Remembering old times
Monday, October 3, 2022
Victor Martell
A few days ago, I had the joy of meeting a friend and old colleague from the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. We recalled that he got involved at St. Catherine of Siena Church in Kendall, and he remembered that the first time he went to visit a needy person they sent him with me, because I already had experience. The main thing is that he did not conceive that there were people in need in Miami, and that we were going to help them, since the houses we visited were new and beautiful, in the Kendall neighborhood, and judging by the furniture, they seemed to lack nothing.
Before entering the house, I asked him to say a prayer to the Holy Spirit so that everything would go well, and he was surprised because, although he was a Catholic, he had never prayed to the Holy Spirit. The first thing I did was ask for a glass of water and I signaled to my partner to look at that two-door refrigerator, very expensive: the only thing inside was a gallon of cold water. It was a family with two children, whose parents had been laid off from their jobs and the money they received from unemployment assistance was not enough to pay their high expenses.
He always remembered that anecdote, because it served him well in life. He told me that he had joined the Army and was sent to Afghanistan, where he was able to see hunger and need close-up, like orphaned children wandering the streets, trying to steal or simply begging for lack of food. He, as an Army officer, tried to help those children; and although he sometimes experienced anxiety, because the enemy used to load the children with shrapnel and send them where the soldiers were, this never happened to him and his company. They shared the food with those children and he remembered our Vincentian phrase that "he who gives, receives much more than he gives."
He and his men all returned to their homes healthy, after having participated in many high-risk missions throughout that country. He attributed this to what they were able to do for those children, and even after returning he has had contact with Sisters of Charity and priests based there to continue helping them in some way.
One of the things that he was most grateful for was that I had told him about the Holy Spirit and had initiated him in his devotion, and in praying to the Spirit when he had a serious problem. He spoke with their chaplain and always before going on risky missions, in which many would have lost their lives, they felt protected, because they handed over the mission to the Holy Spirit and asked him to help them. One of the things that surprised him the most was the abundance of words that he put into his mouth so that his companions, many of whom did not even believe in God, would receive in their lives the strength that the Holy Spirit inspires.
Unfortunately, my friend was just visiting Miami and therefore visited Calle Ocho, which is where we met; he lives in Seattle with his family. The hug he gave me, and knowing these stories and many more that he told me, filled me with joy, because once again I understood that God sometimes works very strangely and uses different people to convey his message.
Thank you, Holy Spirit, for always being attentive to our lives.
This article originally appeared as a column in the September 2022 edition of La Voz Católica.
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