| Embracing Suffering for Love's Sake: The Vocation Story of Sr. Therese, OCD |
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| Written by Judith Concepcion |
| Thursday, 01 July 2010 00:00 |
 The road she traversed was not smooth and straight. Sr. Therese’s journey to sisterhood was marked with doubts, obstacles, sufferings, and temptations. Though there have been setbacks, these did not deter her to finally heed the call of her Divine Lover, Jesus Christ. The saving grace of God and her deep love for Jesus enabled her to pass through the dark tunnel of her ordeals with flying colors. She considers her particular call to be “all about love: to love without feeling its sweetness while losing oneself in nothingness in complete surrender to the Truth (i.e., Jesus). Sr. Therese’s religious life is a story of self-denial, loving through suffering, and a total surrender to the will of God. The Call: A False Alarm? Sr. Therese’s early religious influence came from her parents who were both Cursillistas and devotees of Mama Mary. She was a daily mass-goer since she was a student; she sang in the choir and was very active in the parish. She was also a member of the Legion of Mary. She studied in Catholic schools from nursery until college. But never did it cross her mind to be a nun someday. “It just wasn’t my type,” she admitted. “I wanted to have a family with many children and take care of them.” Once, when she attended the Cursillo, she felt the desire to be a sister. It was here that she understood about the merciful love of God and because of that she wanted to repay God’s love by becoming a sister. “I didn’t know about calling or vocation,” she said. “What I knew was sisters didn’t marry because they belonged to Jesus alone. And that’s what I wanted to happen in my life.” She asked God for a sign if becoming a sister was really for her. When she dreamt of a lady dressed in white with a long white veil that reached the floor who was praying alone in the middle of the chapel altar, she took that as a sign from the Lord. “That’s me. I’ll be a sister,” she exclaimed. (Later she realized that the lady in her dream was Our Lady of Mediatrix of All Grace who appeared in Lipa Batangas in 1948. She was praying for her.) When she shared her dream with her parish priest, the priest just laughed and told her, “Mag-asawa ka na lang.” (You better marry instead.) She doubted her initial call thinking that it might just be an effect of the Cursillo. She asked again for a sign from God: to give her a job if she wasn’t meant for the religious life. She did get a job and forgot all about her calling. Hearing the Call Again In 1991, when Sr. Therese’s family transferred residence, she met Fr. Pedro, their community chapel’s chaplain and who later became her spiritual director. Fr. Pedro told her about his project – to build a 50-foot statue of Our Lady of Mediatrix of all Grace – which was revealed to him by Mama Mary in a dream. She got interested with the project and became the secretary of the foundation founded by Fr. Pedro. In 1994, Sr. Therese had a flourishing and lucrative career as an independent IT consultant of a multinational company where she had opportunities to travel abroad. But despite all the material comforts, she still felt deep emptiness. She always thought of Fr. Pedro’s project. She prayed to Mama Mary for the grace to leave all these behind if this was God’s will for her. She resigned, with peace in her heart, in May 1995. A week after, she received a fax message from her family in the Philippines: “PAPA HAS CANCER.” Looking back she admitted, “If I received that message before I resigned, I would not have left my job.” Sr. Therese helped Fr. Pedro with his project and he wanted her to be the co-foundress of the religious order he would establish. But Sr. Therese was not interested for her plan was to work again after the completion of the project. In November 1995, the 10-foot bust of Mama Mary was placed on top of the mountain of San Mateo, Rizal. This was when the call came back. In Search of the True Order Sr. Therese had no idea about religious orders – that there was a distinction between active and contemplative. In search for the right congregation for her, God sent her different people who became her link to the various religious orders. She also prayed to Mama Mary to lead her to the true order she wanted her to join. Through a friend, she was brought to Carmel (Order of Carmelite Discalced) and was able to talk to one of the nuns. She told her, “In Carmel, you will be alone with the Alone (i.e., God).” These words made a great impact on her as she felt the longing to be alone with the Alone. She pondered, “I will be alone with Jesus. It’s Jesus and me.” She discovered