"End of an era" para sa loyal patrons ng Harrison Plaza ang nalalapit na demolition sa 43-year-old mall sa Malate, Manila bilang pagbibigay-daan sa bagong residential building at shopping complex na itatayo sa naturang lugar.
Dating sementeryo (Ermita Cemetery) at parke (Harrison Park) ang kinatitirikan ng Harrison Plaza na nagbukas noong 1976.
Marami ang nalungkot sa balitang tuluyan nang isasara ang Harrison Plaza sa huling araw ng December 2019 dahil naging bahagi ng kanilang buhay ang establishment na naghatid ng mga masasaya at malulungkot na alaala noong kabataan nila.
Naging popular din sa mga turista ang Harrison Plaza, na may isang department store at apat na sinehan na parehong nagsara dahil sa tumitinding kumpetisyon sa mga higit na bago at malalaking mall.
Gibain man ang Harrison Plaza, na-immortalize naman ang pangalawa sa oldest mall sa Pilipinas dahil dito kinunan ang mga eksena nina Vice Ganda at Anne Curtis sa M&M The Mall, The Merrier.
Hindi ginamit sa pelikula ang pangalan ng Harrison Plaza dahil pinalitan ito ng Tamol Mall, pero nakilala pa rin ng mga taong may mga hindi makakalimutang karanasan at alaala sa nabanggit na mall.
Puwedeng sabihin nina Vice at Anne na naging bahagi rin sila ng Harrison Plaza, na magiging alaala na lamang sa kanilang pelikula na kasalukuyang nangunguna sa box-office race ng 45th Metro Manila Film Festival.
Incidentally, pansamantalang nagpaalam si Anne bilang co-host ng It’s Showtime noong Lunes, December 23, dahil sa payo ng kanyang doktor na magpahinga siya.
Ang pagbubuntis sa magiging panganay na anak nila ni Erwan Heussaff ang priority ni Anne.
Nakatakdang magsilang si Anne sa March 2020 kaya matatagalan pa bago siya muling mapanood sa It’s Showtime.
https://www.pep.ph/pepalerts/cabinet-files/148382/harrison-plaza-to-close-this-2019-a734-20191225
Wednesday, December 25, 2019
Jubilee Year opens to a flow of graces
By Howard Q. Dee
THE JUBILEE YEAR 2000 is not just about celebrating 20 centuries of Christianity and ushering in a new Christian millennium.
It is not the end of the world.
Instead, it comes with great anticipation of the imminent fulfillment of a heavenly promise: ''My Immaculate Heart will triumph! An era of peace will be given to mankind.''
The tradition of the jubilee year is derived from the Jewish ''sabbatical year'' when the earth was left fallow, slaves and prisoners were set free, debts were forgiven and everyone returned to their ancestral home and the land returned to those dispossessed of them.
And every 50 years, a jubilee year is celebrated with splendor and solemnity.
The Jubilee Year 2000 is like no other jubilee. In the old tradition, a generation consisted of 40 years. We, in the year 2000, belong to the 50th generation after Christ was born. We are completing one generation of jubilees to begin a new age of Christianity. Surely the gates of heaven will open with an avalanche of graces to flow. We, on earth, must open our doors to Christ!
Springtime of faith
The Holy Father, with the theme of Isaiah 61 that Christ used to announce his messianic mission, promises ''a new springtime for the Faith.'' But this glory, he foretold, comes with a heavy price. The Church will once again become a Church of martyrs.
Today, we are witnesses to the martyrdom of the Church in Rwanda, East Timor, and now in China where organized persecution torments the faithful.
Martyrdom in this ''fullness of times'' is not limited to the shedding of Christian blood. The gigantic waves of materialism have inundated Christian citadels around the globe, leaving in its wake a godless culture, destroying moral truths and values and secularizing every human activity and institution, the schools and churches not exempted.
The Holy Father looks beyond this suffering of the moment to celebrate the glory that shall soon be revealed. The faithful awaits in vigil for this proximate triumph.
The Pope said: ''At the end of this century, the words spoken by the Lady to the shepherd children of Fatima seem to be close to their fulfillment . . . When the victory comes, it will be brought by Mary.''
Aren't we being foolhardy, to expect a triumph amid the deepening darkness?
Catholic historian Ralph Martin explains: ''In the very darkest days and hours, in the midst of what is certainly a great apostasy, the seeds of a new Pentecost and a new evangelization are being sown. At the end of the century, it appears that the darkness is growing darker and yet the light is shining more brightly.''
Cardinal Hans Urs Von Baltazar, the eminent theologian, describes a ferocious battle in progress: ''The nearer the end approaches, the more fierce becomes the battle. The more the Holy Spirit becomes present in history, the more prevalent is what Jesus calls the sin against the Holy Spirit.''
