Waking up to birds chirping early in the morning and very temperate weather where we don’t need umbrellas and just our vigorous legs to visit basilicas is a huge gift.
Why – folks ages 45 yo to 88yo pilgrims are actively breathing, ready to take on the day’s journey, and seeing all immersing with respect to the local Mexican culture, is another gift – the gift of seeing fully the local folks’ loving and responsive treatment of 38 pilgrims of diverse backgrounds: Chinese, Filipinos, Latinos, Polish, Caucasians, whose ethnicities are different from local Mexicans: food, mariachis, dances, mole, carnitas tacos and memey ice cream served on the shell of sweet potato shell, orange ice cream served on half orange peels and coconut ice cream on brown coconut shells.
In turn, American-based pilgrims seem to see fully the locals’ expressive art, the deluge of fresh flower offerings in the churches that we all visited, some located in less than rich neighborhoods, their inspiring depth of faith is a gift of improving our relations as human beings to one another.
It was the reverence and the expressive love of Indians, Mexicans and early Spaniards: Franciscans, Augustinians and Dominicans who were in Mexico and built these churches for the neighborhoods, as well as for the nuns. Some of these churches are now used for educating students.
Ricardo Gomez, our tour guide, informed us that Our Lady of Guadalupe has been responsible for 5,000,000 Indians and Mexicans were converted to the Catholic faith.
We progressed from seeing the simple Indian chapel where apparitions happened to miraculous healings of communities suffering from cholera through the well water, to magnificent gilded churches, ornate ceilings, sculpted saints, and angels numbering the total beads of the rosary, including wall-sized, signed original paintings inside the priests’ room and the Blessed Virgin Mary’s dressing room, when she is taken to be dressed for a procession.
Might our desire to deepen our faith, express our gratitude, say our remembrance and healing prayers be emerging from feeling the weight of grief from serialized deaths, back to back as if mucked up waters of the river, clogged by trauma, when we experienced 6,600,000 deaths from #CoronaVirus in the last three years, worldwide?
Contrast that to how we feel now, the jolt of positive and sacred divine energies as we listen to more healing stories of miracles in this pilgrimage, where we are pilgrims on a spiritual retreat headed by Spiritual Director, Fr. Joel Bugas.
This pilgrimage is well planned given the progression of sacred experiences to reach a summit or was that a result of our collective prayers for this pilgrimage to be animated by the Holy Spirit, for our prayers to be answered through the intercession of Our Lady of Guadalupe to the communion of saints and angels with the townsfolk? Faith was definitely at the center of these folks in Mexico during the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries.
As one reflects by sharing the spiritual journey and revelations from three days, we are grateful for the depth of spirituality, another gift of grace we are feeling.
Celina shared that yesterday was her brother’s death anniversary, whose name was Abel. She also felt her dad, one who was such a man of love to his family, accompanying her. His name was Domingo and lived a life of simplicity. What a gift it must have felt for her as she passed by many images of Santo Domingo. He got a rosary from the Blessed Virgin Mary, a gift from her.
If I am to be honest, I too was so moved, felt so overwhelmed and cried tears as I prayed, realizing my privilege being here. I texted the images from the churches we visited and lighted candles from once-estranged sisters, one with cancer, and they all texted back with loving messages. What a gift of generosity!
We even had synchronized masses attended for that day, they attended mass in Southern California, while I attended mass in Puebla, Mexico. Rachel saw a dove linger, while I saw birds hovering by the facade of the Church being renovated. Serendipity perhaps?
Fr. Joel Bugas’ homily was exceptional inside Nuestra Senora Basilica de Ocotlan.
He defined for us, our collective mission, as prophets to convey the message of the Lord, a message of love.
“God created the world out of love. Amongst us, around us, to know that He loves us now and forever. We can’t deny his love for us, He gives to us, daily, to show His love to us. But, we keep asking. We fail to follow commandments. How many, he asked? It took a while to say 10.
The Jewish people have 613 laws, what to dress, how to speak to a man, a woman, what to eat. It is so strict to follow. When Jesus came, He talked about love, forgiveness and kindness.
They didn’t have GPS then, but they looked at the skies and winds to guide them, the same understanding to follow God’s love.
Purification of the soul takes effort, takes conversion, takes education. Embrace gratitude to God, pinch my face, [I am ] able to see, able to think of our loved ones despite being away from us.
Pilgrimage – offer our sacrifices, offer what we do, whenever we enter the Holy Ground. God never left us. God is ever present now and forever and sent many prophets for us. As we progress in life, we are invited to prepare, ask intercession of Our Lady of Guadalupe, even the presence of angels that the love of God never ends.
There’s a lot [given to us], there’s a lot of chances: have faith, confidence, and trust in God, let Him take care of the needs of the world and never abandon prayers, even if you just bring one more soul to heaven, faith of our family members to never be removed from God.”
When you hear that exceptional homily, followed by visits to several sacred grounds, one of which was described by Yucatan Times as: “”The Chapel of the Rosary, housed in the Temple of Santo Domingo, in the city of Puebla, is undoubtedly one of the masterpieces of the New Spanish Baroque in Mexico. Built around 1690, this architectural jewel was considered in its time as the “eighth wonder of the world”.
Its interior, to the left transept of the complex, has a Latin cross, although with very short arms. The three theological virtues can be admired in the vault, framed by thick foliage; and in the dome, Grace can be seen, accompanied by the gifts of the Holy Spirit and a group of 16 Dominican saints.
In the upper part of the chapel walls there are six large canvases by the painter José Rodríguez Carnero, with themes alluding to the “Gozos de la Virgen”, while in the lower part of the walls there is a beautiful “lambrin” or panel of talavera type tiles. In the transept there are other paintings with themes also related to the life of the Virgin, as well as another one of great size that crowns the apse of the chapel and that is dedicated to the Glorification and Triumph of the Rosary.
The golden charm that surrounds the visitor in this place earned the space the title of “reliquary of America” by Pope John Paul II, who, during his first visit to national territory in 1979, had the opportunity to admire it and fall in love with its beauty.”
Question at the table? Why is it that we didn’t know about this 8th wonder of the world? Or that craftsmen of Indian and Mexican descent were super-skilled, patient, and gifted artisans who built sustainable structures, sacred basilicas of worship, sometimes understated as chapels or churches, when they are actually magnificent basilica works of sacred arts, lasting several centuries now.
How far will we now extend and share what we all saw and how we feel about the healing miracles of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Our Lady of Ocotlan, and Beato de San Sebastian? Whose soul will we take up to heaven, with us?-@Prosy Delacruz #Pilgrimages
In the presence of a miracle, faith is never washed away
Scott Pelley, 60 Minutes – reported from Lalibela, Ethiopia.
Two hundred thousand pilgrims visit Lalibela for an 11 church-pilgrimage in the northern highlands of Ethiopia around Christmas, celebrated during the first week of January. These churches were built from a single rock, and many believe that angels built them, carved in precision and in darkness while inside a big stone. They tunneled in the darkness that enables pilgrim/believers to worship today in the light, prayers, and music.
Angels also preceded the onset of a century-old pilgrimage to Fatima, a city in the municipality of Ourém in Portugal, named for a 12th-century Moorish princess. Portugal, for me, has been in the back of my mind, not the top of my mind.
Why? Ferdinand Magellan was killed by Lapu Lapu for colonizing the Philippines. Being born into the colonized country left me with a subdued feeling of bias towards Lapu Lapu and a feeling of somewhat angst of being in Portugal.
Yet, as a naturalized American citizen who has resided in the U.S. for close to half a century, my visit to Portugal made me begin to examine these lingering thoughts. Should they be replaced? Can we truly understand the people of Portugal and why Magellan carved a new route to explore the world?
Can we be guided by the stories of the Angels and the Apparitions of the Queen of Peace, which seem to have so much relevance today as we read about the launched missiles on U.S. bases recently by Iran and how U.S. guided drones led to the death of Iran’s second high ranking military official? Are we on the cusp of another world war or should we factor in our beliefs about Our Blessed Virgin Mary, also known as the Queen of Portugal and the Queen of Peace?
Upon visiting this holy site, we learned that the Angel of Peace and the Angel of Portugal preceded the century-strong pilgrimages to Fatima, Portugal, following the apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary in 1917.
Our Lady of Fatima and to believe beyond what we see
These three shepherds were Lucia dos Santos (born 1907), Francisco Marto (born 1908) and Jacinta Marto (born 1910) and lived in this town of Portugal whose communities were into agriculture and sheep herding.
