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MANILA, Philippines -- Filipinos working in Hong Kong have raised money for the food of flood victims in Barangay Silangan, Quezon City, and the cleanup of their neighborhood, activist priest Fr. Robert Reyes said Saturday.
Reyes' group, Buhay Ka, raised some P15,870 during a fund-raising event attended by cancer survivors last Sunday in Hong Kong, a day after storm ?Ondoy'' battered Metro Manila and nearby provinces.
The money will go to cleaning up the barangay and preparing soup for the residents, he said.
?I'll organize as many people as possible to clean up the barangay, and cook soup for everybody,'' he said.
Reyes will lead a procession from the Sandiganbayan court on Commonwealth Avenue to Barangay Silangan at around 7 a.m. on Sunday, and then say Mass for the barangay residents at around 8 a.m.
This will be followed by the cleanup from 9 a.m. to 12 noon, and the feeding of the residents.
Reyes is celebrating the Mass to mark the Feast of St. Francis, who as a patron of ecology should serve as a model for everyone. He said the Mass was a means for the residents to ?reconcile with nature.''
?St. Francis of Assisi reminds us of our primordial connection and connectedness with nature. Today, St. Francis reminds us, in a way gentler than Ondoy?s angry rains, to go back and reconcile with Mother Earth,'' he said in a statement.
?Thus, we say ?mea culpa? and ask Mother Earth to forgive us. We ask her friend and disciple, Francis of Assisi, to lead us back to lives of simplicity and humility.''