It is the proximate victory, preordained by God, which gives us cause for celebration. In celebrating the Jubilee, Vatican tells '' to look forward to his glorious second coming and the full realization of the kingdom of God.'' The Holy Father said ''while waiting for Christ's return in glory, we must live in hope as we build the kingdom which Christ will hand over to the Father at the end of time.''
This end of time or the ''novissimi'' associated with the prophecies of Fatima, is not to be interpreted as the end of the world.
According to Fr. Joseph Iannuzzi, OSJ, in his exhaustive research on the teachings of the Fathers and the Saints on the Millennium and the End Times, it is ''but the end of the times of the reign of the human will and the beginning of the times of the reign of God's Divine Will, or God's rest in creation'' lasting a thousand years. Could this ''seven-day'' rest correspond to the era of peace promised by Our Lady of Fatima in 1917?
Urgent need
Our Lady of All Nations in her Amsterdam (1945) and Akita (1973) messages, spoke of the urgent need for a radical conversion and return to God to prevent a great chastisement by fire that would destroy a great part of humanity. She asks us to pray for the descent of the Holy Spirit in a second Pentecost to save the world from ''degeneration, disaster and war.''
Our Lady asked for the Papal proclamation of a new dogma recognizing her as Coredemptrix, Mediatrix and Advocate to empower her to accomplish this mission. Heaven leaves it to us to determine how the triumph of good over evil shall be attained, either by the cleansing fire of chastisement or by the purifying fire of the Holy Spirit, depending on our response to the call of conversion, repentance and reparation.
Year of the Lord's favor
Remember that Isaiah 61, the central theme of the Jubilee Year, proclaims not only ''a year of the Lord's favor'' but also ''a day of vengeance for our God'' when God will make manifest his presence and omnipotence.
The Holy Father, in his role as the gardener in the parable of the fig tree (Luke 13), is appealing to the Master to be patient to allow him to fertilize the fruitless fig tree that it may bear fruit during the Jubilee.
This cultivation to restore our faith to fruitfulness the Pope calls the new evangelization: ''The whole of humanity, which is at a very difficult time, has great need of it. How, in fact, could we remain silent in the face of the sad spectacle . . . which seems to drive individuals and whole populations onto the brink of the abyss? . . . It is time to return to God! . . . Our world hungers for faith, for an authentic and deep faith, because God alone can fully satisfy the desire of the human heart.''
This moving appeal of the Holy Father is a clarion call for Christian soldiers to march into battle to ''take up the struggle for the world's soul.''
Cardinal Von Baltazar said that this is a ''struggle for the soul of the contemporary world at its height when the spirit of this world seems strongest, . . . a world that is distancing itself from the Gospel.''
While the secular world celebrates the passing of an era, unmindful of the grave dangers that lurk in the days ahead, we must quicken our hearts in prayer to receive Christ and open our doors to him.
The Pope beacons: ''Open your door to Christ, welcome the Spirit, so that a new Pentecost may take place in every community! A new humanity, a joyful one, will arise from your midst. Today the Lord is passing by. He is calling you.''
In the Jubilee Year of the Lord's favor, His Spirit shall come to revive us with a new heart. He shall free us from the slavery of sin. Our debts shall be forgiven and our inheritance shall be restored to us. We shall reclaim our rights to our ancestral land, Paradise, where the Father awaits us. Our Blessed Mother, the Morning Star, shall come with her Spouse to guide us to her Son, ''who is the true light that enlightens everyone.''
THE JUBILEE YEAR 2000 is not just about celebrating 20 centuries of Christianity and ushering in a new Christian millennium.
It is not the end of the world.
Instead, it comes with great anticipation of the imminent fulfillment of a heavenly promise: ''My Immaculate Heart will triumph! An era of peace will be given to mankind.''
The tradition of the jubilee year is derived from the Jewish ''sabbatical year'' when the earth was left fallow, slaves and prisoners were set free, debts were forgiven and everyone returned to their ancestral home and the land returned to those dispossessed of them.
And every 50 years, a jubilee year is celebrated with splendor and solemnity.
The Jubilee Year 2000 is like no other jubilee. In the old tradition, a generation consisted of 40 years. We, in the year 2000, belong to the 50th generation after Christ was born. We are completing one generation of jubilees to begin a new age of Christianity. Surely the gates of heaven will open with an avalanche of graces to flow. We, on earth, must open our doors to Christ!
Springtime of faith
The Holy Father, with the theme of Isaiah 61 that Christ used to announce his messianic mission, promises ''a new springtime for the Faith.'' But this glory, he foretold, comes with a heavy price. The Church will once again become a Church of martyrs.