They sought refuge from the rains, as they tended to their family’s flock of sheep. They were cousins who reveled in each other’s company, “illiterate and sent to work at a young age, saw almost no one else between morning and evening. The terrain consisted of a high valley interspersed with olive groves, oaks, holm oaks, and pines, leading up some hills. The sheep would graze on parcels of land the families owned, while the little shepherds played games, prayed the rosary, and girls danced while Francisco played his flute, or they sang popular songs,” Andrew Housely wrote in “A Pilgrim’s Guide to Fatima” (2017).
They were ages 7, 9 and 12, yet the mother of Francisco and Jacinta could not protect them from the community’s detractors to the point that she encouraged them to retract and reject what they saw to stop the shunning. But, these young shepherds persisted. Their pure hearts could be relied on.
Our Lady of Fatima reportedly visited them six times. The seventh would be at noon on October 13, 1917, gathered around the chief priest and witnessed by 70,000 folks. All had their umbrellas, seeking cover from the rain. The three shepherds arrived at 11:30 a.m., with Lucia and Jacinta donning a crown of flowers. Lucia ordered those gathered to close their umbrellas and all promptly obeyed.
From once gray clouds, the sun came out, without the cover of the clouds, and 70,000 witnessed the sun to have spun around, like a ring of fireworks. Today, it is described by the living descendants of pioneers who witnessed this miracle of the dancing sun and personally share what their great grandparents saw at orientation meetings attended by travel guides in Fatima.
From 1916 to 1918, children of Portugal were dying from flu or pneumonia and even after a stay in the hospital, Jacinta came home with an open wound, and later, her early death. Science then had not found adequate cures for these common respiratory illnesses that 75% of the population perished, as shown by a chart documenting the population’s health conditions during that time, as well as headlines of newspapers of that period, when the shepherds stayed with the Ourem Administrator in his house, between August 13 to 15, 1917. Folks then resorted to their faith more. Unlike today that most of these serious ailments are cured by hospital stays, respirator assist and antibiotics.
Now, we find faith and science converging. Although they are on parallel paths, as one philosopher notes, they seem to converge to the Source, the “theory of everything.” Even the world’s genius physicist Stephen Hawking considered the Big Bang Theory as accounting for the gravitational forces in this one big Universe. Could this Big Bang be also the Higher One up above?
Monument to the navigators and Portugal’s globalization identity as pioneers
Neither did I expect to appreciate the Portuguese navigators, e.g. Ferdinand Magellan, who circumnavigated the world in search of new lands, spices and new routes. Magellan was a fallen Portuguese as far as the Filipinos were concerned, having read from history books that Lapu Lapu killed him in 1521 in Cebu.
I failed to appreciate the bravery and courage shown by Magellan to reach this island, as much as the bravery of Filipinos who fought against these colonizers.
In contrast, the cold dreary winds and the gray skies heightened my appreciation for the sun-dappled Monument to the Discoveries, also known as the Monument to the Navigators of the golden 15th and 16th centuries, when Portugal commanded the world’s colonies that controlled half, while Spain controlled another half.
Thirty-three heroes are memorialized here, led by Infante d. Henriques, also known as Henry the Navigator, on the edge of the replica of a caravel, the small maneuverable sailing ship developed in Portugal to explore the West African Coast into the Atlantic Ocean.
At the height of Portugal’s empire building, the monument included a priest, a poet Luis Vaz de Camoes, Vasco da Gama as well as other navigators, painters, mathematicians, cartographers, and kings, such that the “Portuguese were the first fearless men that crossed the Cape of Good Hope, and of course, the recognized first navigators of the world,” the website A View on Cities cited.
This is where globalization started, our tour guide Manuela Diaz astutely shared her insight. From a map of the world, we traced by our footsteps Portugal’s colonies, which included Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea, India, Macau, Malacca, Morocco, Mozambique, Timor, Uruguay, and West Africa, and acknowledged the unfortunate enslavement of Africans during this period.
It opened my eyes that Portugal’s identity as a country is so much linked to its past, including what they regarded as their golden 15th and 16th centuries, the earthquake of the 17th century and the rebuilding after.
Recall the Carnation Revolution that was started by a military coup on April 25, 1974, against the authoritarian Estado Novo regime? A shrine to that effort is the 25th of April Bridge in Lisbon, a suspension bridge that spans the Tagus River (near the Monument to the Navigators) and is a spitting image of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco.
Would you have persisted in your beliefs as a miracle witness?
Each time I sought answers as to why I was drawn to the Fatima Square, the more details I knew about the three shepherds and how they were prepared by the Angel of Peace on how to pray, “Pray thus. The Hearts of Jesus and Mary are attentive to the voice of your supplications,” it remained a mystery.
“Because God is a mystery, two crucial principles of theological aesthetics can be articulated. First, God’s incomprehensibility belongs to God alone. Second, such incomprehensibility does not cease with the vision of God. Someone becomes known in mystery even as mystery makes us realize how little we know. Similarly, the beautiful allows Beauty to be felt even as Beauty itself slips, in the end, past the grasp of our affection,” Alejandro Garcia-Rivera wrote in his book, “The Community of the Beautiful.”
Yet, the unknowable mystery is replaced by the awe of God’s infinite wisdom in sending the angels and the Blessed Mother to convey the messages to these three shepherds.
First, the visions of hell, the sea of fire underneath the earth where demons and souls in human forms were floating in burning flames, with clouds of smoke with the appearance of the Our Lady of Fatima, “otherwise I think we would have died of fear and terror,” Lucia wrote in her memoirs.
The second secret was “The war is going to end. When you see a night illumined by an unknown light, know that this is a great sign given you by God that He is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and the persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father. To prevent this, I shall come to ask for the Consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of Reparation on the First Saturdays.”
Recall the First Friday devotions reported by St. Mary Margaret Alacoque in the 17th century whose remains and relics we also visited in September’s Marian Pilgrimage in 2019?
For a long time, the third message of Our Lady of Fatima was kept a secret as requested by the Virgin of Fatima from Lucia, who had senses of hearing, seeing and talking with the Virgin of Fatima and whom the Virgin requested to go to school to learn how to read and write. Francisco could only see the Virgin of Fatima while Jacinta could see and hear the Virgin but could not talk directly with her, as Lucia did.
The third secret was given to Lucia on July 13, 1917, by Our Lady of Fatima and was disclosed in three phases. When Lucia got sick, she was ordered by Bishop of Leiria in 1943 to write down this third secret, which was in a sealed envelope and given to the Bishop for safekeeping. In 1957, the Vatican ordered all of Lucia’s writings be transferred there. Pope John XXIII read the contents possibly with his confessor and the contents were resealed again. It was not until the bloody assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II at St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican on May 13, 1981 that the Pope on March 25, 1984, consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
The third secret was about “Our Lady and little above her was an angel with a flaming sword in his left hand, flashing, giving out flames, that died out when in contact with the splendor that Our Lady radiated towards him from her right hand. The Angel cried out: Penance, Penance, Penance. We saw the immense light that is God…a Bishop dressed in white (we had the impression it was the Holy Father). Other bishops, priests, men, and women were going up a steep mountain, at the top of which there was a big Cross of rough-hewn trunks as of a cork tree with the bark before reaching there the Holy Father passed through a big city half in ruins and half trembling with halting step, afflicted with pain and sorrow, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he met on his way; having reached the top of the mountain, on his knees at the foot of the Big Cross, he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and arrows at him, and in the same way there died one after another the Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious, and various lay people of different ranks and positions. Beneath the two arms of the Cross, there were two Angeles each with a crystal aspersorium in his hand, in which they gathered up the blood of the Martyrs and with it sprinkled the souls that were making their way to God,” A Pilgrim’s Guide to Fatima noted.
Pope Francis’ 2017 visit confirmed that the third secret and blood came from Pope John Paul II’s assassination.
As gratitude for being saved by Our Lady of Fatima, Pope John Paul II donated the papal ring that he received as a gift at the start of his papacy in 1978, as well as the assassin’s bullet retrieved from his operation. The bullet fits exactly at the center of the crown placed on the statue of Our Lady of Fatima, crowned as Queen of Portugal and as Queen of Peace and the world.
Seeing the papal ring made me recall a bucket list wish of mine: to see Pope Francis in person inside the White House during Pres. Obama’s tenure. Here I was, September 23, 2015, in Washington D.C., along with 500 media representatives from around the world, covering the Papal visit for the Asian Journal’s readers. It was a wish that I thought was impossible, yet by God’s miracle, I was praying the rosary at 3:15 a.m., finding my way to the White House, closed off by barricades.
I am now realizing as devotees of the Virgin Mary in a Catholic elementary school, that I was actually there in Fatima, where before it was just a pipe dream, as my limited faith could not visualize it. Pinching myself several times, as I sat amongst thousands of pilgrims in Fatima, who spoke in many languages: Portuguese, Tagalog, English, Korean, Taiwanese, Spanish, Dutch, Italian, French, Japanese, Ethiopian. I realize that my elementary school dream came true not just once, but twice.
