God Bless the "Land of the Morning"

I know the emphasis of this blog is about the liturgy and my travels, and maybe this post still qualifies in a way....but the truth is, I can't really focus on the normal, spiritual texts as my heart is just breaking for the people of the Philippines.

Typhoon Haiyan

I lived in the Philippines for 2 years back in the late 60's.  My Dad was stationed at Clark Air Force Base during the Vietnam War at the USAF Hospital there.  We lived off-base in a mostly-American housing area in Angeles City, but I was still able to experience a lot of the culture of the Philippines and her people.

I loved it!

1967-ish

I was 8-10 year old in a land of perpetual summer!  Or mostly.  I was outside most of the time, but even inside our house was like living on a porch as there was not even glass on the windows!!  Just wooden slats that shut for privacy.  Our yard had banana and papaya trees and even pineapples!  It was so wonderful.  Our next-door-neighbors were Filipino and had a pet spider monkey!  Oh, it was nothing like the sterile environment of the Air Force Bases I lived on in the States!!  I learned to love many things about this tropical place and it's people, and I know my experience there has impacted my life and is part of what has made me who I am.

If I was to use a word to describe the Philippines, it might be Green.

Green in all it's shades and hues. 

My first sight of the Philippines was from an airplane window in the Spring of 1968.  I was only 8 years old.  After a long, 18 hour flight with my parents & 3 younger siblings (my poor mother!) I gazed out the window to get a glimpse of my new home for the next few years.

 I will never forget.

My memory....I put together three photos from Wikimedia to make this

As we descended down through the blanket of clouds, and popped out beside a mountain terrraced with rice paddies.  It could have been a travel movie for the perfectness of it!  It had been raining, but the sun was setting? rising? and was shining below the clouds.  Everything was SO GREEN!   Or maybe it just seemed that way to my mind since I had just left the winter browns and grays of the U.S. 

And just when I thought it couldn't be more beautiful, the plane turned and I was presented with the glorious gift of a beautiful, full-spectrum rainbow!  Oh My!

I was completely charmed by my new home!!

To compare that cherished memory with the devastating video I am seeing on the news of the destruction of Typhoon Yolanda is breaking my heart!

That beautiful, colorful country - wiped out!

Those beautiful, colorful people - so many lives lost!

I cannot imagine the hardships that the survivors are enduring either!  I was in Hurricane Hugo in Charleston in 1989 and although the South Carolina coast was ravaged we had all the rest of the U.S. to come to our aid.  Or to run to.

So much loss of life.  So much suffering now.  I feel so helpless here in my safe, warm, dry, secure home.

More than half of my fellow pilgrims to Israel, and both priests are Filipino.  I imagine that in a group that large people have lost friends and family.     : (     And those with surviving family in the islands must be beside themselves with worry for their loved ones in their need for the basics like food, water, shelter and medical attention!  The stress and sadness for the people I came to know and love last year must be great.  My heart breaks for them all!

Lord, please watch over the Philippines!  Please take care of the people and end their suffering.  Please be with them as they wait aid.  Please be with the aid workers to be swift.  Please open the hearts of anyone who can help so that they do all they can as quickly as they can.  Lord, please be with the littlest survivors, especially the new orphans!  God Bless them all and give them hope and peace!  

And God, please be with my fellow Pilgrims.  Give them hope and peace for their loved ones and their homeland.  Amen.