Pastor Berlin V Guerrero

This is a press release when Pastor Berlin V Guerrero was kidnapped: PRESS STATEMENT *presented to the media, 12 nn, May 28, 2007 The United Church of Christ in the Philippines condemns in strongest terms the latest abduction of one of its pastors, Pastor Berlin V. Guerrero who was taken at gunpoint yesterday at 5:45 pm Sunday, May 27, 2007 in front of Seven Star gas station at Bgy. Casile, Binan, Laguna by undetermined number of armed men who were on board two L 300 FB vans whose plate numbers were covered. Pastor Guerrero, 46 years old, pastor assigned at the UCCP local in Malaban, was with his wife Mylene and three children when the abduction took place. According to his wife, they were on board a tricycle when military looking armed men blocked their way, poked their guns on them, grabbed her bag as they forced Pastor Guerrero in one of the vans. According to witnesses, some of the abductors were even video taping the incident. The vans fled to the direction of Carmona. As of press time, efforts to locate Pastor Guerrero in various military and police facilities are fruitless. This update was then printed: We have found Pastor Berlin. He is detained here at Camp Pantaleon Garcia in Imus, Cavite. The Philippine National Police (PNP) says he faces murder and sedition cases filed in 1991 and 1993. He is tortured. The following is a poem that he apparently wrote while in prison: A PASTOR IN PRISON When a pastor is in prison his ministry is not impaired; the bars and walls are only futile attempts to cut his connections to the world beyond the state curtain. His confinement is limited only to the physical body and never to his spirit; transcending the man-made prison he is ever connected to the Source. He remains a priest -- meditating on the liberating Gospel together with fellow prisoners, they come before the God of freedom and justice. He remains a prophet -- speaking the truth, exposing the crookedness of the prison meant to straiten persons pointing out the negligence and faults of the court system which add up to injustice already done to the poor and the oppressed. His understanding and skill of pastoral care is deepened and honed in the countless narratives of human frailty, failure and hopelessness where the only the spoken language is that of forgiveness, love and hope. He becomes a healer -- of the sick and broken -a sea of humility, its will defeated and dying. His touch caresses the hardened heart and calms the troubled soul. His ears are attuned to the whisper pleas and unspoken prayers of the remorseful, lost and heavy-laden. His voice echoes God's message of redemption in a pit of forsakenness and a ravine of damnation. He is humbled in finding himself among the wicked and downtrodden which reminds him of his own imperfection. He treats each inmate as a child of God invited to partake in Christ's feast and into God's reign in the here and now of the concrete prison cell. Christ is enfleshed through the pastor's acts in the redeemed and redemptive community he prayerfully works to bring about within the wall and iron bars of the cursed state prison. Pastor Berlin V. Guerrero June 21 2007 CPJ - TMC

Please pray for Pastor Berlin V Guerrero and his family as they attempt to get through this ordeal.