Prolife priest is new rector of Filipino college in Vatican

A prolife priest and scientist was chosen by the Vatican as the new rector of the official residence of Filipino priests studying in Rome. The Vatican announced that Fr. Gregory Ramon Gaston, 45, will be the new rector of the Il Pontificio Collegio Filippino. “A scientist who has served on the Pontifical Council for the Family, he is a well-known critic of the promotion of contraceptive use and has frequently spoken on life and family issues," the Union of Catholic Asian News said on its website on Thursday. Gaston is currently the Dean of the Holy Apostles Senior Seminary in Makati City. He will succeed Bishop Ruperto Santos, who was appointed as bishop of Balanga diocese in Bataan in April. According to the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), Gaston served as an official of the Pontifical Council for the Family in the Vatican from 2002 to 2007. Gaston is a native of Silay City, Bukidnon and finished a degree in Zoology at the University of the Philippines before deciding to become a priest. In 1988, the late Jaime Cardinal Sin sent him to the University of Navarre in Spain for his seminary formation. Gaston was ordained priest for the Archdiocese of Manila at the Vatican by Pope John Paul II in 1993, when he was assistant priest in Mandaluyong City’s San Roque Parish. He obtained his doctorate in Sacred Theology at the Angelicum in Rome, and did a short Post-Doctoral Fellowship Program in Bioethics at the National Catholic Bioethics Center in Boston in 1997. Since then he has been given several assignments and taught in different Catholic institutions in the Philippines. The Pontificio Collegio Filippino is under the auspices of the CBCP’s Episcopal Commission. It provides a special type of ongoing priestly formation significantly influenced by a proximity to the Pope and the cultural diversity that only Rome provides. “The priests are often invited to celebrate weekend Mass in Filipino migrant centers," noted Sorsogon Bishop Arturo Bastes. –VVP, GMANews.TV