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“Go Home!”
The last time a member of the Jesuit community of the Ateneo de Naga died, it was our beloved Fr. Jack Phelan. His requiem Mass was at Loyola House of Studies and his interment was at Sacred Heart Novitiate. On this occasion, Father Michael approached Bro. Lando Jaluag – who had worked in the high school the two previous years – and cried out, “Lando, we miss you!” It was typical of Michael to go out of his way to make those of us with whom he worked feel appreciated, special, loved. But almost in the same breath, he added, “We miss especially your last homily!” He was referring to a rather poignant message that Bro. Lando had delivered to the high school community and its PTA. Its main message was a quotation from his own students: “If you want to feel at home, go home!” Bro. Lando’s homily was a reflection on students and parents yearning for home. It was a homily Fr. Michael appreciated, because “home” in our society is so elusive, is it not? It advised people who were feeling estranged, alienated, unappreciated, isolated, uncomfortable, tired, lost, to “Go home!” Go to where you are certain people are for you. It considered it particularly tragic when people at home could not be at home. I feel this significant on this day because to a great extent the core of Michael was to help people in a home-starved world to go home, to be at home. Indeed, he was himself home for many people. His cheerfulness, his friendliness, his warmth, his encouragement, his laughter all conspired to make people feel at home. That was certainly true for us in the Ateneo de Naga Jesuit Community. As minister of our community, Michael made the community home for us. Not just by attending to the myriad details of providing us food and clothing, to managing house repairs and keeping track of various expenses. Michael was the sunshine of our community. He was its warmth. He was its brightness. It was he who welcomed each of us to table, greeting each of us cheerfully by name. It was he who welcomed each of us home, made sure that each of us felt comfortable, brought us to the doctors when we were sick, and drove us to the bus stations when we were on mission. It was he who at table drew out our stories of success or failure in the work; he who congratulated us, he who encouraged us, he who laughed at our jokes, and even graded them. I do not mean that only he did this in our community. But Michael did this in an extraordinary way. He jumped to meet our needs. Even before we asked, he was already trying to respond. That’s why we had such a feeling of being at home in our community. Michael could be home to people because he was at home with people. He was at home with the Archbishop and with the janitors, with the clergy and the cooks and caterers. He was at home with policemen and wardens, as he was at home with prisoners, whom he served throughout his priestly life.. He was at home with the high school faculty and staff, but most of all with his students. He loved his students. They were the center of his apostolic life. He was a director of high school guidance, so had no definite class; he treated all the high school students, present and past, as his own family. He made a great effort to learn each student’s last name, and succeeded for the most part, and even when he missed, he was at home with asking them with a confused smile to remind him of their names, and they were at home with him. Fr. Michael and I were TV partners. We loved what we called, “bang!-bang! movies” – Steven Seagal, Claude van Dam, Bruce Willis – action movies with lots of violence. The more violence, the better. The last movie that he saw here in Naga on my recommendation was Jet Li’s “Fearless.” When nothing better was on, there was always “Law and Order” or “the Closer” or “Crossing Jordan” on the Crime/Suspense channel to unwind with. We were at home with violence when violence was not real. But where life was real, Michael was anything but at home with violence. He hated confrontation, he hated punishment, he hated man-made pain. We watched the news regularly together. I really believed he suffered when he watched the footages of war in Israel, in Palestine, or in Iraq; he cringed when he saw pictures of bombings, of mangled bodies and exploded lives; he brought these scenes to his prayer, and he prayed for peace. He hated pain – especially when it had to be inflicted on his students. He tried to connect to students before it was too late, to lead them from out in the cold into the safety of home. When he succeeded he could be found dancing for joy, shouting praises for God’s goodness from the high school corridors. When he failed, he would bow, shake his head, and be sad, praying under the bitterness of the Cross. How can we be at home in a world which leaves students out in the cold? How can we be at home in the world when human beings – even those imprisoned for crimes against others – have no home? Every Sunday, Michael would go to the local prison and try to do the impossible – try to make prison more of a home for its inmates. It