For five days I was in the ICU, with pneumonia. Considered critical, I was anointed. Then another three weeks in the hospital. Discharged, I came home to Xavier House, on Pedro Gil in Santa Ana, Manila.
My ever loving doctor is a nun, Sister Arlinda Pacina. She is high powered, with a diplomate both in internal medicine and in cardiology. But she wants to work with the poor, so she is based in J.P. Rizal Hospital in Dasmariñas, Cavite ‑ a hospital for the poor. She sees me rarely ‑ about four times a year, when she comes to Manila.
She is super careful, super conservative, and she feels deep responsibility for every one of her patients. So she wanted me to be quiet, to stay still, to rest, and “not to go running around.” Above all, she did not want me to go out in the evening.
To make sure that her orders were followed, she enlisted my staff. She told each one of them to guard me like a watchdog. . . . And not only like a watchdog, but like a fierce watchdog, such as a Doberman. She said to them: “If you let him go back to his regular routine — I warn you — he is apt to drop dead on you, at any moment.”
So I was confined to my room, forbidden to go near my desk. All phone calls went through the main office, even the phone calls for me. The members of my staff answered the phone. And they were prone to say cheerfully: “No! He is not available.”
I did not resent this. I knew that they were doing it with all the good will in the world. They were protecting me from people, but they thought that this was a matter of life and death. They were doing it for my survival.
So I had time to think, to reflect, to remember. And I remembered many things that I really wanted to do, but never had quite the time to do them. One of these things was to write a little book on the Blessed Virgin Mary.
I was asked to do this, with some intensity, by a fellow Jesuit whose opinions I respect — Father Catalino Arevalo — and by a publisher, Louie Reyes, who has always been a good and loyal friend. For the past year my conscience has been troubling me that I never even tried to write that book.
So, in the peace and quiet of my room, with no one knocking at the door, and with no phone calls, I wrote it: “Mama Mary and Her Children.” I have really wanted to do this for a long long time. The request of Father Arevalo and Louie Reyes just stirred up my sense of guilt.
The book is all stories — 30 true stories of real people. Most of these people I have known personally, at close range. And I have admired their goodness, their prayerfulness, their sheer unadulterated holiness.
Writing it was a joy! Every morning I woke up smiling, eager to get at that book: the story of Charlie Fiel and his Fourth Queen. . . . the beautiful experience of Mary Jo Tanpinco with Mama Mary. . . . the Virgin and the athlete. . . . Shanghai Lil. . . . the amazing account of the young Jesuit who was in the dead center of Hiroshima when the city was annihilated by the atom bomb. . . . these and many others.
The memory of all these good people touched me to the soul. I was re-living the adventures that they poured out to me. When you try to write about the holiness of others, it has this strange effect: you convert yourself!. . . . . I wish that I was as close to God as these children of the Virgin Mary. . . . . They are our unknown saints.
I hoped that the book would come out before Christmas:
“Mama Mary and Her Children”
But Anvil Publishing felt that if they hurried the printing, to meet that date, they would not do justice to the Virgin Mary. Their target is February 2, 2008, the Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord, and the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Mother, 40 days after Christmas.
So my bout with pneumonia, and the forced seclusion which followed it, were really beautiful gifts of God, thinly disguised.
God draws straight, with crooked lines!
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