For the Nov. 2019 pilgrimage, Manuela Diaz was our travel guide, courtesy of a well-curated trip by the Association of Commerce, Industry, and Services of Ourem (ACISO)’s Isabel Machado. This trip was exceptional in blending what Smithsonian Journeys often describe their trips as: “unique blend of enriching insights, exceptional quality, intellectual camaraderie and personal attention,” a four-pillar feature of well-curated pilgrimage with not a failed moment to speak of.
The first time I got to Fatima was in Sept. 2019 when a holy priest, Fr. Joel O. Bugas, led it. I regard him as holy as he kept the focus on our spirituality, paying attention to the Holy Spirit, and led us to a renewal of committing our lives to God and by his actions, promoted group’s reverence to God, Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, Saint Joseph, the angels, the Saints, the Holy Father, his fellow priests, including a pleasant surprise of a mass concelebrating with Cardinal Gerald Cyprien Lacroix. It was during a 14-day pilgrimage that allowed us to go to medieval churches, see the French countryside, visit fourteen saints, go from the south to north, from Portugal to Spain to France, ending in Paris.
The allure of the Eiffel Tower in Paris was the clinching factor for me to join this multi-city pilgrimage only to realize later it was actually the spiritual magnetism of having a personal relationship with Our Lady of Fatima, Our Lady of Lourdes in France and a visit to St. Therese of Lisieux on her feast day, which gave me these unforgettable experiences.
With no nap, I had limited energy, yet the sight of at least 5,000 pilgrims, and lighted candles carried by folks of various ethnicities, inside the Chapel of Apparitions in Fatima, we became part of the twenty million pilgrims who come here from around the world to form a million-strong pilgrimage church each year. They come here from May to October, except August, each year.
On May 13, 2017, Pope Francis was welcomed by millions who witnessed his announcement that Jacinta and Francisco are now canonized saints, as the Vatican has verified the miracles, and healing has been stable for over a decade, traceable to the shepherds’ prayers.
Could the persistent strong rains be a convergence of grace from Above, sprinkling us all wet as we prayed, just as Our Lady of Fatima had asked of the three shepherds, over a hundred years ago, in 1917? It was raining then, yet, each time, it would clear up, much like how we were submerged in the healing waters of Lourdes, and as soon as we got outside of the tub of these waters, we were dry without using a towel and a resurgence of lightness, an uplifted sense of well being, without weariness, aches or pains.
How can that simple request of Our Lady of Fatima gain a following of a pilgrimage church, visited by 20 million tourists each year?
When I held the hand of Sister Lucia’s niece, Maria dos Ajos, now 98 years old, during both Sept and Nov. 2019 pilgrimages, I was seeking clarity about what my senses were picking up. My senses were in hyper mode alertness: looking, observing, watching, listening, and of course, praying.
But I could not gain clarity singularly from my mind, a human mind capable of recognizing symbols, metaphors, and even make abstractions. I had to resort to my heart, opening it more to recognize that what I was feeling was true, quite humbled in witnessing grace from God.
The question to you, my dear readers, would your heart and mind’s interior world, as it is now, be ready to accept a miracle or series of miracles that befall on you?
What did I see: the rosary in Maria’s hands, her wrinkled face, yet with broad smiles, the picture of the three shepherds taken after the first apparition of Our Lady of Fatima, near a large holm-oak tree. This is where, Sister Lucia described in her own words, “we beheld a Lady all dressed in white. She was more brilliant than the sun, and radiated a light more clear and intense than a crystal glass filled with sparkling water, when the rays of the burning sunshine through it. I too sensed a fragrance coming from a bouquet of flowers, the warmth of her heart and the lightness of her energy.
In Lucia’s words, she described her own witnessed miracle:
“Our Lady spoke to us: “Do not be afraid. I will do you no harm.”
“Where are you from?”
“I am from Heaven.”
“What do you want of me?”
“I have come to ask you to come here for six months in succession, on the 13th day, at this same hour. Later on, I will tell you who I am and what I want. Afterward, I will return here yet a seventh time.”
It reminded me of “what the artist and photographer Carrie Mae Weems said about the power of images and the art of looking: It’s in that looking that you discover the multiplicity of a simple thing and the depth of a certain thing. And not only of a certain thing, but your relationship to that thing, and your relationship therefore with yourself is deepened,” I once learned from hearing Jason Parham relate about a fellow artist in 2018.
When you replace that thing with God, and your relationship with God deepens, your relationship with yourself also deepens. That is perhaps beyond the metaphor of sight, delving into the metaphor of mystery, and perhaps even believing beyond what you see with your naked eyes. It is also with renewed beliefs that prior miracles and new miracles unfold before our very eyes.
After all, shedding bias is also a miracle of the mind, when I shed my bias towards Lapu Lapu and made an effort to understand Magellan who came from Portugal and even appreciate that his courage led to us being connected as nations in this world.
It is like listening to Fado music, a genre of melancholic music developed by Portuguese in the 1980s, that contains the sentiment of nostalgia, longing, and aspiration. Might that be a spiritual hunger, to be closer to God, a feeling of ‘saudade’ by millions who aspire to be united with Our Lady of Fatima, her son, Jesus Christ, the most powerful Holy Spirit and God Himself?
Each thing becomes a window onto a whole new world, an inner world, composed of the light of Heaven within everything.
A Course in Miracles
I joined two pilgrimages this year, both of which took me to Fatima, Portugal. On Sept. 22, 2019, I got to Fatima Square, an hour before rosary began at 9:30 p.m. inside the Chapel of Apparitions, and a procession after. I would come back five more times in two days, as if drawn to it by a magnet, and three other times on Nov. 10, 2019. It has been a tiring 20 hours of travel from the USA, one way.
We had barely slept. Yet, the lure of thousands with lit candles praying the rosary together was too inviting, despite the blustery night and the cold rains. The warmth of a united humanity, speaking multiple languages kept us all cozy and secure. It was even inspiring to see a Franciscan priest in front of my pew, who brought his stool, only to sacrifice and offered it to another pilgrim. I wondered if that is what life’s purpose is – offer your gifts and graces for others’ welfare?
Fr. Joel O. Bugas, our spiritual director, had confided his wish to pray part of the rosary and wondered aloud if he might get it. Christina Vives, a much sought-after seasoned travel guide of 50 years, persuaded the chapel staff to include him.
We were a 25-member pilgrimage that flew in from New Mexico, Denver, Maryland, Philadelphia, California, Florida, Idaho, and Texas. He encouraged us to pray for each other’s good health, 12 prayers, 12 days of intentions, and to ask for the Holy Spirit to guide our experiences. We were seated on wooden benches inside the Chapel of the Apparitions. The chapel has walls on three sides, and in the altar, the encased statue of Our Lady of Fatima. Now awake, we held our lighted candles and prayed the rosary in several languages.
After, a replica of Our Lady of Fatima statue was taken out for the procession, which started with a 10-foot lighted cross leading us to walk past the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary, past the Divine Mercy Statue, past the fountains where blessed holy waters flow, and then back to the Chapel of the Apparitions. It made for an uplifting feeling, recalling that we just prayed for those needing conversion around the world.
Enjoy every minute of this blessing, as even the mother of Jacinta and Francisco were not keen on believing
Fr. Bugas
He was referring to 7-year-old Jacinta, her 9-year-old brother Francisco and their 10-year-old cousin Lucia, who saw the Angel of Peace in 1916 three times, preparing them to spread Our Lady’s message, the Good News of the Gospel. Six months later, Our Lady of Fátima made six apparitions. She also requested Lucia to go to school; the young girl learned fast, enabling her to write her memoirs about Fatima.
Another grace came from meeting Lucia’s niece, Maria dos Anjos, 99 years old, whom I gave the “mano po,” a form of Filipino respectful greeting of taking her hand to my forehead, first on Sept. 22, 2019, and a second time on Nov. 10, 2019. When I took her hand — she had a rosary in another — I could smell the fragrance, hinting at a bouquet of flowers. She gave me a nose to nose greeting in response. I handed her a small token of my appreciation.
The next day, Sept. 23, a nun docent of the museum exhibition, Fatima Light and Peace, told us that we do not choose to go to Fatima. Instead, the Virgin of Fatima chooses us.
True enough, months later, Fr. Bugas celebrated two masses in his parish church on Nov. 30 and Dec. 1, 2019, as an associate priest of Santa Maria de la Real Church in Santa Fe, New Mexico with the traveling statue of Our Lady of Fatima. The statue is described as “a traveling symbol of miracles that occurred in 1917 when the Virgin Mary appeared to three children to impart what is known as the Peace Plan from Heaven,” according to the Knights of Columbus Santa Fe Council 10517’s Facebook post on Dec. 1, 2019.
