Father Cesar Gualandi

Father Cesar Gualandi was ordained priest a
few years after his brother, Father Joseph. He also felt the needs of his brother to help the deaf and so he joined Father Joseph in establishing the mission. He was the first Superior General of the congregation. His love and willingness to share his talents and abilities with the deaf had made him a shining example to the community.

Mother Orsola Mezzini

The Founder, wanting to extend his work of education to the female deaf also thought of establishing, along with the already existing Congregation for men, a congregation for women.

On October 1874, the right moment came. A 20-year old girl, Orsola Mezzini, accom- panied by her father came to the newly opened school for the deaf along Via Nosadella in Bologna to recommend a deaf boy from her home town. Joseph and Cesar immedi- ately saw in her the providential woman for whom they had been asking in assiduous prayers and awaited with lively hope.
They spoke to her of their work. She was deeply moved and on November 16 of the same year, she returned to stay for good to become the mother and teacher of all the students.

THE FOUNDER

Father Joseph Gualandi

Fr. Joseph Gualandi was born in Bologna, Italy on 1826. As a young priest, he felt the call to spread the Gospel among infidels, but the providential circumstance that brought him to the first communion ceremony of a young deaf girl steered him into the world of the deaf. After his first encounter with the deaf, a great apostolic fervor to serve them was born in him which would later determine his whole life's career, involving the whole Gualandi family, particularly Cesar, who was one of his brothers and also a priest. Both of them together studied the problems connected with the instruction and education of the deaf, contacting institutes for the deaf which were already existing in Italy and in the neighboring countries. Esteemed by all as an exceptional educator, father of the deaf and sympathetic figure of a priest, Fr. Joseph died in 1907 in the mother house of the Mission in Bologna.

THE MISSION IN THE PHILIPPINES

(Cebu City-Las Piñas)

The Congregation arrived in the Philippines on October 1988. The first steps that the Mission took in that new social reality, aside from giving religious instruction in the schools and helping the indigent students, was to shoulder the salaries of teacher aides in the public schools to improve the quality of education of the deaf children.

Since then, the education of thechildren has improved a lot, thanks to the improved level of awareness of the people regarding the problem of deafness, to the cooperation of the Quota Club International, to the initiative of our Congregation in favor of the deaf, and to the support of the DECS administrators in meeting the needs of the deaf children in the SPED centers.

In Metro Cebu, like in Metro Manila now the families of deaf children can avail of the services of an early intervention program for children from birth to six years old and of elementary, high school, and college education for the older students. The hearing impaired students enrolled in these schools number more than 450.

The communities of the Congregation of the Mission for the Deaf, in Las Piñas as well as in Cebu City, for their part in the education of the deaf, are presently giving scholarship grants to about 360 indigent students.

The commitment of the Mission, however, is not limited only to Las Piñas or Metro Cebu. Throughout its ten-year stay in the Philippines, it has extended help also to other schools in the Luzon,Visayas and Mindanao. The scholarship program is reaching Metro Manila, Naga City, Iloilo City, Leganes (Panay Island) Bacolod City, Silay City, Kabankalan City, Murcia and Escalante (Negros Occidental). Dumaguete City, Siaton and Baiawan (Negros Oriental). Tagbilaran City (Bohol), Surigao City, Sison, Davao City and Ozamis City (Mindanao). San Francisco (Camotes Islands).

The Congregation was instrumental in establishing a high school in Iloilo City, a dormitory for students in Tagbilaran City and in Davao City and a social center in Dumaguete City.

The Gualandi Social Center has become the venue for the activities of the deaf community. Every Sunday morning in Cebu and every second Sunday of the month in Las Piñas, the Mass is celebrated in sign language, 100 individuals or more participate. Free lunch is offered afterwards.

The afternoon is spent in games, socialization, and other activities which normally end at 5 p.m. Recently, to remedy the problem of unemployment among deaf people, the Congregation of the Mission for the Deaf helped establish the Gualandi Multi-purpose Cooperative, run and managed by the deaf themselves, housing them in the new building adjacent to the Mission premises.

Since its arrival in the Philippines in October 1988, the Gualandians have worked to extend their apostolate to a large number of hearing impaired Filipinos. Through their initiative and effort, the Gualandi Social Centers for Hearing Impaired People were established in Las Piñas, Manila and Cebu City to improve the personal, social, and religious condition of the lives of deaf people in the area.