One chilly night a week before my exams, I met two crying boys, aged seven and 10, at the threshold of the National Shrine of St. Jude Thaddeus. It was past 8 p.m., I was tired and dizzy from a long day of study, and the parish caretaker was already turning off the lights.
The younger boy was shivering in the cold and crying, “Mommy, Mommy!” My heart melted. The boys are students of the pricey Chinese Catholic school nearby and, as I learned from the parish security guard, their mother regularly picks them up hours after class dismissal. I sat down beside them and put my books aside.
The older boy said they had been waiting since the afternoon, and that they had used up all their money for food. He fiddled with an empty bottle of Gatorade and seemed irked at his brother’s crying. The younger one ignored him and took out his iPhone, which, according to his brother, had no more prepaid credits. He tried to call his mother again; the operator’s voice could be heard saying the balance was insufficient to make a call.
That’s when I decided to call their mother myself, to tell her that her sons were waiting. She soon arrived to pick them up, and sent me a message of thanks the next day. I never learned the boys’ names, nor they mine. Their mother knows only that I am a law student and a former teacher who took pity on her kids. (I told her that because she might mistake me for a kidnapper. I wouldn’t blame her, being rich and Chinese, but that is another story.)
After the family left, I proceeded into the church to do what I had originally intended: pray. I had come to beg God to help me in my exams, as most law students do. But I wept for a long time, thinking about the two boys and the multitudes of less fortunate children everywhere. Instead of making another bargain with God (“I swear never to be a corrupt lawyer if you help me pass my exams”), I made a promise to him, and to myself. And for the first time, I asked God for children of my own, when I am ready financially and morally, if I should ever be ready.
That night, instead of a bargain involving legal ethics and divine legal intervention, I swore to God that I would never be too busy for my family and the children that he would give me in the future. Nor would I allow them to be neglected or unloved, or have a life lesser than the good and privileged life I have led. I thanked God fervently for my own loving family, who has never ceased to aid me, materially, spiritually and morally. I asked God’s blessing for my family, for the boys I had just met, and for the children who shiver in the cold of the streets, parental neglect, and other ills.
Ordinarily, after praying at St. Jude’s, I light candles. I like seeing the rose-shaped, red and white candles floating in little cups, and the tiny flames flickering. That night, as I lit two candles, I prayed for two things: help in my education and endless gratitude to my family. The former seemed so mundane and too prayed-for, but the latter was long overdue.
Consuelo Maria G. Lucero, 22, is a sophomore at San Beda College of Law and a former teacher of English to Korean children. She says she goes to church to pray in solitude and light candles, but never to hear Mass, because she’s still angry at most priests for objecting to the Reproductive Health Law.