July 29, 2010, Memorial of Saint Martha

Circular Number 08/2010

RE: CARITAS LINGAYEN DAGUPAN

My dear brothers in the holy priesthood:

I am pleased to inform you that we have taken a significant step in pursuing the pastoral priority of ìService, Development and Justiceî in our archdiocesan vision ICTHUS by consolidating all the social service and development programs and initiatives in the whole Archdiocese of Lingayen Dagupan under a SEC registered non stock non profit corporation called CARITAS LINGAYEN DAGUPAN, INC. Putting our social action programs under the Caritas umbrella corporation can also facilitate networking with other international funding agencies in the future.

With a team of incorporators headed by the Archbishop of Lingayen Dagupan, we have constituted all the lay coordinators of Archdiocesan Social Action Apostolate (ASAP) in every parish as corporation members and the RCA LD and the LD Social Action Director as ex officio members of the Board of Trustees. The other members of the board will represent each of the five major concerns of social service and development, specifically: housing, health care outreach, social advocacies, livelihood and scholarship.

The housing component will assist the poor in building homes and communities in collaboration with pertinent non governmental organizations and government agencies. The health care outreach will conduct medical missions in various poor areas of the archdiocese within a regular time frame. The social advocacies desk will attend to political education, ecological concerns and legal aid. The livelihood component will address the needs of the agricultural sector especially through micro financing and organic farming. The scholarship programs will widen the network of sponsors and extent of student beneficiaries in coordination with the Catholic schools of the archdiocese.

Within the next months, we shall conduct workshop sessions among the members of Caritas Lingayen Dagupan for the definition of objectives and goals and the laying out of strategic pastoral plans for the poor.

I entrust this initiative to your fraternal prayers with the hope that we can better serve Christ who has identified Himself with the poor in our midst. Thank you.

Sincerely yours,

+SOCRATES B. VILLEGAS

Archbishop of Lingayen Dagupan

Home