My seminary class: looking back

Today is Saturday, July 25, 2009, the feast of St. James the Apostle, but I will always remember this day more as the birthday of my classmate in the seminary, the late Bishop Benjamin de Jesus, OMI, DD, the martyred bishop of Jolo, Sulu. As I prayed for him and to him at mass this morning, my mind went back to the years we spent together in the seminary from 1958 to 1968…

The school year 1958-59 ushered a new era in the history of Our Lady of Assumption Scholasticate (OLAS), in Quezon City. That year, 12 young men, all high school graduates, formed the biggest class to start their seminary studies at OLAS – six from Visayas and Mindanao, and another six from Luzon. The six from Luzon were Benjamin de Jesus from St. James Academy of Malabon; Ambrocio Cabildo, a transferee from the Minor Seminary of Vigan; Bernardo Tuazon of Quezon City; Rogelio Canete from Tanay, Rizal; Angelito Nepomuceno, Ben’s high school classmate also from Malabon and me. All of us were products of the First Oblate Vocation Workshop conducted that previous summer in Manila. The six from the South included Nelson Javellana who was recruited from La Salle Bacolod, and five others who were products of the Oblate Vocation Workshop in Midsayap, Cotabato that same summer – Domingo Tacardon, Rodolfo Limbaga, Enrique Gonzales, Leo Gutierrez, and Jose Enginco. Except for Cabildo who has had Latin studies at the Minor seminary in Vigan, the rest of us were enrolled in the two-year Special Latin Humanities course with the Jesuits at San Jose Seminary.

The twelve of us successfully hurdled the difficult first year, but only nine of us came back the following year (1959-60) to continue our studies at San Jose. Cabildo went back to Vigan to continue his studies and was later ordained a diocesan priest there, while Tuazon and Nepomuceno pursued college studies outside the seminary.

The following year (1960-61) only six of us made it to the OMI novitiate in Cotabato. Our class made history once more as the first Scholastic novices at the yet-to-be-completed novitiate in Tamontaka, Cotabato. The six were Gonzales, Javellana, de Jesus, Gutierrez, Enginco and myself. All six of us survived the very rigorous novitiate year and made our first vows as OMI’s on May 31, 1961.

Back at OLAS for school year 1961-62, we pursued our AB Philosophy studies at San Jose for three more years graduating in 1964, then on to four years of Theology at Loyola School of Theology.

It was while in Theology that the members of our class began to separate. After our first year in Theology, I went to Cotabato on sabbatical for health reasons. I spent the year in Makilala and Tacurong for pastoral work, and then at the novitiate for prayer and discernment. I went back the following year to OLAS and thus fell behind by a year from my original class. Nelson Javellana followed next. He decided to leave the seminary for family reasons. He went to Cotabato and taught Philosophy at Notre Dame University for sometime before going back to OLAS. He was ordained some years later after our original class had graduated. Four – Gonzales, de Jesus, Gutierrez and Enginco – went on as scheduled until Fourth Year Theology. However, only Gonzales, de Jesus, and Enginco were ordained in December 1967. Gutierrez unfortunately left before he could be ordained to the subdeaconate. I was ordained a year later in December 1968. So, out of the original twelve who started at OLAS and six Novices who pioneered at Tamontaka, five were ordained Oblate priests.

Of the five, two left the priestly ministry – Joe Enginco and myself. As for the three others who remained in the ministry, all have already passed away – two of them rather violently. Bishop Ben de Jesus was martyred in Jolo while Fr. Nelson Javellana was killed in an ambush at the height of the Muslim-Ilaga conflict in the early 70’s in Esperanza, Cotabato. Fr. Ike Gonzales, on the other hand, died of a rare disease some five years ago.

Today, I have resumed writing this two days after I started it because I did not know how to end it…

It is interesting to note that there is no more trace of our class among the Filipino Oblates at present, but I am certain our class spirit remains, especially our pioneering spirit in the pursuit of our vocation. But, no matter where we are now and no matter how contrasting our lives have been, I am sure we somehow have left an impact on people whose lives we have touched. And I am referring not only to those who have remained priests till the end like the gentle and humble Bishop Ben, the well-loved Fr. Nelson and the much-admired Fr. Ike. The same goes even to those like me who left the priestly ministry or to those who left the seminary along the way.

And come to think of it now, each one of us has a unique role in God’s plan of salvation; that no matter how we played the cards that had been dealt to us, just as He chose and loved the ones who stayed, God has also chosen and equally loved even those who have left. And that He loves them with the same unconditional love that He has for all, saints and sinners alike.