many things about the life in Carmel. Learning that there were many Carmelite saints like St. John of the Cross, St. Therese of the Child Jesus, etc., she told herself, “Where else should I go when this congregation has produced many saints already? This is the true order I’m looking for that will lead me to holiness as well. Reading ‘The Story of a Soul’ gave me an idea about the Carmelite life and this confirmed the kind of life I wanted to follow.” She learned that the Carmelites wear the habit of our Lady. With this knowledge and her devotion to Mama Mary, she said to herself, “I want to die wearing this habit.” This became her desire. She also got attracted with the congregation’s spirituality: hiddenness, solitude, silence that lead to a life of prayer. Obstacles to her Entrance into the Monastery Her entrance into the monastery was met with a lot of obstacles. Fr. Pedro discouraged her from entering the monastery for he wanted Sr. Therese to help him with his project and fulfill his dreams while another priest wanted her to audit the financial records of the school he founded. She declined both for she didn’t want to delay anymore her pursuit of her vocation. Another priest who assessed her before she entered Carmel also wanted to delay her entrance for one year. When she thought that everything was smooth sailing and she has already applied in one of the communities of Carmel, she had to postpone her entrance because she needed to take care of her dying father. On her father’s deathbed, her dad expressed that he wanted her to marry her ex-boyfriend. But she was firm with her decision to become a nun and was able to get her father’s blessing before he died. During her dad’s wake, her mom told the Foundress, “She is all yours now Mother.” Sr. Therese shared, “The Foundress was very touched with the courage of a mother to be able to say this when she was just left by her husband and now her daughter will be leaving her too.” Struggles Inside the Monastery Sr. Therese’s life inside the monastery involved a lot of adjustments – schedule, food, dialect, work, living in a big community, etc. But her greatest ordeal was coping with her different illnesses like syncopal (collapse) attacks, chronic migraine, chronic fissures that caused bleeding almost everyday, stress related diseases, etc. It affected her physically, emotionally, and psychologically, causing her humiliations, which made her life in the monastery difficult but her spirit continued to fight. Sr. Therese almost didn’t make it to her first profession. She experienced a crisis when she was a novice due to her deteriorating health, which also affected her appetite. In the monastery, they served paksiw na galunggong (fish cooked in vinegar) for a simple breakfast because of abstinence from meat. One day she was feeling weak as usual but she had to eat to be strong. Before she took a bite of the fish, she prayed to Jesus, “If you want me to persevere, help me to eat.” When she began eating, she noticed that the fish tasted like paksiw na lechon. “I was like dreaming but it really tasted like lechon,” she exclaimed. “I was able to eat a lot that morning.” For Sr. Therese, that experience was one of the saving graces she received from God because a month before her first profession, she collapsed and was hospitalized due to body weakness caused by hypoglycemia. Her novice mistress told her, “If this happened before the evaluation, you will not be accepted.” Despite her illnesses, she faithfully renewed her vows for three years and continued to do her duties inside the monastery. She had these tempting thoughts that maybe this cloistered life was not really for her. She said, “My mom, who knew of my illnesses, told me that maybe this is a sign from God that I should leave the monastery. But in all these, I didn’t give up for I had that strong desire to suffer for Jesus.” She confessed, “I complain many times to the Lord especially when it seems that my sufferings are beyond my strength. But I always end up surrendering to his love: ‘Lord if this is your will let it be done to me for the glory of the Father, for your beloved priests, and for the salvation of souls.’” Committed Till the End Sr. Therese made her solemn profession (final vows) in 2004. As a full-fledged nun, the only thing she desires so much is to do the will of God. “I understand His will is that I love,” she said. ”I really do not know anything anymore save to love. Then doing His will is no longer burdensome when done for love alone because it is compassion that moves me to serve my brethren and to pray for our Lady’s beloved priests.” And her heart’s desire is to suffer for love of Jesus… until her last breath. |
| Last Updated on Monday, 19 July 2010 11:37 |