Bishop Ambo speaker in HAU online lecture series on St. Joseph
ANGELES
CITY---Most Rev. Pablo Virgilio David, Bishop of Kalookan, will be the featured speaker in the first of a lecture series sponsored by Holy Angel University’s Center for Kapampangan Studies to mark the Year of St. Joseph.
The Anloagui Lecture Series, named after the Kapampangan word for “carpenter,”will explore the saint’s various titles in the Catholic Church, such as patron saint of husbands, of workers, of foster parents, and of people wishing for a happy death.
Bishop David’s online lecture is titled “St. Joseph: A Tender and Loving Father, A Father in the Shadows. It will be held on the saint’s feast day itself, March 19, at 3 o’clock in the afternoon.Detailsofregistration, which is free and open to the general public, will be announced l at er.
The lectures are part of the Center’s year-long program of activities collectively called San Usip, which is the Kapampangan phonetic spelling of the saint’s name popular among the common folk. The project is the brainchild of cultural worker/ historian Francis Musni. Another featured activity
is a Kapampangan gosu songwriting competition, designed to popularize the old tradition of hymns sung in honor of saints on Halloween.
Pope Francis has declared 2021 as the Year of St. Joseph in observance of the 150th anniversary of Pope Pius IX’s naming of St. Joseph as Patron of the Universal Church, coinciding with the 500th anniversary of the Christianization of the Philippines and the 450th anniversary of the Christianization of Pampanga.
The University launched its own countdown for the twin anniversaries last 2017 with a program of activities called FIDES 500, which was also Francis Musni’s brainchild, with the publication of the book on Kapampangan candidate for beatification Felipe Sonsong and the unveiling of the Chapel of Sacred Relics and the discipline-based outreach activities of the various colleges under the Institute for Christian Formation and Social Integration (ICFSI).
On March 8, the University will launch the culminating activities under FIDES 500 as well as the San Usip project, as part of the Founders Day celebration.
The HAU founder, Juan D. Nepomuceno, as well as the entire Nepomuceno Family, was a devotee of St. Joseph.
The rest of the topics in the Anloagui Lecture Series include “St. Joseph: Patron of Laborers, A Paragon of the Silent Worker” on May 1, Labor Day; “St. Joseph: Foster Father of Our Lord, A Model for All Fathers” on June 19, Fathers Day; “Invoking St.
Joseph in These Trying Times: Parenting in the Time of Pandemic” on August 20; “St. Joseph, Patron for a Happy Death” on November 2, All Souls Day; and “St. Joseph: Model for All Husbands of the World” on December 8, feast of Our Lady’s Immaculate Conception and closing day of the Year of St. Joseph.