My Postulancy

Luningning M. Balagdan
Postulant



In my journey in the postulancy, I experienced joys and struggles. These experiences brought me closer to God.

What are my joys? I feel God’s presence in my sisters. I am accepted as part of the community. I make my sisters happy through my sense of humor. These are but a few of the joys I experienced in my postulant’s community.

What are my struggles? I struggle to focus in prayer. I struggle to express my feelings. But little by little, I learn to focus and to express myself. These give me courage to move ahead in my journey.

Postulant’s Community

Roxan T. Sarmiento
Postulant

Living in the postulant’s community gives me a wide range of realization that leads me to true self-knowledge and thus, enabling me to give myself wholly in my apostolate.

The many experiences I’ve encountered here are just revelations of what and who I am, far from the false perception I had of myself before entering. There were many “I thoughts” and “I believes” that were purified, and these purifications were indeed painful to accept at first.

These revelations became my framework in writing my new script of life. With the grace and help of God, I am recreating myself according to what God wants of me –to be truly His beloved child.

Becoming so aware of this truth, I am so compelled to bring something back to God. He is indeed so good, so generous, and so full of love. He even gives me chances and opportunities daily to thank Him and adore Him through the people I see. Wholeheartedly, I give myself to them just as God has given Himself to me.

Praised be His name forever.

Reflections on Palautian Spirituality

Sr. Rofina Mariani Uge, CM
Indonesia

Palautian spirituality is the outcome of two currents which merge and fuse in unity, they are: the Teresian Carmelite legacy and, the charismatic experience of Fr. Palau.

The Carmelite Teresian legacy is an integral part of Fr. Palau’s life because his religious formation was based on it. During the period of his religious formation and community life as well as during his exclaustration, he lived faithfully and intensively the Carmelite ideal with an eminently contemplative orientation.

He searched his life’s ideal; which later became his beloved object… “In the austerities of religious life, in fasting, in silence, and in poverty” (MR I, 3). Since then his soul has been steeped with the spirit of the Teresian Carmel.

His understanding of the mystery of the church and his union with her in faith, hope and charity, fulfills his long and intense search… “I sought her and I found her…. I say my love one, and I united myself to her in faith, hope and love”. (MR I, 3) After the long journey of anxious search, “she let herself be seen and known.” Recalling the delightful and longed for encounter, he writes, “At last, after forty years in search of you, I found you. I found you because you came to meet me, I found you because you let yourself be known …” (MR 22, 17)

He discovered in the Church the final meaning of his life, the center of his existence, the guiding light of his pilgrimage, the ideal that gave meaning to his entire mission.

The Church for him was not only and ideal but a living reality, the supreme and final object of his love. He was convinced of his mission “to letting the people know that you –Church- are infinitely beautiful and loveable and to request them to love you” (MR 12, 2). This is the object of his mission to fulfill the precept of love of God and of neighbors. Since then, the Church became everything for him. “…I live and will live for her, I live and I shall die for her”. (MR 1:29) marked his total surrender to the Church.

Reflections on Palautian Spirituality

Sr. Agatha, CM
Korea

The elements of Palautian spirituality are clearly shown in the following passages in the writings of Fr. Palau:

 His passion was centered on the search for the beloved: “Apart from the world, withdrawn in the convent, I inquired about the beloved object, I searched for her. And, who would think of such a thing! I searched for her in the austerities of religious life, in fasting, in silence, in poverty; I searched for her and I found her…! I saw my loved one, and I united myself to her in faith, in hope and love! Her presence satisfied my passion, and with her I was happy, her beauty was sufficient for me. God and my neighbor, or rather the Catholic Church seemed to me as beautiful as a divinity. She was covered under the veil of mystery and allowed herself to be seen in the obscurity of night, but it was not so dark that one can not distinguish the infinite perfection which adorned her and which made her infinitely loveable. I found my happiness and blissfulness in her; I was happy!”

