“When I look back over my life, I realise how my vocation has evolved. I see that at the beginning, I felt a deep desire to be useful, to serve and to help others over time. I have discovered my vulnerability and weakness. This makes me feel more in communion with the disadvantaged.” Experience has taught me that a vocation is something profound, a specific way of life that each one of us has been called to embrace and live. This implies a dynamism that moves us entirely. Therefore, a vocation is not something that belongs to the past but something that is rediscovered everyday in the events and the people around us. I was born in 1971, in Zaragoza, a city in north-western Spain. Zaragoza sits on the banks of Ebro River. It’s the capital of Spain’s Aragon region.
A mid-way stop between Barcelona and Madrid. I came to know the Comboni Missionaries during my secondary education. The Comboni Community of Zaragoza had started a youth group. I joined the group. We had various programs and activities in which I participated joyfully and actively. The group became a springboard for my vocation discernment. Little by little, I began to imagine my life as a missionary. This dream captivated and filled me with inner joy.
Meanwhile, I had a choice between becoming a priest or a brother. Thus, after much prayer and consultation with the vocation promoter, I felt that my call was to be a brother. The service of the brothers that emphasises human promotion and social ministry attracted me. Consequently, in 1994, I decided to enter the Comboni postulancy as a brother. This step officially marked the start of my missionary journey. In hindsight, some key encounters and experiences have had a significant influence on my vocational journey. The family I grew up in introduced me to a faith that is rooted in life. Put differently, a faith that is committed to the social context and engaged in the life of a parish. Faith is not only transmitted in words but above all, through a testimony of a coherent life that gives meaning to one’s existence.
The testimony of missionaries also inspired me in a significant way, it was not so much for the narration of their experiences in distant lands, but the happiness they expressed in recounting them. Their enthusiasm touched me. The third significant encounter is related to the world I lived in at the end of the eighties and the beginning of the nineties. This period was marked by a growing sense of international solidarity and a strong desire for social justice among the youth. Throughout my missionary life, I have also had other important experiences that have helped me reinforce or live my vocation.
In 1997, during my time in formation house for brothers in Nairobi, I did apostolate with the St Vincent de Paul group in the slum of Kibera. Frequent visits to the most disadvantaged people in that marginalised context made me discover the harsh dimension of poverty: women, men and children struggling to survive and to get by on so little money! Their witness of faith and inner strength was for me a real school of life. I was challenged to go out of myself and to open up to the needs of others. In South Sudan, I also had the grace to collaborate with other Comboni Missionaries and Comboni sisters in the establishment of Catholic Radio Network (CRN). This was an initiative aimed at creating a network of radio stations in each of the diocese of South Sudan and the Nuba Mountains.
In 2005, the protocol allowing South Sudan to hold a referendum for independence had been signed so CRN wanted to raise awareness among the population on issues of civic education, justice and peace as well as a space for listening to the word. Participating in the CRN gave me an opportunity to collaborate with many diocesan teams in setting up the radios, making Comboni’s dream of “saving Africa with Africa” come alive. In Rome, my missionary life and work took a twist in I was elected General Assistant in our institution. The Institute was asking me to be part of the general council of our congregation in Rome. The general council comprises of four general Assistants and the Superior General.
Domiciled in Rome, their task is to oversee the running of the entire Institute. It was a new phase of missionary service for me. This service has given me the opportunity to visit many countries where Comboni missionaries carry out the missionary work. This experience has been very enriching for my vocation I have been able to witness the passion, creativity and love of a family of people who seek to live the gospel with radicalism and prophetically for the kingdom.
Extracted from ComboniMissions Magazine (North American Province)
