A total of 1,697 students will graduate from college and technical-vocational courses for the school year 2017-2018 under Caritas Manila’s (CM) Youth Servant Leadership and Education Program (YSLEP).

This is the biggest number of graduates since CM started offering the scholarships in 1953.Out of the current number, 548 came from families and communities devastated by supertyphoon “Yolanda” four years ago. A major part of the rehabilitation program implemented by CM was to extend YSLEP scholarships for the children of Yolanda victim families.

At any given year,  YSLEP sponsors 3,000 to 5,000 scholars nationwide. Priority is given to poor youth from Metro Manila like those from Payatas and Baseco; from the poorest provinces such as Apayao and Masbate; indigenous people; victims of calamities; and those affected by war and conflicts in Mindanao.

Last year, CM graduates raised P1.5 million under the CM Scholars’ Alumni Association’s Balik-Handog program.

Caritas Manila is the social services and development arm of the Archdiocese of Manila.

For those interested in helping CM and YSLEP, visit Caritas Manila at 2002 Jesus St., Pandacan, Manila or call 5620020 to 25, e-mail [email protected] or visit www.caritasmanila.org.ph.

Fr. Rosales, OFM

On April 25, Fr. Tony Rosales, OFM, author, artist, theologian and former parish priest of Santuario in Forbes Park (1997-2007), will celebrate the golden jubilee of his ordination to the priesthood.  

Ordained with two others by the first Filipino cardinal, Msgr. Rufino Santos, in Villa San Miguel, Mandaluyong, in 1968, he was among the golden jubilarians honored by Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Tagle, in the Chrism Mass of last Holy Thursday.  

After serving in Manila for some 40 years, he joined the Franciscan group for the Visayas and Mindanao in 2007.  

He has published about a dozen books in the last 10 years and taught Moral Theology at the Redemptorists’ St. Alphonsus Theological and Mission Institute in Davao City.