CBCP urges Filipinos to pray for protection in sea row

Archbishop Socrates B. Villegas (CBCP News photo)

MANILA — The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines ordered an Oratio Imperata, an obligatory prayer for all Catholics, amid the ongoing trial in the United Nations arbitral court to resolve the ongoing territorial dispute with China.

“We will have an Oratio Imperata, which is an obligatory prayer for all Catholics in all the dioceses to be prayed so that the tension may ease, and justice, equality and prosperity may be served,” Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas president of the CBCP said.

He made the statement during a press briefing at the end of the three-day plenary assembly of the CBCP yesterday.

Villegas said that prayers are what Filipinos could offer amid the rising tension in the West Philippine Sea.

“We (bishops) don’t have the means to negotiate with the superpowers, we cannot represent the Philippines in the international court, but we can certainly represent the Philippines before God and ask [Him], the sure source of peace, to take care of the Philippines,” Villegas said.

He also said that the conference had the right to care about the territorial dispute as it is a “a problem of peace” and added that “peace is the mission of the Church.”

“We know that the tension there will not be solved through people alone but through God’s grace,” Villegas added.