Thank you, Pope Francis

His visit was more than history. He gave Filipinos irreplaceable spirit of God, hope and kindness. He gave ME an inexpressible feeling. Pope Francis was someone I didn't expect to give me such sentiment. At first, when I heard about his visit, I was hoping I’d see him because I just want to. But as his arrival nearly comes, I got so eager about it because I want to feel his aura. I got to the point where I begged my parents to see him, unfortunately, my parents are scared of big crowds.

When I was watching Pope’s plane to land (in the television), I felt something. I saw him step out of the plane and I found myself with a huge smile on my face, it’s like I saw Jesus. His masses were all filled with the presence of the Holy Spirit.  It pushed me to do more for God and other people. His homilies about corruption, sanctity of family, caring for the poor and the children and respecting women drove the Filipinos heart to God once again. I, as I saw him in the television felt really blessed. And boy, his smile, is one of the soothing things I could ever imagine. His down-to-earth personality was unique, even though there were previous Popes who focused on the poor, he was still different. He, as we know him, is the Pope of the 21^st Century. He understands each and one of us. His mass in Tacloban was really emotional, even I cried. He telling the people that when there’s nothing left God is there for us, Pope Francis is there for us. He speaks a different language but I feel I can understand him. In the middle of the storm, he still managed to speak in the name of the Lord, he seems very tireless. I also want to be like him. But what really hit me was his mass in UST and his meeting with families in MOA. Two street children orphans in his mass in UST told about their story, and one asked

“Why would God allow us to suffer?”

I broke into tears when the Pope had to cut what she was saying and hugged them both. His reply was

“Why do children suffer so much? Why do children suffer? When the heart is able to ask itself and cry, then we can understand something. There is a worldly compassion, which is useless. You spoke something of this. It is a compassion which moreover leads us to put our hand into the pocket and give something to someone, to the poor.”

 "When we pose this question to us, why children suffer, why this or that tragedy occurs in life, our response must either be silence or a word that is born of our tears."

This made me realize that when problems goes to our path we should face it courageously, we should share what we have to the poor. In MOA, there was a boy who have a cerebral palsy who gave his cross-stitch Mama Mary image to the Pope. In his interview he said that he was longing to see Pope Francis and he was very overjoyed. This made me cry even though we think it’s dense, but it has really something about it.

                Pope Francis’ left the Filipinos a path back to God, extreme joy and gratitude and as well as sadness when we bid goodbye to the Pope. His words and wisdom left us something to think about- to change what we are for the better us, to know what life is really for – to know, love and serve the Lord. Pope Francis’ sacredness will always be in my heart and I will continue to pray for him.