Unique birthday celebration

There are really certain events during our lifetime that we simply cannot forget and do not fail to celebrate despite the passage of time. Of course one of them is our birthday and the birthdays of our loved ones specially those of the immediate members of our family. Aside from these events however, the most unforgettable ones are also those times which put an end to any further birthday celebrations in this world by our loved ones, when their earthly sojourn comes to an end; in other words when they die.

Death in the family is naturally a tragic and painful event, a time to grieve and to mourn, hence quite hard to forget. But as time goes by and as we recall and learn from others how our departed loved ones led exemplary lives, the time to grieve and to mourn becomes a time to celebrate. This is the time when we realize and become convinced that “death is not really the end but the beginning of life”, the beginning of life that has no more end. Hence it is also a birthday celebration, the celebration of the birthday in heaven of our loved ones who had died.

Yesterday, March 10, 2013, our family had one such kind of birthday celebration. We celebrated the 10th death anniversary of our only daughter Joyce Joanne. We felt deep in our hearts full of faith in the Good and Merciful Lord that yesterday was indeed her tenth birthday in heaven. It was really a unique celebration every year because we hold it at the cemetery nestled on the verdant hills of Antipolo City aptly called “Heaven’s Gate”, where she is buried. Instead of a birthday cake, we bring her flowers and lighted candles as our family and her confreres in Opus Dei, pray the Rosary, which has been our way of greeting her a “happy birthday”.

But like any birthday celebration, this is likewise an occasion when family and friends get together to recall the comparable experiences we had with Joyce that serve as the common thread tying us closer to each other. And there are indeed plenty of them.

But of course, one of the most unforgettable experiences for my wife Josie and I, is when Joyce was born. She was our first and only daughter and so like any young couple, we were so elated to have a baby girl. As we lovingly gazed at her for the first time, she appeared to be smiling at us. So we could not help but shed tears of joy, taking turns in caressing her in our arms like a most precious gift from heaven. Hence on her baptism, a few weeks later we named her Joyce. And since her birthday, June 24, 1964, also coincided with the birthday of St. John the Baptist, who paved the way for Christ coming on earth, we also named her Joanne.

Joyce Joanne was really such a bundle of joy such that we doted on her and almost spoiled her. Fortunately, as her five other siblings, all boys, came into this world, she became the loving and caring ate to them all sacrificing her own “wants” and desires to give way to her brothers’ preferences which are undoubtedly different from hers. Thus, at such an early age, she has shown us the real meaning of “love” which she joyfully embraced and observed till the day she died.

Her days and years with us were full of happy memories, of family togetherness usually capped by family gatherings at suppertime when we had some spiritual readings and prayers before starting dinner then followed right after eating by a recount of the pleasing and problematic happenings during the day.

Joyce was not only the caring and loving ate to her brothers but also an able and willing assistant of Josie in the housekeeping and in her part time work as an aerobic dance instructress at a nearby sports club. Even in her school at St Joseph’s College and UP she was always ready to help and to participate in the social and humanitarian activities as later told to us by her classmates who became her best friends and still remember her up to now.

Then at age eighteen she surprised us when she casually informed us that she was leaving home to become a member (a “numerary”) staying at one of the student centers of Opus Dei (Work of God), a religious organization founded by St. Josemaria Escriva showing the way to sanctification in this world through one’s work or occupation. Her decision somehow broke our hearts because of the thought that our only daughter will be leaving our family. But when we realized that she was just responding to a vocation or calling from God, working full time for Him in harvesting more souls in this world, we gratefully rejoiced and accepted her decision. Somehow we felt that we have taken good care of God’s gift and was just returning her to Him more beautifully wrapped.

She was so dedicated to her vocation even as she continued her schooling in UP where she finished her Bachelor of Science in Nutrition. Subsequently she was sent to Rome by Opus Dei to further prepare her in the pursuit of her vocation.

But we were quite devastated to learn later on that she had breast cancer. Despite her sickness however she remained cheerful and considered all her sufferings as a “Divine caress” always reminding us not to “shed tears for Joyce”, but to shed “tears of joy”.  And tears we indeed shed copiously when she died at age 38 on March 10, 2003. These are indeed tears of joy as we recall St. Josemaria’s reminder that “God is… like a Gardener who takes good care of His flowers and waters them and only cuts them when they are at their best, in full bloom. God takes souls to Himself when they are ripe”.

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