Today, we are witnesses to the martyrdom of the Church in Rwanda, East Timor, and now in China where organized persecution torments the faithful.
Martyrdom in this ''fullness of times'' is not limited to the shedding of Christian blood. The gigantic waves of materialism have inundated Christian citadels around the globe, leaving in its wake a godless culture, destroying moral truths and values and secularizing every human activity and institution, the schools and churches not exempted.
The Holy Father looks beyond this suffering of the moment to celebrate the glory that shall soon be revealed. The faithful awaits in vigil for this proximate triumph.
The Pope said: ''At the end of this century, the words spoken by the Lady to the shepherd children of Fatima seem to be close to their fulfillment . . . When the victory comes, it will be brought by Mary.''
Aren't we being foolhardy, to expect a triumph amid the deepening darkness?
Catholic historian Ralph Martin explains: ''In the very darkest days and hours, in the midst of what is certainly a great apostasy, the seeds of a new Pentecost and a new evangelization are being sown. At the end of the century, it appears that the darkness is growing darker and yet the light is shining more brightly.''
Cardinal Hans Urs Von Baltazar, the eminent theologian, describes a ferocious battle in progress: ''The nearer the end approaches, the more fierce becomes the battle. The more the Holy Spirit becomes present in history, the more prevalent is what Jesus calls the sin against the Holy Spirit.''
It is the proximate victory, preordained by God, which gives us cause for celebration. In celebrating the Jubilee, Vatican tells '' to look forward to his glorious second coming and the full realization of the kingdom of God.'' The Holy Father said ''while waiting for Christ's return in glory, we must live in hope as we build the kingdom which Christ will hand over to the Father at the end of time.''
This end of time or the ''novissimi'' associated with the prophecies of Fatima, is not to be interpreted as the end of the world.
According to Fr. Joseph Iannuzzi, OSJ, in his exhaustive research on the teachings of the Fathers and the Saints on the Millennium and the End Times, it is ''but the end of the times of the reign of the human will and the beginning of the times of the reign of God's Divine Will, or God's rest in creation'' lasting a thousand years. Could this ''seven-day'' rest correspond to the era of peace promised by Our Lady of Fatima in 1917?
Urgent need
Our Lady of All Nations in her Amsterdam (1945) and Akita (1973) messages, spoke of the urgent need for a radical conversion and return to God to prevent a great chastisement by fire that would destroy a great part of humanity. She asks us to pray for the descent of the Holy Spirit in a second Pentecost to save the world from ''degeneration, disaster and war.''
Our Lady asked for the Papal proclamation of a new dogma recognizing her as Coredemptrix, Mediatrix and Advocate to empower her to accomplish this mission. Heaven leaves it to us to determine how the triumph of good over evil shall be attained, either by the cleansing fire of chastisement or by the purifying fire of the Holy Spirit, depending on our response to the call of conversion, repentance and reparation.
Year of the Lord's favor
Remember that Isaiah 61, the central theme of the Jubilee Year, proclaims not only ''a year of the Lord's favor'' but also ''a day of vengeance for our God'' when God will make manifest his presence and omnipotence.
The Holy Father, in his role as the gardener in the parable of the fig tree (Luke 13), is appealing to the Master to be patient to allow him to fertilize the fruitless fig tree that it may bear fruit during the Jubilee.
This cultivation to restore our faith to fruitfulness the Pope calls the new evangelization: ''The whole of humanity, which is at a very difficult time, has great need of it. How, in fact, could we remain silent in the face of the sad spectacle . . . which seems to drive individuals and whole populations onto the brink of the abyss? . . . It is time to return to God! . . . Our world hungers for faith, for an authentic and deep faith, because God alone can fully satisfy the desire of the human heart.''
This moving appeal of the Holy Father is a clarion call for Christian soldiers to march into battle to ''take up the struggle for the world's soul.''
Cardinal Von Baltazar said that this is a ''struggle for the soul of the contemporary world at its height when the spirit of this world seems strongest, . . . a world that is distancing itself from the Gospel.''
While the secular world celebrates the passing of an era, unmindful of the grave dangers that lurk in the days ahead, we must quicken our hearts in prayer to receive Christ and open our doors to him.
The Pope beacons: ''Open your door to Christ, welcome the Spirit, so that a new Pentecost may take place in every community! A new humanity, a joyful one, will arise from your midst. Today the Lord is passing by. He is calling you.''
In the Jubilee Year of the Lord's favor, His Spirit shall come to revive us with a new heart. He shall free us from the slavery of sin. Our debts shall be forgiven and our inheritance shall be restored to us. We shall reclaim our rights to our ancestral land, Paradise, where the Father awaits us. Our Blessed Mother, the Morning Star, shall come with her Spouse to guide us to her Son, ''who is the true light that enlightens everyone.''