Our Lady of Fatima chooses us, just like my co-pilgrim who visited the Light and Peace exhibition on her special day. The Sri-Lankan nun docent gave her a necklace of hearts. In unison, our tears flowed as the nun warmly welcomed us with an open heart and a loving prayer to love even more. She showed us the rosary of diamonds given by Philippines’ First Lady Imelda Marcos on Sept. 19, 1970. Knowing Imelda Marcos’ affinity for numerology, was it a coincidence that she gave the rosary two days and two years before martial law was declared on Sept. 21, 1972? Or did it just arrive on that date? It was a sparkling gift, but was it sparkling enough?
Fatima’s 8,000 residents welcome millions of pilgrims each year with open hearts and thoughtful giving of services.
The story of Our Lady’s apparitions
Whenever we look to Mary, we long to believe in the revolutionary nature of love and tenderness.
Pope Francis, May 13, 2017
The Angel of Peace appeared once in spring, summer and again in autumn of 1916. Recall that in 1916, there was chaos, violence, and it was Europe’s darkest moments of atheism, hatred, the rise of fascism and a year after, the Bolshevik Revolution broke out in Russia.
Lucia described seeing the Angel of Peace, “It was whiter than snow, transparent as crystal when the sun shines through it and of great beauty. He drew closer and said, ‘Do not be afraid! I am the Angel of Peace. Pray with me. My God, I believe, I adore, I hope and I love You. I ask pardon of You for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not hope and do not love You. Then, rising, he said, ‘Pray thus. The Hearts of Jesus and Mary are attentive to the voice of your supplications.” (Source: “Fatima in Lucia’s Own Words,” 22nd edition October 2018).
For the first apparition, “He was holding a chalice in his left hand, with a Host suspended above it, from which some drops of blood fell into the chalice. Leaving the chalice and host suspended in the air, the Angel prostrated beside the little shepherds and gave the Host to Lucia and the contents of the chalice to Francisco and Jacinta, saying ‘Take and drink the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men. Make reparation for their crimes and console your God,” Lucia wrote in her own words.
Six months later, the heavens opened up again and Our Lady of Fatima appeared on the 13th of May, 13th of June, 13th of July, 19th of August, 13th of September and 13th of October in 1917, six apparitions in all.
On the first apparition, they were asked by Our Lady to come successively for six months on the 13th day at this same hour. She asked them if they were willing to make sacrifices as acts of reparation for the the conversion of sinners, after all, we all were endowed with free will.
Lucia continued in her memoirs, “Pray the Rosary every day, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war [World War I when Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire were pitted against Great Britain, United States, France, Russia, Italy, and Japan.] Lucia described how “Our Lady began to rise serenely, going up towards the east, until she finally disappeared in the immensity of space. The light that surrounded her seemed to open up a path before her in the firmament.”
In the second apparition, Our Lady promised to take Francisco and Jacinta to heaven soon and Lucia had to stay much longer to establish devotion to her Immaculate Heart and to make Jesus known. When she opened her hands, in front of the palm of Our Lady’s right hand, Lucia wrote, “was a heart encircled by thorns which pierced it.”
In 1917 in Portugal, for every 100,000 inhabitants, 87% of the males died and 62 % of the females perished from pneumonia. (Source: Ourem Museum).
Like other young children who had pneumonia at that time, Jacinta and Francisco died.
Lucia was present when Pope John Paul II beatified her cousins, Francisco and Jacinta on May 13, 2000, while Lucia at age 98 died in 2005 just as Our Lady said she would.
The third apparition’s message was to continue to pray the Holy Rosary daily and Our Lady taught them a prayer, “O Jesus it is for Love of You, for the conversion of sinners and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.” When Our Lady opened her hands, Lucia told us, “that the little shepherds beheld a most terrifying vision of hell and the souls of the demon and the damned.”
In the local parish church in Fatima where Jacinta and Francisco were baptized, a painting illustrates a vision of hell and next to it is Our Lady of Fatima providing solace to pilgrims.
In another local church, known for miracles, local pilgrims go to Our Lady of Ortega Church. The narrative goes that a mute shepherd was approached to give her lamb to Our Lady. She consented but conditioned it on her father’s approval. When her father saw the miracle, where for years she could not speak, he agreed. Ever since then, locals make a yearly pilgrimage and stay all day in this church.
I too felt the grace of receiving the Holy Eucharist, guided to be more conscious of not becoming background noise and to stay mindful and considerate in assisting other pilgrims, while seeking solitude to process the daily infusion of richly divine experiences.
Back home in America, I recalled a statement told to me by a former non-believer, describing a journey from once an atheist, to an agnostic, to a believer of spirits embedded in nature and to one that prays Our Father Prayer at night. The all-inclusive flow of love from the Immaculate Heart of Mary goes out to anyone needing conversion. In our pilgrimage, we all witnessed a reluctant pilgrim change to become more conscientious in prayers and during mass.
Google Mary and you will get a National Geographic Magazine displaying 500 years of Virgin Mary sightings in one map, since A.D. 40 to 2015, from Guadalupe to Medjugorje, Bosnia, including an article by Maureen Orth describing Mary as “the most powerful woman in the world. Mary draws millions each year to shrines such as Fatima, in Portugal and Knock, in Ireland sustaining religious tourism estimated to be worth billions of dollars a year and providing thousands of jobs.”
‘My future is already in my past’
Portugal enjoys 28 million tourists, 20 million of whom go to Fatima each year, according to Manuela Diaz, a seasoned travel guide of 45 years, independently contracted by the Association of Commerce, Industry and Services (ACISO) of Ourem, Portugal to guide the November 2019 pilgrimage. It is a country of over 10,000,000.
She was quite knowledgeable and ready to answer our questions. And why not? She has a willing attitude, positive professionalism, and is one who enjoys her job, including anticipating sunshine even if with gray skies, plus an instant appreciation of how beautiful Portugal is, as soon as the sun gilded the sand-colored buildings. She was dressed impeccably each day in her fashionable sweater, silk, and a silk scarf tastefully adorned with the palette of pastels or fall colors, outer jacket and leather boots, ready to assist the pilgrims with a well-paced schedule.
Wise and profound, she said: “My future is already in my past.” Could it be that she has seen a glimpse of an inner world with the light of Heaven within, through manifested miracles in her life?
Was it because she has seen three popes who visited Fatima and with that, the belief in special indulgences and grace: 1) Pope Francis in 2017 when he announced to a crowd of nearly 500,000 pilgrims, the canonization of Francisco and Jacinta, after the miracles attributed to them were verified, now St. Francisco and St. Jacinta; 2) Pope Benedict in 2010 who accepted the challenge of constructing the pilgrim church and gave the Sanctuary of Fatima a golden rose whose center is the Immaculate Heart of Mary, encircled by the thorns of the rose and framed by a rosary which ends with the crucifix, and 3) Pope John Paul II who visited Fatima three times on May 13, 1982, 1984 and 2000 and who gave many gifts to Our Lady of Fatima, including a bullet, in gratitude from being saved from the assassin’s four bullets in Rome.
Fatima was once with sprawling green farm fields, where shepherds went with their grazing animals for water and grass.
In September, fig-trees had bountiful green fruits, some had turned purple ready to be picked, and some fell to the ground, crushed by countless pilgrims, visiting the house of Sister Lucia in Aljustrel.
In November, the olive trees were full of black olives, once green fruits that are now ripe for harvest. Portugal’s wealth was once derived from farmers, but now aging and unable to do the back-breaking harvest and production of olive oil. Nine hundred families are currently members of an olive oil cooperative that run the Olive Oil Museum and a factory displaying equipment for extracting olive oil, a higher value product. Without this cooperative, we were told their olive oil industry would disappear.
These verdant fields have been partially displaced by a cemented sprawling square with a 500,000 person capacity, with these pilgrims’ stations: High Cross, Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary, Chapel of the Apparitions, Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity with several chapels and a museum underneath.
Southeast of the Fatima square is a commanding High Cross, inviting folks to linger and to see what is far beyond.
Just a few yards from it is a sculpture of Pope John Paul II, who visited on May 13, 1982, 1991 and in 2000, announced the beatification of Jacinta and Francisco.
To its right is the Main Door of the Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity whose façade includes messages inscribed on the glass door of not demeaning anyone as God is in them, in 26 languages. The first stone was blessed and donated by Pope John Paul II, which came from a marble fragment of Apostle Peter’s tomb located under the basilica in Rome.
