Marcelino Antonio Malabanan Maralit Jr.
Marcelino Antonio Malabanan Maralit Jr., fondly called Bishop Junie, was born May 18, 1969, in Manila. He attended Canossa Academy from 1976 to 1979 and De La Salle Lipa from 1979 to 1981, entered St. Francis de Sales Minor Seminary in Lipa from 1981 to 1985, earned his degree in philosophy at St. Francis de Sales Major Seminary from 1985 to 1989, studied theology at the Universidad de Navarra in Pamplona from 1989 to 1994, and earned a licentiate in church history at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome from 1999 to 2003. His episcopal motto is Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum, 'May it be done to me according to your word' (Luke 1:38).
He was ordained a priest on March 13, 1995, in the Archdiocese of Lipa. As a priest of Lipa he served as parochial vicar of the Immaculate Conception Parish in Bauan from 1995 to 1996, professor at St. Francis de Sales Major Seminary in Marawoy from 1995 to 1999, assistant director of the Archdiocesan Commission on Vocation from 1996 to 1998, director from 1998 to 1999, vice-rector, professor, educator, and dean of studies at Saint Francis Theological Seminary from 2003 to 2009, rector from 2009 to 2013, parochial vicar of Sto. Niño in Marawoy from 2011 to 2013, parish priest of Invención de la Santa Cruz in Alitagtag from 2013 to 2014, and member of the Presbyteral Council of Lipa. He was known as the 'Obispong Siklista' (Cyclist Bishop) for pastoral visits on his mountain bike across Marinduque.
Pope Francis appointed him Bishop of Boac on December 31, 2014. He received episcopal ordination on March 13, 2015, at San Sebastian Cathedral in Lipa City, with Gaudencio Rosales as principal consecrator and Luis Antonio Tagle, Ramon Cabrera Argüelles, and Giuseppe Pinto as co-consecrators, on his twentieth sacerdotal anniversary, and was installed on March 17, 2015, as the fourth bishop of Boac, succeeding Reynaldo Evangelista, who had left Boac for Imus in April 2013. Pope Francis appointed him the fifth Bishop of San Pablo on September 21, 2024, on the feast of St. Matthew. He was installed on November 21, 2024, at the Cathedral Parish of St. Paul the First Hermit, by Cardinal Jose Advincula, with Mylo Vergara, the outgoing administrator, present, and more than 30 bishops including Rosales, Ryan Jimenez of Agaña, and Leo Drona. From the small island Diocese of Boac, with 14 parishes, 41 priests, and about 250,000 people, he now shepherds San Pablo, with 91 parishes, 140 diocesan priests, and about 4 million people.
No decree, permission, suppression, expansion, or transfer of the Traditional Latin Mass by Bishop Maralit, in Boac or in San Pablo, was found in the searches listed.
His public record in the window is the CBCP and FABC communication leadership and the relationship-centered installation message, not a liturgical act. A 2008 listing of a Saturday Low Mass at San Isidro Labrador Parish in Biñan, Laguna, in the Diocese of San Pablo, predates both Maralit and the TC window and is not his act.