PUSAN POINT MILLENNIUM SUNRISE PACKAGE TOURS READY
Special package tours are now available for nature lovers and mountaineers who will trek to Pusan Point in Davao Oriental to watch the first sunrise of the 21st century.
The dawn of the new millennium in the Philippines will be first visible at exactly 5:46 A.M. on Jan 1, 2020 at Pusan Point, Barangay Santiago in Caraga, Davao Oriental. Watching the first millennium sunrise will highlight the festivities of the day in the region.
In a report to Secretary Berna Romulo Puyat of the Department of Tourism, DOT Region XI Director Tanya Rabat-Tan said preparations may not be as grand as in other places but the sight will be memorable to whoever will be lucky enough to witness it.
Araneta chairs the Committee on the Turn-of-the-Century Celebration, which is tasked to prepare for the country’s observance of the new millennium.
The celebration of the event, dubbed Pusan Point: "First Sight, First Light," will feature a variety of activities aimed at fostering peace and unity of the Filipinos.
Among these activities are a mountain bike tour, Parada ng mga Parol, sports festival, search for Binibining Caraga and a guided tour for parties interested to discover more about Pusan Point.
Tourists will be treated to a socio-cultural show and a grill party at the park on Dec. 31, before a sunrise breakfast and salo-salo at dawn on Jan 1, 2020.
Dakudao said a major infrastructure development is being undertaken in Caraga, especially improvement of the trails leading to Pusan Point.
She added that tour packages have been arranged for the convenience of out-of-town guests.
Since there is no permanent settlement near the site, two types of accommodations have been made available. Guests may be accommodated either in tents or makeshift camps installed in the site of Caraga Tourism complex.
Dakudao said the package rate for the tents is only P2,350, which is inclusive of round trip aircon transportation, meals and entrance fees.
A guest’s stay at the Caraga Tourism Complex is only P3,250, which includes round trip aircon transportation, meals, entrance fees and a guided tour.
The preparations in Caraga are part of the Pistang Milenyo Filipino, a six-day nationwide celebration set for Dec. 26 to 31.
Secretary Berna Romulo Puyat said the activities in Manila will be held at the Rizal Park, which will be transformed into a special Millennium Park with colorful decorations and festivities meant to attract people to the Turn-of-the-Century program at the Quirino grandstand on Dec. 31, where President Duterte and his family will join the masses say goodbye to 2019 and welcome the year 2020.
The dawn of the new millennium in the Philippines will be first visible at exactly 5:46 A.M. on Jan 1, 2020 at Pusan Point, Barangay Santiago in Caraga, Davao Oriental. Watching the first millennium sunrise will highlight the festivities of the day in the region.
In a report to Secretary Berna Romulo Puyat of the Department of Tourism, DOT Region XI Director Tanya Rabat-Tan said preparations may not be as grand as in other places but the sight will be memorable to whoever will be lucky enough to witness it.
Araneta chairs the Committee on the Turn-of-the-Century Celebration, which is tasked to prepare for the country’s observance of the new millennium.
The celebration of the event, dubbed Pusan Point: "First Sight, First Light," will feature a variety of activities aimed at fostering peace and unity of the Filipinos.
Among these activities are a mountain bike tour, Parada ng mga Parol, sports festival, search for Binibining Caraga and a guided tour for parties interested to discover more about Pusan Point.
Tourists will be treated to a socio-cultural show and a grill party at the park on Dec. 31, before a sunrise breakfast and salo-salo at dawn on Jan 1, 2020.
Dakudao said a major infrastructure development is being undertaken in Caraga, especially improvement of the trails leading to Pusan Point.
She added that tour packages have been arranged for the convenience of out-of-town guests.
Since there is no permanent settlement near the site, two types of accommodations have been made available. Guests may be accommodated either in tents or makeshift camps installed in the site of Caraga Tourism complex.
Dakudao said the package rate for the tents is only P2,350, which is inclusive of round trip aircon transportation, meals and entrance fees.
A guest’s stay at the Caraga Tourism Complex is only P3,250, which includes round trip aircon transportation, meals, entrance fees and a guided tour.
The preparations in Caraga are part of the Pistang Milenyo Filipino, a six-day nationwide celebration set for Dec. 26 to 31.
Secretary Berna Romulo Puyat said the activities in Manila will be held at the Rizal Park, which will be transformed into a special Millennium Park with colorful decorations and festivities meant to attract people to the Turn-of-the-Century program at the Quirino grandstand on Dec. 31, where President Duterte and his family will join the masses say goodbye to 2019 and welcome the year 2020.
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