In a pilgrimage to Rome, because of an unintentional chapel displacement, Fr. Bugas had the honor, usually reserved for bishops and cardinals only, to say mass in front of Apostle Peter’s tomb under the basilica in Rome, another grace he prayed for.
The Christ crucifix inside the Basilica of the Holy Trinity has open eyes, heavy human body looking at us unlike traditional crucifixes with a lean body. It includes a 9.8 foot-image of Virgin of Fatima in Carrara marble, with Francisco and Jacinta in front of Our Lady and Lucia in the back of Our Lady. Both Francisco and Jacinta are now saints, announced by Pope Francis during his visit in 2017.
Opposite that Basilica is the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary where the graves of Francisco and Jacinta lie on the left and on the right of the altar, Lucia’s.
Today, Portugal enjoys its wealth from wineries, from crops exported to the European Union, including hosting international conferences on chemistry, information technology, sustainable energies for smart cities, art, architecture and environment sustainability as well as religious tourism and pilgrimages. As a result of globalization, younger folks have gone abroad to secure their future.
Did Manuela mean she has seen visions of heaven in her past and that now her past is her future?
A Warrior of the Light knows that he has much to be grateful for. Angels help him in his struggle; celestial forces place each thing in its place, thus allowing him to give it his best. His companions say: “He’s so lucky!” And the warrior does sometimes achieve things far beyond his capabilities. That is why, at sunset, he kneels and gives thanks for the Protective Cloak surrounding him. His gratitude, however, is not limited to the spiritual world; he never forgets his friends, for their blood, mingled with his own on the battlefield. A Warrior does not need to be reminded of the help given to him by others. He is the first to remember and he makes sure to share with them any rewards he receives.
Paulo Coelho, 2004
Inside the Chapel of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal in Paris, France | Photo by Prosy Abarquez-Delacruz
Try this exercise from the church pew during your worship, whether a Catholic, Presbyterian, Episcopalian or Baptist, to think of all the folks who contributed to your formation into becoming the kind of person you are now. From the pew, name the graces you have received, starting from the person officiating mass.
On occasions, I go to Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills where Rev. Colm O’Ryan still helps with Sunday mass and with noon weekday masses, even at 90 years old. He relies on the lay leaders to administer communion as he struggles to keep his balance, using a cane. But, his sharp mind makes for inspiring homilies.
For example, his homily one Sunday exhorted you to be fully human and in being humane, one can also fully grasp what it is to be divine. He has taken human experiences, even the divisions within the church, as opportunities to look at humanity as stories of the human heart. How much have we offered our lives to right doings, as opposed to wrongdoings?
To me, it simply asks us: Are you a living sacrament of God? Do you have eyes that see beyond the weaknesses of a person, their gifts, their talents and what they offer to you by their presence?
By your life, are you able to see that God still moves stones, the way Max Lucado describes? “The God who forgave King David still offers you forgiveness. The God who helped men and women in ages past still comes into your world, and he comes to do what you can’t, to move the stone away so you can see his answer,” Lucado wrote.
January 1, 2019 – I had the biggest scare of my life when my daughter had major surgery. It shook me to my core that I must have gone to different churches praying for a miracle. It was so nerve-wracking as she is a young mother of an active, precocious 4-year-old girl. Yet, to her tenacity and physical strength, she managed to get up, walk 20 hours after her surgery, and even make different animal figures using balloons for her daughter’s birthday, 19 days later. She is that strong, physically and mentally to will her recovery. Of course, her husband deserves a lot of kudos for his leadership and his mobilizing of friends and family.
I stood in awe of their strengths, but also grateful to Our Lady of Guadalupe and Santo Niño, both of whom I prayed to, for a miracle to manifest. I felt ready for God to pour His blessings on her and her family. Praying the rosary and going to Mass became uplifting moments for me as my burdens became lighter, knowing God and Mama Mary were there to surround her. For this, I am most grateful.
In one school activity, my granddaughter made a crown for Santo Niño from colored twist ties. It fit exactly the small statue’s head that I marveled at how she visualized it. She was quite excited for the crown to be put on Baby Jesus and told me how she loves him. Did I ask why? Her answer was – “Baby Jesus helps me in my nightmares and when He is there, I am not afraid.” Oh my, I could not believe my ears. I had made it a habit when she was an infant to pray daily in front of Baby Jesus, and holding her hands and telling her to gently touch the statue and do it with much love. I had no idea that she was having nightmares and in her bad dreams, Baby Jesus was helping her out. Is this not a miracle you want in your life?
Sacré-Cœur Basilica in Paris, FrancePhoto by | Prosy Abarquez-Delacruz
This year, I am even more grateful to have joined three pilgrimages. In February, a trip to the Holy Land that brought me to places where I felt divine energies inside the Holy Sepulcher, inside the birthplace of Jesus and an opportunity to visit Israel and Gaza without encountering any form of violence. I am even more grateful to have joined a 14-day pilgrimage, led by a holy spiritual director, Fr. Joel O. Bugas, that covered Portugal, Spain, and France during which the group got to visit 14 saints and see much of the French countryside during our road trip. It is also where we evaded a lockdown for hours due to a murder that happened in a police station near the Chapel of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal in Paris.
This month, I had an opportunity to visit Portugal, monasteries and eat the best food. “There was not a bad moment,” as my co-pilgrim said.
In all these three trips, we had the finest travel guides, who were not only knowledgeable about their locales and the cultural highlights, but also efficient. In the last tour, our travel guide’s pacing of travel for each day was just right and not rushed. It made for a very luxurious feel, one of retreat and renewal.
Back in America, I am not sure what right doings are anymore. Given these days, wrongdoings of a key tenant in the White House dominate the news. Still, we are grateful that federal staffers are standing up to uphold what is right and what is legal by the U.S. Constitution. All throughout 2019, 11 months now, our guardians of U.S. democracy have been Congress, federal judges, key federal employees and key institutions who have sounded the alarm, like the whistleblower complaint which led to the impeachment investigation of Pres. Donald Trump by Rep. Adam Schiff.
We are grateful for all these freedom fighters and warriors of light for without them, our Thanksgiving dinners this 2019 will be in darkness. Thank God for light overcoming the darkness in America and we pray 2020 will be brighter and where we can all know and experience God’s love and plan for our lives are our realities!
Lastly, “Good deeds from a filthy heart is wretched rags to God,” and all we need to do is acknowledge that “God loves us as He offers a wonderful plan for our lives,” as Max Lucado continues, but also, “Don’t overstep the forbidden mark.”
I do have a friend, who since he composed his CD, the music has been used by video game developers. Then, he got another job at a major university to take care of information technology. A few months later, he launched his first book on artificial intelligence and now, his publisher is asking for a second book and he just got another job promotion. God’s blessings on him have been one after another and keep achieving using his talent and even beyond his capabilities.
Ask yourselves this Thanksgiving: Are you in a position where God can pour blessings and continuous grace on you?
We all got lucky, blessed by God’s immense grace, the Blessed Mother’s faithful intercession, and the 14 saints we visited. Even the weather was temperate for most days, pleasant to the pilgrims and the locals. It was sunny with deep blue skies and the pillowy white clouds, that through a glance at the verdant undulating hills with freshly mowed green farms in the countryside, one could breathe deeply and feel serenity.
In some farms, herds of ponies, sheep and Charolais, a French breed of taurine beef cattle, for delicious beef bourguignon, could be seen. No, we are not talking food, just putting you right in the heart of France, after visits to Portugal and Spain. Man-made reservoirs were evident in most farms to catch the rainwater and images of water next to green made for a picturesque countryside France.
Marian Pilgrimage Group led by Fr. Joel in front of Mural of Apparition of Sacred Heart of Jesus to St. Margaret Mary | Photos courtesy of Prosy Abarquez-Delacruz, J.D.
Weather forecast was cold with rains and when we got the “wet,” we were inside the tour bus, on the way from Portugal to sunny parts of Spain or with umbrellas traveling the sidewalks on the way to the Basilica of St. Therese of Lisieux on October 1, 2019, her feast day, as rains are indicators of God’s blessings manifested, as my Ethiopian-American friend once told me. It must be of such value to that country, just like California’s decade of drought and finally, periods of strong rains and snow to revive our reservoirs and water tables.
Inside the Cathedral of St. Cyr and St. Juliette in Nevers, France
Making spaces for God’s miracles
When we stopped at Nevers in Central France, the burst of sunset greeted us with light reflecting on a segment of the Loire River. There were many more images that made us say, “Oh my God!” or simply in awe of our timing.
