HEROIC PRACTICE OF VIRTUES IN GENERAL
Mother Francisca del Espíritu Santo de Fuentes has a unique place in the heart of our Lord. Jesus called her to follow him. She accepted the invitation to live in conformity with His way of life in a community: “For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister, and mother.” God willed that she be a living witness to His love and to the people of her time and of today, in the different states of her life: as single, as married and widowed, and as a religious.
What we know of her in her childhood is based on what Fr. Francisco Gaínza, OP in his Milicia de Jesucristo wrote: “from early childhood, it had already been known what could have been expected of her on reaching maturity, for even when she was still very young, she had already displayed a precocious modesty, an edifying composure, a sort of prudence superior to young age, a tender devotion to God and a vivid desire not to offend Him Whom she loved even before she got acquainted with earthly vanities.”
Fr. Domingo Collantes, OP writes of Francisca: “She spent the early years of her youth in the state of matrimony.” Fr. F. Gaínza writes: “However, as she was not meant for the world, the Lord came to her assistance in order to relieve her of the yoke of matrimony and to impose upon her the burden of the cross. Shortly after her marriage her husband died, and seeing herself without heirs, she conceived the idea of consecrating herself to God. She lived in such a way that her abode did not resemble the dwelling of seculars but the house of the most recollected religious because her seclusion and practice of spiritual exercises of vocal and mental prayers gave it rather the appearance of an oratory, than that of the residence of persons living in the world.”
It was then that she dedicated herself entirely to the service of the poor and the sick, especially those in San Juan de Dios Hospital. She faithfully observed this practice until she enclosed herself in the Beaterio influencing the leading ladies of the city by her good example. As she grew in charity for her neighbor, she also grew in the desire to surrender herself intimately to her celestial Spouse.
“God cannot be resisted,” Mother Francisca told Fr. Sto. Domingo when she was told that a religious order opposed the foundation of the Beaterio. Indeed, Mother Francisca cannot resist God calling her to another state of life, consecrating herself in prayer, penance, and service to people in the fraternal life of a community as a Beaterio when there was religious community available at the time.
As “gold is tested by fire,” so the unwavering faith and perseverance of Mother Francisca and the beatas to bring to reality the first Philippine religious community. God loved them and tried them. They have to undergo the trials of a hundred doubts, of ecclesiastical censures, of separation from their house and of exile for two years at Santa Potenciana. It was in suffering, in patient endurance and in perseverance in prayerful life that Mother Francisca and the Beatas found the source of their growth and their vitality.
It was her great love for God and neighbor that brought the best out of her - her unwavering faith, dauntless courage and trust, joyful hope, prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance; her fidelity to the evangelical counsels; determination and persistence, mortification and penance, sensitiveness to the needs of others, patience and ever grateful.
Reflecting on the virtues of Mother Francisca which she firmly and heroically practiced all her life, everything can be summed up in one statement: “The goal of a virtuous life is to become like God. Yes, following the example of her loving Spouse, open to the power of the Holy Spirit, and in her cooperation with God’s grace, Mother Francisca reached the fullness of Christian life and the perfection of charity she was called to. All are called to holiness: “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect”.
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