Filipino Bishops elected Gilbert Garcera, Archbishop of Lipa, to be president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) for the next two years. He was elected at last week's CBCP plenary assembly in Anda, Bohol, and the term will begin in December.
Archbishop Garcera has been in charge of Lipa since 2014. Lipa is located in southern Luzon, the country's largest island, and is home to 3.3 million Catholics.
Before Lipa, Bishop Garcera served in the Diocese of Daet for seven years. Daet is a suffragan diocese of the Archdiocese of Caceres, where the bishop was born in 1959 and ordained a priest in 1983.
The archdiocese is well-known for its annual festival in honor of Our Lady of Peñafrancia, its local Marian patroness. This religious celebration is one of the largest in the Philippines, drawing crowds of hundreds of thousands every year.
Archbishop Garcera was consecrated in 2007 in his home archdiocese. For his episcopal motto, he chose a verse from the book of Jeremiah, "Ad Omnia Mittam Te" (To wherever I will send you, you are going), highlighting his commitment to obedience, mission, and the apostolic work of spreading the gospel.
The laughing photo that went viral
In October 2024, he made headlines when a photo of him and Pope Francis laughing in St. Peter's Square went viral.
About that moment, he said, "I made Pope Francis laugh in spite of all the problems of the whole world."
A video from 2019 caught him saying almost the same line while visiting Filipino migrants in Vienna, Austria.
A fellow priest interviewed him about what being a devotee of Our Lady of Peñafrancia means. His reply was twofold: be a good Filipino by being joyful amidst difficulty, and never be ashamed of announcing the gospel.
Like his many homilies and talks available on the internet, that video shows a bishop who finds joy in connecting and working with the laity.
Another instance worth mentioning was a keynote address he delivered to Catholic Media practitioners who gathered in Batangas in 2019.
In that speech, he unabashedly declared "I love people!" and outlined practical ways young people can satisfy their yearning for belonging, beyond social media.
18 Years of pastoral service: highlights
Highlights from his ministry as bishop include participating in Pope Francis' Synod on the Family in 2015 and leading the CBCP's Episcopal Commission on Family and Life from 2017 to 2021.
His commitment to helping families become schools of faith was palpable in a Zoom talk he delivered to Filipino couples living in Qatar in 2021.
Synodality is another theme close to his heart. We see this in a homily he delivered last year, during a pastoral visit to a parish in Lipa. In that reflection, he described faith as "sabay-sabay tayo naglalakbay patungo sa kaharian ng Diyos": a journey together towards the kingdom of God.
He also emphasized solidarity when he echoed the 2021-2024 Synod's exhortation from Isaiah, "to enlarge one's tent" and called on his congregation to entrust themselves to Nuestra Señora de Solidaridad (Our Lady of Solidarity).
A near-death experience
During the Holy Week of 2021, he contracted a severe case of COVID-19. In this interview, he recounts how he almost died from the virus. When his COVID was at its worst, doctors predicted only a 20% chance of survival
Confined in the hospital’s ICU, he prayed intensely to his guardian angel. Then, on Holy Thursday night, he heard children's voices praying in the room next to his. When he asked the hospital's staff who those children might be, they replied that there were none, because children weren’t allowed there.
Since he was sure he had heard young voices praying, he later considered that perhaps those could have been of angels interceding for his healing. He recovered after that evening and attributes his recovery to grace.
His testimony suggests that his ministry is rooted in a powerful, personal experience of God. For Archbishop Garcera, believing goes beyond knowing Church teaching: faith is our response to the surprising, overwhelming love of Jesus, especially during life’s most difficult moments.
