Sr Bernadette Purcell, who is a full-time chaplain at the college where the young woman studied, said that Jastine Valdez was seeking to improve her prospects by studying accountancy and was a very diligent student and gentle person.

This is the second Filipino priest to be assassinated by gunmen in just over four months. Both were social justice advocates and defenders of the poor.

“I don’t know of any law in any civilized society that says a person deserves to die because he or she is ‘a drug suspect’.”

We need, in the words of Pope Francis, to strengthen the conviction that we are one single human family – Bishop John McAreavey.

"I want to thank you for the contribution so many Filipino people to our parish communities and in the care of the sick and the elderly."