“Then Someone wrestled with him until the break of dawn… striking Jacob at his hip socket that it was wrenched as they wrestled. Then the Man said, “You shall no longer be called Jacob, but as Israel, because you have contended with the Divine and have prevalied…” Gen. 32: 25-29.

You.
Wrestler wrestling
With God.

Struggling. Celebrating.
Finding Meaning.

Challenger of the challenged.
Dared us to say yes and mean it.
Die for it. Live by it.

You. Who made a promise.
And kept it.
Lived by it. Died for it.

Radical thinker.
Designer of thoughts
Of angry Jesus’
And happy Jesuits
And ‘plastic’ students.

You cry the most beautiful cry
Of reality and truth
And pain and love
And gratefulness.

Until the end still
Wrestler wrestling
Struggling. Celebrating.
Finding meaning
Amidst the pain.

One Christmas day
You were who you always were–
Wrestler wrestling–
Struggling… to make the sign of the cross
– a stole draped upon
your shoulders–
Celebrating Him who
wrestled before you.

And in the end,
Wrestler wrestling
With God.
You let yourself lose
He struck at your legs.

And you won.

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Was written in Sacred Heart Novitiate the day Fr. John Moran died– December 26, 1999. He was a “character” — seemingly always angry but surprisingly gentle in unguarded moments.

His sickness affected his legs so that he had a painful time walking. Together with Fr. Vic Baltazar and Aldwin Mahusay, we visited him in the hospital on Christmas day 1999 where he struggled to say mass for us in his hospital bed, saying the words of the mass while in so much pain. The next day, he died, a priest ’til the end.