[Fr. Bernardo Toribio Blanco is a Spanish Claretian priest who came to the Philippines on February 25, 1977. Fr. Blanco was initially assigned to Basilan which is one of the northernmost islands of the Sulu Archipelago but lies in the southern coast of the Zamboanga Peninsula. We became friends after he got assigned to the Claretian Seminary located within the Sanville Subdivision in Tandang Sora, Quezon City (as the seminary is just a stone’s throw away from our residence in K-Ville); after he escaped from a 49-day captivity by his Abu Sayyaf captors. It was through my friendship with Fr. Blanco that I eventually had the chance to journey to Europe and to accidentally concelebrate mass (which is narrated in another of my BLOGS in this site) at the Claretian’s Provincial General’s chapel located in the Parioli District in Rome. Up to and until now, Fr. Blanco has served as my principal spiritual adviser.]
Father Bernardo Toribio Blanco (“Fr. Blanco”) is a Spanish Claretian priest who was assigned to the Philippines in February 1977 after a raucous stint in Equatorial New Guinea (“Equatorial”). His sudden assignment to the Philippines was an aftermath to his unfortunate deportation mandated by the then President Francisco Macias Nguema of the Equatorial government. This was because Fr. Blanco was advocating the new trend towards liberation theology during those times and the Equatorial government resented this seeming intrusion into Equatorial politics.
Fr. Blanco was born in Ceadea de Aliste in Zamora, Spain on November 20, 1927 and at age 12, he entered the seminary in Segovia, Spain. After his ordination as a priest in May of 1953, the following year, Fr. Blanco was assigned to Equatorial New Guinea which regained its independence from Spain in 1968. Drastic political development came about in Equatorial after the grant of independence and religious repression became the order of the day.