July 16, 1995

To my dearly beloved in Christ:

Today we begin the observance of National Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation Week, focusing our attention on the disabled and the handicapped in our midst.

We all know that Jesus Christ went around teaching and caring (Mt 9:35). He had a special love for the handicapped, the rejected, the mentally ill, the lepers, all the people who suffer in silence.

In His parable of the GOOD SAMARITAN (Lk 10:25-37) Jesus explains to us how to love. A person was robbed, beaten and left abandoned on the road, half-dead. The Good Samaritan did not say, “He is half-dead and, therefore he has only half human value,” but he did what he could do: lift him up, bring him to a good place and pay all the expenses. Jesus tells us: “Go and do the same.”

Jesus also said how it will be at the time of the FINAL JUDGMENT: “Whatever you have done to the least of my brothers, you have done it to me. Enter into the Kingdom prepared for you.” To the others he will say, “Out of my sight, into the everlasting punishment” (Mt 26:31-46).

In the same line, the apostle Peter cared for the handicapped. He said to a lame: “I do not have silver nor gold, but WHAT I HAVE, I GIVE YOU” (Acts 3:6a).

We experienced the deep love for the handicapped in our Pope John Paul II, on the occasion of the World Youth Day when he warmly embraced a girl who is both deaf and blind and has a hunchback.

Many people are surprised to learn when told that about TEN PERCENT (10%) OF OUR POPULATION IS HANDICAPPED. One reason is that we do not see many of them on the streets. Many more are hidden in the homes. Still worse is the fact that only an extremely small number of them can go even to elementary school. What will happen to them if we do not teach them the Word of God and skills for daily living?

We do not laugh so much at the deaf as people did at the time of Jesus but many still ridicule the MENTALLY ILL. Yet most of them suffer atrociously.

We know that after the treatment with modern medicines the LEPERS, whom we now call the hansenites, cannot contaminate another person. Still, many avoid them like the plague. AIDS is most likely thousand of times more contagious than the untreated lepers monopolistic attempts. Just as the Department of Health provided needed vaccinations to all people in any kind of institution or in no institution, so it is imperative that funding from taxes be available not just for the government to make laws and implementing guidelines but also and mainly for private entities.

We also insist that the existing declarations and laws for the handicapped be fully implemented and further legislation be established that is fair for all.

Dearly beloved, Jesus has a special care for the rejected; the handicapped and ordered us to love all people. Therefore, I conclude with a reiteration of my most urgent appeal to:

- respect all human life,

- treat the handicapped as part of our Catholic Church

- welcome every blind, lame, deaf, mentally retarded

- leper and mentally ill by providing them with sin- cere love and the right assistance.

I challenge you to walk every road to find all the handicapped, to welcome them to the home of our Catholic Church and to tell them the greatest love the world has known.

May the Father give you His eternal love when you have cared for the least of our brothers and sisters.

(Sgd.) + JAIME L. CARDINAL SIN, D.D.

Archbishop of Manila

July 16, 1995