Never in my wildest dream did I think that this day would come …. that the Queen of Peace Church would be desanctified or closed. What made it worst was that the last mass before it was closed was on the feast day of Mary, the Queen of Peace.
The desanctification of Queen of Peace Church is the result of the disagreement between the Diocese of Bacolod and St. John’s Institute, my alma mater. The school owns the church as certified by the donor of the lots of the school and church and wanted to have it back with chapel status but the Diocese wants to have it. After they cannot have it legally, they punished the school with their desanctification decree.
All throughout the mass, I was quite emotional and teary-eyed just like many Johnians who attended the last mass. I kept on reminiscing happy memories and important milestones in my life of which the Queen of Peace Church was part of. First Communion, Confirmation, graduations, First Friday confessions and masses (first and last period classes were suspended), praying the rosary, class schedule to serve in the mass, anticipated Saturday masses with two of my closest high school friends and many other happy memories. Who could forget our high school graduation day when there was a shooting incident inside the church just as the graduates were preparing to march to the church for our graduation rites. Someone shot one of the principal sponsors at an ongoing wedding during communion. Our graduation rites was rescheduled in the afternoon at the gym. The church was temporarily closed.
The Queen of Peace Church has been an integral part of every Johnian’s Christian formation. The faith has been imbibed in us from kindergarten till high school. It strengthened our Catholic faith. With its closure, I feel sad for the students of St. John’s Institute. They lost the opportunity of strengthening their Christian formation outside the four walls of the classroom.
After the mass, the decrees about the closure issued by the Bishop of the Diocese of Bacolod was read and the altar was stripped of its vestments. I was teary-eyed throughout the mass but this was when tears welled in my eyes. It was a very sad moment. It felt like someone was taken away from me. I also saw many crying openly.
A Johnian placed a white cloth at the altar after it was stripped of its vestments. She also placed on the altar the image of Mama Mary which she donated to the church some years back. The Diocese have intended to take the images of adoration inside the church since they are planning to build a new one carrying the name Queen of Peace, but no way can they get the image of Mary, the Queen of Peace at the center of the altar. She should stay where she has been since the late 1960’s. The Johnians and Hua Ming community will protect her and will fight for her. She has and will forever be a part of our lives.
Emotions flared up among the Johnian community and I am one of them. But when emotions calmed down I came to realize that the closure is like a stab in the back but it may be God’s way of returning our “chapel” to where it rightly belong . . . to the Johnian or Hua Ming community who founded and built it from scratch through the leadership of the late Msgr. John Su and Msgr. John Liu. Together with St. John’s Institute, the Queen of Peace Church was their baby.
The desanctification will not diminish our Catholic faith. In fact it unified the Johnian/Hua Ming community. Stripping St. John’s Institute of its Catholic status is painful but it will survive and stand strong. Being a Catholic is in the heart and no human can take it away from us. In the eyes of God, we are and will remain as Catholics.
I attended the last mass to show my support to my alma mater and because my conscience said so. Being the biggest Johnian family, my family is very passionate with this controversy between the school and the Diocese. The school has our full support. During the mass, being emotional with the events unfolding, I was inspired to write this blog. Before I started writing, I asked the guidance of Mama Mary.
We may not understand it now but God may have better plans for the Johnians/Hua Ming chapel. This could also be a test of our faith. Our chapel may have lost the sacraments but it will remain strong and standing. We remain hopeful that something good will come out of this sad development.
I took these pictures on Christmas Eve 2015.
Hail Hua Ming Hail!
Debz Viewz 
Thank you for writing this. Salamat
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You are welcome Pershing.
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You nailed it! The closure was a punitive move on the part of the Bishop when he failed to get what he wanted. Imagine, after just about 10 months in office, his first significant order was to kill an institution that has been in existence even before he became a priest. Now, he will go down in the history of Bacolod City as the only bishop who closed down a fully functioning church being attended by thousands of parishioners most of whom are ardent supporters of the Diocese. How I wish the Canon Law has some provisions on common sense.
