While waiting for Vicky and Monique to finish with their passport renewal, I spent some time at the Chapel of the Eucharistic Lord which is located at the 5th floor of the SM Mega Mall. It was a good place to power down and place myself in the presence of the Almighty. Very comfortable and spacious. The chapel was not placed there as an afterthought--it was designed to be a chapel as the mall was conceptualized. I felt relaxed and stress-free.
I am truly amazed at how organized religion has adapted itself to the rising demands of city living, and how in fact, it has woven itself into the every day life of Filipinos. What could have been be viewed by critics as crass commercialism some thirty years back, is now de rigueur for mall operators; you can find chapels set up in a lot of malls nationwide. There is no dichotomy of opinion--both the clergy and laity embrace the set-up with open arms. If you examine the historical origins, you can see that concept is based on the triumvirate of the Filipino town plaza--the town hall, the church and the market. This blend started off with the Ayala developments (Makati, for example had the Greenbelt church as the centerpiece of convergence). The blend carried on with the SM Malls--it is a well known fact that the patriarch of SM, Henry Sy, is a deeply religious man (he was usually seen in Baclaran every Wednesday), and that the SM Mall of Asia was seeded with the construction of the Archdiocesian Shrine of Jesus.
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