Hafa Adai friends, family and my dear people of Guam,
Even as many of us gather in this Holy Week to celebrate our Lord, our faith and our family, it is difficult not to see the chaos, the fear and the anger that seems to envelope so many around world.
Here on Guam, we enjoy blue tropical skies and warm sunny beaches with a harmony that calls to people from throughout the world. Our Chamorro people have welcomed Japanese, Koreans, Chinese, Taiwanese, Filipinos, Russians, Australians, Palauans, and other Micronesian brothers and sisters, as well mainland Americans and so many others.
It is an understatement, I think, to say that we are blessed here on Guam with beauty and a diverse community made greater with an even more diverse group of visitors — we all come together to form a tapestry that is unique and something to be prized. Here we gather in peace and are reminded that love, family, and community are the most important things and we should not lose sight of those.
Our people know war. Our island remembers the devastation of great adversity because it was not that long ago when we were caught in the crossfires of two nations. It’s interesting that we are now a place that brings these two nations together in peace.
On Palm Sunday Pope Francis reminded us that, in our Catholic and Christian traditions, Jesus is the king of justice, mercy and peace. He also called for us this week to pray, meditate or call on what greater powers we believe in, that peace will continue to prevail over the nations.
I ask that we all join that prayer for the world and our island. And for those of us who are Christian, remember that even in the great suffering that our Lord endured, he also brought us hope. We must cling to that hope and never allow the events of the world around us to extinguish it.
Un dangkulu na si Yu’os ma’ase my wonderful people of Guam. Have a blessed Easter celebration and a blessed week.
Audio: Easter Message 2017
