Devotees will celebrate Friday, Aug. 19, the feast day of Saint Ezekiel Moreno, the revered patron saint of cancer patients.
Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines president Kalookan Bishop Pablo Virgilio David will celebrate a fiesta mass in honor of the revered saint on Sunday, Aug. 21, at the St. Ezekiel Moreno Parish in Kaunlaran Village, Caloocan City at 9 a.m.
Holy masses will also be offered at 6:30 a.m., 4:30 p.m., and 6:30 p.m. Novena masses will be celebrated from Aug. 12 to 20. This year’s feast of St. Ezekiel coincides with the 29th parish fiesta.
Commemorative masses will also be held at the St. Ezekiel Moreno Oratory in Las Pinas City, St. Ezekiel being the holy patron of the city.
Known as a miraculous saint, St. Ezekiel was a member of the Order of Augustinian Recollects. He was born on April 9, 1848, in Alfaro, La Rioja in Spain, and later served as a missionary to the Philippines, arriving in Manila on Feb. 10, 1870.
He received and finished his minor orders in Jaro, Iloilo in 1870. In 1871 after his sacerdotal ordination, St. Ezekiel was sent to Calapan, Oriental Mindoro for his first mission and where he was said to have become proficient in Tagalog.
Two years later, he served as Military Chaplain to a penal colony, now Iwahig Prison and Penal Farm in Puerto Princesa City in Palawan. He was among the founders of the towns of Aborlan, Palawan and Barangay Inagawan in Puerto Princesa. He was later sent back to Calapan where he was assigned as Vicar Forane of Mindoro at 28 years old.
In 1876, St. Ezekiel was transferred to Las Piñas City and worked zealously for the development of the lives of the people in the area. He was later transferred to Santo Tomás, Batangas, and then appointed as General Preacher of the Order of Augustinian Recollects in 1880 and as parish priest of Santa Cruz Church in February 1881.
In 1888, he left the country for a Recollect mission in Colombia. St. Ezekiel died on Aug. 19, 1906, at the age of 58 in Montegudo, Navarra in Spain. The Pope now Saint John Paul II canonized him on Oct.11, 1992.