Chancery
Cardinal Rosales Pastoral Center
P. Burgos Street
6000 Cebu City, Philippines


Dear Officers and Members of Sto. Nino de Cebu Association International at St. Dominic's Church in San Francisco, California. U.S.A.

P e a c e !

On the occasion of your 33rd Annual Fiesta in honor of Sto. Nino de Cebu, I wish to send you my sincerest greetings and felicitations. I join you in thanking the Holy Child for the countless blessings He has showered upon you.

It is always my profound joy to know that you have remained devoted to our dear Sto. Nino, the source of joy, peace and unity in our lives. This beautiful devotion to the Sto. Nino could have easily been forgotten in society where honor, power and wealth are the most desired values and where the sacred and transcendent is relegated to the background, yet with great pride and courage you remain strong in professing and living out your faith in Him.

We Filipinos may not be a politically powerful and economically rich nation, but we have our faith that we can be proud of. It is our best gift to the world. It is the one light of our cultural heritage that will shine above and beyond the boundaries of colors and race.

I wish that you have a meaningful and fruitful fiesta celebration this year. And may it be a source of inspiration and strength for you to live for the Kingdom as you continue to face the many challenges of the new millennium.

Viva Pit Senor!

December 6, 1999

Dear Brothers & Sisters of Santo Nino de Cebu, Association International at St. Dominic Church, S.F. U.S.A

It is with profound paternal joy that I send you my warmest felicitations on the occasion of your 32nd Fiesta Celebration in honor of the Santo Nino. The people of God in the Archdiocese of Cebu join you in offering praise and thanksgiving to the Triune God as you come together to celebrate the feast of the Child Jesus on the year when the whole Christian world is celebrating the Great Jubilee Year of our Redemption, the beginning of the new millennium.

While the secular world is anxiously waiting for the dawning of the new millennium with the multitude of uncertainties affecting contemporary life that it brings, we believers are eagerly anticipating its coming with the spirit of Christian optimism. Indeed, the Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, is exhorting us to welcome it in the spirit of great hope and jubilation, especially that at the beginning of the new millennium, we celebrate the 2000th Anniversary of the Birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, the fullness of God's revelation.

I wish, therefore, that you will celebrate your annual fiesta in the spirit of the Jubilee Year. May it be filled with much joy and marked with oneness of hearts reflecting the union of the Triune God. And may the grace of Jesus, the love of the Father and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us always. Happy Fiesta! Pit Senor!

Sincerely yours in Christ,
Signed:

RICARDO J. CARDINAL VIDAL
Archbishop of Cebu
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