After all, we had 14 days of pilgrimage from Sept. 21 to Oct. 4, 2019, which took us from LA to Portugal to Spain to France, then travelled over 1,000 miles by bus, stayed in eight different hotels of moderate to upscale quality, walked over 130,000 steps and reached places. This was 75 miles on foot, but if we count trips to bathrooms, restaurants, and limited shopping on souvenir shops, perhaps it was nearly 80 miles.
We are pilgrims, after all, not tourists, committed to doing a pilgrimage to the Heart of Jesus, the correct descriptor, as we visited the saints. One of them was St. Margaret-Mary, “who experienced a vision of Christ, scourged and bloody.” The local priest of Paray Le Monial delivered a special lecture for us, describing the apparition – that while in prayers, St. Margaret-Mary’s heart was taken from her body and merged with the Heart of Jesus and then, the merged heart back into her.
St. Pope John Paul II’s note to Msgr. Seguy, Bishop of Autun, in 1990 said: “During my pilgrimage to visit the tomb of Margaret-Mary in 1986, I made the request that, in the spirit of what she had conveyed to the Church, we consecrate a veritable cult to the Sacred Heart. For it is through the Heart of Jesus that the heart of man learns the true and unique meaning of his own life and his destiny and it is thanks to the Heart of Jesus that man learns to love.”
Fellow pilgrims like the Lucero family, particularly Margaret Lucero, shared her own miracle of praying to St. Margaret-Mary. She wrote: “My oldest daughter, Jessica, had to have open-heart surgery at 3 years old. I was so desperate for God’s help and Blessed Mother that I found a prayer for St. Margaret-Mary. I am also devoted to the Sacred Heart who appeared to her and not knowing what she looked like nor her entire story I simply begged for her intercession to please pray with me for a good recovery for my Jessica. Since then, I have prayed to her. I have never in my wildest dreams ever think I would be able to thank her in this church. This is so emotional for me as I begged her to help me pray to God for my baby girl. Her incorrupt body is a blessing to me and I wish I can share this with Jessica, now healthy and about to get married.”
I believe we were being led by a holy priest, Rev. Fr. Joel de Oño Bugas, who celebrated a mass most days, except travel days, including inside the airport in France on the way back to Los Angeles.
Sacre Coeur Basilica, dedicated to the Heart of Jesus, in Montmartre, France, crowns the hills in the 18th arrondissement, north of downtown. This is where tourists enjoy a panoramic city view. Cold blustery winds greet you. During prior visits, we could not attend a mass and simply had audio tours. This time, we were blessed with a special mass for pilgrims celebrated by Fr. Joel inside the chapel of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Fr. Joel Bugas celebrating mass. When I took the photo I saw only one row of rainbow colors, but later it had three rows.
I took a photo of one row of rainbow lights by the altar. After I examined this photo, it now has three rows of light, perhaps a symbol of the Holy Spirit, which Fr. Bugas implored to animate our pilgrimage at the start of over a thousand miles bus ride. Esterlita, a fellow pilgrim, showed me her photo of one row of light and confirmed what I saw.
At the medieval town of O’Cebreiro, a Celtic town traceable to 1500 years, where it sits 4,242 feet above sea level, a 4.3-mile climb uphill, defined by mountain ranges of Os Ancares, and O’Courel, sits the statue of Santa Maria La Real of O’Cebreiro carrying Infant Jesus inside its parish church.
The miracle story goes that a reluctant monk secretly despised a peasant from Barxamaior who braved the frightening snow to hear Mass and to receive the Eucharist, the body and blood of Christ, in the sixteenth century. At the moment of consecration, “the sacramental Wine to Blood seethed and stained the corporals, the white linen cloths upon which the elements of bread and wine are consecrated). The corporals remained in the Chalice, and the Host on the Paten,” according to the Franciscan Fraternity brochure I obtained in Lugo, dated Sept. 26, 2019.
Inside the church is this statue of Santa Maria La Real of O’ Cebreiro, the Virgin of Healing, with The Infant at her breast, and where the legend goes: “the Virgin bent her head in adoration of The Miracle, but some add that the Infant in her arms opened his eyes for the same reason,” as stated in the book published by Fama Vigo.
In this medieval Church, I took a photo of Christ on the crucifix, a 12th-century carving, during our visit. When I looked at the photo later, it had three crucifixes, one original and two shadows of the crucifix. I again was in awe of what I saw that I compared it with Esterlita’s whose photo had one crucifix. We were blessed to have a Mass inside this historic church, founded by Benedictine monks.
To the left of the altar lies the tomb of Dr. D. Elias Valiña Sampedro, the parish priest of this church who restored the church and made it his life’s mission to pave a way to O’Cebreiro for pilgrims on their way to Santiago de Compostela, about 93 miles from here. He wrote publications describing “The Santiago Way,” his best work that has been used as a guide by many pilgrims for many years. He restored the church and created markers to promote this town. He is credited by locals with creating livelihoods for them, enabling them to stay in this region, while visited by pilgrims and 50,000 more during the feast of Santa Maria de la Real on Sept. 8 each year.
When we got to Santiago de Compostela Church, it was under renovation and will not be opened until July 2021. Yet, we were fortunate to get inside, follow a trail and give a hug to St. James, a gilded life-sized statue. When I embraced the statue, my tears rolled down and I could smell a special flower scent.
The story goes that the remains of St. James, covered in clamshells, floated from where he died to where his body was found in Compostela. Christina Vives, our competent and conscientious tour guide, spoke to pilgrims and inquired about their journeys.
We walked a few more yards to attend a mass celebrated by Fr. Joel, concelebrated with local priests from St. Francis de Assisi church. An hour before we walked in, the church was empty and by noon, pilgrims who have completed their Camino, have packed it.
Enrique (my husband) completed his Camino Francés of 780 kilometers or 485 miles in 36 days, starting Sept. to mid-October 2019. He too has a lot to share about his journey, one of which is how to be in a state of mindfulness. That we are having our parallel pilgrimages is a grace as well in our winter years.
Facade of Santa Maria dela Paz in Santa Fe, New Mexico
“Everyone falls in love with His humility”
Our spiritual director for the pilgrimage was Fr. Joel, who was newly appointed associate pastor of Santa Maria de la Paz Catholic Church in Santa Fe, Mexico. Celebrating his 10th sacerdotal anniversary, Fr. Joel was formerly the pastor and associate pastor of eight parishes in New Mexico, some of which were four to five hours away. He was ordained in the oldest Saint Francis of Assisi Cathedral Basilica in Santa Fe (built 1869 to 1887) in 2009. He is the first Filipino American to be ordained as a priest in the Archdiocese of Santa Fe.
His tenth sacerdotal celebration occurred a week after this Marian pilgrimage in his new home parish, Santa Maria de la Paz, attended by 600+ folks who traveled from 12 parishes and mission churches that he has served over the 10 years.
Imagine that, as Santa Fe seems to have more land than people. It is also a place of both art and history where you can walk for miles to just visit galleries. But, our focus will be on this the spiritual director, whose anniversary celebration as a priest I attended.
Coincidences abound — like Fr. Joel was the former mayor of Nabunturan capital of Compostela Valley in Davao del Norte from 1988 to 1998 to now, 2019, a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela.
Or that our pilgrimage took us to Santa Maria de la Real in O’Cebreiro to now my personal visit to Santa Maria de la Paz in Santa Fe, New Mexico, a place where Ansel Adams once described, “The skies and lands are so enormous, the details so exquisite.”
In Compostela Valley, whose capital is Nabunturan, in Davao del Norte, then-Mayor Bugas and his team ushered in infrastructural improvements (public markets, terminals, two high schools, farm to market roads, bridges) to bring prosperity to the city, under his mayoral leadership from 1988 to 1998. He also developed a Simbally Festival in 1989, now on its 30th year of celebration, and has brought “unity and empowerment to the people to share and participate whatever talents, abilities and expertise they can contribute in nation-building,” Fr. Joel said, recalling his days as mayor.
Nabunturan means surrounded by mountains, presently made up of 27 barangays or smaller administrative divisions, and where children are employed as miners. He brought peace and order to this city through dialogue when he created a reconciliation council, which included the opposition.
“I did not want violence as my father died from it,” Fr. Joel referred to the untimely demise of his father Zosimo Bugas who was assassinated two weeks before the city’s elections.
Fr. Joel confided that he has had God’s calling quite early in high school, but was dissuaded when his father’s cousins entered the seminary but had other callings. “My grandma always reminded everyone to be open more to God’s calling,” he continued.
In 1988 at age 21, he was the first and youngest mayoral candidate ever elected in the Philippines under the Lina Law that was approved and signed by Pres. Corazon Aquino in December 1987, “due to last-minute replacement, I qualified to run,” he shared. Eighty percent of the registered voters in this city’s population of 50,000 voted for him. He was elected for three terms, a total of 10 years. He was groomed to run for the higher position of the governor but a female candidate requested him not to. “The next thing I knew, he was going to the seminary,” according to Susan de Oño Laset, his aunt. Bugas also wanted to end his political life at 31 years old, saying, “I have done my part in sharing some leadership, talents, and abilities. Let others share and shine!
