2024 31st Annual Rosary Rally

Program distributed during the rally

On a yearly basis, FFRGOC whose members are mostly Catholics, we celebrate the month of October as the "Month of the Rosary". The feast day of Our Lady of Rosary historically has been October 7 that signifies the victory of the Battle of Lepanto due to the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary through the prayer of the Rosary.

FFRGOC board officers decided to have the rosary rally at the new and beautiful modern Christ the Savior Church at Santa Ana, CA and Rica Werner, Southwest Chapter Director of Southwest Area1 and a parishioner of the church worked hard to enable us to celebrate our Rosary Rally together with our current President Helen Alonso and fully supported with hard work by the Board Officers and Chapter Directors.

The goal of this blog on this event is to take you, the readers to witness or remember this important event as days, months and years go by.

Exterior of Christ Our Savior Church, Santa Ana, CA

Beautiful Altar of Christ the Savior Church where mass was celebrate

Event logistics and Mass are as follows:

Thank you all for your support !

We appreciate everyone who participated in the Holy Mass.

There were a lot of preparation mostly behind the scene and everyone is aware that Nenita and Dean Miyata were responsible for transporting necessary materials and contributing their efforts the best way possible. Some of the pictures available to me on the preparation although some people who helped are not included but here are some of them.

Dean Miyata with friends helping to prepare the carosa

Mary Ann, Fely and Chat decorating the carosa with the Blessed Virgin Mary on the carosa that looks so beautiful with a heart, an idea of Mary Ann, FFGROC first VP

So lovely our carosa with the Blessed Virgin Mary with donated balloons from a parishioner of St. Simon and Jude through Boots Mercado, our auditor.

The carosa led the procession of attendees and the rosary was prayed in major Philippine dialects i.e. Tagalog and English

Our Finished Carosa

One of the strengths of FFRGOC is having a very good Director of Religious Services and we have one... Evelyn Ruiz who plans and executes using "the devil is on the details" concept plus involving the community in having roles in the event as shown below:

Executed well by the participants

Executed well too especially with St. Cecilia Choir singing at the right moment

Registration with Fely, Zeny and Mary Ann as volunteers

Preparing for the procession with the banners of different areas of FFRGOC

Attendees happy to see one another before the procession

St. Cecilia Choir getting ready for the procession

Actual praying of the rosary and procession

The Holy Mass :

Evelyn Ruiz, Director of Religious Services welcoming the attendees of the Holy Mass

Children and Adults offering flowers

Beautiful candid photo of a young girl happy to offer flowers

The Most Rev. Bishop Thanh Thai Nguyen Auxiliary Bishop of the Diocese of Orange together with co celebrants entering the church

Attendees of the Holy Mass

Auxiliary Bishop delivering his homily who caught my attention because he had been doing services for FFRGOC for several years. Thank you.

Philippines is an archipelago consisting of 7,641 islands and people speak 180 dialects.

The Petitions - Prayer of the Faithful led by Wally Claudio, Director of Charity was said in different languages/dialects.

Prayer of the Faithful in 7 dialects/languages: English, Waray, Pampango, Cebuano, Ilocano, Ilongo and Tagalog

FFRGOC Choir Cantor leading everyone to sing with the choir

FFRGOC choir in action during the Holy Mass

The Offering of Gifts, a Filipino tradition

Gifts Offered and the symbolic meaning of each gifts

Gifts

Mass ended with our President Helen Alonso thanking everyone for attending our event and invited them to partake on our complimentary boxed lunches .

A picture of our farewell to the auxiliary bishop with Debbie, Ely, Benita, Helen and Rica

Our lunch boxes with Filipino food

Attendees getting lunch

Food being served

Attendees enjoying lunch under the tent

Boxed lunches were served and attendees had choices where to eat including these tents especially for dining

Special thank you to Mimi Fule and Larry Orque who shared pictures with our President Helen Alonzo and gave me the permission to use those pictures plus what I and other board members pictures on our website. (Videos will be added as soon as I figure out the best place and length I can without technical problems)

Following pictures are fun pictures using the once in a year beautiful carosa as backdrop plus our talented choir and its members who always dressed up to the occasion.

Helen with Mimi and friends

Talented Larry, Choir Conductor and Marga Gargantiel, Pianist of the choir

Love this lady who started me in doing the website, Debbie Gonzales, former FFRGOC President and Benita

The talented husband, Glen(President of Choir) and wife, Mary Ann Puzon, First VP with the once a year carosa

Another husband, Wally, Director of Charity and wife, Fely Claudio, Previously a BOD team who work hard on FFRGOC events

The famous choir with emphasis on men!

Our choir with emphasis on women!

Beautiful ladies of FFRGOC with Mimi Fule and Cora Narciso

Thank you all for reading my blog and hopefully I reach my goal where you can peruse/read and remember the good clean fun on our FFRGOC events. Till my next blog and thank you all for participating and see you in our next event.