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Thank you. You are right. What did the Johnian/Hua Ming community do to be given such a harse “punishment”? It’s the Diocese who made the parishioners churchless. The Johnian/Hua Ming community just wanted their chapel back which will still be open to the public and the Diocesan priests can still say mass and the weekend income will still go to the Diocese. But they want ownership of something that is not theirs in the first place.
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This is a hauntingly beautiful church which ought to be preserved as part of the religious, cultural heritage of Bacolod. How can such men of cloth who are turning out to be wolves in sheep’s clothing move to desanctify it? Upon whose authority are they doing this? What irony that while Jesus drove away merchants who were turning His Father’s House into a marketplace because He wanted to preserve its sanctity, in contrast, these men of cloth in Bacolod are driving away the faithful from this beautiful church and have it desanctified– for what reason? Our suspicion is that they will destroy it so they can build income-generating spaces in the new church they will build. SUCH IRONY OF IRONIES!!!
We advise the Johnian Community to seek temporary restraining order from the court to prevent the Bishop from destroying it. Per Supreme Court ruling in a case, the Bishop and Priest are, in the real sense, administrators of the church for the benefit of the faithful. Thus, the owners of the church, in the real sense, are the faithful.
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I doubt if the Supreme Court has authority over church matters but I will relay your advise. Thank you.
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But why the school wants it back as a chapel when it is already a parish were it reaches out to more faithfuls???
I don’t find the logic of putting it back into a chapel again.
If some are telling that the Diocese has their own interest on the church income, why??? Does the School doesn’t have interest of the same???
Who was in the first place started this chaos?
The BOT who wants to have the church ‘s ownership to be back to the school governance.
What’s the intentions then???
The Queen of Peace Parish has been there for many years now, and both the Johnians and parishioners are all excersicing their faith through this Church.
Why would somebody wanted this to be separated???
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Queen of Peace only became a parish later in the late 1980’s (without consultation with the Johnian community). Since the Diocese took over the parish about three or four years or so after the order running it left, there had been conflicts between the school and the priests. So the school wanted it to be deparished and be on chapel status to have full control again. The public are still welcome. The Diocesan priests can still officiate the masses on weekends and the income goes to the Diocese. This is proof that the Johnian community is not running after the income. Apparently talks between the two parties bogged down especially when the Diocese claimed ownership of a property which has never been theirs as certified by the donor. The Johnian/Hua Ming community built the church from scratch in the late 1960’s.
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The BOT never meddle with the church income. The BOT wants it back to chapel status because of some security issues in the school. They dont want people coming in and out of the school premises if they are not connected in the school. Secondly, because the diocese wants to have some seats in the BOT which is not good for the school. In my opinion the diocese doesnt want to let go of the income they get from Queen of Peace
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Thank you for the comment.
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As a devout catholic my wisdom and discernment believes that a Parish already in place should no longer be downgraded to just a Chapel, since the purpose is to serve and reach to all kinds of faithful residing in that Parish. It was approved so why a change of decision? What is the real motive behind it? For me it should have been on STATUS QUO.
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Even if it was just a chapel like it used to be since the church was constructed from scratch by the school’s founders, Msgr. John Su and Msgr. John Liu, Queen of Peace has always been OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. It was made into a parish without consultation from the Johnian community. As a parish, it was under a religious order which also helped manage the school until the priests had some misdoings which led to their moving out. Since the school still had to find a religious order as replacement, then Bishop Navarra said for the Diocese to manage the church for a year until the school could find one. During this time, the school requested for QOP to be deparished and change to chapel status but the Bishop never acted despite many follow ups. It has been more or less three years since. It seemed that they do not want to let go of the church. Even as a chapel, the diocesan priests could still say mass on weekends and the income will go to the diocese and not the school. QOP has the biggest mass collection in the Diocese of Bacolod. As stated in one of the comments here, another reason for the change of status is for security reason. There had been some incidents that the security of the students were jeopardized. Also, there were a number of conflicts during the more or less three years that the diocesan priests had been at QOP.
I can only reply on comments as far as I know because this blog is about my sentiments during the last mass and not the conflict between my alma mater and the Diocese of Bacolod.
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