My Blog

January 8, 2009, exactly two months ago, could have been the saddest day of my life – the day my Tatay died and I became an orphan, the only one left in our family, in our lineage, with no brother or sister, niece or nephew of my own – that is – as far as I know. My Nanay has gone home to our Eternal Father six years ahead of Tatay.

Yes, I feel sad but not devastated, thanks to the many people who came forward to show love and concern. But the deeper reason I believe is God in His subtle but once in awhile very palpable ways allowed me to experience that I, too, is his beloved. I am loved. That I am destined for a bigger family and I belong to a much wider family, our faith community. That for the past 23 years I am a priest, I tried and continue to learn what it means to be totally given to God, for God, to be of God!

And God has always been faithful to His promise. The hundredfold, the providence He promised in the Gospel abounds. Yes, it could have been the saddest day but it was not... Thanks be to God! I was backed up by years of experience of what a wonderful Father we have in heaven. He has given me a lot of memories of Him touching my life, seeing His hand “writing straight with my crooked lines,” of telling me too in many and varied ways, “You are my beloved in whom I am well pleased!”

After reminding us last week that like Jesus we shall be tempted but like Him we too shall overcome, the second Sunday of Lent invites us to review and savor our Tabor experiences to constantly prepare us to meet, embrace and carry our cross along the way, to enable us to go through our own agony in the garden and eventually face our Calvary – the day we hope we can with finality express to God with our last breath that we are indeed TOTALLY GIVEN to Him, only for Him, only of Him. Siya gid lang ang Tag-iya naton kag dapat magpanag-iya sa aton. But the paradox is because we are totally given to Him, we feel connected to everyone and everything. That is why St. Francis would say, “Brother Sun, Sister Moon.” This profound and personal experience is our true source for reaching out to others – pagpakig-angot sa iban – to build community, OUR community, for we are not destined to be alone. We are never alone. Our relationship with God leads us to be in relationship with others.

Sometime ago, a religious sister sent me a letter after trying perhaps several times to see me in person but each time I was out either for confirmation, a meeting, a fiesta mass or simply visiting. I laughed and was challenged when I read her first lines where she said she now realized that it is easier to talk to God and tell Him our concerns than to come and see the bishop! She’s right because I do not know yet how to bilocate or to be omnipresent. Kidding aside, one of my striking realizations after few weeks I am a bishop is my poverty of time. I want to be available to everyone and yet I have to struggle to maintain balance and order in my life to live longer and maintain my sanity, more so to grow in sanctity! It’s tough but this week let us draw strength and wisdom from some of our “mountaintop” experiences.

I wish to end with the beautiful words of Jean Baptiste Henri Lacordaire, OP describing the life of a priest: “To live in the midst of the world without wishing its pleasures; to be a member of each family, yet belonging to none; to share all sufferings; to penetrate all secrets; to heal all wounds; to go from men to God and offer Him their prayers; to return from God to men to bring pardon and hope; to have a heart of fire for charity and a heart of bronze for chastity; to teach and to pardon; console and bless always. My God, what a life! And it is yours, O Priest of Jesus Christ!” So be it....