative, Pope Paul VI donated a chalice, a paten, a ciborium, and a communion plate which, according to His Holiness, should remain in the seminary as a personal pledge of his paternal interest.
A pastoral statement officially proclaiming their intentions to establish the Society was finally issued by the Bishops on January 29, 1965. Said the Bishops: “We, therefore, proclaim officially our intention to undertake a national effort to orient our people to the Missions. To achieve this and to express in the concrete our gratitude to God for the gift of Faith, we will organize the Foreign Mission Society of the Philippines.”