Day: October 18, 2009

By MARYA SALAMAT
It what appears to be a challenge to the assertions of conservative groups and the government that the Church should not be involved in politics and the “affairs of the state,” Catholic priests from all over the country — in a historic first — gathered to discern and discuss their role amid these turbulent times.

Ruth Gecaro, barangay treasurer of Somoroy, Lope de Vega, in Northern Samar, was supposed to provide witnesses to a fact-finding team on the murder of Father Cecilio Lucero, the parish priest of Catubig, Northern Samar. Two days before the fact-finding team arrived in Samar, Gecaro was abducted by men believed to be soldiers. She remains missing.