Sanctuary provider

On Monday evening, Feb. 4, a fearful Violet Lozada walked into the all too familiar La Salle Green Hills (LSGH) campus on Ortigas Avenue with five of her children. Her husband, Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada, star witness in the still-unfolding National Broadband Network (NBN) deal between the Arroyo administration and China’s ZTE Corp., had left for Hong Kong on an official trip. And with serious threats of harm to their family, Violet had thought that LSGH and the Christian Brothers would be their safest refuge and sanctuary.

The Lozadas’ daughter is enrolled in St. Paul’s while their four sons are all studying at LSGH: the oldest boy is in second year high school, the second son is in grade seven while the couple’s twins are in kindergarten.

Jun Lozada would later join his family in LSGH campus in the evening of Feb. 5 (after being “escorted for the day and night” by police at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport) and hold a press briefing on Feb. 7 at 2 a.m. Later, Jun placed himself under the custody of the Philippine Senate prior to testifying to what he knows about the aborted deal.

At the helm of the Brothers in the Philippine District and on hand to provide sanctuary to the Lozadas was Brother Edmundo Adolfo Fernandez, FSC, Provincial. To friends and the Lasallian family, the present provincial, the eighth head of the Brothers in the Philippines since the country was declared an independent province in 1970, is simply called “Dodo.” He is the seventh Filipino Brother to occupy the position.

The LSGH campus is home to the Provincial of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, a group of dedicated laymen established in 1686 by a French priest who eventually came to be known as St. John Baptist de La Salle, patron saint of teachers. The Christian Brothers are not priests but religious whose lives are totally vowed to carrying on God’s work through education.

If there are many ways to describe Br Dodo (the initials for Brother have been modified to “Br” to distinguish the Christian Brothers from many modern day Christian preachers who have called themselves “Brother” and adopted the same abbreviation of “Br” used for many years by the followers of St. John Baptist de La Salle), among them have to be “humble,” “nationalist” and “hater of injustice.”

In a conference where De La Salle administrators were gathered to reflect on the national situation characterized by cynicism and poverty several years ago, Br Dodo was quoted to have said, “Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night to reflect on what La Salle has done to improve our situation as a country and what we have done to bequeath a better future to succeeding generations.”

It is not therefore surprising that Br Dodo and the rest of the Brothers have welcomed the Lozadas during their hour of need. To this day, Violet and her children are still in the protection of the Brothers. Perhaps, providing refuge to the Lozadas is, in Br Dodo’s own mind, one way of fighting injustice and promoting truth and freedom.

In fact, Br Dodo says, “the Lozadas asked the Brothers’ help as early as Jan. 6 to provide sanctuary for them ‘in any event that their family will be in danger’.”

Raised in humble surroundings in Gagalangin, Tondo by his father, Antonio Fernandez, and mother, Pacita, Br Dodo’s adolescent years cannot be called “uneventful.” While both his parents were educators — the father, a professor at De La Salle University and the mother, a professor at St. Theresa’s College in Quezon City — bringing up Br Dodo and his eight siblings was indeed a challenge for the couple in the midst of the turbulent ‘60s and ‘70s. Those were years marked by student activism and assertiveness and demonstrated through student power, flower power, psychedelic delights and fantasies and LSD.

Like most youth, Br Dodo did not have a clear idea of what he would want to make out of his life. Although reflective early in his life, Br Dodo did not exactly know what he wanted to do. He did know, however, that he loved children and education.

During his meditations then and now, Br Dodo would always reflect on the fact that “we are all broken, sinful people but God completes us. Mine is a spirituality of brokenness but God’s love for me is not a theological concept. It is real. I feel in the love of my friends and family.”

For Br Dodo, the road to the Brotherhood was not easy. He confesses that he never thought he would be a Brother. He never had childhood dreams of wearing the Brother’s robe and in fact advises youth who think they have a vocation to be a Brother to live their lives as fully as they can before committing to the life of a religious.

In his youth, he had dreamt of being an architect, a pilot. He then went to the University of the Philippines (UP) to enroll in fine arts because “I didn’t make it to the College of Architecture.” At the UP, Br Dodo confesses to having been intoxicated by his newfound freedom after finishing his high school at the more conservative atmosphere of a Catholic high school, LSGH.

It was at LSGH, however, that Br Dodo came into close contact with the Christian Brothers whom he found “to be regular people, cool, approachable and of this world.”

It would take Br Dodo 11 years to finish college. But those years were, in his words, “enjoyable and wonderful years.” It was during this time that he had his first one-man show, had barkadas, developed deep friendships including falling in love with a woman who broke his heart. He and the lady, however, remain good friends to this day.

At the age of 23, while still in college and basking in his freedom, Br Dodo took the first steps to join the Christian Brothers. To show the Brothers that he was serious in his vocation, he finished his course after 11 years. Some elder Brothers had doubted his maturity and readiness to become a Brother but Br Armin Luistro, then Vocation Director, stuck his neck out for him and highly recommended him to join the ranks of the religious group.

It was because of this so-called reprieve that Br Dodo believes that God gives man second and third chances. “God is a loving God from my experience. I love my vocation. It is my way of repaying God who is so good to me.”

As Brother Provincial, Br Dodo believes his greatest challenges are to accompany the Brothers, lead the De La Salle Philippine Province, continue to make the Province dynamic and viable and to continue to respond to challenges of education and to respond to the signs of the times “and ensuring the safety of those who speak out the truth is responding to the sign of the times,” he said.

Br Dodo believes that the position of Brother Provincial offers many opportunities for service and not just to exercise one’s authority. One of his main concerns is to ensure the well being of the Brothers. In short, as Brother Provincial, he has both pastoral and administrative responsibilities.

Perhaps one can judge a person’s character by what he reads. Br Dodo is no exception. One of his favorite books is Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold. The book is about a 13-year-old girl who was raped and cut into pieces and never found. She narrates her tragedy from heaven where she watches her family’s healing and how they cope and move on.

No wonder then that the good Br Dodo has adopted as his personal prayer the following verses from Rabindranath Tagore: “I asked for strength that I might be great, I was given weakness that I might be humble. I asked for power that I might have the praise of men, I was given weakness that I might feel the need for God. I asked for health that I might do great things and I was given infirmity that I might do better things. I got nothing that I asked for but everything that I hoped for, almost despite myself my unspoken prayers were answered, I am among men richly blessed.”

And for Br Dodo, his belief in bringing out the truth and his desire to provide sanctuary for those whose lives are in imminent danger are among the things he considers his blessings.

(For your new beginnings, please e-mail me at bumbaki@yahoo.com. Have a blessed Sunday.)