Staying Satan Behind

AS FAR AS crime is concerned, I can never hold a candle to Fr. Donald Calloway’s record. The Episcopalian convert is quite open about his checkered past and the attribute endeared him to audiences of his earnest, if confounding, confession, this one included. Consider bad company, tattoo at a young age, drugs, girls and a Godless existence. From place to place where his military father took them. Until, alone in Japan, he came across one of his mother’s books about Mary’s apparition to the three Fatima children. Akin to Saul’s conversion in Damascus, although he didn’t have to go blind to regain sight, his myopia beheld for the first time the mother of God who told him that he didn’t have to change to love her. His awesome, inspiring story cannot be contained in a few paragraphs for he is better heard than read and youtube has him so I will spare the reader. If Mary was his epiphany, she has been my constant source of succor whether I’m at peace or in peril. Like Fr. Donald’s adamant affirmation, Mary is the only mountain I can move and she moves me; I can only be stilled by her silence.

While Fr. Donald didn’t fall into grace like I often did (his is undeniably the most unbelievable conversion I’ve come across), my faith was tested several times, the devil using the most effective weaponry to get my attention, friends usually and family to really up the ante. And because Satan knew God (although he just takes chances on our fallibility, which he also knows only too well), he scores when my heart is hard and my mood dark. Like that day when my eldest son thought I was disrespecting his mother and would not listen to my side. I withdrew my defenses, did not take back my opinion of his mother, and yielded to their decision that my asshole person had to leave their household. Decently, quietly, I packed some stuff and submitted myself to exile. Which brought as bell-clear the same word in “Hail Holy Queen.” And, as clearly, my serene behavior during our discussion, a revelation even to me. Mary’s attitude of silence never fails. I have adopted it ever since.

There was no worry on my part about parting with them (begging to stay was out of the question), moving in with welcoming friends (in spite of shame) and fending for my senior self (this dawned heavily one night, when I was refusing to yield to flu, and Ate Lyn brought provisions for my healing and well-being). Save for a solitary existence, my routine pretty much remained the same, halted only by illness. Which happened three months after my eviction. Bad news being what it is, news of my sickness circulated. Kind greetings and get-well messages from friends poured in. (A nasty bit about me having Covid drifted into the rumor mill which I immediately laughed off.) It reached my family who was appropriately moved and decided to take me back in.

I was brought back to our house on July 19. The process was hazy as I was still weak when they collected me. As soon as I was strong enough, I put my prayer paraphernalia together and seriously lifted up my thanksgiving to heaven. When I got stronger, I got out of BF Homes on August 31, National Heroes Day. There was no connection between my egress and the holiday. I needed a haircut and Kuya Gemer was on hand to fetch and bring me back. We missed each other at the designated meeting place because of my fluctuating fear that turned useless and unnecessary. The ego rearing its domineering head again. But my self would not be daunted. I checked again, meandered between Robinsons and taking a tricycle to BF Road, decided against either and on going back to the village. I saw him astride his bike, across BDO. It turned out he took a different route and didn’t have load so he never got my text messages and the interchanging meeting places I mentioned.

Between then and the present, I missed serving at Mass as a lector of San Jose ang Tagapagtanggol Parish but Ate Leony reassured me that dual citizens are accorded the courtesy of waiting out the crisis. I also miss my Totus Tuus Journeyers in Madriñan but my AMQAH family overwhelmed me with a red envelope containing what I surmised right was provision for my recuperating needs. Reassuring as ever, our national director, Fr. Fed Yumang, acknowldged my gratitude with the statement that we will remain family no matter what.

I knew exactly what he meant. On Mary’s birthday, Ate Marivic made true her word that we were going to reunite over dinner. She fetched Sis Veron in San Juan and both rued Ate Bubbles’ absence (her children would not let her risk a rather long outing). Ate Maricar joined us later. I was to receive the red grace the next day, specially delivered by UtoLiza along with her gift, a scented candle, for Myrna. Which paralleled the Contis ensaimada from Sis Veron the night before. Suddenly, I missed the fellowships in Madriñan that the pandemic abruptly brought to a halt. A septuagenarian can only do so much. So Mohammed is visited by the mountain. Amen.