We had a special mass inside St. Therese de Lisieux Basilica by Fr. Joel Bugas Photos courtesy of Prosy Abarquez-Delacruz, J.D.
Years later, Fr. Joel got ordained in 2009. Now, in 2019, Santiago de Compostela is part of this pilgrimage – is this a coincidence?
But his human tongue, as St. Therese of Lisieux wisely said, “It is impossible for the human tongue to express things that the human heart can hardly understand.” Fr. Joel simply said, “What is it Lord that you need me to do?”
Could it be that he resides near St. Loreto Chapel, the site of a 20-foot miraculous circular staircase of 33 steps without railings? As the narrative goes, “two 360 degrees turns that create a double helix, like the structure of DNA,” and repaired using square wooden pegs, without the use of nails, and no supporting structure to hold this double helix.
Double Helix Staircase in St. Loreto Chapel
To this day, engineers wonder as to how this staircase supported the weight of nuns who used this staircase to reach the loft where they sang from, for eight years, while locals and visitors believe that it was St. Joseph who repaired this staircase. A wood technologist, Forrest Easley, examined even the wood and stated: “No other spruce has square-shaped structured cells like this,” and called this unknown wood, Loretto Spruce.
By the way, Fr. Joel did not reveal any of his political achievements, even as hard as I tried to secure an interview during the 14-day pilgrimage, but persistence, good research and later, goodwill prevailed.
Perhaps, God wants Fr. Joel’s talents in the service of many churches? I finally got him to confide about his God’s calling, over turon merienda in Lourdes, France. Still, his humility prevailed.
His practices embodied His holiness
Fr. Joel’s spiritual practice showed us how to have a much closer relationship with the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the saints whose relics and tombs we got to visit. For example, the incorrupt body of St. Margaret-Mary de Alacoque rests above the side altar in the Chapel of the Apparitions, located at the Visitation Monastery in Paray-le-Monial.
Outside the souvenir store run by the nuns, Fr. Joel led us in a prayer of consecration to the Heart of Jesus, by St. Margaret-Mary, and encouraged us to sign our commitment on the day of our collective prayers, Sept. 30, 2019. That day of consecration to the Heart of Jesus marked a qualitative change in all of us to be more tight-knit as a family and to have an unwavering concern for one another, assisting anyone with a visible need for help in walking or getting what they need. I assisted Esterlita, a 73-year-old caregiver and former teacher, whom I thought I was helping by taking her arm as we walked; then, it turned out that she is quite strong, walking slowly but steadily, even if walking with a cane.
But, the special mention award for sustained consistency goes to Lionel Pascual, a young man in his 40s, who in his quiet ways would stay behind and ask, “Do you need help to get to the tour bus?” or simply offered to carry your bag if needed. In the end, he also got weary that we had to be told repeatedly how to be safe within the walking boundaries, that these pilgrims, ranging in ages of late 30s to early 80s were lost in our own world of perhaps looking for “apparitions” “magical signs,” or keeping up with a bum knee.
For pilgrims who had not ventured out of their “clamshells,” the symbol of a Peregrino, not to be confused with the water San Pellegrino, which few did, a pilgrim chooses to adjust, to be resilient, and not to be the dogmatic “ugly American,” insisting on their own four to five stars accommodation of dining entrees. Had I not read the pilgrim prayer in our handbook from QTS Tours and Travels and having been to the Holy Land before, that would have been me. How horrible would that be for the community paper that I write for and blessed to be part of?
During the pilgrimage, Fr. Joel had an extra bag that he carried filled with relics and at key places and he touched these relics at several tombs of the saints. He had his plans of sharing them with his parishioners at his 10th anniversary on Oct. 12, 2019.
A spiritual life intersected by God’s light
Chama in New Mexico only has 1,022 population as of the 2010 census and a dignified church was needed. It was once housed in a 1970s structure with a corrugated metal roof, rusted and dilapidated, and lacking a dignified sign.
The narrative goes, “We have told seven priests now that we need a church. They keep promising. You are the eighth priest, [Fr. Joel]. We wonder if it would be the same story again, a promise and then, nothing?”
Fr. Joel raised funds through donors, parishioners, auctioned paintings and rosaries, and after three years, in 2012, Archbishop Michael Sheehan consecrated a new St. Patrick’s Church in Chama, New Mexico and St. Nepomuceno in Canjillon. With his team of faith builders, another brand new Mission in Canjillon called St. Nepomuceno was built, including the renovation of three rectories, parish halls and another church in Tierra Amarilla.
Many wonderful projects and programs WE accomplished together. It was a hard and challenging time. But I welcome it as a great opportunity in doing for the glory of God. And above all, bringing people together as one. I told them that I am only a passing priest. It so happened that I stumbled upon some holes in the walls to fix. In all of my assignments, I don’t want to be remembered by putting plaques/memorials. Just remember me when you come to the Church, in the altar.
Fr. Joel Bugas
He did what he once had done in improving Nabunturan in Compostela Valley in the Philippines: rally the parishioners and the community to help build brand new churches (3) in New Mexico. Fr. Joel auctioned his sacred paintings that he himself painted to raise thousands to help build three brand new churches.
Not too long after, Fr. Joel got another assignment to a crossroads city, a destination stop called Clayton, with a 2010 census population of 2,980. Clayton is made up of sprawling ranches, ancient volcano fields and with a popular museum, Herztein Memorial Museum, about the holocaust.
It is four to five hours from Albuquerque and Fr. Joel drove this route to celebrate Simbang Gabi, novena of nine masses before Christmas, in the dead of winter with snow on the roads. He kept doing it for years until the community support grew from a handful to now half a church-full, according to Myrna Samson, a long-time supporter and faith leader in Albuquerque, who also joined this pilgrimage.
In Clayton, as in Chama, Fr. Bugas spearheaded the renovation of St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church, the rectory, continued building a ten classroom/office building and in addition, opened a new Catholic Museum housing vintage priests vestments and religious artifacts, the New Museum and Learning Center of St. Francis on May 15, 2019 and has since been renamed as of June 2019 to SFX Museum and Religious Education Center by the new pastor. “We also did many projects and programs together to strengthen the collective lives of our parishioners,” he shared, “that the joy of being a priest is to serve God without any condition or reservation. That people are happy and can attest that “once upon a time, there was a passing priest, his name is Fr. Joel.” We refer to the team that he formed.
His fellow priests and parishioners describe him with such love during his 10th-anniversary mass and celebration.
Msgr. Jay Vorheese, his former pastor at Our Lady of Annunciation Church, described Fr. Joel as embodying four pillars or hallmarks of his God’s servant/ priesthood.
The first pillar as a bridge-builder. The priesthood is in the bridge business, he said, it is like Jacob who saw a ladder from heaven to earth, with angels descending into earth, carrying blessings from God and ascending to heaven, to bring our prayers and our petitions to God our Father. He then described him as quite an artist, who uses his gift of art to express that union between heaven and earth. His sacred paintings have been auctioned to raise funds for building a church. He was described as “transcendental with his hands and with his words, representing the divine artists, the Almighty God with your art, words and actions.”
The second pillar as bright light, “The light shines brightly on you, Fr. Joel,” the Msgr said.
The third pillar, as a fountain, “where the Holy Spirit fills up Fr. Joel and in that fullness, you share generously.”
Those were not empty words for in the short time that I was with him in New Mexico, he managed to carve out time to give me a ride to the inn Santa Fe and drove his relatives and me an hour away to take us to Albuquerque near the airport and even shared two meals with us.
And the fourth pillar “his charism of the spirit is joy.” His favorite saying is ‘God is good all the time and all the time God is good,” that his infectious joy is carried onto the youth.
On the eve of his 10th-year celebration, a lapsed Catholic in coma waited for Fr. Joel. He got a call late that night, baptized this Catholic who consciously received the final rites from him. Hours later that person died, according to Alice and Bill Gallegos.
Ivy Cabilla of Clayton described him as a “really good mentor, everybody falls in love with his humility and he brings people together.”
Another parishioner named Virginia spoke of her personal ordeal of having her son in jail. Fr. Joel visited jails and ministered to inmates. He brought a live Christmas tree and had the inmates decorate them. He invested in these inmates and visited them during Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. He helped Virginia’s family get through those daily trials and now, Virginia’s son is leading a new chapter of his life in being productive.
When Deacon Leandro spoke, he described Fr. Joel as an ever-growing priest, who continues to evolve to almost perfect, saying, “You have shown your light and so many people have received that grace from you.”
