By Judge Ma. Nimfa Penaco-Sitaca

Taught for 18 years by Columban Fathers, Sisters and dedicated teachers at the ImmaculateConception College in Ozamiz City, Nimfa always believed in returning to God the blessings she has received from Him. As a member of the Legion of Mary and Couples for Christ, it has been her joy to bring Jesus and Mary to others and to speak of the wonderful things that God does for her.

A Legionary since I was 12, I cannot remember being idle on weekends. I can still see myself trudging up and down the streets with my Legion partner, rain or shine. Every Saturday, we went in search of children we could bring to Sunday Mass. We knocked on doors and asked parents to entrust their children to us. We picked their children up on Sunday mornings and marched them off to and from the church. We brought in young and not so young children for Baptism and older children for Confirmation and First Communion. We encouraged parents and their families to hear Mass every Sunday, go to confession regularly and say the rosary every night. We cleaned the church sacristy, kept a flower garden at the convent ground and sold the Sentinel, a Catholic newsletter. During the summer, we gathered children in the neighborhood for catechism.

Legionary warrior

As we grew older, our responsibilities became bigger. We sought for civilly married and live-in couples and persuaded them to get married in the church. We visited the sick, trained junior Legionaries and gave adult catechism.

Lost and found

After college, however, things changed. I left home to work in the city and went to night school at the same time. I was not able to continue my work in the Legion. But Mary would not let me be. She stood by me and waited till I was good and ready to take on my duties again. After nine years, I was now ready.

Forty years after I attended my first Legion of Mary meeting, I find one thing that I am really proud of today – I am a Legionary, called, chosen and commissioned by Mary to bring her and her Son to others; that I have remained a Legionary, and able to perform my Legionary duties despite the pressure and demands of my profession and my work as a wife, mother, daughter, teacher. This is not a mystery to me but is very much a miracle.

Catechist for life

Fr. Kevin McHugh, who, in my college days, supervised the work of Immaculate Conception Collegecatechists in the public schools, would be glad to know that the seed he planted in my heart has grown into a tree, which continues to bear fruit. Today, I remain a catechist, spending my lunch hour four times a week at a public high school. Sometimes my spirit flags, not knowing whether I am able to touch base and reach the hearts of children living in an increasingly irreligious world. But I am encouraged to continue when a parent tells me how her daughter echoes the lessons she learns in my class to her sisters and brothers, or when a priest tells me how amazed he was that his altar boy would refuse to accompany him to fiestas because he does not want to miss his catechism class with me.

Always on duty

My profession gives me so many opportunities for Legionary service. As an executive judge tasked with jail inspection, I get to talk and listen to jail inmates and see to their needs. As a law professor, I get to recruit many of my students to Couples for Christ and Singles for Christ and arrange their retreats prior to their graduation. I also give crash course on Christian marriage. These opportunities to bring God and Mary to others stretch out endlessly and I can truly understand what the Legion handbook says about “being in a sense always on duty”.

Their footsteps after mine

Today, my eldest daughter’s life revolves around Ligaya ng Panginoon. My second daughter faithfully shepherds her friends and classmates to Bible and Catholic doctrine studies at her school’s campus ministry. As a medical student she is assigned to take care of the health needs of one family referred to as “urban poor”, but she always walks extra miles, caring for two or three families. My only boy is active in Christ’s Youth in Action, finding much satisfaction in doing, among others, the laundry in a home for the aged in Tondo. Although my third daughter still resists the call to work in God’s vineyard, I know that God is at work in her and that in His time, she will yield, just as my husband did. Initially, my husband didn’t want to join Couples for Christ, but it didn’t take long for God to touch him and today he is a committed member of its medical mission team.

I dream of my husband and I, with one or two of our children, joining the Columbans in Latin America after early retirement from government service. It is a dream I shall nurse with the wings of prayer. But for now, the reality is here. There is much to be done near and around me and it is for the work that Mary, many years ago, called and prepared me.