‘Tapping into’ wisdom from local Catholic business leaders

By Emily Chaffins -

CORAL GABLES | When he was young, Tony Argiz synced his footsteps with his mother’s, taking the route near the Havana park on their way to Mass. Along the way, the air rang with the Cuban militia’s jibes.

“Hey, why do you believe in God? Why are you going to church? He doesn’t exist! You should believe in Fidel and the revolution!”

Upset, Argiz took a deep breath, about to give them a piece of his mind. Before he could say anything, his mother put her arm around him.

“Cállate la boca,” she warned. “Shut your mouth.”

Argiz chuckled at the treasured memory from the early 1960s. He said his mother braved government harassment for the sake of their faith, and his own faith solidified.

Argiz, South Florida managing principal at the accounting firm BDO USA, spoke about his faith and his philosophy as a businessman during the Sept. 26, 2025, event in Coral Gables, “Theology on Tap: Empowering Young Catholic Professionals.”

Collaborating with the Archdiocese of Miami’s Bridging the Gap Conference, four Catholic business leaders spoke to young adults gathered at the University of Miami Catholic Student Center.

The other panelists included Jorge Rico, managing partner at MBF Healthcare Partners; Robert Sanchez, chairman and CEO of Ryder System, Inc.; and Mercy San Miguel, a certified public accountant. Archbishop Thomas Wenski spoke and prayed over the event. Katie Blanco Bourdeau, president of the Archdiocese of Miami Development Corporation, and Stephen Colella, cabinet secretary of Evangelization and Parish Life, acted as masters of ceremonies.

Some of the testimonies were touching including one from Rico. He said his father had kept a secret that shocked the family upon his death some 15 years ago

“My mom and I were going through all of my dad’s stuff,” Rico said. “My mom finds out that he had 11 families in Africa that he was sponsoring.”

His father sponsored the families while he had a yearly earning of only $25,000.

“He taught us a lot about giving and about not just being Catholic by name, but also by actions.”

Accordingly, Rico’s Catholicism-based management philosophy is “to be hard on the issues but soft on the people.”

“You have to ensure responsibilities to shareholders, investors, and your board, but you still have to understand that you’re dealing with people who are human beings,” he said. “I think that you get the most out of people who understand that you’re there to respect them, you’re there to understand them, to be kind and fair to them.”

Fellow panelist Sanchez also weighed in: “One of the most important skills is to be a problem-solver. … The world is full of problem-identifiers. There are very few people who say, okay, here’s how we’re going to fix it.”

Young adult attendee Mariale Balladares has seen firsthand the effects of a caring, positive management style.

Balladares is operations manager at Esther Maria Bakery, her family’s Nicaraguan bakery on Flagler Street. Her aunt and cousin (both named Esther) have been role models for her. Balladares described herself and her relatives as “super proud Catholics,” and their faith informs how they do business. During a time of personal challenge, her family’s conduct toward employees enabled the bakery to overcome it.

“My aunt and my cousin are always asking employees how they’re doing. For everyone’s birthday, they have a celebration, and they celebrate every achievement,” she said. “This year, my aunt was very sick. She was more than two weeks in the hospital. It was beautiful to see the employees saying, ‘Don’t worry, we will run the business.’ It made me realize that being a good leader makes an impact.”

OVERCOMING DILEMMAS THROUGH FAITH

Another presenter, San Miguel, reflected on a time when a referral spelled out “dilemma.”

San Miguel was initially thrilled when a friend referred her to a medical practice as a potential client. But when she learned about the clinic’s services, her heart dropped.

It was a fertility clinic that “helps people have babies, but in doing so they make embryo babies that are… alive, and a lot of them get terminated,” she explained. “It’s a termination of a life and of a soul.”

San Miguel realized that, although tempting, the opportunity wasn’t right. “How can I call myself a Catholic and make money off an organization that kills?” In the end, she turned it down.

Similarly, attendee Guillermo Antonio Barquero, a young software engineer, has also faced challenging moral situations in his career.

Barquero has at times found himself under pressure to address others according to the premises of sexual ideologies. “I like to view people from their identity as a son or daughter of God, not necessarily from their sexuality or job because that doesn’t define you,” he said. “I think there are ways to be respectful but firm, so that people know where you stand but also know that you love them.”

Not all dilemmas related to the workforce are ethical, however. As attendee Kevin Protzman noted, “choosing between two good things” can also be a struggle.

A recent graduate of the University of South Carolina, Protzman felt his heart pulled in two directions. On the one hand, he could move forward with the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Maryland, an organization he’d enjoyed interning at for years. On the other hand, he could become a FOCUS missionary, responsible for “fundraising [his] salary” and supporting college students’ faith at an assigned campus.

“My prayer was, which job would allow me to become the man God intends?” said Protzman.

Through discernment, the right move for him became clear. He now works at Florida Atlantic University as a FOCUS missionary.

 

FAITH AND WORK: BALANCING ACT OR HARMONY?

Grace Purvis, a FOCUS missionary at UM, felt a lightbulb go off at one of Rico’s points.

“I don’t look at it as a [work-faith] balance. I look at my faith as the driving factor of the rest of my life.” Rico explained, “I don’t know how to balance life without it.”

Purvis had come to the talk envisioning faith and work as a balancing act in the secular world. Rico’s words transformed her view. “It can be hard to recognize work as holy and how work can make us holy, because work is not always easy,” she said.

Sanchez recommended a down-to-earth way to fuse faith and work: “I pray all the time in my office. I got a tough call I need to get on, I say a quick little prayer.”