 Once found, he offered his life for the beloved: “I give you what I am, what I have and desire all that I could have. I give myself to you, Oh holy Church, in love, obedience, chastity and poverty…. Just as I am I give myself to you, and I am not better it is my own fault; make me pure, chaste, holy and perfect, then I will be”.

 The object of his love: union of God and neighbor or the Church where Christ is the head and the people forming one body with Christ.

Reflections on Palautian Spirituality

Sr. Bridget Eze, CM
Nigeria

From early childhood Fr. Francisco Palau was aware of a burning force of Passionate Love which animated his life as echoed in his writing “My Relations with the Church”: “God wrote this law with his own finger in the stratums of my heart: you must love with all your strength (Mt.22:27). And this efficacious voice created an immense passion in it which made itself felt form my infancy and developed in my youth. I, when I was young love with all my strength because the Law of nature impels me with irresistible impact. What did I love? Who was the beloved object?” This quest for the object of his love consumed him and moved him into a determined search for the object of his love that constitutes the meaning of his existence.

He searched for his beloved through the austerities of religious life, in fasting, in silence in poverty. “I search for her and found her! I saw my loved one and I united myself to her in faith, hope and love”. At this time of search, Fr. Palau was attentive to the voice and action of the Holy Spirit within him, and to the signs of the times revealed in the external circumstances of the historical period. He fought zealously to defend the Catholic faith in Spain with all his might; which at that time or instance he knew as a divine institution. Within forty years of search the object of his love was revealed to him in his spiritual conversation as the Church. “Your beloved exists and lives; she is a moral being, perfect and complete just as an individual. Your beloved is God and neighbor…This perfect being is the Holy Church.”

This encounter became the central focus of his life and the object of his relations in his spiritual and apostolic exercises. In this spirit he identified his mission as “My mission is to announce to the people that you are infinitely beautiful and lovable, and to tell them to love you. Love of God and love of neighbor: this is the object of my mission”. In this authentic, determined and humble manner, Fr. Palau sought and discovered his beloved and was transformed in her who is the moving force behind his perseverance, spiritual zeal, apostolic services and paternity in the Church; and he is alive even today.

Reflections on Palautian Spirituality

Sr. Veneranda T. Ervite, CM
Philippines

“My heart is consumed by the passion of love, is detached from every temporal and earthly object; but it did not know its Beloved and not knowing her, what madness, what illusions, what wanderings, what ravings”!

Love impassioned Fr. Palau to search for the object of his love. He spent long and difficult years in this search. There were so many trials and challenges but these even made him more and more determined. The practice of virtues, the solitude and his total surrender are the forces that helped him moved on and which made him remain faithful.

He searched for his beloved in Carmel. He searched for her in the austerities of religious life, in fasting, silence, poverty. He united himself with his Beloved in faith, hope and love. However, his anxiety for clarification, his desire for something more concrete did not rest.

Finally, he encountered his beloved, the Church. The Church, God and neighbors; Christ the head and the people forming one body with Christ. This is the reality that gives fullness to his capacity to love. And Mary is the perfect model of this Church.

Reflections on Palautian Spirituality

Sr. Apichaya N. Poolpokpol, CM
Thailand

Palautian Spirituality has its center on Fr. Palau’s strong idea of the church as the mystical body of Christ, the mystery of communion which he expressed in his love in the precept of loving God and neighbors by serving and doing acts of charity through fraternal love and works of mercy which are part of our active life and fruit of our solitary and contemplative life.

Along his journey, he never gave up his authentic zeal even how he faced many trials and difficulties, his happiness last forever because his hope and search for meaning in life had possessed and dominated him. His passion of faith, hope and love united him to the Church which is infinitely lovable. Fr. Founder also presented Mary as reflective of the holiness of the Church.

We as daughters of Fr. Palau may try to live out this passion in its uniqueness and follow the footsteps of our Founder by practicing it faithfully and joyfully so that our Congregation may be a visible sign of faith, hope and love in this present time.