was an extraordinary, life-long, voluntary ministry which he’d engaged in in Naga for 15 years. Before coming to Naga, he’d done the same in Davao and Cagayan de Oro. With his Sunday barkada – the Ladies of Charity – he would celebrate Mass with the inmates every Sunday afternoon. Unless he was away or sick, he would never miss. At table, he would tell us of the joy of the inmates at Mass, of the strength of their responses, and the power of their singing. He was not interested in their past crimes and misdeeds. He was interested in them as persons, loved by God. During his homilies he told them stories of God’s compassion and kindness. In this context, regularly, through the help of his relatives, he distributed soap; regularly, he gathered letters of the inmates and mailed them to their loved ones. He would delight in discarded carton boxes which prisoners could use as beds. He heard their confessions, forgave them their sins, hoped with them, loved them. Prison was more of a home because of Fr. Michael. Today, the prisoners had no Mass; the prison would be more like prison. Last Tuesday night, I conversed with his brother, Jim, on the telephone and told him that Michael would be buried right here at the Ateneo de Naga. He was delighted. He said, Naga was Michael’s home. Naga was where he belonged. How true! Ateneo was his life. Naga was his home. He didn’t want to miss anything going on. He wanted to be part of it. “It’s fun!” he would say. So at every Military Parade during Fiesta he was there, sweating it out with the boys. He was part of every victory, part of every defeat. At every Penafrancia Traslacion, at every fluvial procession, he was there. At every meeting of the clergy, he was there. At every Good Friday re-enactment of the Soledad, at every Easter morning celebration of the Salubong, at every golden jubilee, at every special blessing, he was there. He would love to be invited to homes, love to interact in families, love to praise and encourage students. Graduations for him were special because he would spend the whole night making the rounds of the houses of the graduates, adding his joy to the joy of proud families.. He was there for weddings, for baptisms, for confessions, for wakes. Whenever he would leave Naga, he would fret about what he would miss while gone. Naga was his home. But there was no lasting home in Naga. The last time he got sick, we didn’t think it serious. But we could not keep him alive. At the hospital last Sunday, I was shocked to hear Dr. Llorin describe his condition as critical. It was all so fast. A decision to bring him to Mother Seton before noon; a decision to let him go before dawn. Towards Sunday evening, some six hours after they’d begun working to try to save him him, when finally they seemed to have stabilized him with a respirator that prevented him from talking, Fr. Ernie Carretero, Fr. Alex Badiola, Bro. Robbie Sian and I were in the room still feeling shocked, confused and helpless. Michael looked at us. He wanted to tell us something. He gestured for something to write on. We gave him paper on a clipboard. He wrote two words with an exclamation point. He encircled his message for emphasis. He wrote, “Go home!” It was as if he were repeating the line of the students, “If you want to feel at home, go home.” In his hour of his greatest discomfort, he was still thinking of easing our discomfort. He didn’t want us hovering over him distressed. He still wanted us to be home – even if it meant going home without him. We went home, underestimating his own need to “Go home.” After what Fr. Michael described to his closest friend, Fr. Pat Giordano, as the happiest year of his life, our heavenly Father has called him home. I honestly think he would rather be here, not refusing the joys of heaven forever, but just saying, “Not today, Lord, tomorrow. Here, it’s too much fun! Here are my Jesuit companions who lean on me, my friends who care for me, my imprisoned brothers who await me, my repentant sisters who confess to me, my invigorating work, my students! Here are the people who love me and need me, the people whose names I know, and who from the motley crowd call out, ‘Fr. Rooney, Fr. Rooney!’ Here is the world your passion, death and resurrection kissed to heal, to uplift, to sanctify, to make home. So why the rush to go home now when I am already at home?” But the Lord has called, maybe because heaven can’t be heaven without such as Fr. Michael. Maybe because heaven needs his cheerfulness and love. Maybe because God wishes through Fr. Michael in heaven to touch our hearts in ways beyond anything we can imagine. In love and obedience, Fr. Michael has gone home. Already in the home of the Lord’s embrace, he will be buried here in Naga, behind the Church, in the garden over which he prayed each morning, still in the company of his brothers, his colleagues, his students, and his friends, still in the company of yourselves and mine – at home. Welcome home, Michael!
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© 2003 Philippine Jesuit Foundation |
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