By: Jessica WildeOur short term medical mission trip to the Philippines was over. Genevieve dropped us off at our hotel in Cagayan de Oro, we walked upstairs to our rooms, and we fell on the bed and cried. We didn’t want our mission trip to be over. In fact, Grace said it took all the self control she could muster to not grab on to the back of Genevieve's car and hitchhike back to Canossa. We had all fallen in love with mission life. The next day we took a short flight to Cebu. It was a shock to our system. We went from the beautiful simplicity of a convent to a lavish 3½ star hotel. For a quite reasonable $100/night, our executive 2 room suite came with a hot Asian-style buffet breakfast. We had an adequate supply of bottled water, two bathrooms (one with a large tub), and most importantly, hot water. But after spending a week bringing God’s mercy to families who could barely afford basic necessities or critical medical care, staying here felt so hypocritical that we fought to only use what we needed and keep living simply. Even so, it felt like we were missing something. We were missing the endless love of sisters who always had a hot meal ready promptly at 7am. We missed the wake-up call of a missionary crying out “Rise and shine and give God his glory…”. We missed the extra special prayers in pain as we poured ice cold ladles of water over our heads. The next day, we took a Jeepney to the Basilica where the beloved statue of Santo Nino is kept. Magellan brought this statue with him on his voyage around the world in his quest for the spice islands. He gifted the statue to the locals in Cebu. It was the first image of Jesus in the Philippines and now a major pilgrimage site. We walked into the dark church where Santo Nino sat in a side chapel for veneration. Long lines of people processed through the church to lay their hands on the glass surrounding and protecting him. We knelt down outside the chapel but within view of Santo Nino. He was stunning in his regal robes. Santo Nino is dressed like a king. His robes are royal red and embroidered with gold. This was not the image of baby Jesus that I hold close to my heart. I tend to think of him as a poor boy swaddled in a manger. I think of his homeless parents searching for a safe home for their son first in Bethlehem and later when they fled to Egypt. As a young boy, I imagine him playing with his friends and getting dirty like little boys tend to do. But through this statue of Santo Nino, God pulls aside the veil of poverty and shows us our King. Santo Nino is a beautiful depiction of how God sees the poor. God is often hidden behind a veil as seen in Jesus’s presence in the Eucharist. If only we could see with God’s eyes, I wonder how many poor, sick or imprisoned people we see on a daily basis are really princes and princesses in God’s eyes. “Seeking the face of God in everything, everyone, all the time, and his hand in every happening; This is what it means to be contemplative in the heart of the world. Seeing and adoring the presence of Jesus, especially in the lowly appearance of bread, and in the distressing disguise of the poor.” (Mother Teresa, In the Heart of the World)
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On a MissionTwo passionate parents and their four children are excited to bring His Word to everyone in need while living a life of Gospel poverty as missionaries. They invite you to join them on a journey to encounter our global neighbors that Jesus commands us to love through works of charity and service. Archives
April 2021
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