My Vocation History

I was raised as an ordinary child who knows nothing about the church, who barely knows basic prayers, and barely knows about God. I remember my church life back then as a minimal one. Rarely going to church, and if my family visits our GKK it would be for Christmas party or Novena de Gallo. But I was raised to be a God-Fearing man, to be a good person worthy of respect. But one day, I had a dream. It was an image of the Divine Mercy really shining in my dreams, he radiated a white light and red one just as the old image of the Divine Mercy. Tears ran down my eyes that time while I slept, because in that dream, my father was with Jesus himself (meaning he’s going to die), just as I was in my dreams, one of my parents woke me up, asking why I cried and replied, “I saw in my dreams that father was taken by Jesus”.

Many years passed by and I was a grade 8 student and an academic achiever. Life seems to be going well, I can buy whatever I want and we ate great meals. But before I knew it, life gave me a great turning point. The father whom I loved, looked up, and cherished suddenly fell ill. At First, he only had ulcer and we did not take it seriously and expected that it is only mild and that it would just go away after a few months. Unfortunately, life did not agree with me. Days turned to weeks and weeks turned into months and before long he was once again diagnosed with chronic kidney decease, polyps and other complications. My whole world shattered before me. The Father that joined me with my adventures and even spar with me was now lying-in bed, depressed in the agony of an illness that strucked him down. My mother crying, and my little brother worried. I don’t know what to do. I realized that life was not infinite, it is finite, it has an ending and my father is facing the danger of that. The cause of all this was when the GSL in our GKK asked God to give them the first man (married by the church) to enter the “Kapilya” to be the new PSL, my father was the one who approached the doors first and so they asked him and he refused. The following days, his illness started showing up. My Father consulted the quack doctors, but he never felt better, but rather, worse. One day he saw a video of Fr. Darwin Gitgano and that is the start of his conversion, he started praying, and attending the church’s activities and even becoming a PSL. We started praying the Holy Rosary every night and when they knew about the deliverance handbook they bought it and started using it under some restrictions. So we started praying it and months later, one night during one of the session, my father twitched and looked like he was strangled by something, he shivered as the Holy and Exorcised oil and water was poured in his head and in his mouth. He sounded like crying but was laughing and shouting. During that time a voice in my head that told me what to do. It guided us on what to do, during that time, he said to me “Magpari ka.” We continued and my father did his best not to be overpowered by the demons. He tried to ask help from the Blessed Virgin Mary and from Jesus by saying their name but every time he tried, he ended up failing to say it clearly. His body was really hot that time and after an hour of consistent prayer, he was back to normal and the first words that come out from his mouth is that a voice said to him that will be a priest.

We felt a very strange feeling of joy after that session. It was the type that can’t be explained. Why father who had difficulty sleeping back then, had a good night’s sleep that night. Personally, I was really happy about it because I saw my father facing death two times. The first time was when he was sitting outside, shouting “Kuyang, Marlon tawaga inyong Mama kay naglisod kog hinga, basin diri rako taman. So, we ran as fast as we can towards my mother’s workplace and rushed back again. Fortunately, he survived just as the second one but this time I cried out to God that if my father lived, I will offer my life to God as a priest. And so, he lived. (Cutting the story short) I entered the search-in program after feeling that there is something missing, in me. After learning that the tuition is beyond my family’s financial capacity, I was introduced by my close friend (Jastin Herbosa) to the AHFI community and got myself a group of people with generous hearts who is willing to sponsor my fees. Up to this day my father still has his illness but is willing to suffer for the sake of Christ. And I was now a grade 12 seminarian with almost two years in formation. I also incidentally had a devotion to the Divine Mercy chaplet and prayed it every night. I had many struggles at the moment, but what I learned in my current life is that “Mourning will turn into dancing if you surrender it all to Christ. Let go and let God!” and that “God calls in a very special way, “God did not call the qualified, he qualifies whom him calls.” (Mervin John V. Tagalog, SLCD Immersionist)