Three hundred guests got raffle tickets and 100 received blessed relics during the reception. The team even categorized the diverse food offerings and made the families quite happy to try Filipino, New Mexican and American foods. Have you ever been to a priest’s sacerdotal anniversary where the priest is thoughtfully thinking of his parishioners and how to deepen their faith including answering their questions about relics and what constitutes first-class, second-class, and third-class relics, as these were?
“That during my 10th anniversary,” Fr. Joel confided and that we all witnessed, “I choked and the tears I cannot hold. I was overwhelmed by the presence and representations of all my parishes (12 in 10years) that I served. More than 600 attended the Mass and 300+ attended the lovely reception.” I timed how long he paused with tears — about 3 minutes and the congregation respected that and cried with him. It was a very special, touching moment, even for this writer.
In Our Lady of Fatima Apparitions’ chapel, in Fatima, Portugal, Fr. Joel joined a group of priests from Europe, Asia, the Americas, and Africa leading the rosary in multiple languages of English, Tagalog, French, Spanish, Portuguese, South Korean and African. This was quite a special blessing for him as he confided his wish to be included. Myrna Samson got to also lead part of the rosary with him, like other lay leaders.
In the Church of Miraculous Medal in Paris, Fr. Bugas got another blessing, by chance, His Eminence Cardinal Gerald Cyprien Lacroix of Quebec City came to visit. He asked Fr. Bugas if he could concelebrate with him, but Fr. Joel, in his humility, deferred to His Eminence, even though his name was listed as the mass main celebrant. Hours later after our visit, four were murdered in the local police station near the Church of Miraculous Medal. Was it a coincidence that we were not part of the crowd that got cordoned off by the Parisian authorities?
You may recall that the Archdiocese of Santa Fe recently filed bankruptcy in June 2019 and several dozen lawsuits against sexual abuse by the Catholic hierarchy were stalled from proceeding, with 300 claims pending.
So to have a very holy Catholic priest from Santa Fe in our midst is truly God’s undeserved grace to us, 25 pilgrims who came from Idaho, New Mexico, Florida, Colorado, Maryland, Pennsylvania and California.
By the 10th day of the pilgrimage, we were more comfortable sharing resources, helping one another, and with unwavering concern for each one needing help.
Anita Rubio, whom I met previously in the Holy Land, was again blessed to reunite with a long lost friend, a Camino pilgrim who reached Santiago after walking a week. For two pilgrimages now, she gets reunited with friends and classmates that she has not seen for decades. I told her she must be blessed.
Thank you to all my co-pilgrims, and to Fr. Joel for teaching me through St. Bernadette and St. Margaret-Mary and St. Therese of Lisieux, that Jesus’ wounded heart from being crucified shows His boundless love for us. For making me realize that the Lord has greater hurts and pains with our indifference, our negligence, disbelief, and Jesus gets a broken heart.
Thank you for teaching me that these saints lived during the Grand Century of Spirituality known as French School of Spirituality formed by St. Francois de Sales, St. Vincent de Paul, St. Claude La Colombiere, “a never-ending spring of grace during the period of narrow-minded Jansenism,” the answer then was God was Love and today and for always, just like the rivers and fountains of water that we saw and heard described, God is still Love and He awaits men and women’s love in return.
Holiness was defined by Fr. Ed Benioff of the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills, California, as someone with an intimate relationship with God. Are you about to conclude, as I did, that we have an exceptional spiritual director who knows instinctively how to build communities of faith, empowers us all to participate, to take turns to do the first reading, to take care of tithes and offerings, to lead the singing that each day leaders emerged to organically fulfill the needed tasks?
Do you get a sense that we got not just rain showers, but a river of blessings and God’s grace?
There are many more miracles to write about, perhaps by a heart being cracked open to love Jesus in a much deeper way, and in time, those would be the subjects of future pieces.
This holy, humble, humorous, happy priest, Rev. Joel Bugas is a miracle medium. I observed him get his wishes many times. Yesterday, he got to say mass at the Chapel of the Virgin Mary inside the Basilica of Sacre Cour. Usually, all we get is an audio tour but thanks to QTS Tours and Christina Vives, this chapel was secured and we had mass.
Today, our last full day of touring, Fr. Joel got another surprise, Cardinal Gerald Ciprien La Croix of Quebec City waited to ask his permission to concelebrate the mass as Fr. Joel is the designated priest for 3pm. Fr. Joel of course deferred to His Eminence and I could see how happy Fr. Joel was not as the main celebrant, but as a concelebrating priest.
God’s abundance is indeed overwhelming and overflowing to this priest who genuinely puts our spiritual growth ahead of anything else, yet we also had fun, we got to shop a little and one pilgrim got to visit with her college classmate. God is good all the time.
Being in a pilgrimage is both the best experience and a space for observing miracles of wishes granted plus God’s abundance to those serving him and those with total faith.
Our spiritual director, Fr. Joel Bugas, is one of the best priests I have met, now 53 priests and 2 bishops in person and via one on one interviews: thoughtful, humorous, considerate, caring and had the best 3 minute homilies.
He too had a health issue but if you look at him, he made no noise about it, no complaints and I love seeing him allow us to take care of him: like a septuagenarian who would split her plate with him, or others would offer to carry some of his bags which had the vestments and chalice or pack him breakfast one day as he had no time to get one. He reciprocates with kindness and thoughtfulness, moving from table to table at dinner to check on folks, buying us snacks and cookies to share. He is quite endearing as anyone approaches him and he is accessible with sharing his own observations and wisdom.
It is also observing physical changes, like a mom in her retirement years shedding a cane, feeling stronger to walk without her anchor to her disability. She got stronger.
It is also observing folks’ quirks transformed for days, from just a voice box to a voicebox of sacred choral music. It is observing folks with rigid standards shed them for awhile to go along for just even a day to align with the group’s choice or food chosen for us. It was a welcome treat though to savor good French food at lunch: escargots and beef bourguionon.
Then, there are earth angels: they ask how you are and keep you company, they extend their arms as anchors as you walk, they sat behind to make sure the ailing, the sick, and slow walkers like me with asthma are encouraged to walk the distance, and there are those who provided us with inspiring examples of sprinting uphill in Sacre Cour.
In the end, we are all triumphant as we walked a total of nearly 130,000 miles, about 75 miles, had masses and communion all of 13 days, had offered over 500+ prayers for peace on earth, unity in America with justice for all, family, parents, spouses, children, grandchildren, grandparents, cousins, aunts, uncles, in-laws, neighbors, praying for healing, health, love and more time on earth.
P.S. Portugal has one beautiful square with chapels, museums, and two basilicas built for Our Lady of Fatima and a factory that makes chalices with pure silver, gold and precious stones, discounted at 1,500 euros, and stores that sell the most beautiful priests vestments, fully gilded, at 500 euros and above.
Spain and France seem more aligned in taking care of their surroundings, bringing out the green fields, lots of man-made lakes that are for the most part kept clean (Japan has the most pristine lakes near their homes with daily dredging to remove leaves and debris).
It got me thinking of Merced River and beautiful Yosemite. California is still my best state, except at some of the French restaurants, I heard Chinese tourists condemning the homeless in San Francisco and Los Angeles.
We need better examples of Spain in how they take care of their people. In Burgos, old folks were just talking while enjoying the sounds of the river, the shade of trees whose branches were joined to give a natural green awning, young folks enjoying their hot chocolate and churros.
Blue skies for the most part, white clouds and sometimes gray that gave us rains, for two days and it poured when we left Paris, as if saying bon voyage until we meet again.
Pilgrimages test your entire person physically to shoulder on despite your ailments, lack of mobility and even, breath. Yes, the ability to breathe at all times of the day.
It also tests who is caring, who is kind, who is considerate to the entire group and who makes us laugh with jokes.
It also tests those of us how far we are indulgent of our own pleasures in wine, food and shopping.
It makes you leave what is superfluous, superficial and connect with the better Angels, with our best selves, helping one another go through customs with grace and patience.
A special treat was to have mass inside the airport in Paris, in front of terminal 66 of Lufthansa airlines. How Fr. Joel made this happen was a miracle to see the end of a terminal with space seemingly reserved fo tdd 26 pilgrims. This must be how early Christians prayed with silence during Eucharist and we also received communion. Imagine the logistics of saying mass with communion wafers for 26 of us in all those days.
It was equally a treat to see the calm, serene, thoughtful Lou who curated this pilgrimage and gave us this pilgrimage with the best direction for travel, from south to north, driving from Portugal, Spain and France to linger to be with nature, ancient churches, great architecture in Basilicas, church museums and more in prayers at masses and daily communion at LAX.
